Category: teacher education and development

Why ask teachers to 'transmit' knowledge…

…if you believe that "knowledge is constructed in the minds of students"?

Keith S. Taber

While the students in the experimental treatment undertook open-ended enquiry, the learners in the control condition undertook practical work to demonstrate what they had already been told was the case – a rhetorical exercise that reflected the research study they were participating in

A team of researchers chose to compare a teaching approach they believed met the requirements for good science instruction, and which they knew had already been demonstrated effective pedagogy in other studies, with teaching they believed was not suitable for bringing about conceptual change.
(Ironically, they chose a research design more akin to the laboratory activities in the substandard control condition, than to the open-ended enquiry that was part of the pedagogy they considered effective!)

An imaginary conversation 1 with a team of science education researchers.

When we critically read a research paper, we interrogate the design of the study, and the argument for new knowledge claims that are being made. Authors of research papers need to anticipate the kinds of questions readers (editors, reviewers, and the wider readership on publication) will be asking as they try to decide if they find the study convincing.

Read about writing-up research

In effect, there is an asynchronous conversation.

Here I engage in 'an asynchronous conversation' with the authors of a research paper I was interrogating:

What was your study about?

"This study investigated the effect of the Science Writing Heuristic (SWH) approach on grade 9 students' understanding of chemical change and mixture concepts [in] a Turkish public high school."

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

I understand this research was set up as a quasi-experiment – what were the conditions being compared?

"Students in the treatment group were instructed by the SWH approach, while those in the comparison group were instructed with traditionally designed chemistry instruction."

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

Constructivism

Can you tell me about the theoretical perspective informing this study?

"Constructivism is increasingly influential in guiding student learning around the world. However, as knowledge is constructed in the minds of students, some of their commonsense ideas are personal, stable, and not congruent with the scientifically accepted conceptions… Students' misconceptions [a.k.a. alternative conceptions] and learning difficulties constitute a major barrier for their learning in various chemistry topics"

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

Read about constructivist pedagogy

Read about alternative conceptions

'Traditional' teaching versus 'constructivist' teaching

So, what does this suggest about so-called traditional teaching?

"Since prior learning is an active agent for student learning, science educators have been focused on changing these misconceptions with scientifically acceptable ideas. In traditional science teaching, it is difficult for the learners to change their misconceptions…According to the conceptual change approach, learning is the interaction between prior knowledge and new information. The process of learning depends on the degree of the integration of prior knowledge with the new information.2"

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

And does the Science Writing Heuristic Approach contrast to that?

"The Science Writing Heuristic (SWH) approach can be used to promote students' acquisition of scientific concepts. The SWH approach is grounded on the constructivist philosophy because it encourages students to use guided inquiry laboratory activities and collaborative group work to actively negotiate and construct knowledge. The SWH approach successfully integrates inquiry activities, collaborative group work, meaning making via argumentation, and writing-to-learn strategies…

The negotiation activities are the central part of the SWH because learning occurs through the negotiation of ideas. Students negotiate meaning from experimental data and observations through collaboration within and between groups. Moreover, the student template involves the structure of argumentation known as question, claim, and evidence. …Reflective writing scaffolds the integration of new ideas with prior learning. Students focus on how their ideas changed through negotiation and reflective writing, which helps them confront their misconceptions and construct scientifically accepted conceptions"

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

What is already known about SWH pedagogy?

It seems like the SWH approach should be effective at supporting student learning. So, has this not already been tested?

"There are many international studies investigating the effectiveness of the SWH approach over the traditional approach … [one team] found that student-written reports had evidence of their science learning, metacognitive thinking, and self-reflection. Students presented reasons and arguments in the meaning-making process, and students' self-reflections illustrated the presence of conceptual change about the science concepts.

[another team] asserted that using the SWH laboratory report format in lieu of a traditional laboratory report format was effective on acquisition of scientific conceptions, elimination of misconceptions, and learning difficulties in chemical equilibrium.

[Another team] found that SWH activities led to greater understanding of grade 6 science concepts when compared to traditional activities. The studies conducted at the postsecondary level showed similar results as studies conducted at the elementary level…

[In two studies] it was demonstrated that the SWH approach can be effective on students' acquisition of chemistry concepts. SWH facilitates conceptual change through a set of argument-based inquiry activities. Students negotiate meaning and construct knowledge, reflect on their own understandings through writing, and share and compare their personal meanings with others in a social context"

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

What was the point of another experimental test of SWH?

