Tennessee began its movement toward Middle Level Licensure during the 2002-2003 school year. Only 14 years later, in 2016, Middle Level Licensure in Tennessee will change. In this article, the background and experiences of seven middle level education teacher candidates at the University of Memphis who were the first candidates to complete the…

In this study, we examined dynamics of pedagogical involvement of 39 preservice teachers (PST) as they tutored students at a charter school serving lower income, diverse students. We qualitatively analyzed PSTs' initial predictions, refections following each tutoring session, our observations of college students' lessons, and final anonymous…

A study compared performance on the Area Concentration Achievement Test in Social Work (ACAT) of 32 undergraduates who had nearly completed a field practicum and 38 who had not begun it. Results showed no difference in the groups' knowledge of social work professional foundation overall or in individual content areas. Other variables that could…

This paper describes a survey of Texas teacher education programs. The programs investigated whether increased pressure on K-12 teachers to prepare students for mandated tests contributed to dissonance between higher education's expectations for field experiences and preservice students' actual experiences. A questionnaire was mailed to the…

A study was made of an early field practicum, in elementary education, which theoretically emphasized quantity and diversity in the students' field experiences and allowed them the opportunity to apply newly acquired curriculum methods and theories. Ten student teachers were intensively interviewed and observed over a six month period. It was…

Students enrolled in classes which stressed learning theory and human development served as subjects in an investigation of the predictive power of observation scores compared to more traditional predictors such as grade point average and ACT scores. A stepwise discriminant analysis was employed, using the BMDP7B program on the Sperry 1100 Univac,…