A team approach to practice teaching

The ideas presented in this paper were originally generated in a workshop at an NSPCC conference on Practice Teaching in March 1996. In this article we wish to develop some of these ideas further and explore the idea of a team approach to practice teaching. This is not some radical new notion, but an acknowledgement of the reality of many placements. Although a student will be allocated a practice teacher (and possibly an off-site practice teacher) he or she will not function by themselves but will be part of an organisation. It is this wider structure and its effects on the student that we feel needs closer scrutiny. Firstly, we believe that not enough attention has been given to the power that organisations can have over an individual (particularly one whose stay is only short-term and possibly part-time). Secondly, we believe students can obtain benefits from the wealth of knowledge existing in any team, drawing on the skills and expertise of all team members. When team learning works well we feel that it provides benefits for all parties - the student, the practice teacher, the team and service users.     

The religious and worldview dimension of intercultural education: the Council of Europe’s contribution

ABSTRACT

This article traces the Council of Europe’s work on teaching about religions and non-religious worldviews, regarded as an important contributor to intercultural education. It explains why studies of religions came late in the Council of Europe’s educational work and traces the development of a project which led to a Recommendation from its Committee of Ministers on teaching about religions and non-religious worldviews. It summarises follow-up work by the Council of Europe and the European Wergeland Centre, which led to the publication of Signposts. It outlines new research on themes identified in Signposts and discusses the relationship between intercultural education and studies of religions, in the context of the Council of Europe and responds to criticisms of its work. An account of the development of a new teacher training module, based on Signposts, is given. The module can be adapted for use in Council of Europe member states and in different settings, including university and school-based teacher training. An account is given of the work of the module’s writing group, its structure and chapters, the piloting undertaken and how it could develop. Finally, this article introduces the concept of ‘dialogical liberalism’, aiming to promote dialogue and discussion, rather than imposing equality.     

Roma Education in Eastern and Central Europe: some personal reflections

In this article I reflect on my experiences working on educational projects involving Roma in Eastern and Central Europe, especially in Bulgaria. I discuss one particular case study, in which a group of educational experts were able to get the Bulgarian Government to accept and later to support intercultural education materials on the Roma. I also outline an educational approach that I would like to call the “bottle party” approach to education, to be contrasted with the “vessel filling” approach. I close by describing a new initiative in informal education in Central and Eastern Europe that revolves around the concepts of empowerment and mentorship.     

Initial teacher education for inclusion: a review of the literature

This article presents a review of the literature on initial teacher education for inclusion published from 2000 to 2014. The analysis uncovers a number of aspects of concern to academics, researchers, teacher educators, and policy-makers. Making informed decisions about the design of initial teacher education courses and units of study for inclusion depends upon addressing some fundamental issues (i.e. the legacy of special education, and the challenges faced in different regions) and making a balanced and informed assessment of the value of content-infused, single-unit, and school placement/experience approaches. The article discusses the implications of this literature review’s findings for future research.     

An analysis of internationalisation and intercultural outlook in Swedish teacher education

Foucault's discourse concept provides an instrument for the critical examination of internationalisation and, respectively, inter‐cultural education in Swedish teacher education. Three different discourses concerning internationalisation are treated in the article: solidarity with developing countries, immigrant knowledge, and integration within the EU. Attention is focused on the analysis of intercultural teaching upon those visions that governed implementation of the concept in teacher education, and on reality as it appears in evaluations of teacher education. The question is whether a dilemma exists for teacher education in realising the goals of intercultural education, or whether these goals merely act as teacher education's false banners? The article concludes with perspectives on the future of the development from immigrant knowledge to intercultural learning.     

Stumbling towards oblivion or discovering new horizons? Observations on the relationship between social work education and practice

What should social work education be training students for? What should the relationship be between social work education and practice? The first half of this article cautions that social work education, as currently constituted, may 'unfit' people. Principally, this is because social work practice, as envisaged by employer interests, has not been subject to the same critical scrutiny as social work education and has come to dominate perceptions of the training task. The dangers that follow from this position are outlined. The second half of the article proceeds to explore the contribution that practice teachers and tutors can make to enable practitioners to remain confident, credible, critical and creative in this practice environment. The article concludes with some observations on the future as envisaged in the proposals to modernise social services and to create a General Social Care Council.     