So, it seems that from a theoretical point of view, so-called traditional teaching is likely to be ineffective in bringing about conceptual learning in science, whilst a constructivist approach based on the Science Writing Heuristic is likely to support such learning. Moreover, you are aware of a range of existing studies which suggest that in practice the Science Writing Heuristic is indeed an effective basis for science teaching.

So, what was the point of your study?

"The present study aimed to investigate the effect of the SWH approach compared to traditional chemistry instruction on grade 9 students' understanding of chemical change and mixture concepts."

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

Okay, I would certainly accept that just because a teaching approach has been found effective with one age group, or in one topic, or in one cultural context, we cannot assume those findings can be generalised and will necessarily apply in other teaching contexts (Taber, 2019).

Read about generalisation from studies

What happened in the experimental condition?

So, what happened in the two classes taught in the experimental condition?

"The teacher asked students to form their own small groups (n=5) and introduced to them the SWH approach …they were asked to suggest a beginning question…, write a claim, and support that claim with evidence…

they shared their questions, claims, and evidence in order to construct a group question, claim, and evidence. …each group, in turn, explained their written arguments to the entire class. … the rest of the class asked them questions or refuted something they claimed or argued. …the teacher summarized [and then] engaged students in a discussion about questions, claims, and evidence in order to make students aware of the meaning of those words. The appropriateness of students' evidence for their claims, and the relations among questions, claims, and evidence were also discussed in the classroom…

The teacher then engaged students in a discussion about …chemical change. First, the teacher attempted to elicit students' prior understanding about chemical change through questioning…The teacher asked students to write down what they wanted to learn about chemical change, to share those items within their group, and to prepare an investigation question with a possible test and procedure for the next class. While students constructed their own questions and planned their testing procedure, the teacher circulated through the groups and facilitated students' thinking through questioning…

Each group presented their questions to the class. The teacher and the rest of the class evaluated the quality of the question in relation to the big idea …The groups' procedures were discussed and revised prior to the actual laboratory investigation…each group tested their own questions experimentally…The teacher asked each student to write a claim about what they thought happened, and support that claim with the evidence. The teacher circulated through the classroom, served as a resource person, and asked …questions

…students negotiated their individual claims and evidence within their groups, and constructed group claims and evidence… each group…presented … to the rest of the class."

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013
What happened in the control condition?

Okay, I can see that the experimental groups experienced the kind of learning activities that both educational theory and previous research suggests are likely to engage them and develop their thinking.

So, what did you set up to compare with the Science Writing Heuristic Approach as a fair test of its effectiveness as a pedagogy?

"In the comparison group, the teacher mainly used lecture and discussion[3] methods while teaching chemical change and mixture concepts. The chemistry textbook was the primary source of knowledge in this group. Students were required to read the related topic from the textbook prior to each lesson….The teacher announced the goals of the lesson in advance, wrote the key concepts on the board, and explained each concept by giving examples. During the transmission of knowledge, the teacher and frequently used the board to write chemical formula[e] and equations and draw some figures. In order to ensure that all of the students understood the concepts in the same way, the teacher asked questions…[that] contributed to the creation of a discussion[3] between teacher and students. Then, the teacher summarized the concepts under consideration and prompted students to take notes. Toward the end of the class session, the teacher wrote some algorithmic problems [sic 4] on the board and asked students to solve those problems individually….the teacher asked a student to come to the board and solve a problem…

The …nature of their laboratory activities was traditional … to verify what students learned in the classroom. Prior to the laboratory session, students were asked to read the procedures of the laboratory experiment in their textbook. At the laboratory, the teacher explained the purpose and procedures of the experiment, and then requested the students to follow the step-by-step instructions for the experiment. Working in groups (n=5), all the students conducted the same experiment in their textbook under the direct control of the teacher. …

The students were asked to record their observations and data. They were not required to reason about the data in a deeper manner. In addition, the teacher asked each group to respond to the questions about the experiment included in their textbook. When students failed to answer those questions, the teacher answered them directly without giving any hint to the students. At the end of the laboratory activity, students were asked to write a laboratory report in traditional format, including purpose, procedure, observations and data, results, and discussion. The teacher asked questions and helped students during the activity to facilitate their connection of laboratory activity with what they learned in the classroom.

