This author explains why he believes that teacher education is under attack. The same forces that are seeking to dismantle teachers' unions and de-professionalize teaching have their sights set on university-based teacher education programs. After all, logic decrees that if teachers are to blame for educational inequality--as corporate education…

Fifty years ago, students at Harvard University and the University of California, Berkeley, were publishing guides rating teachers and courses. Irreverent and funny, they featured pungent comments. Unfortunately, what originated as a light-hearted dope sheet for the use of students has, at the hands of university and college administrators, turned…

Rather than being neutral, teacher education is grounded in a set a values that are culturally defined and politically transmitted. These values, and their political significance in terms of power and control issues, go far toward defining the educational experience that students and teachers, both in the schools and in universities, have.…

Nostalgically reviews a student teacher's experience with a class of ninth grade nonreaders. (JK)

Testing for admission to a teacher education program, testing subject matter knowledge, testing competence, and testing a teacher's understanding of children are all discussed. The value of a continuing program of evaluation of prospective teachers is stressed. (Author/MT)

Evaluation methods lack direction to improve efforts of teachers because the methods operate on vague impressions. Congruence analysis techniques offer promise for diagnostic determination of strengths and weaknesses in teaching practices over a variety of specified criteria. The analysis circumvents some of the problems of linking objective data…

A school can assemble a winning teaching team by taking lessons from sports talent recruitment programs. Schools should search for early talent and ask education professors to identify promising student teachers. Contracts should be offered immediately to final round draft choices. (CJH)

This essay distinguishes between the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act's narrow definition of highly qualified teachers and the full range of skills and knowledge teachers must have to teach all children effectively. It asserts that the NCLB's lack of distinction between minimally and highly qualified teachers, along with rapid implementation…

Student teachers need to have high quality cooperating teachers as mentors for the development of the best reading teachers possible. The mentor needs to assist the student teacher to achieve diverse attitudes in the teaching of reading. First, the student teacher should be a consumer of reading materials with an appetite for reading. Second, the…

This article primarily focuses on the representation of the manner in which the activity is presented to the students, both in terms of how it is structured as a set of experiences and of the actual tasks that students learn.

Argues that the simple inclusion of reflection (intentional self-examination of thinking) in student teaching is insufficient and that both supervising teacher and student teacher need to examine what they understand by reflection and what they mean by teaching. The unexamined use of reflection compounds difficulties already inherent in…

Discusses the ways that videotape technology can be used to help evaluate and advise preservice teaching activities of student teachers. Describes a method by which teachers videotape their own class session for the purpose of self-evaluation. Argues for the benefits of such a method. (HB)

The general problems of standard preservice teacher education programs are described and recommendations for long-term improvements to them are made. A model teacher education program is outlined and discussed. (JL)

Outlines recent efforts to analyze, document, or enhance the impact of collegiate teacher preparation on teaching, learning, and practice. Includes examples from empirical studies or reviews, national initiatives to make teacher preparation more assessment based and evidence driven, and regional efforts to assess the impact of naturally occurring…

Examines how reflection has been discussed in teacher education, presenting data from a longitudinal study of 10 teacher apprentices that investigated the experience of becoming reflective through a portfolio process and identifying developmental elements of reflection. The study notes that student teachers consistently report little formal…