Search results for: Best practices

In this self-study, the author investigates the gap between best and actual practices, as experienced by a university teacher educator who spent a year as a student teacher in a middle and high school English language arts program. Occupying the identities of a student, a student teacher, a teacher educator, and a researcher, she explored the gap from these multiple perspectives, with the intent of learning how to better support student teachers' development. Her findings fall into three distinct phases: (1) In “Mind the gap,” she explains the dilemma she encountered as a student teacher. (2) In “Mine the gap,” she describes the process of exploring the nature and extent of this dilemma. (3) In “The gap is mine,” she analyzes a shift in her understanding of where the gap is located.

In this article, the author situates contemporary issues in early childhood teacher education within the historical context of the kindergarten movement in the U.S. The author frames the discussion around two central questions that recur in contemporary pre-K expansion discourses: (a) What constitutes a qualified teacher?, and (b) What is high-quality early childhood teaching?

The number of students taking online courses in K-12 has increased exponentially since the inception of virtual schools in 1996. However, K-12 virtual schooling is a relatively new concept for those involved in teacher education. This article describes several major attempts to form standards and best practices. In doing so, the article also examines the research backing and the need for additional research to support such standards.

'Robust hope' was recently championed as fundamental to achieving educational utopias. Hope feels good and has utility in some circumstances. However, in other situations different motivations - positive (e.g. curiosity) or negative (e.g. frustration) - may offer greater pedagogical value. Robust hope may lead to: (1) failure; (2) an exacerbation of existing judgement biases; and (3) emotional reasoning. Hence, best-practice principles require that the net pedagogical impact of robust hope be assessed.