This article suggests ways in which teacher supervisors and trainers on short courses can reposition their role by making the feedback conference more collaborative and trainee-led. The authors argue that by taking a more dialogic approach and exploring critical incidents, trainee teachers can develop reflective skills and take more ownership of…

Coverage of reading and reading instruction in initial teacher education is highly contested, with the "reading wars" representing decades of debate concerning approaches that should be promoted to teachers-in-training. Empirical evidence strongly endorses explicit and systematic teaching of code-based skills as a starting point,…

This case study is about the design of the one-day course "How to find a job as a Spanish teacher in the UK," which is taught at the Instituto Cervantes in London. The course came to exist due to a large number of requests from Spaniards who have come to the UK in recent years--many of them wanting to find a job as a Spanish teacher--and…

This article reports on a qualitative study that explored the experiences of eight Hong Kong teachers of academic subjects who undertook a full-time, short-term professional development course (PDC) designed to provide them with specialized knowledge and classroom skills required to teach content subjects through the English medium. Using a…

This article examines the teaching practicum in Thailand as it occurs in three settings: "Rajabhats"--four-year universities which offer an additional period of teaching practice, and where the vast majority of EFL teachers are educated; regular universities; and a TESOL short course certificate program for non-Thais preparing to teach…

This document contains a list of 19 research questions completed by the staff of the Teacher Education Program. The ideas are stated in very brief terms, but each idea has behind it a tentative research plan which can be expanded into a design to fit conditions that exist in any given preservice or inservice teacher education setting. The major…

This document describes the adaptation of an American inservice teacher training package to German teacher education programs. Far West Laboratory's "Minicourse Nine" was processed in two steps in order to field-test the material and to eliminate possible language inconsistencies. Difficulties in the transference of educational material…

Outlines a mini-course in problem solving that is being given to teaching assistants in the language department at West Virginia University. (RL)

This paper elaborates on a list of procedures contained in an accompanying handout entitled "The 27 Steps in the Development Program." These 27 steps are subsumed under 12 categories: 1) research and information collecting, 2) planning, 3) develop preliminary form of product, 4) preliminary field testing, 5) main product revision, 6) main field…

This paper pulls together the knowledge and insights that have been accumulated in the development of Minicourses. It is expected that the guidelines will be revised and enlarged as new knowledge about this work is accumulated. The guidelines cover the following aspects of Minicourse development: initial planning, the introduction film, the…

A course to improve the qualifications of prospective teachers is described. Its success has encouraged educators to seek to develop other courses along similar lines. (CK)

This kit explains the use of minicourses at Macquarie University in New South Wales, Australia, which were designed for the inservice training of teachers. The kit contains the script of the audio commentary, a cassette tape, color slides, and a booklet entitled "Anatomy of the Minicourse." The tape briefly describes the minicourses in general and…