Teacher Education In and For Uncertain Times


Book Description

This volume considers the role of initial and continuing teacher education in uncertain times. It highlights key principles and methods that preserve curiosity and optimism regarding the potential of teacher education, and regarding the manifold achievements of pre-service and in-service teachers. It explores how teacher education can produce teachers who are committed to counter-oppressive curricula and pedagogies, and reflects the critical role of teacher educators as public academics.




Navigating Teacher Education in Complex and Uncertain Times


Book Description

Carmen I. Mercado draws on four decades of seminal research and theory on how American children, who come from homes where languages other than English are spoken, learn to read and to write in school to reveal aspects of locally-responsive planning and adaptations that should be central to any teacher education program that hopes to serve its unique, local population base responsibly. Mercado uses a range of theoretical lenses particularly those surrounding critical theory, the approach designed to deconstruct power relationships in society, to capture and explain the complexities of the teaching-learning process making visible institutional, social and political influences clear. She explores an extensive collection of tools and resources for teaching to explore how educators can inform their thinking and shape their own practices to broaden access to people and resources, and to influence classroom instruction as school populations becomes increasingly diverse on a global scale through immigration. Mercado also shows how self-study has been a key aspect of her program's evolution, suggesting that teacher education should be informed by teacher educators' own investigations into their own programs and processes; that each teacher educator ought to be an active reinventor of her own program, based on reflection on current data. Mercado sensitively draws together the technical and emotional dimensions of learning to teach, acknowledging that critical theory can bring up deep, often uncomfortable feelings of anger, guilt, resentment, and other responses to unfair conditions. However, since schools are designed as places of opportunity, facing these responses is essential at a time with the feelings of antagonism that characterize the present-day world and its conflictual social groups. Mercado offers the opportunity to address these facets of educational process in compelling, informed ways.




Teacher Education Through Uncertainty and Crisis


Book Description

Teacher Education through Uncertainty and Crisis explores the relationalities, spatialities and temporalities of teacher education, sketching hopeful innovations, pathways and sustainable futures for teacher professionalism.




Reclaiming Accountability in Teacher Education


Book Description

"1. The book offers teacher educators and stakeholders an overview of accountability in the era of education reform and embraces teacher education accountability as a lever for reconstructing its targets, purposes, and consequences in keeping with the larger democratic project. 2. The book introduces a framework, eight dimensions of accountability, for interrogating dimensions of accountability policy and practice by revealing an accountability initiative's operation but also exposing underlying values and principles, theory of change, and relationship to larger political and policy agendas. 3. Using the authors' framework, eight dimensions of accountability, the book deconstructs four of the most visible education reform initiatives relevant to teacher educators and education stakeholders. The book proposes a rallying call to teacher educators and stakeholders to reclaim accountability using a new approach: democratic accountability in teacher education" --




Learning for Uncertainty


Book Description

Learning for Uncertainty explores technology’s role in education, specifically unpacking the question: How should educators prepare today’s children for a world that has yet to be made? As technology evolves faster than our capacity to fully understand the social, cultural, economic, and moral implications of many innovations, today’s educators are tasked with the unique role of preparing students to capitalize on technology’s opportunities and also mitigate its dangers to their society, to democratic processes, and to institutions. Veteran educators McDiarmid and Zhao explore the implications of emerging technologies for future jobs, organizations, students, and learning, covering topics such as • The future of work and workers as technology eliminates some industries while creating new ones. • Potential futures, both bright and dark, awaiting students. • The qualities, dispositions, social behaviors, and skills that are likely to advantage students in the future. • The possibility of technology to revolutionize education in ways that will better position students for an uncertain future. • How technology can free teachers from time and effort devoted to routine matters to instead assuming roles that are potentially more satisfying and supportive of their students’ learning. • Learning opportunities and educator roles that have the potential to bring about needed changes. • Capitalizing on these uncertain times to rethink curriculum, pedagogy, opportunities to learn, and the organization of school as well as the roles of students, educators, parents, and policymakers. This latest book in the Routledge Leading Change series is ideal reading for educators and policymakers in both P–12 and higher education interested in ensuring our education systems provide the experiences and learning opportunities necessary to cultivate the innovative, iconoclastic, and generative thinkers and creators needed for a future that nourishes the minds, bodies, and spirits of all.




