Teacher-as-researcher: a foundational principle for teacher education

One of the most important principles in educating to teach is the notion that teachers are also researchers of their own practice. The pedagogic cycle of understanding -> preparing -> instructing -> assessing -> reflecting, is, as we have long argued (la Velle and Newman 2022), an upward spiral of learning and growing comprehension. To teach is to learn. This increasing understanding can be of subject (content) knowledge; pedagogic content knowledge; digital pedagogy; matters of equality and diversity; out-of-school education, etc. The articles in this issue of JET reflect these themes and add to the increasing body of evidence for the underpinning role of research as a vital element of good teacher education.

Over the last 40 or so years, teachers and teacher educators have been engaged with the development of the special pedagogy associated with the educational use of computers and information and communications technologies. We have now entered what has been termed the postdigital state. Put simply, this is the intersect between the human condition and the technological: how we interact and work with technology in its various and expanding forms. Our first four papers are concerned with this.

Tan Jin and colleagues address the matter of digital competence and its relationship with developing teacher identity of Chinese student teachers. They found that information literacy, communication and collaboration and digital security had a positive impact on the development of their individual identities as teachers. These authors emphasise the importance of bridging the gap between personal and professional use of technology. This can of course be a fine-drawn line, especially in the advent of artificial intelligence – about which much more to come.

The next article comes from Benjamin Moorhouse from Hong Kong, a frequent JET flier, who presents an exploratory study into the impact on student teachers’ professional learning of a virtual – instead of face-to-face – teaching abroad experience. Cultural insight and pedagogic innovation were the reported gain, which, as the author candidly acknowledges, is better than no overseas teaching experience but not a patch on an immersive and extended period in an overseas school setting.

Another form of simulated learning experience for student teachers is the focus of the next article, from Rose Sebastian and her colleagues, educational consultants. To inform the future development of educative simulations, these researchers collected data from transcripts of student teachers engaging in simulated parent-teacher consultations. Student teachers’ strengths included giving positive feedback about the pupil to the parents/carers, but found challenging situations such as receiving personal disclosure more difficult. Basing these findings on the diagnosis of areas for professional development, targeted, individualised simulations can prove very helpful to student teachers learning to strike the important balance between collaboration and productivity in parent/carer/teacher meetings.

The body of research literature about the impact of the CV-19 pandemic and lockdown on emergency remote teaching is vast: its urgency and necessity producing a burgeoning of innovative technical and pedagogic approaches, expanding our postdigital understanding of how face-to-face teaching and learning can be adapted. The next paper, from Effat Alvi of the University of Punjab, gives an interesting exemplification of this. Pakistani student teachers undertook a four-week online teaching practice and were surveyed before, during and after the experience. Unsurprisingly at the outset, they were apprehensive, not believing that it would be a comparable practice, not wanting to change or engage, concerned about their technical ability, etc. However, factors such as focussed observation and feedback, critical reflection and peer support combined to create a positive learning experience for these student teachers. In the postdigital age, this is another example of better than nothing, but nothing like the real thing.

The impact of the pandemic on people’s mental health is widely acknowledged and reported. The next article, from Xunyi Lin and Jesus Alfonso D. Datu reports on the importance of kindness in university education, noting the positive effect this has on emotion regulation, life satisfaction and psychological flourishing, especially in the post-pandemic context. This is particularly important for the university education of student teachers.

We now turn to a series of papers about equality and diversity in teacher education, starting with an article from Vini Lander and colleagues from the UK and Spain. They surveyed student teachers’ attitudes and preparedness to teach in ethnically diverse schools in those two countries. The student teachers – mainly White – across both countries showed an acceptance of racial diversity but reported a need for better initial teacher education in this area. Perhaps, this might be economically and easily provided by simulation resources – a positive use.

Jana Obrovská and her colleagues from the Czech Republic and Austria continue in the theme of preparation of student teachers for pupil diversity, finding that in general university courses model differentiated instruction well, but the student teachers, in their practicum, demonstrate this unevenly. Addressing the needs of all learners is a high-level teaching skill, rarely acquired in the early stages of teacher education courses. No doubt failure to include everyone is an uncomfortable reflective focus for student teachers and teacher educators alike, and this is the focus of the next article from Meghna Nag Chowdhuri and Louise Archer from the UK. They report on a research-development project looking at the experiences of teacher educators during a nine-month equity-oriented professional development programme. Analysis of the written reflections of the participants identified three foci that supported justice-oriented practice: personal privilege in relation to race, class, gender and academic discipline; the norms and values of educational professional development; and practical implementation of justice-orientated professional development with teachers and schools. Within a ‘safe and brave space’ for critical reflection, these authors emphasise and discuss the productive potential of experiences of discomfort that generated humility, empathy and insights and resulted in more equitable practice.

The underrepresentation of women in science is the focus of the next article, by Jorge Alcántara-Manzanares and colleagues from Spain. They report on a curriculum development initiative, led by student teachers in practice schools, to encourage greater knowledge and understanding of women’s contributions to science and how this can be brought into young children’s learning. Encouraging findings were that both Early Years teachers and children found it engaging and motivating. Clearly, the value to the student teachers lay in the major part they played in the practice-based research.

Continuing with the theme of science education, Brian Hand and colleagues from the USA present a powerful and evidenced argument for the need for professional development in generative learning environments, i.e. those in which meaningful connections can be made between new information and pre-existing knowledge. An innovative model is presented, the Science Writing Heuristic, which showed that teachers learn about the implementation of new pedagogic approaches in a complex, non-linear manner as they understand and use a range of epistemic language tools, dialogue and argumentation that underpin such a generative learning environment. Such systematic evaluation of innovative practice in teaching is a hallmark of the teacher-researcher.

The final two full papers in this issue focus on under-researched, non-standard educational settings: small rural schools and hospital schools. Xiaojing Yan and Bingqing Li, from China and Australia, respectively, addressed the issue of preparing early career teachers (ECTs) for work in ‘under-resourced, challenging’ rural schools in China, where there is a chronic teacher shortage. Drawing on learning and resources from their pre- and in-service professional development experiences, the ECTs who were the foci of a series of case studies, showed increasing resilience and consciousness of place. In her study of learning to teach in a hospital setting, Lucrezia Tomberli and colleagues from Italy found that there is little formal training for teaching hospitalised children. The need for teachers to acquire medical as well as didactic skills, flexibility and personalisation of teaching is highlighted. An important finding was the need for children not to lose touch with their class if they have to stay in hospital for an extended period. Facilitating online opportunities could play a vital part in this, providing an educative experience for both the children in hospital and their classmates.

The papers in this issue conclude with a single Research-in-Progress piece by Luis Dos Santos from Korea, who briefly reports on the motivation and experiences of second career teachers from the engineering industry.

Teachers working in isolation, be it a hospital or a remote school, or rising to the challenge of the diverse classroom, or grappling with new technologies or simply pursuing their career-long acquisition of professional knowledge all clearly exhibit the heroic characteristics reported previously (la Velle 2021): Hope, Efficacy, Resilience and Optimism. Development of these qualities through targeted professional learning, underpinned by and infused with research, has never been a more urgent matter for the teacher education community to address than it is now in our postdigital, post pandemic world.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).