University strategic plans emphasise the essential nature of partnerships at national and international levels. Along with establishing collaborative research partnerships, providing professional development to key stakeholders is considered a crucial activity for making and sustaining partnerships. Utilising knowledge from professional…

Professional development for teacher educators is critical in a rapidly changing environment where graduate teachers are expected to have 21st Century skills and knowledge. As made explicit in a recent report on teacher education in Australia, "the evidence is clear: enhancing the capability of teachers is vital to raising the overall quality…

There are increasing calls to improve the quality of Teacher Education by reconceptualising the connection between university-based coursework and the teaching practicum. In response, the School of Education at RMIT University, Melbourne, Victoria redesigned courses in its first year program to interconnect the two spaces of universities (first…

Despite reported shortages of teachers world-wide, around 50% of teacher education students do not establish themselves in the teaching profession. It is therefore important to confirm the career pathways these students undertake and that teacher education degrees are of benefit to them throughout their career. This paper describes the method used…

This paper explores ways in which Teacher Education can be implemented in higher education through a consideration of "site-based" teacher education and its role in strengthening the practice-theory notion of teacher education (Strategic Education Research Program, National Research Council 1999). Many innovative educational approaches are…

This autoethnography focuses on a study undertaken during the writers 15 month employment in a Muslim girls' school in the United Arab Emirates. The paper outlines a school improvement project in the Abu Dhabi Emirate and the imposition of an Australian curriculum on the schools involved in this program. The teachers in these schools were exposed…

There is a dominant paradigm of teacher education within the teaching profession; that only through the experience of undertaking professional practice can a student become a teacher. This approach, the "apprenticeship of observation" model (Borg, 2004 using the term coined by Lortie, 1975) describes the way in which teacher education students are…

Supporting Teachers as Action Researchers (STAR) explores how school improvement initiatives may be sustained over time. It represents stage one of a broader investigation into how teachers' professional learning may be enhanced by positioning teachers as practitioner researchers and professionals who are capable of generating change from within…

Communities of practice challenge the traditional notion of learning as receiving knowledge which is essentially disembodied from practice. A community of practice is grounded by two central tenets: essentially that learning is situated, and that practice is made meaningful through reflection with others who engage in the shared experience. In…

The research reported here aims to develop understandings around the expectations and perceptions of Canadian students entering a Graduate Diploma of Education program in an Australian university. The study align well with the theme of "crossing borders", as the study focuses on international students "crossing borders" to…

It is not unusual for academics to bemoan the reticence of teachers in adopting innovative tools and pedagogies, never more so than in the area of new technologies and multimodal literacies in classrooms. Typically, educational bureaucracies seek to dictate change in new technologies through a diffusion-adoption model of professional learning…

This presentation is concerned with the professional relationships between teachers and paediatricians in supporting children with special educational needs to reach their full potential. In England, both professions are subject to government legislation and guidance with regard to their own professional practice, including Every Child Matters…

The voices of students can make a significant contribution to understanding what constitutes accomplished teaching (Flutter, 2007). Young people give cogent and significant views about their learning, providing important insights for improving teaching (Rudduck, McIntyre, & ESRC Teaching and Learning Programme., 2007). Using a qualitative…

Interculturalism is a major theme that needs to inform the teaching and learning of all subjects in teacher education courses. Moreover, the practicum is an area where there needs to be more attention given to developing the attributes of an intercultural teacher. In 2008 I took a group of thirteen teacher education students on a three-week…

Teaching literacy requires accurate and current knowledge in the field (Commonwealth of Australia, 2005). There have been persistent inquiries into what constitutes specialist knowledge and skills for teaching students to be literate. Preservice teacher education is fundamental to literacy development, which includes the approaches universities…