Teacher Education for Diversity


Book Description

Foregrounding the diversity that characterises various educational settings, this book discusses how histories and geographies of oppression, exclusion and marginalisation have impacted on teacher education. Contributors draw on first-hand experiences of living and working in countries including Brazil, China, South Africa, New Zealand and Malawi. Positioned in a geographical and metaphorical ‘Global South’, the book draws critical attention to debates which have been otherwise marginalised in relation to those conducted in the ‘Global North’. Chapters address difference and diversity on both a conceptual and empirical level, acknowledging the significance of various global trends including increased migration and urbanisation; and broadening understandings of race, religion, gender, sexuality and dis/ability. Taken together, these chapters reveal the extent of the work which still remains to be done in the field of teacher education for diversity. The issues discussed are of global significance, making this text key reading for teachers, teacher educators, and those concerned with the advancement of social justice and reduction of inequality through education.




The Politics of Education Policy in an Era of Inequality


Book Description

In a context of increased politicization led by state and federal policymakers, corporate reformers, and for-profit educational organizations, The Politics of Education Policy in an Era of Inequality explores a new vision for leading schools grounded in culturally relevant advocacy and social justice theories. This timely volume tackles the origins and implications of growing accountability for educational leaders and reconsiders the role that educational leaders should and can play in education policy and political processes. This book provides a critical perspective and analysis of today’s education policy landscape and leadership practice; explores the challenges and opportunities associated with teaching in and leading schools; and examines the structural, political, and cultural interactions among school principals, district leaders, and state and federal policy actors. An important resource for practicing and aspiring leaders, The Politics of Education Policy in an Era of Inequality shares a theoretical framework and strategies for building bridges between education researchers, practitioners, and policymakers.




Teaching Economics in Troubled Times


Book Description

In the Great Recession of 2007-2010, Americans watched their retirement savings erode and the value of their homes decline while the unemployment rate increased and GDP sank. New demands emerged for unprecedented government intervention into the economy. While these changes have a dramatic impact on society at large, they also have serious implications for the content and teaching of economics. Teaching Economics in a Time of Unprecedented Change is a one-stop collection that helps pre- and in-service social studies teachers to foster an understanding of classic content as well as recent economic developments. Part I offers clear and teachable overviews of the nature of today’s complex economic crisis and the corollary changes in teaching economics that flow from revising and updating long-held economic assumptions. Part II provides both detailed best practices for teaching economics in the social studies classroom and frameworks for teaching economics within different contexts including personal finance, entrepreneurship, and history. Part III concludes with effective strategies for teaching at the elementary and secondary school levels based on current research on economic education. From advice on what every economics teacher should know, to tips for best education practices, to investigations into what research tells us about teaching economics, this collection provides a wealth of contextual background and teaching ideas for today’s economics and social studies educators. Additional information and resources can be found at the authors’ website neweconteaching.com.




Made for Learning:


Book Description

This is a book for teachers that explores Brian Cambourne's Conditions of Learning and the Processes That Empower Learning, incorporating abundant examples of the ways teachers implement the conditions to lead to durable learning. Written by Debra Crouch and Brian Cambourne, this is the primary source of insight and information about the Conditions of Learning.




Critical Pedagogy in Uncertain Times


Book Description

This book brings together the most important figures in the evolution of Critical Pedagogy to provide comprehensive analyses of issues related to the struggle against the forces of neoliberalism and the imperial-induced privatization, not just in education, but in all of social life through the radical democratizing forces of critical pedagogy.