By exploring the question of whether teaching begins and ends in contemplative thought, this essay suggests that conceptions of teacher thinking must be expanded beyond planning and decision making. People's ordinary conception of thinking includes imagining, remembering, interpreting, and caring. In order to understand the full scope and meaning of teachers' thoughts, researchers and teacher educators need to broaden and diversify their ideas of thinking. Contemplation is a process of thinking that although remote from action and utility, directs and supports the comprehensive practical life. Describing contemplation as devoted thought that is not deluded, the essay examines subject matter and children as objects of teachers' contemplative concern. The argument for the practicality of contemplation derives from a concept of practice going beyond what an individual teacher does or what typically can be observed in schools. The collective moral concept of contemplation invokes intrinsic ends and ideas of perfection so that constitutive fidelities of teaching made available in contemplation further teachers' professional development. Contains 15 references. (Author/CK)