Section archive - Instruction in Teacher Training

The Centre for Educational Research and Innovation launched a project in a number of countries, which focuses on how ‘innovative learning environments’ can contribute to offering meaningful and sustainable learning experiences for learners in the twenty-first century. This article presents the main findings of the Austrian part of the project. The article discusses whether and how the development of ILE is possible against the background of school routines and a school system that seems to be successfully resistant to change.

This article describes a project that sought to provide meaningful remote early field experiences for teacher candidates enrolled in distance teacher education courses. The focus of this study was to examine how candidates experienced the online field component, which was consistently structured for both methods courses. The findings reveal that a multitude of themes emerged: shared viewing that enhanced field experiences by making them more meaningful and relevant, created opportunities for social learning and reflection, and served as a bridge between classroom learning and experiences in the field. The authors argue that collaboration may be the key to survival in an age where economic conditions find teachers competing for positions and evaluated based on their ability to function as a leader within professional learning communities.

The author argues that an important task of career-long teacher education is the encouragement of imagination and creativity in experienced teachers. The task implies a reversal of the managerialism that currently afflicts so many European education systems. The article begins by giving an analysis of pedagogical relationships to expose some of the reasons that teaching is an extraordinarily complex activity. Indeed it is so complex that it is not something that can be learnt in advance of experience. However, the author claims that experience is not enough on its own. To become excellent requires a career-long commitment to self-cultivation as teachers.

In this article, the authors examine how critical reflection during a study abroad program to Honduras facilitates pre-service teachers’ multicultural competencies for personal and professional growth. The authors conclude that critical reflection for developing multicultural competencies in teacher education students is necessary if teachers in U.S. American schools are to succeed with teaching diverse students. In addition, participating in well–organized and structured programs such as study abroad infused with opportunities for critical reflection is one way of preparing multicultural teachers. Finally, exposure to diverse cultural knowledge and pedagogical practices enacted in diverse educational settings offers teacher education students opportunities for developing multicultural competencies.