Within this issue of "Teacher Education Quarterly," the authors examine the social justice knowledge of teachers, reflective practices, and predictors of performance on the Educative Teacher Performance Assessment (edTPA). This article is a response to those articles and offers continued probes into who should be allowed to teach our…

Teacher reflectivity has become significant to practice and research in teacher education and development. The literature on teacher reflectivity is substantial, and reflection has come to be widely accepted as a central factor in the professional growth of teachers. In contemporary research and practice, teacher reflectivity has come to refer to…

Discusses the need to address spiritual beliefs in teacher education, arguing that: because spiritual impulses are so primary for many people, they must be addressed in teacher education; educators must recognize and cultivate students' spiritual motivations to teach and foster reflectivity; and student teachers must learn what they can legally…

In order for teachers to reflect deeply upon themselves, they need powerful models and images to guide their introspection. In teacher reflectivity, as in the therapeutic processes, psychic energy must ultimately be "contained" by models and modalities that enable one to make sense out of one's inner and outer experiences. This enables those…

The focus of this paper will be one of the authors' transformation from reluctant teacher-researcher to empowered teacher-researcher. The authors will describe Shayla's journey through action research because it was this journey from circumspection to empowerment that strengthened her in ways that she had not foreseen or anticipated. It allowed…

Many teacher education programs are working at a feverish pitch to ensure that their graduates are considered "highly qualified" in light of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation, which reduces teacher competency to proof of subject matter knowledge as demonstrated by passing a state test and completing requisite number of courses in the…

Examines personal literacy portfolios as a tool to extend teacher literacy and breathe life into the curriculum, offering examples of teachers' knowledge as it forms in their portfolios. Over three years, the reflective summaries that 250 preservice and inservice teachers wrote about their portfolios were examined, providing insight into five…

This article offers a description of critical literacy practice and/as professional development as it evolved in a teacher inquiry group investigating critical literacy. The authors describe this professional development experience as an instance of critical literacy in practice. The entirety of this article is a collaborative product in which the…

Throughout the literature, teacher education is often described as being based on a specific tradition, paradigm, or agenda. Examples of these descriptions include: behavioristic, personalistic, inquiry-oriented, social reconstructionist, academic, developmentalist, and social-efficiency. These approaches are closely linked to the "beliefs and…

Highlights the importance of teacher educators co-constructing knowledge with student teachers within reflective environments, examining co-teaching within a social constructivist framework in one teacher education program. The paper examines four primary roles for teacher educators as more experienced colleagues within a learning community:…

Discusses the use of aesthetic knowledge to grapple with transformational projects for engaging preservice teachers in critical examinations of self, exploring the teaching of philosophy, autobiographical experience, and cultural collage (which includes five layers: critical aesthetics; emergence, relationality, and transformation; teacher…

Anyone who works with new teachers must let them know that they should not have to make a choice between bringing up test scores or promoting lifelong learning. Mentor teachers must show beginning teachers how to be "passionate teachers," which the author defines as living a life as a reflective educator, making it a priority to build positive…

Professors from Australia's Queensland University introduce the concept of a "practernship" that is a variation of typical internship/apprenticeship programs for preservice teachers. The "practernship" combines practice teaching and internship, encourages collaboration and professional development, and promotes a holistic,…

Describes a model used in Santa Cruz (California) for supporting and assessing beginning teachers that moves away from traditional inservice education and staff development into ongoing teacher development. The program's emphasis on collegial partnerships, personal inquiry and reflection, and ongoing self-assessment is described in relationship to…