This paper reports on an investigation carried out in New Zealand into experienced elementary and student teachers' beliefs about the nature and purpose of social studies education. Since its inclusion in New Zealand's curriculum, social studies has been organized around the notion of citizenship education with curricula and programmes of work…

Research has shown that undergraduate disciplinary study provides new teachers with knowledge schemas derived from their discipline. The key question considered in this article is: what existing disciplinary knowledge do pre-service music teachers call upon to construct their schemas of global education? This is a critical question as global…

This study further extends a conceptual framework that explores science teaching as a "practice" not reducible to the application of formal knowledge, but as informed by teachers' practical-moral knowledge. A hermeneutic model was developed to examine practical-moral knowledge "indirectly" by investigating teachers'…

Background: A major consequence of the neo-liberal ideology underpinning recent reforms in higher education in the Western world has been the significant increase in the competitiveness of institutions to recruit students in the marketplace of education and to keep them. Accordingly bachelor degrees relating to physical education teacher education…

The current study examines the personal epistemology of fourth-grade elementary school teachers from Germany (n = 10) and the United States (n = 10) to gain a more nuanced understanding of teachers' beliefs about knowledge and knowing through a cross-cultural lens. Analyses of semi-structured interviews reveal similarities and differences in the…

It is highly likely that teachers' abilities in dealing with different forms of learning difficulties will be affected by their knowledge about and attitudes towards those difficulties. Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) provides a useful framework within which to explore such attitudes and was used as the starting point for investigating…

The United States is becoming increasingly diverse with the largest growth in Hispanic populations. Diversity also is increasing in rural America. This diversity is reflected in the participants in early care and education programs and K-12 students. Unfortunately, demographics for college and university teacher education programs do not match…

To address the need of scientists and engineers in the United States workforce and ensure that students in higher education become scientifically literate, research and policy has called for improvements in undergraduate education in the sciences. One particular pathway for improving undergraduate education in the science fields is to reform…

This ex-post-facto designed study was geared towards assessing the readiness of would-be teachers in universities in Cross River State for the teaching profession, and how reforms can be managed to strengthen this. Three hypotheses were isolated to give direction to this investigation. 200 students from the two universities in the state…

The aim of this study is to find out what teachers say their primary focus is when planning to teach an object of learning. The study is carried out in two different cultural contexts, Sweden and Hong Kong, and based on the framework of variation theory, which has a two-fold focus, namely both what teachers do and what students learn at school.…

The purpose of this paper is to reveal findings from two qualitative studies with White, female practitioners in the field of multicultural/special education that examined (a) how White women's social, cultural, and professional identities and experiences influence their praxis with diverse families and students; and (b) promising practices in…

Prospective foreign language teachers need to have an accurate knowledge and a positive perception of the target language and target culture so that they can help their students gain further insight on culture by and large. Hence, by means of a questionnaire, prospective English language teachers' (n = 412) perceptions of the target language and…

Teacher preparation programs play an essential role in this nation's elementary and secondary education system, which relies on them to recruit, select, and prepare approximately 200,000 future teachers every year. Strong programs recruit, select, and prepare teachers who have or learn the skills and knowledge they need to be hired into teaching…

This study intends to identify the effectiveness of the English teachers training program of elementary school English teachers in Riau province, Indonesia. The study also intends to identify the further needs of the English teachers in attending the training program. Fifty five English teachers who had attended the training program were the…

To reduce teacher shortages, an intern credential has been introduced as a means of alternate certification in California. Individuals who meet the requirement of subject matter competency are eligible for an intern credential, allowing them to teach students in special education programs for two years while completing their coursework…