The importance of teacher cognition in curriculum implementation and the role of conceptual metaphor in teachers' thinking are equally well documented, yet the role conceptual metaphor might play in teachers' knowledge of curriculum has received less research attention. Drawing on a range of qualitative data, this study examines how five novice…

In this article Karl Hostetler portrays teachers as tragic ironists whose existence is prone to "playful disruptions of the soul," when the meaning and value of ideas pertinent to teaching--including "teaching" itself--become puzzling, prompting a reassessment and reinvigoration of those ideas. In developing his concept of…

This paper traces 120 student teachers' professional identity transformation during practicums in China and US. By eliciting the participants' 240 written metaphors at the start and the end of the teaching practicums respectively, this study reveals the change of the embodied metaphors revolving around four arenas: (1) from idealistic expectations…

This paper explores metaphors as a process of professional learning, and as a research method to interrogate professional knowledge landscapes (PKLs) within the flexible space and time of online pre-service teacher education. The methodology comprised five pre-service teacher educators with different disciplinary areas of responsibility engaging…

Over the past few decades there has been increased interest in how students and teachers think and learn about negative numbers from a variety of perspectives. In particular, there has been debate about when integers should be taught and how to teach them to best support students' learning. This book brings together recent work from researchers to…

Using the analytical tools of broadening, burrowing and storying and restorying, this narrative inquiry examines a middle school teachers' knowledge of her pedagogical practices through the strand of pearls' metaphor that she employs to explain her teaching to herself, a beginning teacher whom she mentors and ourselves as researchers. Throughout…

As new media proliferate, professors need to be particularly attentive to the ways by which students learn--in and out of the classroom--and how scarce classroom time can be organized. This article argues that professors' comparative advantage lies as an exemplar of discipline-based thinking. Effective training in how to think about problems (the…

In this methodological discussion, the authors detail and reflect on the processes of using photo-elicitation interviewing as a way to align with positive qualitative methodologies, to gain access to participant beliefs and values, and to highlight participant voices through their choices of words and visuals. A review of the literature and an…

In this article, the author explores her observations of preservice teachers' technological literacy as it is often enacted across iterations of a writing methods course. Using personal examples and classroom anecdotes, the author argues that the construct of "digital native" is flawed and, instead, the author positions preservice…

My dissertation investigates teachers' thinking within that "oscillating place of difference" that is the classroom. I propose that teachers think and see differently in the classroom because they have practiced, like travelers, the dynamic thinking which makes them open to novelty, attentive to difference, reflective wayfarers on…

This essay explores the nature of what teachers know by examining trends in teacher knowledge research, specifically the use of conventional metaphors to describe teacher knowledge. Contending that conventional metaphors fail to acknowledge the complex and multidimensional nature of teacher knowledge, the author argues that novel metaphors should…

In 1965, Memmi introduced the concept of a protectorate. "Whenever the colonizer states, in his language, that the colonized is a weakling, he suggests thereby that this deficiency requires protection. From this comes the concept of a protectorate" (pp. 147-8). While this concept is 45 years old, it is an apt metaphor for thinking about…

Secondary student performance in the domain of reading has been a cause for concern for educators and scholars alike. To understand the demands placed on students we must first understand how reading changes within content areas and across grades. Furthermore, we must have an understanding of teachers' conceptions about the texts they teach. This…

How can teachers teach digital citizenship when the digital landscape is changing so rapidly? How can teachers teach proper online social interactions when the students are outside their classroom and thus outside their control? Will encouraging students to engage in global collaborative environments land teachers in hot water? These are the…

In this article we review the notion of teacher knowledge from four metaphorical standpoints--teacher knowledge as "computer", as "craft", as "complexity" and as "change". We employ each of these metaphors to examine and analyse the work of one teacher of science. We draw implications from our analysis for teacher education, teacher development…