Articulating, reclaiming and celebrating the professionalism of teacher educators in England

This paper examines the cumulative effects on teacher educators of a series of ideological and policy changes in the English teacher education landscape since the early 80s. We argue that these rapid changes have marginalized the role of the university in teacher learning and resulted in narrower, more instrumental forms of teacher education. Within this landscape we see a distinct need to re-state (and reinstate) the importance of higher education-based teacher educators, and to reclaim and celebrate their practices and the nature of the professionalism involved. We invite the reader to rethink teacher educator professionalism as what is enacted by teacher educators, as engaged in their professional activities. A view of enacted professionalism gives central stage to and trusts the professional judgement of teacher educators to do what they deem is good, appropriate, or best – understood in a broad sense – to support the professional learning of newcomers in the profession

Redactioneel: Het opleiden van leraren. Waarom de context waarin dat gebeurt er toe doet.

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De professionele identiteit van lerarenopleiders

Het opleiden van leraren wordt steeds meer erkend als een eigenstandig beroep. Onder de noemer van de 'professionele identiteit' van lerarenopleiders wordt datgene wat de eigenheid uitmaakt van het professionele handelen van lerarenopleiders samen gebracht. De vraag is echter wat de precieze inhoud is van deze professionele identiteit? En hoe deze identiteit zich ontwikkelt doorheen de loopbaan? Deze vragen staan centraal in deze bijdrage. Het bestaande onderzoek wordt samengevat in drie onderzoekslijnen die elk belangrijke inhoudelijke en conceptuele bouwstenen aanleveren voor een omvattend beeld van de professionele identiteit van lerarenopleiders. Het betreft, op de eerste plaats, onderzoek dat vanuit een demografisch perspectief tracht in kaart te brengen wie precies wanneer als opleider de lerarenopleiding binnenkomt. Ten tweede, gaat het om interpretatieve gevalsstudies naar de inhoud en kenmerken van de professionele identiteit van lerarenopleiders. En als derde, onderzoek dat focust op de ontwikkeling van de professionele identiteit van lerarenopleiders. Elke onderzoekslijn maakt duidelijk dat de persoon van de lerarenopleider, wie of wat iemand is, respectievelijk hoe iemand zichzelf ziet, ertoe doet, en dit zowel voor de lerarenopleider zelf als hun leraren-in-opleiding.zie ook http://www.lerarenopleider.nl/velon/kennisbasis/actualisering-kennisbasis/kennisbasis-2016-2010/ no ISBNstatus: publishe

(Re)constructing teacher educators' professionalism: biography, workplace and pedagogy