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

The teacher variable

Often in small scale research studies in education, a different teacher teaches each group and so the 'teacher variable' confounds the experiment (Taber, 2019). Here, however, you avoid that problem 5, as you had a sample of four classes, and two different teachers were involved, each teaching one class in each condition?

"In order to facilitate the proper instruction of the SWH approach in the treatment group, the teachers were given training sessions about its implementation prior to the study. The teachers were familiar with the traditional instruction. One of the teachers was teaching chemistry for 20 years, while the other was teaching chemistry for 22 years at a high school. The researcher also asked the teachers to teach the comparison group students in the same way they taught before and not to do things specified for the treatment group."

Kingir, Geban & Gunel, 2013

Was this research ethical?

As this is an imaginary conversation, not all of the questions I might like to ask are actually addressed in the paper. In particular, I would love to know how the authors would justify that their study was ethical, considering that the control condition they set up deliberately excluded features of pedagogy that they themselves claim are necessary to support effective science learning:

"In traditional science teaching, it is difficult for the learners to change their misconceptions"

The authors beleive that "learning occurs through the negotiation of ideas", and their experimental condition provides plenty of opportunity for that. The control condition is designed to avoid the explicit elicitation of learners' idea, dialogic talk, or peer interactions when reading, listening, writing notes or undertaking exercises. If the authors' beliefs are correct (and they are broadly consistent with a wide consensus across the global science education research community), then the teaching in the comparison condition is not suitable for facilitating conceptual learning.

Even if we think it is conceivable that highly experienced teachers, working in a national context where constructivist teaching has long been official education policy, had somehow previously managed to only teach in an ineffective way: was it ethical to ask these teachers to teach one of their classes poorly even after providing them with professional development enabling them to adopt a more engaging approach better aligned with our understanding of how science can be effectively taught?

Read about unethical control conditions

Given that the authors already believed that –

  • "Students' misconceptions and learning difficulties constitute a major barrier for their learning in various chemistry topics"
  • "knowledge is constructed in the minds of students"
  • "The process of learning depends on the degree of the integration of prior knowledge with the new information"
  • "learning occurs through the negotiation of ideas"
  • "The SWH approach successfully integrates inquiry activities, collaborative group work, meaning making" – A range of previous studies have shown that SWH effectively supports student learning

– why did they not test the SWH approach against existing good practice, rather than implement a control pedagogy they knew should not be effective, so setting up two classes of learners (who do not seem to have been asked to consent to being part of the research) to fail?

Read about the expectation for voluntary informed consent

Why not set up a genuinely informative test of the SWH pedagogy, rather than setting up conditions for manufacturing a forgone conclusion?

When it has already been widely established that a pedagogy is more effective than standard practice, there is little point further testing it against what is believed to be ineffective instruction.

Read about level of contol in experiments

How can it be ethical to ask teachers to teach in a way that is expected to be ineffective?

  • transmission of knowledge
  • follow the step-by-step instructions
  • not required to reason in a deeper manner
  • individual working
A rhetorical experiment?

Is this not just a 'rhetorical' experiment engineered to produce a desired outcome (a demonstration), rather than an open-ended enquiry (a genuine experiment)?

A rhetorical experiment is not designed to produce substantially new knowledge: but rather to create the conditions for a 'positive' result (Figure 8 from Taber, 2019).

Read about rhetorical experiments

A technical question

Any study of a teaching innovation requires the commitment of resources and some disruption of teaching. Therefore any research study which has inherent design faults that will prevent it producing informative outcomes can be seen as a misuse of resources, and an unproductive disruption of school activities, and so, if only in that sense, unethical.

As the research was undertaken with "four intact classes" is it possible to apply any statistical tests that can offer meaningful results, when there are only two units of analysis in each condition? [That is, I think not.]

The researchers claim to have 117 degrees of freedom when applying statistical tests to draw conclusions. They seem to assume that each of the 122 children can be considered to be a separate unit of analysis. But is it reasonable to assume that c.30 children taught together in the same intact class by the same teacher (and working in groups for at least part of the time) are independently experiencing the (experimental or control) treatment?

Surely, the students within a class influence each other's learning (especially during group-work), so the outcomes of statistical tests that rely on treating each learner as an independent unit of analysis are invalid (Taber, 2019). This is especially so in the experimental treatment where dialogue (and "the negotiation of ideas") through group-work, discussion, and argumentation were core parts of the instruction.

