This open access book follows the development of the Building Resilience in Teacher Education (BRiTE) project across Australia and internationally. Drawing on the success of this project and the related research collaborations that have since emerged, it highlights the importance of cultivating resilience at various stages of teachers' careers.…

This paper sets out to explain the Deakin University-Teach For Australia (DU-TFA) program for preparing teachers Australia-wide, with a focus on Western Australia (WA), and to offer insight into how the DU-TFA beginning teachers, known as Associates, 'dealt with' the demands of the program. It is not an evaluation of the DU-TFA program; rather,…

The Australian Professional Standards for Teachers (AITSL, 2011) stipulate that graduating teachers need to be classroom-ready and able to perform at a 'graduate standard'. However, recent research indicates that nearly 50% of beginning teachers lack readiness, are overwhelmed with stress, and will leave the profession within five years. This…

Pre-service teachers in Australian Initial Teacher Education programmes gain classroom experience through supervised, formally assessed professional experience placements and internships. This in-situ experience is recognized as important in the development of professional identities, knowledge and skills. However, many pre-service teachers lament…

This chapter discusses how beginning teachers perceive their preparedness for work, drawing on findings from the Studying the Effectiveness of Teacher Education (SETE) project (Mayer et al. 2017). The goal of this large-scale, longitudinal project was to explore graduate teachers' experiences in Australia in order to understand their perceptions…

Amid the growing "teacher quality" discourse, early career teachers have increasingly been positioned as problematic in Australian education policy discourses over the past decade. This paper uses a critical policy historiography approach to compare representations of early career teachers in two key education policy documents, from the…

This paper explores teacher learning. It focuses on access to 'communicative learning spaces' (a concept we coin and develop within this paper) and argues that the creation of such spaces can be a powerful enabler of teacher learning. We draw on the findings from three studies conducted in three different countries - Norway, Australia and Sweden.…

Initial teacher education and experiences of the professional cultures of teaching contribute to teachers' understandings about how to engage with parents. Drawing on qualitative research data, and informed by Michel de Certeau's theory of culture and everyday life, this paper explores how everyday beliefs and professional practices that shape…

Educating for sustainability has been a key principle underpinning the primary/middle undergraduate teacher education programme at an Australian University for the past decade. Educating for sustainability seeks to provide knowledge and understanding of the physical, biological, and human world, and involves students making decisions about a range…

The design of initial teacher education courses is to provide pre-service teachers with skills, processes and knowledge about the practice and profession of teaching. This allows graduate teachers to best service the learning needs of future students. A disposition of inquiry in relation to ongoing teacher learning is a significant aspect of…

Teacher education is a hotly debated policy area in higher education and schooling portfolios, with increasing emphasis on standards and accountability. It is in this environment that "The Standards Project" (2013-2015) presented in this article began. It has at its core a three-part commitment: first, to undertake a comprehensive audit…

Currently pre-service teachers (PSTs) practise teaching by interacting in real-life situations naturally occurring within variable school-based practicums. These are not ideal contexts for beginning teachers because they put novices in situations with real students before demonstrating capability, feedback is often not at point of need and they do…

For graduating teachers, the bridging period between formal teacher preparation and joining the profession is a time of high anxiety and great excitement. While this transition influences efficacy, job satisfaction, career length and future teaching quality, it is widely recognised to be inconsistent, poorly planned and resourced and largely…

A major concern in recent decades is that teachers are equipped with pedagogical knowledge through pre-service teacher education programs but know nothing about how to put pedagogical knowledge into their own teaching scenarios. Hence, an increasing attention has been attached to teachers' contextualized understanding of pedagogical knowledge for…

Formal processes such as ongoing induction, mentoring and professional development are commonly recorded as factors that can enhance early career teacher resilience. Yet, informal processes, including the support provided by personal and professional networks are not often acknowledged nor made explicit. Drawing on two qualitative studies, we…