Teacher Training and Development

by

Dorothea Anagnostopoulos, Juanita Beatriz Bautista Guerra, Carleen Carey, Sakeena Everett

• LAST REVIEWED: 12 July 2019
• LAST MODIFIED: 27 July 2016
• DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199756810-0048

Introduction

Teacher training and development refer to the processes and practices through which teachers gain, deepen, and expand their professional knowledge, skills, and dispositions. These processes and practices are complex and occur both over the course of teachers’ careers and across multiple contexts, including universities, schools, and professional networks and associations. Though the research and practice of teacher training and development employ diverse disciplinary perspectives, they share a central concern with identifying both what teachers should know and be able to do to foster student learning, and which programs, practices, and policies best support teachers’ learning. While these are, in part, technical questions, how scholars and practitioners think about, enact, and study teacher training and development are shaped by a wide array of influences, including their diverse disciplinary perspectives, the models of “good” teaching they adhere to, their understanding of teachers’ work and teachers’ learning, and their beliefs about the goals and purposes of education. These influences are further situated within particular historical and political contexts. In particular, the goals and purposes we ascribe to teacher learning and development, the resources we devote to it, and the ways in which we organize and evaluate it are intimately tied to the shifting politics and policies of both educational and social reform movements. The citations included in this bibliography lead a user to works that examine the individual and organizational processes and practices of teacher training and development and how these are shaped by the institutional and political contexts in which they are situated. In addition to works that have significantly influenced the research and practice of teacher training and development, they include works that are breaking new ground and those that provide comprehensive examinations of key issues in the field.

General Overviews

The following works provide the reader with an introduction to the central ways in which teacher training and development have been conceptualized and studied. Feiman-Nemser 2001 delineates the continuum of teaching training and development, from pre-service teacher education to induction to professional development, and identifies the core learning tasks teachers encounter at each stage. Gage 1978 and Lanier and Little 1986 represent seminal statements of the two central paradigms that have undergirded the research and practice of teacher training and development: the training model and the learning model, respectively. While the 1980s witnessed a shift from the training model to the learning model, the former has persisted. Its influence can be seen in current educational accountability policies that emphasize teachers’ adoption of observable teaching behaviors whose effectiveness is measured by standardized test scores. Taken together, Gage 1978 and Lanier and Little 1986 help illuminate a core set of tensions that exist within the field. Extending the learning model, Putnam and Borko 2000 develops a “situative” perspective that highlights the influence of social and organizational contexts on teacher learning and development. Richardson 2001 and Cochran-Smith and Zeichner 2005 provide comprehensive overviews of current research and practice while offering recommendations for future agendas regarding both.

• Cochran-Smith, Marilyn, and Kenneth Zeichner. 2005. Studying teacher education: The report of the AERA Panel on Research and Teacher Education. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

  Important synthesis and assessments of existing research on teacher education. Identifies what is known about the relationship between teacher education, teaching, and student learning and identifies a research agenda for improving the knowledge base for teacher education.

• Feiman-Nemser, Sharon. 2001. From preparation to practice: Designing a continuum to strengthen and sustain teaching. Teachers College Record 103.6: 1013–1055.

  DOI: 10.1111/0161-4681.00141

  Widely cited article that identifies the central tasks, conventional arrangements, and promising programs and practices at each of the three stages of the professional learning continuum for teachers: pre-service education, induction, and professional development.

• Feuer, Michael J., Robert E. Floden, Naomi Chudowsky, and Judie Ahn. 2013. Evaluation of teacher preparation programs: Purposes, methods, and policy options. Washington, DC: National Academy of Education.

  Report of the National Academy of Education in the United States that examines key methodological and policy issues related to the evaluation of teacher preparation programs.

• Gage, Nathaniel L. 1978. The scientific basis of the art of teaching. New York: Teachers College.

  Influential statement of the training model of teacher development that emphasizes the mastery of specific observable teaching behaviors and competencies.

• Lanier, Judith E., and Judith W. Little. 1986. Research on teacher education. In Handbook of research on teaching. 3d ed. Edited by M. C. Wittrock, 527–569. New York: Macmillan.

  Seminal review of research on teacher education that marks the shift to a learning model of teacher education and development that emphasizes teachers’ knowledge, reflection, and decision making as they are shaped by individual, organizational, and institutional contexts.

• Putnam, Ralph T., and Hilda Borko. 2000. What do new views of knowledge and thinking have to say about research on teacher learning? Educational Researcher 29.1: 4–15.

  DOI: 10.3102/0013189X029001004

  Seminal statement of the “situative” perspective on teacher learning and development, which asserts that both are situated in physical and social contexts, social in nature, and distributed across individuals, groups, and tools.

• Richardson, Virginia, ed. 2001. Handbook of research on teaching. 4th ed. Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association.

  Compendium of comprehensive reviews of research on a wide range of issues related to teaching and teachers. Readers interested in teacher training and development will find the chapters on the knowledge base for teaching, teacher change, and policy of particular interest.