Social Contexts of Teacher Education Policy in England and the United States

Session Type: WERA Symposium

Abstract

Teacher education in the United States has become far more diversified in the past 20-years than ever before. While a wide variety existed before, programs now include a broad range of institutions and theories of teacher learning. Remarkably a similar evolution has occurred in England, but there has been little exchange between these two countries regarding their rationale and approaches to teacher education, or the kinds of teachers that are now entering practice as a result of these policy and programmatic changes. Using a sociocultural framework, this study examines how policy has influenced teacher education and how it mediates the experience of prospective teachers as they negotiate the contexts of teacher preparation and the particular experiences of their school contexts.

Sub Unit

• World Education Research Association

Chair

• Maria Teresa Tatto, Michigan State University

Papers

• The Political Contexts of Teacher Education Policy in England and in the United States - Ian Menter, University of Oxford; Maria Teresa Tatto, Michigan State University

• A Sociocultural Framework for the Analysis of Teacher Education Policy in England and the United States - Ian Thompson, University of Oxford; Maria Teresa Tatto, Michigan State University

• Social Contexts of Teacher Education in the United States: Policy and Practice - Maria Teresa Tatto, Michigan State University

• Social Contexts of Teacher Education in England: Policy and Practice - Ian Menter, University of Oxford; Katharine Burn, University of Oxford; Trevor Mutton, University of Oxford

Discussants

• David F. Labaree, Stanford University

• Geoff Whitty, The University of Newcastle