The context of practice

Interestingly enough, when I did a literature search for teacher education, teachers, and policy effects, I found studies focusing mostly on how policy for primary and secondary education affected teachers’ work and teacher education indirectly. Examples include researchers such as Day, Flores, and Viana (2007), who work on the effects of national policies on teachers’ sense of professionalism (England and Portugal), and Hardy and Lindgard (2008), who research the effects of policy on teachers’ professional development (Queensland, Australia). Grimmett and Chinnery (2009) are, in a similar vein, reviewing research with a focus on bridging policy and professional pedagogy in teaching and teacher education, but they include teacher education by arguing for the need to educate teachers as

curriculum makers to narrow the gap between policy and practice in teacher education and in teaching practice.

However, there are also some studies that in different ways are focusing on the effects of different teacher education programs on teachers. The seminal work by Zeichner and Tabachnick (1981) three decades ago pointed to how the professional knowledge developed in pre-service teacher education seemed to be “washed out” by the experiences from practice when novice teachers entered schools. In more recent times, however, researchers have identified different ways in which education matters. Brouwer and Korthagen (2005) conducted a longitudinal study of the development of teaching competence among students from 24 teacher education programs. Although they found that school practice had a strong influence on teachers’ professional development, they also found that program characteristics in teacher education matter. This seemed, however, to be dependent upon the integration of practical experience and theoretical study in the teacher education curriculum. Rots and Aelterman (2009) investigated how teacher education influenced graduates’ entrance into the teaching profession. They found that the contribution of teacher education on graduates’ decisions to enter teaching was slightly, but still significantly, stronger than other factors influencing intentions to enter the profession.

Less is known about the effects particular types of teacher education programs have upon prospective teachers and their knowledge orientations. In the US, larger studies and syntheses have been carried out that have sought to identify success factors and models that can best prepare teachers for work. Here, it is suggested that ‘exemplary programs’ focus extensively on developmental psychology and theories about learning, cognition, and motivation (Darling-Hammond & Bransford, 2005; Darling-Hammond et al., 2000), but also that prospective teachers need to enact the principles in practical teaching and be involved in inquiry-oriented activities (Grossman, Hammerness, & McDonald, 2009). At the same time, there is a lack of consistent findings regarding the actual effects of different programs (Zeichner & Conklin, 2008). The research field is still quite fragmented (Zeichner & Conklin, 2008), and causal conclusions are difficult to make, as similar types of programs play out differently in different contexts of education and practice (Borko, Whitcomb, & Byrnes, 2008).

In Europe, Osborn et al. (2003) have analyzed teachers’ professional perceptions in UK, Denmark, and France. Their focus is primarily on the influence of policy processes upon

teachers in the different national contexts. Of relevance for the current thesis is their finding that, on the one hand, teachers seemed to perceive their work and responsibilities in quite similar ways, despite different policy frameworks and national regulations. On the other hand, however, they approached their work in quite different ways. While the French teachers enacted a more specialized, subject matter-based discourse, the Danish teachers were oriented towards a broader spectrum of social and professional concerns. This calls for more in-depth analysis not only of teachers’ ways of understanding their work, but of the epistemic orientation and framing that constitute their understanding and enactment.

In the Nordic context, researchers have in the last decade shown interest in the Finnish model of teacher education, which is a five-year research-based master program. Findings from a web-based study reported by Jyrhämä et al. (2008a) show that students in the research- based program appreciate the research-based approach as the main organizing theme of teacher education, and they find it detectable in every part of their studies. Finnish teacher educators’ views on research-based teacher education are elaborated in a mixed-method study (Krokfors et al., 2011). The study emphasizes the significance and relevance of a research- based teacher education model to teaching practice because it opens the door to an inquiry- oriented approach while practicing as teachers. Other studies show that the involvement of students in research in terms of writing a Master’s thesis provides them with analytical tools and skills that have benefits for practice (Maaranen, 2009; Westbury et al., 2005). This was also recognized by Maaranen (2010) in a report of a study with primary school teachers. By learning to engage in research on teaching during teacher education, they were able to think analytically about teaching. Furthermore, the research-based approach enabled them to reflect both individually and collectively. In Norway, analyses conducted in the ProLearn project (Jensen, Lahn, & Nerland, 2012; Klette & Carlsten, 2012; Nerland, 2012) showed that beginning teachers had problems conceptualizing the challenges they faced in professional language terms, which led to difficulties in connecting problems of practice with wider knowledge worlds and knowledge reservoirs. Compared with other groups, like nurses and engineers, the teachers’ knowledge culture was more oriented towards experience-based knowledge that was developed and shared within the boundaries of the local community. Teachers’ knowledge culture was marked by a shortage of systematized knowledge and materialized support structures.

Of special interest for this thesis are the findings of Smeby (2007); (Smeby, 2012). He has investigated the influence of professional education on Norwegian students’ and novice professionals’ relations to knowledge, including teachers. By analyzing data from a larger, longitudinal survey study, he found that professional education plays an important role not only in introducing students to a body of knowledge, but also in connecting them to professional knowledge in the sense of establishing social and emotional relations to a professional knowledge world. Moreover, Smeby (2012) argues that professional education is a prime context for developing epistemic strategies, i.e., ways of approaching, accessing, and making use of literature and other types of knowledge sources. The strategies developed during education seem to continue after several years in working life.

In sum, some research has been conducted on the effects on different models of teacher education. Less research has reported on the effects of epistemic profiles of teacher education programs on prospective teachers and their professional approach.