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This study introduces the scope and nature of teacher candidate (TC) supervision in an era of clinically-based teacher preparation. The findings emerged from a qualitative meta-analysis of 82 artic...

Given the movement to enhanced clinical experiences and school–university collaboration emphasized in the NCATE Blue Ribbon Report, the field of teacher preparation would benefit from an understanding of the research related to preservice teacher (PST) supervision. This article uses qualitative meta-analysis to generate new knowledge about PST supervision using research published from 2001 to 2013. Using a search of three different databases, the findings of 32 studies became the data to address the research question: What are the core PST supervisory tasks and practices that support the developmental nature of PST learning within the clinical context? Through the meta-analysis, the authors identified five tasks and twelve practices of PST supervision. The tasks include (1) targeted assistance, (2) individual support, (3) collaboration and community, (4) curriculum support, and (5) research for innovation. These results indicate that PST supervision and the role of the PST supervisor is changing a...

Teacher educators recognize that teacher candidates must have authentic, scaffolded opportunities to transform knowledge into practice. This study explores teacher candidates’ engagement with teacher inquiry as a method for supporting professional development. Findings suggest teacher candidates differ tremendously in their responses to the inquiry process, creating a continuum of proficiency. This study extends the literature by providing concrete examples of the variation in readiness, sophistication, and quality in teacher candidates’ attempts to engage in teacher inquiry. Implications for teacher educators include the importance of providing differentiated support through structured, sequenced experiences that build an inquiry stance in teacher candidates.

Although the NCATE Blue Ribbon Panel Report challenges those responsible for teacher preparation to design clinically rich programs, there is little discussion about preparing teacher educators to actualize these innovations. This study explored how practitioner inquiry could serve as a mechanism to facilitate the development of the next generation of teacher educators. The purpose of this qualitative study was to understand what 16 doctoral student participants, from across two different university contexts, learned about becoming teacher educators as a result of engaging in practitioner inquiry. Findings suggest doctoral students developed an appreciation of inquiry as a tool for continuous instructional improvement and became active in program innovation. Doctoral students also broadened their understanding of educational research while uncovering tensions related to conducting research. These findings suggest inquiry as a relevant action for doctoral students to develop their abilities to innovate the...

Teachers today operate in highly politicized accountability environments where quick results, typically measured by K–12 test scores, are demanded. Although focusing on student learning outcomes is critical, equally essential is assuring that teacher learning opportunities which can strengthen instruction are available to teachers. A decade ago, Boardman and Woodruff found that teaching in a ‘high-stakes’ environment led to more assessments, scripted curriculum decisions and a shift in professional development that emphasized preparation for and enhancing results on tests. This exploratory, descriptive case study sought to understand how teachers described professional development a decade later. We used purposeful sampling and qualitative methodology to better understand educator perceptions of professional learning within two different accountability environments in the United States. Using the insights of educators working in these environments, the research explored ‘How do teachers describe the influ...

Producing high-quality teachers should be a shared goal and a shared endeavor -between those who prepare teachers in universities and those who support teachers’ learning in schools. Yet, teacher education has been portrayed more as a dichotomy than a continuum of lifelong learning, beginning with the preservice teacher and continuing throughout an inservice teacher's career. When schools and universities work together, especially in professional development school -contexts, this goal can be actualized.

Teacher turnover in urban schools is occurring at a breakneck pace; thus, it is important for us to understand the characteristics of teachers who stay and succeed in these settings. In order to address this need, this study examines the preparation and induction experiences of teachers who completed a Transition to Teaching – a funded urban apprenticeship program. Three research questions guided the study: (1) How do participants describe the characteristics that influence their five-year retention? (2) How do participants describe their success as teachers? and (3) How do participants describe the professional support they received in their preparation program and during the subsequent four years after completing the program? Quantitative and qualitative data via interviews, focus group, and an examination of teachers’ district performance scores were utilized, as a means of understanding teachers’ staying and impact power. Staying power refers to the ability to endure or last within challenging context...

This article explores epistemological awareness and instantiation of methods, as well as uninformed ambiguity, in qualitative methodological decision making and research reporting. The authors argue that efforts should be made to make the research process, epistemologies, values, methodological decision points, and argumentative logic open, accessible, and visible for audiences. To these ends, they discuss two ways of conceptualizing the role of epistemological awareness and instantiation of methods, including (a) a series of decision junctures and (b) a spatial conceptualization of epistemological decision making. Through an analysis of researchers’ decision junctures drawn from studies published in high-impact education journals in 2006, the authors illustrate current methodological awareness and instantiation of methods in the field of education research.

Within the current high-stakes accountability context, student achievement data have become a central focus for instructional decisions given that teachers are held accountable for student performance. Furthermore, as response to intervention is implemented nationwide to identify and monitor students with disabilities, teachers will be required to use student data and become effective instructional decision makers who tailor instruction to meet the academic needs of all students. The aim of this study is to understand the qualitatively different ways that current practicing teachers are using data to inform instruction. Findings from teacher interviews are presented through the image of a ladder representing the stages that teachers experience as they engage in data usage to inform their instructional decision making. These findings have implications and possible applications for teacher educators and school-based practitioners alike in better supporting the professional development of preservice...