Teaching to teach: An ethnographic exploration of a course in social work education

A large proportion of social work doctoral students are interested in pursuing a career in academe. Despite this career aspiration, few have any notion of what is involved in teaching. This article presents a dialogue about the experiences of both a teacher and preparing teacher/student during a doctoral course in social work education. Using an ethnographic approach, the article is written as a set of observations about a shared experience. Its aim is to highlight the process of learning to teach, the struggles of students to learn a new role, the perceptions of the teacher and student about how well the role is learned, and the learning opportunities this type of course affords to would-be educators and even an experienced educator. Codification of these experiences in preparing future educators for their role provides a basis for curriculum protocols that may be used by other social work education programs.     

Restoring "Regional" History Education: A prerequisite in promoting respect for other European and world histories

History teaching in the universities of the larger nation states of 19th- and early-20th-century Europe has often colluded in the repression of regional identities, the exacerbation of hostility between major powers and the neglect or even dehumanisation of non-European cultures. As European integration and regionalisation proceeds in the 21st century, and as smaller Eastern European states adjust to the disintegration of the former Soviet and Yugoslavian blocs, there will be increased interest in the role of historical education in helping to reconstruct national (small nation) or regional identities. It will be of crucial importance for democracy in Europe and beyond that these processes of group identity reconstruction adopt sophisticated and inclusive models, which do not simply replicate the simplistic and exclusive models once held in the larger nation states within which they have gained a measure of autonomy or from which they have seceded. As a first step, it will be necessary for regions or re-established nation states to develop histories which revisit and value local development. Establishing self-respect should confer the confidence to go on to recognise internal diversity and to acknowledge indebtedness to other cultures, including those from beyond Europe. Through teacher education, such histories may contribute significantly to the development of self-confident pluralist societies that welcome the human, economic and cultural exchange essential to the present and future well-being of Europe. At the end of the 20th century, there were signs in Europe's "regions" or former nation states, such as Scotland, of the development of positive and inclusive models. In this paper, Scotland is used as an example to illustrate general issues in such development.     

后现代主义教育观对应用性人才培养的反思

随着我国经济的快速发展,教育为经济服务的呼声也越来越高,导致功利性教育在部分高校出现后,学生批判性思维能力、实践创新能力得不到较好的培养。因此,在此背景下,以后现代主义教育观在教育目的、课程体系、教学方法、师生关系的观点,关注现阶段应用性人才培养具有现实意义。     

Operationalizing Social Justice in Social Studies Education

Although social justice is an overarching goal of most every department of teacher education, college of education, and US College or University, it is rarely an identified goal for K–12 schools. We contend that the field of social studies education also substantively focuses on social justice, and as such, this article clarifies the ways in which classrooms can provide a social justice education. In particular, we explore the role of dispositions, reflective thinking, and controversial issues, and the ways in which they position students to understand, confront, and undermine social injustices. Finally, we provide specific curricular ideas and points of departure for middle school and high school social studies teachers to operationalize social justice education within their classes.     

An argument for love in intercultural education for teacher education

This paper proposes rethinking intercultural education in teacher education, arguing that any discussion of student teachers’ intercultural education should be connected more explicitly to a theoretical conceptualisation of love. The first part of the paper focuses on identifying discursive boundaries in engaging with intercultural education in teacher education. It is argued that if we are to develop intercultural education, we need to consciously move away from some discourses in teacher education, namely instrumentalism, performance orientation, emotionlessness and seeing the relationship between teacher and learner as static. The second half of the paper develops a theoretical alternative by engaging with the concept of love as a basis for intercultural education in pursuing an alternative to the instrumentalist, performance-based, non-emotional fixed-relationship ethos of intercultural education in teacher education.     

Proceed with Caution: On Teaching and Therapy*

The importance of awareness as to the motivation of the leader or teacher who is involved in affective group process is elaborated in this article. Differentiations are made between manipulation and teaching and therapy and education. The importance of “allowing” as a ground rule for groups is described along with a rationale for this which includes factors such as readiness and motivation. The integration of the affective and cognitive domains in the curriculum (confluent education) is touched on in relationship to the conscious use of affective process in the classroom. Finally, the existential condition of the “Now” is described as a significant factor for guiding the behavior of the leader or teacher.     

In Memoriam

This article discusses the origin of social work education in Africa as an export of colonial powers. Social work or social work education has not been the product of a progressive social metamorphosis but rather that of foreign methodologies imposed on African societies. Consequently, the essence of social work education lacks relevance in terms of its philosophical, value and ideological base. Thus students who graduate from such a system of education tend to remain, to some extent, unfamiliar with indigenous knowledge systems and lack adequate knowledge in working with the people. The paper further argues that, while the origin of social work education is well known, its future direction, development and focus on the continent remain unknown, at worst haphazard, ad hoc and undirected with serious implications for the mission and vision of the profession. Social work in Africa has been without a platform to foster discourse on its nature, character and direction. Transformation of social work education from being Euro-centric to being Afro-centric has to be spearheaded by an organization that can provide a forum for dialogue, leadership and a contextual framework. The article therefore examines the need for such a forum and briefly discusses past efforts in this direction in an attempt to provide a direction for transformation.     