The concern with high quality teacher education as a warrant for good schooling remains very prominent in the media, the educational policy, and research. Yet, in these debates on teachers and their teaching quality, little attention is paid to the ones who actually educate these teachers. Empirical research that explicitly focuses on the professional lives and expertise of teacher educators remains scarce. This puzzling paradox is partly explained by the widespread assumption that a teacher educator is someone who teaches (his/her subject) to students in higher education rather than to students in elementary or secondary education. The question that remains largely unaddressed is that of the nature of teacher educators' professionalism: how do they define their professional tasks?; what is the basis for that definition and its enactment in their pedagogical practice? This dissertation addressed this knowledge gap by putting the following research question at its center: how can we understand and conceptualize the content of teacher educators' professionalism and how does this professionalism develop throughout their careers. In chapter 1, we situate this research interest in the international literature and present an overview of the four studies that constitute this dissertation.Chapter 2 reports the results of a systematic literature review of the Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices or S-STEP research. The two central questions in the study were: (1) what research questions are being addressed in self-study research?; and (2) what characterizes self-study as a methodological process? Based on our analysis we described research from the S-STEP-approach as research by teacher educators on their own practice; for this reason it privileges the use of qualitative research methods as well as a collaborative and interactive research process; and trustworthiness is used as the key criterion for its validity. In line with these characteristics, we also identified two essential tensions that constitute challenges and possible pitfalls for the achievement of the self-study research agenda and which need to be (more) explicitly addressed by self-study researchers: the tension between relevance on the one hand and rigor the tension between effectiveness and understanding on the other hand.Based on the results of this literature review we designed a project with a self-study research group, which is described in chapter 3. For this project, we collaborated with and supported six teacher educators enacting a self-study of their own practice. Using an ethnographic case-study approach, we simultaneously figured as the subject and the object of this study and analyzed how teacher educators' professional development through self-study can be meaningfully supported by external facilitation. We started by articulating the pedagogical rationale of the facilitation practices in terms of four general principles, grounded in theoretical understandings of professional development. Each principle was formulated as a working hypothesis that explicitly included its pedagogical consequences. The empirical data for this study include the facilitators' and teacher educators' logs, the audiotapes of the research group meetings, and all the written materials produced during the project. Systematic qualitative content analysis resulted in an empirical validation and refinement of the rationale and, as such, contributed to a pedagogy of supporting professional development with, by, and for teacher educators.The background of chapter 4 was again provided by the self-study research group, but in this study we specifically zoomed in on the professional development of one teacher educator in the collaborative project. Drawing on an analysis of the recordings of the research group meetings, e-mail conversations, and an in-depth interview, we framed this teacher educators' development using the image of the professional learning journey. Our analysis indicated that the most meaningful interactions in the project concerned those moments when this teacher educators' sense of self as a teacher educator was at stake. We analyzed how these interactions induced feelings of vulnerability which acted as a trigger to either enable or constrain this teacher educator s ability to confront personal assumptions and biases. Therefore, we put forward the argument that vulnerability is an inevitable, and therefore structural, condition of teacher educators' work.Chapter 5 delved deeper into the question of how we can understand and conceptualize the content of teacher educator professionalism. Drawing on a combined theoretical framework of the personal interpretative framework (Kelchtermans, 1994a, 2009) and positioning theory (van Langenhove & Harré, 1999), this study examined the relationship between teacher educators' positioning of themselves as teacher educators and their teacher education practices. We drew on a cycle of in-depth interviews with twelve experienced teacher educators in two teacher education programs. Our analysis revealed three forms of positioning as a teacher educator: a teacher educator of 'pedagogues', a teacher educator of reflective teachers, and a teacher educator of subject teachers. Each positioning constitutes a coherent pattern of normative beliefs about good teaching and teacher education, the preferred relationships with student teachers, and valuable teacher education approaches and strategies. We empirically illustrated each positioning and highlighted how teacher educators' positioning of themselves is also consequential for how they define the action agenda in terms of which learning processes the teacher educator accepts as his/her responsibility (or not) and how he/she wants to support these.We conclude this dissertation with a discussion in chapter 6. We summarize the main results of the four empirical studies and critically look back on the theoretical assumptions we started from, as well as the methodological choices we made and its consequences in terms of the research relationship. We then move on to look what this dissertation adds to our existingunderstanding of teacher educator professionalism and offer implications for future research.Chapter 1 Introduction 1. A teacher of teachers? 1.1. Teacher educators’ professional biography 1.2. Teacher educators’ professional working context 2. Existing research on teacher educators 3. Structure of this dissertation Chapter 2 Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices: An appreciative review of the published work 1. Introduction 2. Research methodology 3. Results: Characteristics of self-study research 3.1. Self-study focuses on personal practice 3.2. For this reason it privileges the use of qualitative research methods 3.3. Collaborative interactions play a central role in the research process 3.4. Validation is based on trustworthiness 4. Discussion: Tensions in self-study research 4.1. The tension between relevance and rigor 4.2. The tension between effectivity and understanding 5. Conclusions Chapter 3 Facilitating Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices: Toward a pedagogy of professional development with/by/for teacher educators 1. Introduction 2. A collaborative self-study project 2.1. Setting and participants of the project 2.2. Content and rationale of the facilitation 2.3. Research questions 3. Research methodology 3.1. Data collection 3.2. Data analysis 3.3. Ethical considerations 4. Findings 4.1. Amendments to proposition 1 4.2. Amendments to proposition 2 4.3. Amendments to proposition 3 4.4. Amendments to proposition 4 5. Conclusion and discussion Chapter 4 A narrative analysis of a teacher educator’s professional learning journey in self-study research 1. Introduction 2. Theoretical framework: A narrative-biographical perspective 3. The study 3.1. Introducing John’s story 3.2. Research context 3.3. Data collection and data analysis 3.4. Ethical considerations 4. Reconstructing John’s professional learning journey 4.1. Phase 1: Critical activist 4.2. Phase 2: Disturbed 4.3. Phase 3: Inspired 4.4. Phase 4: Withdrawal 5. Understanding John’s professional learning journey: Vulnerability as a structural condition of teacher educators’ work 5.1. The curriculum policy as an external source of vulnerability 5.2. Personal commitment as an internal source of vulnerability 6. Conclusion and discussion Chapter 5 ‘It’s all a matter of perception’: The influence of teacher educators’ positioning on their teacher education practices 1. Introduction 2. Theoretical framework 2.1. Enacted professionalism 2.2. A combined theoretical framework 2.3. Research questions 3. Research methodology 3.1. Research group and context 3.2. Research instruments 3.3. Interpretative analysis 4. Findings 4.1. The teacher educator of ‘pedagogues’ 4.2. The teacher educator of reflective teachers 4.3. The teacher educator of subject teachers 5. Conclusion and discussion Chapter 6 Conclusions, discussion and future directions 1. Summary of the findings 1.1. Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices: A systematic review of the published work 1.2. Facilitating Self-Study of Teacher Education Practices: Toward a pedagogy of professional development with/by/for teacher educators 1.3. A narrative analysis of a teacher educator’s professional learning journey in self-study research 1.4. ‘It’s all a matter of perception’: The influence of teacher educators’ positioning on their teacher education practices 2. Looking back: Agency and context 3. Looking forward 3.1. Implications for future research on teacher educator professionalism 3.2. Implications for teacher educator development Referencesnrpages: 161status: publishe