Read about units of analysis

Sources cited:

  • Ausubel, D. P. (1968). Educational Psychology: A cognitive view. Holt, Rinehart & Winston.
  • Kingir, S., Geban, O., & Gunel, M. (2013). Using the Science Writing Heuristic Approach to Enhance Student Understanding in Chemical Change and Mixture. Research in Science Education, 43(4), 1645-1663. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11165-012-9326-x
  • Taber, K. S. (2019). Experimental research into teaching innovations: responding to methodological and ethical challenges. Studies in Science Education, 55(1), 69-119. doi:10.1080/03057267.2019.1658058 [Download]
Notes:

1 I have used direct quotes from the published report in Research in Science Education (but I have omitted citations to other papers), with some emphasis added. Please refer to the full report of the study for further details. I have attempted to extract relevant points from the paper to develop an argument here. I have not deliberately distorted the published account by selection and/or omission, but clearly am only reproducing small extracts. I would recommend readers might access the original study in order to make up their own minds.

2 The next statement is "If individuals know little about the subject matter, new information is easily embedded in their cognitive structure (assimilation)." This is counter to the common thinking that learning about an unfamiliar topic is more difficult, and learning is made meaningful when it can be related to prior knowledge (Ausubel, 1968).

Read about making the unfamiliar familiar

3 The term 'discussion' might suggest an open-ended exchange of ideas and views. This would be a dialogic technique typical of constructivist approaches. From the wider context its seems likely something more teacher-directed and closed than this was meant here – but this is an interpretation which goes beyond the description available in the original text.

Read about dialogic learning

4 Researchers into problem-solving consider that a problem has to require a learner to do more that simply recall and apply previously learned knowledge and techniques – so an 'algorithmic problem' might be considered an oxymoron. However, it is common for teachers to refer to algorithmic exercises as 'problems' even though they do not require going beyond application of existing learning.

5 This design does avoid the criticism that one of the teacher may have just been more effective at teaching the topic to this age group, as both teachers teach in both conditions.

This does not entirely remove potential confounds as teachers interact differently with different classes, and with only four teacher-class combinations it could well be that there is better rapport in the two classes in one or other condition. It is very hard to see how this can be addressed (except by having a large enough sample of classes to allow inferential statistics to be used rigorously – which is not feasible in small scale studies).

A potentially more serious issue is 'expectancy' effects. There is much research in education and other social contexts to show that people's beliefs and expectations influence outcomes of studies – and this can make a substantial difference. If the two teachers were unconvinced by the newfangled and progressive approach being tested, then this could undermine their ability to effectively teach that way.

On the other hand, although it is implied that these teachers normally teach in the 'traditional' way, actually constructivist approaches are recommended in Turkey, and are officially sanctioned, and widely taught in teacher education and development courses. If the teachers accepted the arguments for believing the SWH was likely to be more effective at bringing about conceptual learning than the methods they were asked to adopt in the comparison classes, that would further undermine that treatment as a fair control condition.

Read about expectancy effects in research

Again, there is very little researchers can do about this issue as they cannot ensure that teachers participating in research studies are equally confident in the effectivenes of different treatments (and why should they be – the researchers are obviously expecting a substantive difference*), and this is a major problem in studies into teaching innovations (Taber, 2019).

* This is clear from their paper. Is it likely that they would have communicated this to the teachers? "The teachers were given training sessions about [SWH's] implementation prior to the study." Presumably, even if somehow these experienced teachers had previously managed to completely avoid or ignore years of government policy and guidance intending to persuade them of the value of constructivist approaches, the researchers could not have offered effective "training sessions" without explaining the rationales of the overall approach, and for the specific features of the SWH that they wanted teachers to adopt.

Reviewing initial teacher education

Some responses to the "Initial teacher training market review"

A 'market' review

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

The UK Government's Department for Education (responsible for the school system in England) is currently undertaking what it called a 'market review' of initial teacher education (ITE) or initial teacher 'training' as it prefers to describe ite. (Arguably, 'education' suggests broad professional preparation for someone who will need to make informed decisions in complex situations, whereas 'training' implies learning the skills needed for a craft.)

The aims of the review are certainly unobjectionable:

The review has aimed to make well informed, evidence-based recommendations on how to make sure:

• all trainees receive high-quality training
• the ITT market maintains the capacity to deliver enough trainees and is accessible to candidates
• the ITT system benefits all schools1

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/initial-teacher-training-itt-market-review/initial-teacher-training-itt-market-review-overview

Despite such intentions clearly being laudable, the actual proposals (which, inter alia, can be seen as looking to further increase central government control over the professional preparation of teachers) raised concerns among many of those actually involved in teacher education.

