Reshaping teacher education through the professional continuum

Abstract

The current policy gaze on teacher quality is resulting in significant shifts in how teacher education is conceptualized, designed and delivered. Traditional approaches to teacher preparation and continuing professional development (CPD) are being challenged, and often displaced, by new models that expedite the process and experience of becoming a teacher, relocate teacher preparation from universities directly to schools and widen the pool of teacher education providers. This “reshaping” of teacher education and leadership development is at a critical point of reform in a number of systems, driven by the need to align with curriculum and wider education reform and the effect of the dual exposure of international comparative tests and economic performance. As a consequence the practice of teacher education, by which we mean the pedagogies, programmes and places through which and where teachers are prepared, must adapt to become more responsive to demands from government to deliver high quality teaching that is developed and sustained throughout a teacher’s career. This means reconceptualizing teacher and leadership development as a career-long process developed by and through the professional continuum. It requires the redesign of the practice of teacher education, necessitating new thinking and fresh approaches to the rich pedagogies that must underpin professional learning programmes, the sites of professional learning and new partnership arrangements. Crucially it also involves widening the pool of teacher educators so that all teachers and school leaders are recognized as teacher educators.