How Do Teachers Learn to Teach in Ireland? A Review of Policy and Research Literature

• In Event: A Cross-National Examination of Knowledge, Policy, and Practice in Learning to Teach: Part I

Abstract

1. Objectives or purposes
This paper introduces trends in the literature in the Republic of Ireland looking for historical, theoretical and empirical studies across all subject areas to answer the question of how teachers learn to teach effectively. There have been recent major reviews of teacher education in the Republic of Ireland, and these have led to very significant shifts in policy direction with tangible consequences in terms of the structural arrangements we well as the design of teacher preparation programs. A key purpose of the paper will be to examine the explicit and implicit theories behind the reviews’ recommendations and the subsequent policy responses/changes.

2. Perspective(s) or theoretical framework
The paper comprises a review of the recent policy literature on teacher education, and a review of empirical research on teacher education. First, the paper focuses on the historical evolution (Coolahan, 2004) of policy in the country vis-à-vis conceptions to prepare teachers with a particular focus, and on how this informs the recent major reviews of teacher education. Second, the paper reviews the empirical research on teacher education and discusses implications for teachers’ knowledge.

3. Methods, techniques, or modes of inquiry
The paper combines both a discourse analysis of policy, employing Ball’s policy cycle (Ball, 1994; Cochran-Smith et al, 2013) and utilizes the framework developed by a major review of empirical research on teacher education in the United Kingdom (UK).

4. Data sources, evidence, objects, or materials
The main data sources are the recent major reviews and subsequent teacher education guidelines/regulations policy documents in the Republic of Ireland; research publications on the relationship between policy and its effects on teacher education and teacher knowledge.

5. Results and/or substantiated conclusions or warrants for arguments/point of view
Preliminary work suggests that there are a number of common features: continued significance of denominational teacher education at primary level, a consolidation of university-based teacher education, significant move toward system rationalization in order to build research capacity and the impact of stronger accountability and its impact on teacher education and the organization of experiences that support learning to teach, the significant role of major international reports in shaping discourse with the Republic of Ireland and, the emergence over the last fifteen years of a cross-border focus on teacher education which has led to the proliferation of focused small-scale comparative studies of teacher education. A case study of institutional challenges vis-a-vis the shifting policy environment will be briefly presented and discussed.

6. Scientific or scholarly significance of the study or work
The review of the empirical research evidence reviewed in this paper explores how research has served to inform policy and practice. A number of questions will be raised in terms of how policy supports or hinders what and how teachers learn and how they are expected to teach.

Author

• Paul F. Conway, University of Limerick