The consultation

There was a public consultation to which all interested were invited to respond. Since the consultation closed, the Secretary of State (i.e., senior minister) for Education has changed, so we await to see whether this will derail the review.

The review is wide ranging, but there is a widespread view that once again government is seeking to reduce the influence of academic education experts (see for example, 'Valuing the gold standard in teacher education'), and my colleagues still working in university-school based ITE partnerships certainly felt that if all the proposals were brought to fruition such partnership would be at risk. Not that Universities would not be able to contribute, but they would not be able to do so in a way that allowed full quality control and proper planning and sustainable commitment.

My own University, Cambridge, has suggested

We cannot, in all conscience, envisage our continuing involvement with ITT should the proposals be implemented in their current format.

Government ITT market review consultation, Faculty of Education website

Some discussion on one teachers' email list I subscribe to, provoked me me decide to look back at my own consultation responses.

A selective response – and a generic default hole-filler

I have not worked in I.T.E. for some years, and so did not feel qualified to comment on all aspects of the review. However, there were some aspects of the plans (or at least my interpretation of what  was intended) that I felt would put at risk some of the strongest and most important aspects of high quality teacher preparation.

As being able to submit a response to the consultation required providing a response at every section (a cynic might suggest that expecting full completion of such a long consultation document is a disincentive for most people to contribute), I used a generic statement to cover those questions where I  did not feel I had anything informed and useful to say:

I am aware of concerns raised in responses by the Russell group of Universities, the University of Cambridge (of which I am an emeritus officer), and Homerton College, Cambridge (of which I am a senior member). I concur with these concerns, and rather than seek to reproduce or mirror all of their comments (already available to you), I refer you to those responses. Further, I am offering some specific comments on particular issues where I have strong concerns based on my past experiences as a PGCE student teacher; as a teacher in comprehensive secondary schools; as a school/college-based mentor supporting graduates preparing for teaching in schools and also in a further education context; as a researcher exploring aspects of student learning and the teaching that supports it; as a lecturer and supervisor on initial teacher education courses as part of University-School training partnerships; as a supervisor for teachers in post undertaking school-based research; as an advisor to schools undertaking context-directed research; and as a lecturer teaching graduates how to undertake research into educational contexts.

Here are my more specific responses highlighting my particular concerns:

Individual differences

Having worked in initial teacher education as well as having been a school teacher, I am well aware that one of the most important things anyone working in the education sector has to appreciate is individual differences – between pupils, between teachers, between classes, between schools, and between new-entrants. Too much focus on uniformity is therefore unwelcome and likely to reduce the quality of the highest provision which takes this into diversity into account, Similarly, genuinely 'rigorous' sequencing of the educational experience will be responsive to individual needs and that would be welcome. However, uniform and inflexible sequencing, which would be far from rigorous, would be damaging.

Being equipped to engage with research

I am aware that the diversity in routes for new entrants now available has reduced the quality of training experience available to some new teachers. In particular, the fully professional teacher has to be a critical reader of research, and to have the tools and confidence to undertake their own small-scale context based enquiry to develop their own practice.

Table 1 from Taber, 2010

This is essential because the research shows clearly that whilst it is sometimes possible to identify some features of best practice that generalise across most teaching contexts, this is by no means always the case. Teaching and learning are highly complex phenomena and are strongly influenced by contextual factors. So, what has been found to 'normally' work best will not be the best approach in all teaching contexts. Teachers needs to be able to read research claims critically

(there are always provisos

  • most studies are small-scale where strict generalisation is simply not possible,
  • few studies are sufficiently supported with the resources to test ideas across a wide range of contexts; and
  • experimental studies which are the gold standard in the natural sciences are usually problematic in education
    • as randomisation {a critical aspect of true experimental research} is seldom possible, and
    • there is seldom the information or means to characterise populations sufficiently to build representative samples;
    • moreover the complexity of educational contexts does not allow the identification (let alone control) of all relevant variable, and
    • there are some key known factors which influence results when double-blind methods are not viable
      • – a situation that is very common when testing innovations in educational practices as teachers and learners are usually well aware of deviations from normal practice)

and identify the most promising recommendations when taking into account their own teaching context (i.e., what is referred to as reader or naturalistic generalisation) and test out ideas in their own classrooms, and iteratively develop their own practice.