De lerarenopleider gepositioneerd

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In the eye of the storm: Reclaiming the ‘pedagogical’ in teacher education

see https://www.bera.ac.uk/blog/in-the-eye-of-the-storm-reclaiming-the-pedagogical-in-teacher-educationstatus: publishe

A case-study of teacher educators' scholarship: Biography, workplace and pedagogy

Regardless of teacher educators’ responsibility for preparing qualified teachers, there has been little attention to what teacher educators need to know and how they develop that knowledge for teacher preparation. In this article, we present a narrative analysis of the learning experiences and processes of an experienced teacher educator involved in self-study research. Drawing on a variety of data sources, we analytically reconstruct the knowledge and beliefs underlying his teacher education practices and which constitute the basis for his professional actions.status: publishe

Self-study onderzoek door lerarenopleiders onder de loep. Een internationale literatuurstudie

Dit artikel doet verslag van een internationale literatuur-studie naar self-study onderzoek door lerarenopleiders. Via het zelf onderzoeksmatig analyseren van de opleidings-praktijk door middel van self-study, willen leraren-opleiders hun professionele expertise expliciteren en toetsen en zo tegelijkertijd bijdragen tot theorievorming over het opleiden van leraren. Op basis van een analyse van de onderzoeksliteratuur, omschrijven we self-study als het onderzoek naar de eigen praktijk door lerarenopleiders dat de volgende kenmerken heeft: self-study onderzoek focust op de eigen praktijk; om die reden privilegieert ze kwali-tatieve onderzoeksmethoden; het onderzoeksproces is inter-actief; en trustworthiness primeert in het beoordelen van haar onderzoekskwaliteit. Deze samenhangende, en deels overlappende, kenmerken karakteriseren self-study als een specifieke methodologie die lerarenopleiders gebruiken om hun eigen praktijk te onderzoeken en onderscheiden haar tegelijkertijd van verwante benaderingen. Vervolgens zetten we het empirische self-study onderzoek af tegen haar dubbele ambitie van praktijkoptimalisering en theorie-ontwikkeling en formuleren we twee spanningen die expliciet aandacht verdienen omdat ze de uiteindelijke waarde van self-study onderzoek kunnen ondermijnen: de spanning tussen relevantie en rigoreusiteit en tussen effectiviteit en inzicht. Op basis van de resultaten van deze literatuur-studie ontwikkelen we tot slot een concreet perspectief op de mogelijkheden van self-study onderzoek in de Vlaamse en Nederlandse opleidingscontext.status: publishe

Facilitating self-study of teacher education practices: toward a pedagogy of teacher educator professional development

This article reports on a two-year study of a self-study research group facilitation.The research group was designed as a professional development project in which six experienced teacher educators investigated their practices using a selfstudy approach. The pedagogical rationale of the facilitation was based on four broadly shared theoretical principles on how teacher educators can effectively work on their professional development. These theoretical principles were translated in a series of propositions (‘if … then …’) making clear the implications these principles held for the interventions of facilitators of teacher educator professional development. Qualitative content analysis of the audiotapes of the research group meetings, the facilitators’ logbooks and all the written materials produced during the project serves as an empirical validation and refinement of these principles. The findings are presented as amendments to the original propositions. By interpretatively discussing why these propositions functioned as they did in practice, we contribute to the development of a pedagogy of teacher educator professional development.status: publishe