Abstract:
For a decade federal and state government have been working in an effort to reform teaching and especially to reform teacher education. Initially the standard for entry into the profession was increased by the requirement that teacher education courses provide all students with a university standard general education. The National Project on the Quality of Teaching and Leaning (1996) developed a set of competency standards that defined the knowledge, attributes and skills underpinning teachers' learning and professional practice. Paralleling this movement bodies such as the Board of Teacher Registration (Queensland) and the Standards Council for the Teaching Profession (Victoria) released specific guidelines for teaching standards. Recently the Standards Council (1998) provided guidelines for the content, scope and outcomes for the accreditation of pre-service teaching courses.
The aim of these reforms is to strengthen the teaching profession and to raise its standards, that is to enhance the quality of student learning by redesigning teacher qualifications and accountability requirements for university courses.
In this study we address three questions: (1) What representations of teaching are portrayed in the professional teaching standards? (2) How are standards based reforms influencing teacher education courses? and (3) What are the beliefs about teaching that teacher educators hold in the context of these reforms?
These questions cut across two areas of research that are used as a framework for our investigation. First, representations of teaching are informed by research into teaching, learning and teacher education. Zeichner (1993) identified a paradigm of teacher education practices so we use the defining principles to guide our analysis of the current standards based reform and the teacher educators' practices. Second the literature on standards based reform, its policies and practices and the assumptions about teaching that underpin these practices are analyzed.
This investigation draws on two sources of data. First, the national and Victorian teaching standards documents are analyzed to answer the first question. To answer the second and third questions we conduct semi-structured interviews with teacher educators from three universities within Victoria. The interviews focus on three areas: (1) An example of teaching practice; (2) Principles of teaching that guide these practices; and (3) The influence of standards based reform on their course. The interviews are audiotaped, transcribed and analyzed for themes that describe the principles of teaching. These findings are considered within the broader context of the worldwide standards movement and the paradigm of teacher education identified by Zeichner (1993).
The aim of these reforms is to strengthen the teaching profession and to raise its standards, that is to enhance the quality of student learning by redesigning teacher qualifications and accountability requirements for university courses.
In this study we address three questions: (1) What representations of teaching are portrayed in the professional teaching standards? (2) How are standards based reforms influencing teacher education courses? and (3) What are the beliefs about teaching that teacher educators hold in the context of these reforms?
These questions cut across two areas of research that are used as a framework for our investigation. First, representations of teaching are informed by research into teaching, learning and teacher education. Zeichner (1993) identified a paradigm of teacher education practices so we use the defining principles to guide our analysis of the current standards based reform and the teacher educators' practices. Second the literature on standards based reform, its policies and practices and the assumptions about teaching that underpin these practices are analyzed.
This investigation draws on two sources of data. First, the national and Victorian teaching standards documents are analyzed to answer the first question. To answer the second and third questions we conduct semi-structured interviews with teacher educators from three universities within Victoria. The interviews focus on three areas: (1) An example of teaching practice; (2) Principles of teaching that guide these practices; and (3) The influence of standards based reform on their course. The interviews are audiotaped, transcribed and analyzed for themes that describe the principles of teaching. These findings are considered within the broader context of the worldwide standards movement and the paradigm of teacher education identified by Zeichner (1993).