Sadly, whilst the M-level PGCE type programmes usually support new teachers in introducing these skills, this does not seem to necessarily be the case on some other routes.

On 'intensive' practice placements

I consider this is a misguided notion based on a flawed conceptualisation of teaching and teacher skills. It is certainly the case that generally speaking teachers develop their skills over time with greater teaching experience, and that all other things being equal, the more direct teaching experience a new entrant has during the period of initial teacher education the better, as long as this is productive experience.

However, teaching is a highly complex activity that requires making myriad in the moment decisions in response to interactions with unique classes of unique people. The quality of those decisions tends to increase over time with experience, but only if the teacher is well prepared for the teaching in terms of subject knowledge, general and specialist pedagogic knowledge, and knowledge of the particular learners.

This requires that the teacher has extensive preparation time especially when new to teaching a topic, age, group or pedagogic approach, and opportunities for productive debrief and reflection. Given the intensity of teaching as an experience, it is much better for new entrants to initially focus on parts of lessons with plenty of opportunity for preparation and reflection than to too quickly progress to whole lessons where much of the experience will not be fully processed before moving on. Similarly, it is better that new teachers have sufficient time between classes to focus intensely on those classes rather than be moving directly from class to class.

In the same way, the programmes that allow regular movements between the teaching context and an HEI or similar context offer an ideal context for effective learning. The intense focus on the school is broken up by time in faculty (still focused, but as a student without the intense scrutiny in school), where there are extensive opportunities for peer support (especially important given the extreme highs and lows often experienced by new teachers).

Partnerships of Universities with Schools offer new entrants complementary expertise, and opportunities for 'iteration' – moving between the 'graduate student' and 'teaching department member' contexts 2 (Figure 1 from Taber, 2017)

This is also critical for developing teaching that is informed by research-informed and evidence-based theories and constructs. Being taught 'theory' in an academic context, and expecting such content to be automatically applied in a teaching context is unrealistic – rather the new teacher has to learn to conceptualise actual classroom experience in terms of the theory, and to see how to apply the theory in terms of actual teaching experience. 2

This learning is best supported by an iterative process – where there are plenty of opportunities to reflect on and analyse experience, and compare and discuss experiences with peers, as well as with mentors, other experienced teachers, and with academic staff. Over time, as new teachers build experiences, especially ones they recognise as productive and successful, they will come to automatically apply ideas and skills and techniques, and will be able to 'chunk' component teaching moves into longer sequences – being able to work effectively for sequences of whole classes, with less reflection time, and less explicit support. 3

The aim is for the new teachers to be able to prepare, teach, assess, on something approaching a teaching timetable whilst working in school full-time. However, efforts to move to such a state too quickly will [be counter-productive] for many potentially excellent teachers, and will likely increase drop-out rates.

Ultimately, the quality of the teaching experience, and the ability to manage increasing workload according to individual needs, is what is important. Any attempts to increase the intensity of the teaching placements, or to accelerate the rate at which new teachers take on responsibility without recourse to individual circumstances is likely to be counterproductive in terms of retention, and the quality of the 'training' experience in supporting the development of excellent teachers.

I am very pleased that I would not be 'training' nor still working in teacher education under such expectations as I think the incidents of crises, mental health issues, and drop-out, would be likely to increase.

On common timetables for progress

As suggested above, any attempt to tightly quantify these things would be misplaced as it removes the ability of providers to manage the process to seek the best outcomes for individual trainees, and it ignores the responsibilities of teachers and schools to ensure that trainees are only given responsibilities as and when they are ready.

Please remember that every class taught by a trainee contains children or young people who are required to be in school and are entitled to be taught by someone who

  • is prepared for class,
  • confident they are ready to teach that class, and
  • is not under such intense stress that they cannot perform to their potential.

You have a responsibility to consider the pupils as well as to your 'market'.

On applying research evidence

A postgraduate award is meant to include a strong research component. As suggested in earlier comments, it is essential for the fully professional teacher who will need to make informed decisions about her own classroom practice to be be provided with the skills to access research (including understanding strengths and weaknesses of methodology), critique it, evaluate its potential relevance to the immediate teaching and learning contexts, and to evaluate it in the context. Many PGCE-MEd and PGCE-MA programmes already support this.