Action-research and the Production of Knowledge in a Teacher Education based on Inter/Multicultural Education

This paper proposes that the teacher, on the basis of action-research methodology, can produce two types of scientific knowledge: one based on the teacher as researcher (the teacher as ethnographer), and another based on the development of pedagogic action (the teacher as educator). The education of such a teacher, simultaneously a researcher and an educator, is carried out through the concretisation of that which has denominated the interface of intercultural education. The development of this interface renders possible the management of diversity by the teacher. This diversity is present both in the school, as well as, more specifically, in the classroom. It can also be seen as a source of wealth for the further deepening of the democratic nature of both the school and the education system.     

Minority‐Inclusive History Curricula in Secondary Schools: Adopting Methods of Comparison and Multiperspectivity

The study explores from a comparative perspective different strategies for history education reform that European countries have adopted in order to respond to political changes in Europe. Key to an understanding of these reforms are the underlying notions of citizenship reflected in history education. The author presents a set of criteria that could guide curriculum specialists and textbook authors to develop educational material which are based on an active and minority‐inclusive notion of citizenship. More specifically, allowing for multiple perspectives and comparison across and within nations is viewed as crucial for history curricula reform in multiethnic societies. She focuses on six aspects of history curricula that deserve scrutiny when reforming existing history education material and methods: curriculum versus framework, event‐centred versus theme‐centred history education, chronological versus inverse chronological sequence, traditional versus contemporary focus, national versus global scope, knowledge versus skills. The study also highlights three areas in which the hidden curriculum of history education is likely to be manifested: language, polarisations, and visual representations.     

Emotional Labour and Skill: A Reappraisal

The article seeks to open up a critical discussion around the idea of emotional labour as skilled work. It has been suggested by some commentators that many front‐line service jobs, traditionally thought of as low skilled in terms of their technical aspects, may actually constitute a form of skilled work, since they require their holders to perform skilled emotional labour in their dealings with customers. Such discourses hold out the possibility of progress not only in intellectual terms but also with regard to improving the status and pay of many low‐waged service workers. The article subjects these claims to critical scrutiny and argues that applying the label ‘skill’ to all forms of emotion work is extremely problematic.     

交通运输类职业院校双语教学的改革策略

中国不同层次的教育一般都会依据本层次教育实施双语教育的目的、教育的对象,教师的专业素养、双语教育的内容、双语教育的政策法规等构建有本层次教育特色的双语教学模式或策略。文章拟对不同教育层次的人才培养目标进行分类,对国外双语教育的主要模式进行分析述评,进而在剖析国外双语教育模式的特征与交通运输类职业院校实施双语教育模式的利弊和实施条件的基础上,提出构建具有交通运输类职业院校特色的双语教学策略。     

Rethinking motivational challenges amongst young adults on the margin

This article is concerned with how motivation to take an education can be stimulated in young adults who are on the margins of the labour market and educational system. It is widely accepted that young adults in such a position have motivational problems regarding education because of negative schooling experiences, interrupted education, absenteeism, etc. Despite this, in Europe, education is commonly proposed as the solution to the problem of the high proportion of 15–29 year-olds who are not in employment, education or training (NEET). This paradox of having to motivate young adults under pressure is the focus of the article. The article argues that there is a need to theoretically redefine motivation as a phenomenon linked to the individual to a more contextually embedded understanding of motivation as the result of a process between the young and their surroundings, opportunities and perspectives. The article presents a model with five motivational orientations suggesting a new perspective on re-motivating young adults on the margin of the labour market and educational system, while it also discusses the challenges connected to promoting a focus on motivation at a time when the liberalisation of education is increasingly central to the welfare state strategy.     

Citizenship in the classroom: transferring and transforming transcultural values

The aim of the paper is to present and discuss a Report from a Comenius 2.1 project, aimed at developing teachers’ interpersonal, intercultural, social and civic competence. The study presented in the report was a multiple case study, and the methods for collecting data were focus group dialogues (with 34 teacher students), one video recording in each country and a document analysis of a European overview of citizenship education in Europe. Five countries participated in the study (the Netherlands, Portugal, Poland, the UK and Sweden) and the study focused on 12 year‐old pupils. One conclusion was that teacher education needs to focus more on horizontal classroom dialogue if goals for citizenship education are to be reached.