The authors describe a retrospective discourse discussions approach that was developed in a graduate literacy education course. This method represents a reconceptualization of supervising and coaching graduate students where meanings are constructed, problems are reframed, and beginning professionals can develop more nuanced understandings of their teaching and learning (Bogdan & Biklen, 1998; Cobb & Bauersfeld, 1995). The authors assert that clearly stating and understanding one's theories about teaching and learning can help educators converse about, scrutinize, and adapt their teaching in ways that hold powerful benefits for instruction and learning outcomes .

This study examined a teacher education program rooted in a social justice framework and intended to infuse multicultural education throughout the curriculum. Two teacher educators designed the three-year, undergraduate program to prepare mostly White candidates from a suburban area to teach in urban elementary schools. The findings reveal opportunities to enhance multicultural teacher education by negotiating candidates' resistance. Through opportunities that challenge their perspectives and scaffold their conceptions of ideas, such as classroom as communities, candidates can develop capacities as multicultural educators.

This study examined perspectives of field experiences among preservice teachers and their cooperating teachers because of debate in the politically charged atmosphere of No Child Left Behind regarding teacher preparation programs. Nine pairs of preservice teachers and their respective cooperating teachers were observed and interviewed over the course of a semester.Results indicated that relationships between the pairs, based on communication and trust, were paramount to preservice teachers' development.

Two teacher education strategies are presented in this article. A “minimalist” strategy requires teacher educators to make explicit the hidden moral education curriculum and to reveal the inextricable linkage between best practice instruction and moral character outcomes. The “maximalist” approach requires preservice teachers to master a tool kit of pedagogical strategies that target moral character directly as a curricular goal.

This qualitative study was designed to explore one approach to improving teacher preparation with respect to parent/professional partnerships. An undergraduate course for preservice special educators was modified to provide students with multiple opportunities for meaningful interaction with parents of children with disabilities. Results suggest that student dispositions changed from viewing parents as uncaring, uninvolved, and unknowledgeable to valuing them as experts on the child and partners in the decision-making process.

This paper provides the first national information specifically on (a) the national demand- supply, and shortage of first-time special education teachers (SETs) in comparison to general education teachers (GETs) as a function of the amount of teacher preparation (i.e., extensive, some, or none), and (b) trends from 1987-88 to 1999-2000 in the national supply of entering and continuing teachers.