Section archive - Trends in Teacher Education

In this paper, the authors argue that teacher education needs to make a fundamental shift in whose knowledge and expertise counts in the education of new teachers. Using tools afforded by cultural historical activity theory and deliberative democracy theory, they argue that by recasting who is considered an expert, and rethinking how teacher candidates and university faculty cross institutional boundaries to collaborate with communities and schools, teacher education programs can better interrogate their challenges and invent new solutions to prepare the teachers our students need.

New Zealand teacher education has been major changes since 1974: to policy, the locus of programmes, quality control measures, entry standards and governance. Teacher education has been part of revolutionary systemic change to the school and tertiary sectors reflecting underlying assumptions about national direction. In 1974, it was believed that successful teaching experience in schools would fully equip new staff to be teacher educators. In 2014, with the bulk of teacher education carried out in universities, teacher educators are now expected to complete doctorates and take part in the Performance-Based Research Fund (PBRF) quality evaluations. New Zealand teacher educators have found a home in the university sector, albeit one that values theoretical research more highly than investigation and improvement of practice and rates international, rather than local, publication as key.

This article that aims to chart the contemporary landscape of research on teacher preparation and certification. It is based on a review of more than 1,500 studies published between 2000 and 2012. The framework combines ideas from the sociology of knowledge and research as social practice. The article also examines the practices of researchers who are differently positioned from one another, have divergent purposes and audiences, and who work both inside and outside teacher education.

The education system suffers from a tendency to be pulled in two opposing directions. On the one hand, the 21st century demands constant innovation and change as a way of life. On the other, the education system tends to eschew changes that are liable to trigger crises in its smooth organization. Today's world is based on the ideology of constant change. The education system has to present the public with constant invention and change, and all educational administrators and educators are obliged to continually present their latest innovations. Conversely, public education is the most successful revolution to have occurred in the last 300 years. Like any other successful revolution, it tends to conserve the existing situation and not rock the boat. The revolution, which began in the 17th century, is still going strong. It can be described as public education gaining control of the world.