Teacher training is now a requirement for new staff in the further education sector in England. The Sector Skills Council, LifeLong Learning UK, sets national standards for training that include Reflective Practice as an underpinning value and Learning Theory as part of training programmes. There is, however, no statement of what is meant by…

The title of this article came from a student who joined the author's PGCE tutor group in the second semester of last year. It was made during a group reflection activity. The title was fascinating, as was the response from other members of the group: "there's no hiding in here--we all talk." Collaborative journal writing between mentor…

Purpose: The purpose of this action research presentation is to invite discourse on the intersection of race, gender and instructional decisions in the classrooms of student teachers. The purpose of this study is to also examine the thoughts of a university supervisor during clinical observation with respect to her positionality as a woman of…

This qualitative study examined the experiences of 10 prospective teachers completing internships in low-income, majority-minority schools while participating in a professional learning community within the context of a course that focused on culturally responsive pedagogy. Drawing primarily from interviews and online discussions, the article…

The objective of this research was to explore how authentic technology use and teacher inquiry may coalesce during curriculum-based, technology-enhanced field experiences for prospective teachers. Thirteen inquiries were analyzed using qualitative analytic procedures (Rossman, 1998). Results suggest that teacher inquiry may serve a variety of…

This paper explores whether a professional development weblog could support work-based learning in a TAFE Library. The paper includes both a literature review of material dealing with work-based learning in the VET sector, weblogs and their possible use as a professional development tool and an evaluation of a weblog project devised to support…

This article presents evidence that maths diagnostic assessments, consequent individualized learning programmes and face-to-face maths study support can combine to significantly increase maths related module pass rates and scores for undergraduate engineering students. It is argued that simply having a quiet, relaxed, supported study area,…

This paper considers ways in which a detailed understanding of classroom discourse can be achieved through the use of reflective practices and professional dialogue. For the teacher, understanding classroom communication, being able to "shape" learner contributions and making strategic decisions in the moment-by-moment unfolding of a lesson are…

This article details the ongoing collaboration between two teacher training providers in the UK and Finland in the development and use of portfolios to support reflective practice in teacher education programmes. The use of portfolios for assessment in teacher education has developed extensively over a number of years to support the student to…

Background: Over the past 20 years, a number of researchers have expressed concern over the lack of confidence and qualifications of primary school teachers to teach PE. Evidently, the influence of personal school PE experiences may play an important role in the development of teachers' confidence to appropriately teach PE. Most research that has…

Recent efforts to design teacher education experiences using reflection as a philosophical orientation (Abell & Bryan, 1997) have shown that such experiences are influencing the way that teachers think about their practice, specifically teachers' personal beliefs about teaching and learning. In this paper, we introduce the design and…

This paper considers the value of reflexive pedagogical approaches in the teaching of academic communication and writing. We focus on a course developed for pre-degree foundation students at a London higher education institution. Drawing on the students' learning journals, we examine their reflections of the approaches practised on the course.…

This paper discusses the role of blended learning in teacher education on a Master's programme at Manchester University. Blended learning is the bringing together of traditional physical classes with elements of virtual education. The paper focuses on one particular module of the degree and attempts to capture students experiences of using a…

Increasingly, fundamental questions are being asked of online language learning: In what ways can online teaching benefit the language learner most? How can online environments be designed, or redesigned, to suit the purposes of language learners? Finally, what does the language teacher need to know to become a successful online tutor? In other…

Productive pedagogies (PP) is an influential framework for teaching and learning that has featured well in current reforms of teacher education. The present study was designed to examine principles of PP adopted by a cohort of beginning mathematics teachers. A networked online learning environment, WebCT[TM], facilitated the teachers'…