I totally agree that this should be provided to all new trainees, and would have thought there are enough HEIs with expertise in educational research for this to be possible (as it is on the PGCE-M route already). However, it is not enough to simply provide teachers the skills, they also have to have

  • access to research publications,
  • time to
    • read them and
    • undertake small-scale context-directed enquiry, and
    • to give them the confidence that this aspect of professional practice is recognised and appreciated.

For example, a teacher has to know that if they are doing something differently to some government advice because they have looked at the research, considered it in relation to their specific context, and evaluated approaches in their own teaching context and concluded that for a particular class/course/students some approach other than that generally recommended is indicated, THEN this would be recognised (e.g., in Inspections) as praiseworthy.

On 'incentives that could encourage schools and trusts to participate in ITT'

I would think it is dangerous and perhaps foolish to add to schools' expected responsibilities where they do not welcome this.

On proposed reforms on the recruitment and selection process

To me, this seems to complicate matters for a PGCE applicant who at the moment has to only select a university-schools partnership.

Potential equality impacts

As discussed above, in my experience current arrangements, at least for the PGCE route, offer flexibility to meet the individual needs of a range of new entrants. My sense is the proposals would be unhelpful in this regard.

Comments on 'any aspect'

I was lucky enough to undertake my PGCE at a university that at the time was recognised as one with excellent provision in my teaching subjects (chemistry and physics, at Nottingham Trent). At that time the structure of the teaching placement (two isolated blocks, one of 4 weeks, one of 8 weeks) did not allow the kind of incredibly valuable iterative experience of moving between the university and school contexts I discuss above, and the teachers in the schools did not act as mentors, but merely handed over their classes for a period of time.

Otherwise I was very happy with my 'training' experience.

I was also privileged to work for about 10 years in initial teacher education in a PGCE university-schools partnership that has consistently been awarded the very top inspection grades across categories. I have therefore seen much excellent initial teacher education practice in a stable partnership with many committed (if diverse) schools. We were also able to be pretty selective in recruitment, so were working with incredibly keen and committed new teachers.

If (some) university-schools partnerships (such as that based at the University of Cambridge) are recognised as excellent, why change the system in ways that threaten those providers?

Despite this, I know some of our excellent new recruits went through serious periods of doubt and crises in their teaching due to the intense and highly skilled nature of the work. In the context where I was lucky enough to work, the structure of the training year and the responsive and interactive nature of managing the graduates in their work meant that nearly always these setbacks were temporary, and so could be overcome.

I am concerned that some of this good practice may not continue if some of the proposals in the review are carried through – and that consequently a significant number of potentially excellent new teachers will not get the support they need to develop at the pace that best matches their needs. This will lead to drop-out, and early burn-out – or potentially candidates doing enough to cope, without meeting the high standards they wish to set for themselves to the benefit of their pupils.

Keith S. Taber

1 It strikes me that the third bullet point might seem a little superfluous – after all, surely a system of initial teacher education that both maintains the supply of new teachers at the level needed (which in some subjects would be a definite improvement on the existing system) and ensures they all receive high quality preparation should inherently benefit all schools by making sure there was always a pool of suitably qualified and well-prepared teachers to fill teaching vacancies across the school curriculum.

Perhaps, however, this means something else – such as (in view of the reference to 'incentives that could encourage schools and trusts to participate in ITT' in the consultation) making sure all schools receive funding for contributing to the preparation of new teachers (by making sure all schools make a substantial contribution to the preparation of new teachers).

2 It strikes me that the way in which teachers in preparation are able to move back and forth between a study context and a practitioner context, giving opportunities to apply learning in practice, and to 'stand back' and reflect on and conceptualise that practice, reflects the way science proceeds – where theory motivates new practical investigations, and experience of undertaking the empirical enquiry informs new theoretical refinements and insights (which then…).

3 That is, the pedagogic principles which teachers are expected to apply when working with their students are, in general terms, just as relevant in their own professional education.

Work cited:

Valuing the gold standard in teacher education

A response to 'The importance of teaching'

[First published in 2011]

Image by mauriciodonascimento from Pixabay

The government are about to1 publish a white paper on education2 that will set out intentions for the future of teacher education (teacher 'training'). The expectation is that there will be a shift from University-based teacher education, to school-based training. By university-based, the government will mean such routes into teaching as the Post-graduate Certificate in Education, or PGCE, which has long been considered the major way of preparing to teach in secondary schools. However, such courses have not really been University-based for many years. Indeed, there are good reasons to believe that the PGCE represents a 'gold standard' in teacher preparation that has evolved towards an optimal mode of teacher preparation.

