Engaging in Conversation about Ideas in Teacher Education

The Editors: Fiona J Benson and Caroline Riches work in teacher education at McGill University. Dr. Riches’s background is in second language education; her current scholarly interests are in sociolinguistics, international education, online learning, and multiliteracies. Dr. Benson is currently researching in the areas of queer theory and social justice education. As directors of the teacher education programs, they work to strengthen the theory-to-practice connection with the goals of improved program coherence, better prepared teachers, and excellence in teacher education.

• Contents: Caroline Riches/Fiona J Benson: Introduction – Perspectives on Governance: Carolyn M. Shields: American Educational Governance: Rights, Roles, and Responsibilities Meet Paradox and Challenge - Peter P. Grimmett: Response - Peter P. Grimmett: The Governance of Canadian Teacher Education: A Macro-Political Perspective - Carolyn M. Shields: Response – Exploring the Landscape of Teacher Education: Ruth Kane: The Teacher Education Landscape of My Imagining - Thomas Falkenberg: Response - Thomas Falkenberg: Starting with the End in Mind: Ethics-of-Care-Based Teacher Education - Ruth Kane: Response – The Quality of Field Experience Programs: Clare Kosnik: It Is Not Just Practice: Conflicting Goals, Unclear Expectations, Mixed Messages - Jean-François Desbiens: Response - Jean-François Desbiens: Practical Training Must Be More than Just Good Will in the Field - Clare Kosnik: Response – Responding to Diversity and Demands for Social Justice: Claudia Mitchell: «This has nothing to do with us - or does it?» Youth as Knowledge Producers in addressing HIV and AIDS in a Canadian Preservice Education Program - Vianne Timmons: Response - Vianne Timmons: Overcoming Barriers to Inclusivity: Preparing Preservice Teachers for Diversity - Claudia Mitchell: Response – Imagining Sustainable Futures for the Work of Teachers: Anne M. Phelan: A New Thing in an Old World? Instrumentalism, Teacher Education, and Responsibility - James Trier: Response - James Trier: Subversive Engagements in Teacher Education - Anne M. Phelan: Response – Fiona J Benson/Caroline Riches: Afterword.

«Fiona J Benson and Caroline Riches are to be congratulated for the achievement of this engaging and important education text. These pages, drawing on leading teacher education researchers and practitioners, form conversation, reflection, and a call to action. The themes of this book explore the governance of teacher education, the landscape of existing programmes, the way in which the school practicum is pursued, the challenge of social justice as the objective and practice of teacher education, and ensuring sustainability through troubled and troubling futures. This is a text for all stakeholders in teacher education, not so much because it provides a blueprint for an ideal form of teacher education, but because it guides us in approaching the questions that confront us in preparing teachers with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions to educate in and for new times.» (Roger Slee, Research Chair of Inclusive Education, Institute of Education, University of London)