Many reforms in past decades have come and gone without having the desired impact on teaching practices. Two shared ideals that reforms have had are offering challenging content by using whole tasks and tailoring student guidance to what students need for effective learning. In this article, we aim to bridge the reform-practice gap by taking a…

The relationship between theory and practice in teacher training has been discussed extensively in the world of education. Both theoretical and practical knowledge are fundamental to teachers' engagement in educational activities. However, the question of where this knowledge comes from and how it develops over time has yet to be answered. As…

Research in developing teacher and learner thinking highlights the challenges in translating theoretical constructs into changed practice. One Australian study tracked teacher thinking across school contexts over the proposed three-year timeframe of one professional learning programme. The programme framed a shift in learner and teacher thinking…

This study aims to unveil the complexity of introducing and sustaining instructional improvement at a school site by documenting successes and challenges encountered by a research-practice partnership among university researchers, school and district leaders, and a mathematics coordinator from the county office of education. The study answers two…

This article attends to student teachers' 'stuck moments,' or emotional moments of crisis, in a social justice-oriented teacher education program (SJTE). It seeks to problematise the familiar tendency of viewing student teachers' stuck moments as symptomatic of the theory-practice gap. By troubling both the representational logic that undergirds…

Much of the formal professional development teachers experience consists of short-term workshops that maintain -- rather than disrupt -- the systems of power that reproduce educational inequities. In response, some scholars have advocated critical professional development (PD) as a means of supporting teachers' interrogation of these inequities…

The current study is a collective self-study on how we as 15 teacher educators at a university in Norway tried to improve our teaching through working with cases with the aim of better supporting student teachers in making links between theory and practice. We wanted to address the common criticism in teacher education concerning a perceived gap…

There is a need to strengthen the theory-practice connection, particularly for early-career mathematics teachers, through effective professional development (PD) programs that integrate theory and research with the implementation of classroom practices. The current study investigates the effect of the online coaching component a hybrid…

This study deals with novice teachers' mentors' conceptions of mentoring prior to their mentoring training. In Israel, all novice teachers have to be supported and assessed by a mentor during their first year of teaching. The aim of this study was to elicit from prospective mentors their own conception of professional mentoring, as a basis for…

This article addresses the need for 'coherent, holistic frameworks offering insightful understandings as well as viable, connected and synergistic solutions to schools'. We describe a model which emerged from a research study developed in the context of a professional development course attended by more than 150 teachers from primary and secondary…

With a continuing disconnect between structural changes to the work of teaching and the work of teachers engaged with students in classrooms, this paper addresses a growing need to attend to the way teacher professional development (TPD) is enacted in today's schools. Specifically, drawing from theories of teacher learning and numerous models of…

This study explores the specific characteristics of teacher-educator professional development interventions that enhance their transformative learning towards stimulating the inquiry-based attitude of students. An educational design research method was followed. Firstly, in partnership with five experienced educators, a professional development…

This article reflects on my 2005 article in this journal, entitled "Models of Continuing Professional Development: a framework for analysis". Having been invited to reflect on the original article as part of Professional Development in Education's 40th anniversary celebrations, I have taken the opportunity not only to reflect on the…

This paper explores the role of teacher educators in schools and universities in England and the changes that have arisen within the field of initial teacher training (ITT) as a result of the Coalition Government's (2010-2015) School Direct initiative. The discussion which follows and the conclusions suggested are live, current and of pivotal…

There is limited research investigating models of partnering between University and Schools in initial teacher education (ITE). This project investigated, over a 10 year period, how student teachers in an English University on a one year course, draw on theoretical models, introduced in university sessions, when planning for a 'creative week'…