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Teacher educators in many countries share similar concerns as they aspire to improve education for learners and stimulate interest in further study and careers. The roles and professional development of school teachers have been researched, but little attention has been given to teacher educators. Using a small-scale, illuminative study in England and South Africa, this paper examines pedagogical implications of progression from classroom teacher to teacher educator-tutor. Systemic issues include attitudes to personal scholarship in moving to high stakes academic environments requiring research. In both countries, there were issues of student teachers’ subject knowledge and their capacity to translate knowledge for learners. South African teacher educators were concerned about student teachers’ lack of appreciation of the integrity of conceptual understanding and sequencing of topic content. Implications for the professional development of teacher educators and their role identities are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues the importance in and for a democratic state and society of discussing controversial issues in education. In particular it analyses two national educational contexts, that of England and South Africa. It considers both whether they provide a suitable framework for teaching controversial issues in school classrooms and if they prepare teachers to be able to organise discussions of controversial issues in schools. The paper then examines interview data on teaching controversial issues with university tutors and student teachers in four universities, two in England and two in South Africa. The data suggest that there are still serious obstacles in both countries to teaching controversial issues in schools and in preparing teacher education students to teach about controversial issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]