Equipping future arts educators for primary schools of the 21st century: an Australian point of view

This article discusses two interrelated themes. First, that arts education plays a valuable role in developing the skills required by successful individuals of an increasingly sophisticated knowledge economy; and second, that arts education programmes in initial primary teacher education courses should be linked to, and compatible with, the needs of future schools. If young people are successfully to develop skills, knowledge and understandings that prepare them as productive citizens of the creative economy, then those enabling that development should understand and in turn be able to demonstrate and foster these capacities

The Australian mathematics curriculum: A move forward or back to the future?

The release of the Australian curriculum: Mathematics has generated considerable debate in the education community. Some educators warn that this debate has centred on mathematical content and skills, setting the conditions for a 'back to basics' movement in line with the political rhetoric that accompanied the national curriculum development. But the Shape of the Australian curriculum: Mathematics document contains a commitment to provide a futures-oriented curriculum. This article provides a critical analysis of the released curriculum document in the light of these claims. It questions whether the direction taken in the curriculum demonstrates a futuristic view of mathematics education. It considers whether the document is aligned with a national focus on education for citizenship, identified in past government declarations on education as the basis for the development of the national curriculum, and the role of technology in teaching mathematics based on decades of theorising and research in this area

The Importance of VET teacher professionalism : an Australian case study

The effectiveness of vocational education and training (VET) systems depends upon their teachers. The teachers are regarded as “dual professionals,” requiring expertise in both their background industry areas and in VET pedagogy itself. This chapter uses Australia as a case study of what happens when the accepted regime of qualifications for VET teachers alters. In Australia full-time VET teachers were, until recently, required to undertake degree level qualifications in VET pedagogy, taught at universities, either before or, more usually, after entering the occupation. The required level has now reduced to the regulatory minimum of a Certificate IV level qualification, taught by training providers not universities, and often provided to their own teachers. The qualification contains only 300 nominal hours of training. It has been recognized as a particularly poorly taught qualification, requiring the introduction of a high degree of regulation and most recently a special compliance framework for training providers wishing to deliver it. In this chapter, the historical path of the decline in VET teacher professionalism in Australia is charted, including research evidence from a national project managed by the author, about the effects of higher-level qualifications on VET teacher practices and quality and teachers’ propensity to engage in professional development. A conceptual model of the attributes of professional VET teachers with regard to qualifications and professional development is presented. The chapter concludes with some recommendations for change and implications for other countries

Shifting from Developmental to Postmodern Practices in Early Childhood Teacher Education

Changing times and postmodern perspectives have disrupted the taken-for-granted relationship between child development knowledge and the preparation of early childhood teachers. Despite ongoing exchanges about how best to respond to the critique of the developmental knowledge base, few descriptions of how particular teacher educators have gone about reconceptualizing their curriculum exist. Employing postmodern views of knowledge, power, and subjectivity, this article describes three pedagogies employed by the authors to enact a postmodern teacher education. After describing each of these pedagogies—situating knowledge, multiple readings, and engaging with images—an example from classroom practice is given to illustrate how these strategies come together to assist students to understand how teaching enacts power relations. The article concludes with a discussion of some of the challenges involved in trying to shift from developmental to postmodern practices in the preparation of early childhood educators