In the past decade, there has been important progress in the development and validation of video-based instruments that enable the systematic assessment of teaching competence with large samples of teachers, across multiple settings and populations, and by researchers other than the developers. This commentary focuses on the methodological…

Teacher education programs in countries where minoritized students experience systematic and persistent racial discrimination face tension between (1) producing teachers equipped to reverse discrimination in classrooms and schools, especially those attended by minoritized students, and (2) helping everyone considering teaching to develop their…

In this commentary, Laura Hetrick focuses on what is inherently missing from the art education literature about teaching future teachers of art--of addressing nascent teachers' personal, pedagogical, and professional desires. Specifically, she considers teachers' desires for power and recognition, their desires to love and be loved, and…

In this brief article, the author argues that if society defines schools as testing centers instead of learning centers where young people go to watch adults work, then teacher education programs are replaceable. Online technologies allow for the transmittal of information without the need for traditional classroom settings. However, if schools…

Both contemporary popular and scholarly discourse on teacher development and evaluation assumes the truth of a certain view of normative human behavior, one that holds that skill in a given domain is predicated upon the application of maxims, rules, or principles in a given situation. Such a view would allow one to isolate behaviors associated…

Drawing from the work of philosophers Sylvia Wynter and Ian Hacking, in this conceptual article I argue why a humanizing critical approach to sociocultural knowledge is needed for teacher education, particularly in preparing teachers to work effectively with black students. In light of enduring concerns in teacher education with improving the…

In this webinar, Dr. Carol Tomlinson of the University of Virginia presented the research base supporting the practice of differentiation and described the characteristics of effective differentiation. She led a discussion of how quality preparation can build and strengthen teachers' knowledge and skills in implementing differentiated instruction…

The work of schools and the work of universities are deeply interconnected; nowhere is this interconnection stronger than in the work of teacher education. Universities are challenged to produce more teachers and better teachers so that young people will have a vibrant and meaningful future. In these challenging times, universities must step up to…

Teacher educators are supposed to ensure that their preservice candidates and practitioners are equipped with the content knowledge, pedagogical skills, and dispositions that will help to create effective classroom teachers who serve as models of civic engagement for their students. Civic engagement is understood as being the act of making a…

In this wide-ranging interview with Educational Leadership, Stanford University Professor of Education Linda Darling-Hammond discusses the kind of preparation and support new teachers need to survive their critical first years in the classroom. Among her central recommendations are more intensive mentoring that lasts through the first year of…

Whenever there is a discussion on closing or bridging the achievement gap in education, one accurately reasons that the "gap" in question is among groups of students from various cultural and/or socioeconomic backgrounds. Stakeholders throughout academia, then, frantically search for solution(s)" to poor student achievement in…

In this paper we argue that special educators have a critical role to play in supporting children from diverse communities at times of vulnerability, which are created by the distance between the demands of the school context and the child's cultural context, and that increase the likelihood for school failure and for referral for or placement in…

Drawing on a national survey of New Zealand early childhood teachers' views on ethics and professionalism in their practice, this article discusses three key themes that emerged as core conceptual elements in how teachers in education and care settings defined professionalism. The three themes were: a distinct pedagogical style; specialist…

According to Schilling, Blunk, and Hill, the set of papers presented in this journal issue had two main purposes: (1) to use an argument-based approach to evaluate the validity of the tests of mathematical knowledge for teaching (MKT), and (2) to critically assess the author's version of an argument-based approach to validation (Kane, 2001, 2004).…

The specification of various categories of knowledge that teachers should possess has been a historically consistent feature of moves to professionalize school teaching and to argue for individual teachers' professional autonomy. In this article, I suggest that the ways in which subject knowledge has been treated in research-based recipes for…