I was trained on a PGCE course about 30 years ago. At that time, I spent twice as much time in the University, as in schools. Moreover, the school-based practices were blocks of time in school, with minimal input from teaching staff, largely seen as an opportunity to practice the theoretical ideas being taught in the university lectures. The PGCE today is quite unlike this. The students admitted have good degrees in their disciplines – and, often, higher degrees – making them strong subject specialists. During the 36-week PGCE course these students spent two-thirds of their time working in schools. Moreover, this work is interspersed with time in the university in a schedule allowing university-based teaching to carefully support, prepare for, and allow careful reflection upon, school experience. University teaching is not lecturing about abstract theory, but introducing basic principles of learning and pedagogy, essential information about school structures and the curriculum, and a detailed induction into the nature of subject-specific pedagogy: things that the new teachers can apply directly in the classroom.

In the schools, where these 'trainees' spend most of their time, teachers act as their mentors and managers. Schools are partners with the university, and the teaching is shared between university and school staff. Unlike the 'being left to get on with it' mentality of teaching practice during my own training, these days the new teachers are carefully inducted, working alongside an experienced teacher who provides a structured introduction to teaching. Each trainee has a flexible, individualised learning plan, and negotiates with their mentor the rate at which they incrementally take on more responsibility for teaching classes. Trainees work within overlapping communities, as both members of school teaching departments and as part of a group of peers within their subject specialism, supported by an expert subject-specialist educator within the University. It offers the best of both worlds.

Figure 1 from Taber (2017)

In the past decade, the Post-graduate teaching certificate has really become a gilt-edged award, as courses have developed to reflect the Master's level status of the qualification, making sure that trainee teachers are working at the forefront of scholarship in their specialist area: science education, or maths education, or English education etc. In particular, PGCE courses provide trainees with the knowledge and skills that support classroom enquiry. Trainees undertake small-scale research projects during school placements, which ensure that they have the skills to critically draw upon existing research, and practically tackle problems in their own teaching. In my own institution, this work is impressive enough for us to have started an on-line journal to share PGCE student work with the teaching community (http://jotter.educ.cam.ac.uk/). This prepares PGCE graduates to be full professionals:

  • experts in their own discipline;
  • experts in the teaching of their subject;
  • and skilled to tackle problems, and find ways to improve their own practice.

Many teachers prepared through this route, go on to complete practice-based Master's degrees in education.

The excellence of many PGCE courses has been demonstrated not only by Ofsted inspections3, but also by the evaluations of both the graduates who take this route into teaching, and the schools in which they work. Over many years the PGCE has evolved to balance the needs of providing a solid grounding in the theoretical basis of effective teaching; positive and carefully supported classroom experience; induction into working in teams in schools, and levels of critical, analytical and research skills expected of a Master's level qualification. It is indeed the 'gold standard' in initial teacher education, and would only be sacrificed by a government who values a cheaply prepared and uncritical teaching force, over a body of professionals who are experts in teaching their subjects. Let us trust that does not prove to be the case.

Keith S. Taber

1 This piece was written in 2010 (when much of my teaching was on the PGCE programmes at Cambridge) and published as a blog posting on the Academia social media site (an edited version was also published as an opinion piece in 'Science Teacher Education'). Having recently had to think back to this in the context of the current 'market (sic) review' of Initial Teacher Education ('training') being carried out in England (see 'Reviewing initial teacher education'), I discovered that the original blog posting seems to have now disappeared from the www.

[Despite clear indications that the UK government wished to move the responsibility of initial teacher preparation away form Higher Education 'led' partnerships to school-based consortia, this only happened to some extent. If initial teacher education is considered a market, it was clear that many (if certainly not all) of the the 'clients' preferred to train in the university-school partnership routes. Whether the current [2021] 'market' review, which seems designed in part to make it more difficult for Universities to remain as key partners in I.T.E., will change this situation remains to be seen.]

2 The importance of teaching. Presented to Parliament
by the Secretary of State for Education, November 2010

3 Ofsted is the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills – a government directed inspection service.

Work cited:

Taber, K. S. (2017) Working to meet the needs of school pupils who are gifted in science through school-university initial teacher education partnerships, in Sumida, M., & Taber, K. S. (Eds.). Policy and Practice in Science Education for the Gifted: A.pproaches from diverse national contexts. Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge. pp.1-14.