THE SKY IS THE LIMIT! De-minimalizing teacher education by stimulating collaborative professionalism

RDC Curricula in Teacher Education

THE SKY IS THE LIMIT!

De-minimalizing teacher educationby stimulating collaborative

professionalism


Outline

• Focus on minimum standards• Calculating strategies of students• A need for a wider professionalism of teachers• What is understood by ‘wider professionalism’• Discussion: What opportunities and experiences

do teacher educators have to stimulate this wider professionalism?


Minimum standards in Europe

• Concerns about the quality of the teaching profession

• Safeguarding and stimulating teacher quality by setting minimum standards

• Connected to national tests or inspection regimes

• Minimum standards have become the norm!


Calculating students

• Test regimes and modulair curricula dominate teacher eduation

• Teaching and learning to the tests• A ‘pass’ is enough. No interest in feedback• Many competing and more interesting activities• Consumer-attitide of students: ‘I need more

feedback’, ‘The curriculum should cover more books’


Ambitious and excellent teachers

• Children and society need more ambitious teachers• Teachers need a ‘wider professionalism’


Main question

• What opportunities can be created for more challenging teacher education curricula where ‘minimalism’ (focus on minimum standards) is replaced by ‘maximalism’ (a focus on collaborative professionalism and on reaching the highest possible for each student)?


To answer this question?

• A clearer understanding of collaborative professionalism

• A clearer understanding on theories on student motivation

• Examples of good practice in challenging students (e.g. honours programmes, etc.)


Five sociological perspectives on professionalism

1. Traits approach2. Demands to modern ‘professionals’3. A professionalisation project 4. An independent logic5. The idealistic and altruistic

professional


Traits approach

• Compared to classical professions and professionals: doctors, lawyers, …

• Ideal characteristics:– Monopoly regulating the entrance to the

profession– Ethical code and standards (exclusion from

the profession)– Strong academic knowledge base– Independent

• Semi-, para- or proto-professions• Critics: Idealized and historical-cultural

specific characteristics


Modern demands to professionals• Focus on outcomes• Limited budgets (efficiency)• Transparant and steerable• Accountablecontrol and bureaucracy

• No professional isolation – collaborative• No boundaries – multidisciplinairy• Innovative• Lifelong learning

Neo-liberalism

Knowledge society


Professionalisation project

Emphasis on the development of a profession (Larson 1977, Powers 2008, Gewirtz et al 2009)

• Emancipation of a professionor

• Securing the quality of the professionor

• Self-interest: creating a monopoly, strengthening the position in negotiations, increasing status and income

Professional Association of Diving Instructors


A seperate logic

Three logics (Freidson, 2001)• The free market• Bureaucracy• Professionalism

• Special position and work of professional asks for a seperate logic and steering

• Ensuring quality from within• Professional autonomy to be able to make professional

decisions(Atkinson&Claxton 2000, Evetts 2009, Tonkens 2009)


The idealistic and altruistic professional

• Power imbalance between customer and professional. Customer can’t judge the quality of the professional.

• Service oriented motives of the professional: contribution to society, not income.

• Professional freedom and mandate as condition and reward

• Condition: deserved public trust• Instrument: quality assurance from within by

professional codes, professional registers, …(Crook 2008, Lund 2008)


Trust as a condition

• Trust versus control• Contractual trust vs. relational trust• Trust in competence • Trust in intentions:

– dedication and benovelence– empathy

• Role trust (through ethical codes)

(Byrk&Schneider 2002, Bottery 2003, Nooteboom 2006)

Give trust


Translated into qualities of teachers• Feeling part and being member of the profession/ professional

associations • Commitment to central values and good conduct within the

profession through the use of ethical codes;• Public accountability for outcomes of professional performance;• A strong academic knowledge base that underlies professional

activities.• Involvement in the development of the academic and practice-

based knowledge base through involvement in research• Lifelong professional development of the members of the

profession;• Collaboration with colleagues and stakeholders;• Involvement in innovation of the profession;• Commitment to support both the public and the state in their

understanding of educational matters;• Acceptance of the right of the state to set policies, connected to the

drive of professionals to comment on the effects of such policies at the level of implementation


Maximizing teacher education?

• How to stimulate students’ wider professionalism?

• How to stimulate students to get the most out of their study, aiming for maximum learning outcomes?

• What experiences do you have at your institution in supporting and challenging ambitious and excellent students?

Documents

THE SKY IS THE LIMIT! De-minimalizing teacher education by stimulating collaborative professionalism