Conservatoires train musicians to high levels of proficiency in performance and other 'principal study' disciplines, but often, teaching is perceived as a second-class profession, and little is known about how music students learn to facilitate music making in others. Yet, conservatoires have a responsibility to contribute to the development of…

The article raises questions about how argumentation is situated in science and religious education. Argumentation is about the justification of claims with reasons and evidence. It is a way of reasoning in both science and religious studies. A current 3-year research and development project entitled "Oxford Argumentation in Religion and…

This paper presents a critical overview of the way in which higher education institutions (HEIs) in the UK have had their research activity subject to review. There have been six such reviews to date, the first two carried out by the Universities Grants Committee and, from 1992, by its replacement, the four UK higher education (HE) funding bodies…

This article offers an initial account of the Teacher Education Research Network (TERN), a pilot education research capacity building project funded by the ESRC and designed to test a "social practices" model for building an educational research infrastructure across England. The TERN project is still running at the time of writing, so…

This article examines what both in-service and pre-service trainee teachers learn from their early experience of teaching in further education (FE) colleges in England. Despite differences between in-service and pre-service trainees, that early experience is often characterised by isolation and lack of control over practice for both groups.…

This paper discusses some of the conditions that have facilitated the use of a customised virtual learning environment as part of a blended learning approach on a part-time postgraduate initial teacher training programme for prospective primary school teachers. It is based on data gathered as part of a study of the impact of e-learning on students…

Over the past decade international discussions of pedagogy have increasingly clustered around a few ubiquitous and popular ideas drawn ostensibly from psychological research. The internet has been a powerful force in disseminating and globalising pedagogically relevant research into such matters as metacognition, multiple forms of intelligence,…

This paper focuses on recent and innovative moves towards flexible learning in initial teacher education programmes in England and Wales, as part of the "widening participation" agenda in higher education and in response to changes in teacher recruitment patterns. We take as our perspective our own experience as two course tutors in a…

England's Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) requires that students, in order to qualify for teacher status, must undertake the study of law. This article reviews the TDA standards and considers its rationale for the selection of law. Such selection and the need, if any, to study law are contrasted with texts written for teachers…