Physical education (PE), and specifically the teaching area of dance, has been identified as an important pedagogical setting within which young people develop creativity. Creativity is thus an important aspect of schooling. Several studies have suggested however, that dance is seldom taught in PE in ways that acknowledge creative aspects of…

This study analyses how "active democratic participation" is conceptualised by sixteen teacher educators from eight institutions of higher education across four Nordic countries and how these conceptualisations are translated into their own teaching. Teacher educators' strong adherence to a liberal discourse on democratic education may…

In Sweden, although all teacher education programs require the completion of the practicum, little focus has been placed on consistent evaluation of how content knowledge is included and built during practicum lessons, or how lesson planning and teaching are aligned. This article presents a novel method for teacher educators, mentors, and student…

The aim of this paper is to investigate and compare lessons given in primary school teacher education in Japan, Finland and Sweden. We analyse one lesson from each country and compare them using a common framework. Chevallard's anthropological theory of the didactic (ATD) is used to frame this analysis and in particular to model teacher educators'…

Scholars have long questioned the impact of teacher education programmes. Persistent claims are that pre-service teachers have fixed ideas about pedagogy when they enter training and that they become enculturated once in the profession. Within physical education (PE), similar concerns have been raised with respect to ball games. Research suggests…

The aim of our study was to explore how collaborative learning processes unfold when teacher education students apply learning theories in order to learn how to teach Physical Education in a project carried out in addition to the regular teaching in PETE. In the project's social practice, 46 student teachers worked in groups to complete four tasks…

An increasing number of migrant teachers with a foreign teaching degree enter Swedish teacher education to complement their studies to become eligible to teach in Swedish schools. Digital competence is one of the central skills required of teachers in today's digitized information society. Within teacher education few studies examine how migrant…

Equity is an important topic in school context globally because international migration is rapidly diversifying schools and classrooms across the world. Teacher quality is seen strongly related to student outcomes than demographic characteristics of students, and therefore important for achieving equity. This explorative study investigates the…

Sweden is internationally regarded as an inclusive educational system. This study explores how teacher education programmes in Sweden have been organised as regards inclusive education (IE). Specifically, the study examines how teacher candidates and staff perceive teacher pre-service training for IE in terms of its curriculum and pedagogical…

In many countries, assessment for learning (AfL) is recommended in both policy and research as a concept that should be integrated into the teaching of physical education (PE) in schools. AfL is also part of physical education teacher education (PETE) programs in several countries and, consequently, something future PE teachers are expected to…

Professional knowledge for science teaching develops over time and interplays with professional experiences in field. In the present study, we explore student teachers' reflective conversation upon teaching experiences, with pedagogical content knowledge, PCK, as an analytical lens. The empirical data is based on nine meetings, with groups of 3-6…

Recent research and reform efforts in science education have consistently stressed the importance of coherent science instruction, in which learning opportunities are connected and contextualized by meaningful phenomena, focus on a small set of core ideas over time, and generate a need-to-know about new ideas through a set of connected lessons.…

Preparing the next generation of preschool teachers who can integrate and make use of ICT to capitalise on and develop young children's digital competences remains a challenging goal for teacher education programmes (TEP). Given the current gaps in the literature, this study aims to expand and deepen our understanding of the extent to which early…

This article aims to highlight how a scientific and critical approach is used in assessment dialogues during the last period of a practical, school-based teacher education programme. The result is based on 13 assessment dialogues conducted in a course at a Swedish university, where one of the course objectives is to, 'in a scientific way, analyse…

In 2011, new teacher education programmes were introduced in Sweden. This policy case study examines the outcome of the reform, focusing on the pedagogic discourses in the examination practise of the primary teacher education programme, but also on the possible effects of dividing teacher education for primary teachers into two specialisations:…