Learning to teach (LETS): developing curricular and cross curricular competences in becoming a 'good' secondary teacher: executive summary
Conway, Paul F.; Murphy, Rosaleen; Delargey, Michael; Hall, Kathy; Kitching, Karl; Long, Fiachra; McKeon, Jacinta; Murphy, Brian; O'Brien, Stephen; O'Sullivan, Dan
Date:
2011-03
Copyright:
© 2011. Paul F. Conway, Rosaleen Murphy, Michael Delargey, Kathy Hall, Karl Kitching, Fiachra Long, Jacinta McKeon, Brian Murphy, Stephen O’Brien, Dan O’Sullivan
Citation:
CONWAY, P. F., MURPHY, R., DELARGEY, M., HALL, K., KITCHING, K., LONG, F., MCKEON, J., MURPHY, B., O'BRIEN, S. & O'SULLIVAN, D. 2011. Learning to Teach (LETS): Developing curricular and cross curricular competences in becoming a 'good' secondary teacher: Executive Summary. Cork: School of Education, University College Cork.
Abstract:
The aim of this research, the Learning to Teach Study (LETS), the first of its kind on
the Postgraduate Diploma in Education (PGDE) in Ireland, funded by the Department
of Education and Skills (DES), was to develop and implement a study of initial
teacher education in the PGDE in post-primary education, in the School of
Education, University College Cork. Its aim was to identify the individual and
contextual dynamics of how student teachers develop curricular and cross-curricular
competences during initial teacher education (ITE). Within an overall framework that
explores how student teachers develop their skills, competences and identity as
teachers, it focuses on curricular competences in mathematics, science and
language teaching, and on the cross-curricular competences of reading and digital
literacy and the development of inclusive teaching practices. LETS is the first
programme level research on the PGDE, familiarly known to generations of student
teachers and teachers as ‘the Dip’ or ‘the HDip’.
Drawing on research on teacher education both in Ireland and internationally, the
LETS report is divided into six sections encompassing thirteen chapters. Section 1
includes the review of literature and study aims in Chapter 1 and the research
methodology in Chapter 2. Adopting an interpretive approach, LETS involved the
collaborative development of three interviews protocols and a survey by the research
team. Seventeen (n=17) students were interviewed three times over the course of
PGDE programme, and one hundred and thirty three students completed a detailed
survey on their learning to teach experience (n=133, i.e. response rate of 62.7% of
the 212 students in the PGDE 2008/09 cohort). The four chapters in Section 2 focus
on professional identity as a central dimension of learning to teach. Among the
dimensions of learning to teach addressed in this section are the role of observation
and cultural scripts in becoming a teacher, the visibility/invisibility of PGDE students
as learners and the relationships between emotions, resilience and commitment to
teaching. The three chapters in Section 3 focus on mathematics, modern languages
and science respectively in the context of conventional and reform-oriented visions of
good teaching. A number of common as well as subject-specific themes emerged in
this section in relation to subject matter teaching. Section 4 focuses on PGDE
students’ experience of inclusion (chapter 10) and reading literacy (chapter 11) while
learning to teach. Section 5 focuses on a key aspect of initial teacher education,
namely, the school-university partnership. The final section provides a summary of
the findings, identifies seven key issues emerging from these findings, makes
Learning to Teach Study (LETS)
recommendations under four headings (system, teacher education institutions,
partnerships in ITE and further research) and discusses some implications for
research, policy and practice in initial teacher education.
Among the main findings emerging from the study are: (i) schools provide valuable
support for PGDE students but this typically does not focus on classroom pedagogy,
(ii) PGDE students typically felt that they had to be ‘invisible’ as learners in schools to
gain and maintain authority and status, (iii) inherited cultural scripts about what it
means to be a ‘good’ subject teacher shaped teacher identity and classroom
practice, and (iv) as PGDE students begin to feel competent as teachers of maths,
modern languages and science, this feeling of competence typically does not include
their capacity to teach for inclusion and reading literacy within their subject teaching.
In the context of research on teacher education, many of the findings are not unique
to the PGDE or to UCC but reflect perennial dilemmas and emerging challenges in
initial teacher education. This fact is important in setting a context for the wider
dissemination2 of the Learning to Teach Study.
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