Neoliberalism permeates U.S. teacher education programs and governmental policy, consequently increasing market pressure in teacher education and stunting the development of justice-oriented teacher educators. In this self-study, we explored how four female early-career teacher educator researchers (FECTERs) navigate this context. Our arts-based…

This paper describes how we, a group of 7 emerging teacher educators, took up a critical inquiry framework to collaboratively generate knowledge through dialogic reflection on practice across educational contexts. We participated in culture circles and teatro as a practice of teacher education that centers love and humanizing practice. Together…

While research indicates that critical professional development (CPD) can function as an alternative to dominant forms of top-down, anti-dialogical professional learning in K-12 settings, there is limited research on CPD in higher education, or among teacher education faculty specifically. In this article, we examine how participation in a…

Rehearsals and other approximations of practice are often touted as effective pedagogies for preparing teachers to reproduce/replicate practices deemed universally beneficial. However, scholars have noted that reproducing practices across contexts risks undermining equity and justice. This article reports on a three-year project that examined the…

The people who prepare teachers -- teacher educators -- are often explicitly or implicitly held accountable for teacher quality and are frequently blamed when school students do not meet national or international expectations. Despite high expectations, historically there has been little attention to the education of teacher educators or to local…

Schools are increasing the time students spend learning to write, in part because of changing state standards. Studies of classroom practice suggest that most teachers devote little time to the teaching of writing, and many teachers report they do not feel prepared to teach writing. Here, we examine the titles and descriptions of required literacy…

The rationale, process, critical features, and lessons learned by faculty members during the redesign and implementation of our previously existing special education teacher education program into an innovative program integrating research-supported effective teacher education practices are described in this article. We begin with the rationale…

This reflective narrative explores the voices of two participants in the Early Childhood Professional Mentoring Group (ECPMG), created in response to our graduates' concerns about their lack of support as they entered the field of inclusive early childhood education. Building on their existing relationships with each other, and with us as their…

Drawing on our experiences as teacher educators in two programs designed specifically to prepare teachers for particular contexts, this article illustrates how we design our courses to help new teachers link foundational understandings to specific teaching practices in particular school and classroom contexts. We describe our integrated approach,…

This article explores the nature of a federal intervention into teacher education through state policy making and problem framing. The authors examined the 16 comprehensive educator equity plans that were approved by the U.S. Department of Education in 2015 and surface four inadequacies the reports communicate about teacher education: (a) an…

This study investigated how closely related the perceptions of student teachers were to those of the clinical educators and university supervisors who evaluated them in subject-specific content knowledge and teaching ability. Although our initial concern was low teacher self-efficacy, our study found student teachers consistently rated themselves…

This is a study of my dramatized narrative based on a true story of what took place in a mathematics class in an international school setting. My narrative includes the exploration of a mathematical "mistake" and the discovery of newly emergent problems. The drama, commentary, and reflections provide a close examination of the conduct…

This article responds to what seems a nearly ubiquitous call for teachers to be reflective practitioners. Despite near consensus that self-reflection benefits the classroom teacher, teachers struggle to apply this work to daily life in the classroom. Specifically, using Donald Schön's terminology, we find that successful teachers must…

The purpose of this qualitative study is to investigate how new educators respond to pedagogical tasks that require them to use and reflect upon their Teacher Language Awareness (TLA). TLA is defined as a teacher's ability to use, analyze, and teach language--an increasingly important part of teachers' knowledge base given high numbers of English…

In response to calls to resituate teacher preparation in clinical settings, teacher educators are increasingly repositioning their work in PK-12 contexts. In this article, we describe our efforts to connect theory and practice through site-based course instruction and explore how such experiences informed teacher candidates' perceptions of their…