The purpose of this study was to explore two sophomore pre-service teachers' processes of professional orientation in the same teacher education program in the US with emphasis on their identity construction. The pre-services teachers were asked to reflect on their "identity" and articulate "who they are" as becoming teachers…

In the mentoring programme project "Schule für alle" ("School for all") at the University of Bielefeld in North Rhine-Westphalia, university students of primary or special education support a child who is in a situation of crisis for more than one year. In addition, the university students receive ongoing, systematic university…

In this study, a sample (N = 55) of preservice elementary teachers were asked what it takes to be good at math and whether or not they seem themselves as 'do-ers' of math. An examination of their responses to both a Likert Scale and corresponding open-ended questions revealed five key themes: "having a good attitude, being a good student,…

The problem addressed in this study was despite large scale reform efforts over the decades intended to improve student achievement, teachers' perspectives and pedagogical approaches often remain unaffected, which can negatively affect students' achievement. There is much debate focused on various stakeholders in the change process and on what…

In recent years, the presence of the acronym STEAM has been growing in the educational field. All around the world we are faced with a growing demand for professional STEM skills, however, who has the responsibility to train future STEAM teachers? In this article, we explain the results of an investigation with university students pursuing a…

Teaching is a highly complex profession, one in which teachers have to make continuous pedagogical decisions. In this study, we argue that practical wisdom is needed in order to act thoughtfully and effectively. The prerequisite for using practical wisdom is teachers' awareness of the pedagogical beliefs behind the decision-making. In this study,…

Multicultural education curriculum often seems to get lost in the implicit biases of formal education. As K-12 classrooms continue to increase in linguistic, cultural, racial, gender, socioeconomic, and ability diversity, the call for educators to develop mind frames of equity becomes more urgent. This study asks teacher candidates to explore…

Elementary teacher preparation programs often separate content and technology courses. This study examined the impact of changing the required science content courses for elementary preservice teachers in a small liberal arts setting. Following the new science course, students participated in a field experience as part of an elementary science…

Background/purpose: This paper aims to examine school mentors' assessments on the degree of competences developed by preservice (candidate) teachers they supervise during teaching practicum (TP). Materials/methods: A descriptive and cross-sectional study was conducted with a questionnaire applied to 373 school mentors for the evaluation of…

This study explores South Korean pre-service primary teachers' attitudes towards gifted students and gifted education. Qualitative focus group interviews were conducted with 13 South Korean undergraduates who were in their final year of a primary education. Analysis of the interviews revealed that culture was a major factor that had affected the…

The research aimed 1) to study the need in developing learning materials with plastic recycling for primary school students in Central Thailand, 2) to develop learning materials with plastic recycling for primary school students in Central Thailand based on action learning of pre-service teachers and 3) to distill the lesson learned from…

In recent years, it has become increasingly evident that improving K-12 education for all pupils requires the development of teacher quality through teacher education programs. One of the most important areas of teacher education is the preparation of teachers to understand the content they will teach in K-12 schools. It has been demonstrated that…

This study is an exploration of the prerequisites in Swedish teacher education policy for teacher educators' dual didactic task of developing student teachers' professional digital competence to such a level that they are capable of developing K-12 pupils' adequate digital competence. Data were collected from 20 Swedish teacher education…

The transition from natural to rational numbers is difficult for most elementary school children. A major cause for these difficulties is assumed to be the "conceptual change" they need to undergo in order to see that several natural number properties do not apply to rational numbers. To appropriately handle pupils' difficulties,…

Mathematics and science have similar learning processes (SLPs) and it has been proposed that courses focused on these and other similarities promote transfer across disciplines. However, it is not known how the use of these processes in lessons taught to children change throughout a preservice teacher education course or which are most likely to…