Given the increasing challenges faced by high-poverty urban schools, mentoring has become the panacea for policy makers interested in a quick-fix solution to the teacher quality dilemma. As a result, mentoring programs have experienced exponential growth with little empirical attention during the last decade. This 16-month qualitative investigation within a large city in the northeastern United States, sought to better understand the work of mentors in high-poverty urban schools. Analysis of the data collected led to the identification of three assertions that highlight the interplay that occurs in the urban teacher mentoring context between four critical concepts: novice teacher survival, novice teacher success, onus of responsibility, and a social justice stance. Implications are discussed related to the need for adequate resources, placement, and preparation of mentors in high-poverty schools. Additionally, the study also asserts the role that a passion for or a disposition toward social justice plays ...

Given the increasing pressures of high-stakes accountability associated with state mandates and No Child Left Behind (U.S. Department of Education, 2002), linking teacher preparation within professional development schools to the goal of school improvement has become essential. This article illustrates the University of Florida's efforts to understand the ways that prospective teacher education can be linked to individual school improvement efforts. It explains how teacher educators and their school-based partners collaboratively craft their professional development school work with prospective and practicing teachers to target school improvement and teacher learning. Four models for engaging in inquiry-oriented school improvement are illustrated and the factors that underlie their design are outlined. The four models illustrate the ways that inquiry-oriented professional development school work contributes to individual school improvement efforts while cultivating in its participants an inquiry ...

(2008). Resisting ‘Crash Diet’ Staff Development. Kappa Delta Pi Record: Vol. 44, No. 2, pp. 66-71.

Background/Content Since a large gap exists between the rhetoric of reform-minded teacher education and what actually transpires in student teachers’ field experiences, this study sought to fill a gap in current scholarship which has yet to document how mentor teachers, conceptualized as school-based teacher educators, shape and conduct their own work with student teachers assuming the role of full-year undergraduate interns. Focus of Study The purpose of this study was to explore how two successful mentor teachers enact their work with interns in a newly created inquiry-oriented professional development school. Research Design This investigation uses case study methodology informed by both ethnographic and phenomenological perspectives. Using these lenses and data collected over an eighteen-month period, the stories of two mentor teachers are captured and analyzed. Conclusions Three themes emerged within each case that characterized the unique work of each mentor. The three themes that shape the work of the first mentor offer insight into a conceptual illustration represented by a gardening metaphor. The three themes of the second case suggest a mentor as co-inquirer's approach to mentoring. A look across the cases augments our understanding of mentoring prospective teachers.

For over a decade, University of Florida researchers worked with middle schools in a large urban and suburban south Florida district, as they developed and then worked to sustain inclusive reform. One middle school, Socrates, was notably successful, having built its inclusion model on a foundation of previous reform and a school culture characterized by shared decision making, collaboration, and teaming. For 4 years, we studied Socrates and the sustainability of its program. Inclusion was not sustained; our analysis of teacher and administrator interviews revealed three primary factors that help explain why: leadership change, teacher turnover, and state and district assessment policy change. Reduced support for the program, a by-product of the primary factors, also contributed to the lack of sustainability.

Having facilitated, read, and collected more than 200 teacher research pieces written by prospective and practicing teachers, the authors conducted a systematic analysis of the domains and contents of teachers' questions as they embarked on their first research study. Focusing on the questions teachers ask led to the generation of a typology of “six passions” for teacher inquiry: An individual child; curriculum; teaching strategies and techniques; beliefs about management, teaching, and learning; personal and professional identity; and teaching and learning context. This article shares examples of teacher research in each of the six passions and the process of locating questions for teacher research efforts.

This phenomenological interview study identifies the insights and experiences of one early childhood teacher, Anna, through her recollection of becoming an early childhood teacher leader and an advocate for social justice. This study falls at the nexus of the literature in early childhood education (ECE), teacher leadership, and social justice as the researchers seek to understand the lived experiences of a teacher, who is committed to each of these three activities. As a result, the purpose of this exploratory study was to understand how the early childhood teacher might define, understand and play out leadership roles in her position. Two assertions emerge from the merging of themes into categories and categories into assertions. The first assertion describes the importance of experiences in childhood and how they are directly linked to the way one perceives, understands, and carries out leadership in early childhood settings. The second assertion outlines how the visions of leadership in early childhoo...

Teacher education programs are being encouraged to collaborate with K‐12 partners to develop and implement contextually rich field experiences that integrate methods course instruction with public school practices. As a result, we outline four models of integrating methods instruction and field experiences and raise the question “How does the classroom and school context of the field experience influence what prospective teachers learned in the methods courses?” This study examines the way two different cohorts of prospective elementary teachers who learned to teach in two different contexts define their own social studies pedagogical content knowledge. The students' espoused philosophies of education offer insight into how different models of integrated field experiences may impact on their beliefs about social studies teaching. Through this study we raise questions that should be considered in constructing methods courses linked to field experiences and suggest Bronfenbrenner's model as a tool for looki...

Real change and improvement in teacher education will come by joining the classroom with the university, a move that improves learning for students, teachers, and teacher educators.