Enhancing Prospective Teachers’ Professional Development Through Shared Collaborative Lesson Planning

There is compelling evidence on the effectiveness of bibliotherapy for facilitating one’s development. Arguably, in teacher education, bibliotherapy has been shown to facilitate prospective teachers’ professional development. However, teacher educators may experience difficulties in finding relevant reading to stimulate prospective teachers’ identification process, which is essential if the application of pedagogical bibliotherapy is to be successful. This study is situated in a mathematics education course for prospective elementary school teachers and explores the features of relevant pedagogical reading via analysis of four prospective elementary school teachers’ identification processes with two case descriptions. The identification here relates to the reading of the so-called true stories; prospective teachers read stories of other prospective teachers from the same teacher education context. We outline the recommendations for the selection of reading material when applying pedagogical bibliotherapy in order to assist prospective teachers’ professional development.

Prospective informatics teachers in vocational schools (VS) must master content knowledge, pedagogical skills, and technology integration to achieve learning goals. Therefore, informatics teachers in VS need to innovate to increase students' creativity. However, many prospective informatics teachers experience difficulties in this regard. This research aims to develop and implement the Web-Based Microteaching (WBM) model to improve the teaching skills of prospective informatics teachers at VS. This study uses research and development methods with the ADDIE model approach. The research results show that the WBM model effectively improves prospective informatics teachers' teaching skills, especially in planning lessons and practising basic teaching skills. This innovation is a relevant learning solution in the digital era and positively contributes to the professional development of informatics teachers. The WBM model is an innovation to provide a more intensive and structured practical experience by utilizing web technology as the main media. Through web-based learning, prospective teachers can access material, exercises and feedback independently, which is expected to accelerate pedagogical mastery.

This study explores the experiences of prospective Indonesian language teachers during field practice in schools, focusing on their interactions with students, teachers, school management, infrastructure, and the learning process. Using a phenomenological approach, data were collected through in-depth interviews with eight pre-service Indonesian language teacher candidates. Qualitative analysis techniques were employed to extract comprehensive insights. Findings reveal that field experience practices are highly effective in preparing prospective teachers to become professional educators. Key themes emerged: (1) the critical role of field practice in fostering professionalism; (2) the necessity for advanced technological competencies to effectively engage Generation Z students; (3) the importance of maintaining harmonious interactions with students and teachers to support a conducive learning environment; and (4) the adherence to school regulations, emphasizing the principle of adapting to institutional norms. The study underscores the importance of field practice in equipping pre-service teachers with the skills and attitudes needed for 21st-century education. Emphasis on technological proficiency and relational skills highlights the evolving demands of teaching Generation Z. Adherence to institutional norms ensures alignment with professional standards. Field experience practice plays a pivotal role in shaping professional Indonesian language teachers. By mastering technological skills, fostering positive relationships, and respecting school regulations, prospective teachers are better prepared to meet the challenges of modern education. These findings contribute to the broader discourse on teacher training and professional development.

The research presented in this paper aims to shed light on the complex role of mathematics teacher educators who led courses for prospective mathematics teachers. Theoretically, the research combines the documentational approach to didactics and the meta-didactical transposition frameworks, complementing the study with the analysis of the teacher educators’ beliefs about the prospective teachers’ needs. The methodology entails a comparative case study related to two courses, taking place in quite different contexts, led by the two authors independently, and a collaborative self-study of teacher education approach, based on eight reciprocal semi-structured interviews between the authors. The result is a holistic model of mathematics teacher educators’ work that takes into account their practices, including the design of teaching materials based on a variety of resources, justifying discourses and personal beliefs. This can deepen our insight into the expertise of mathematics teacher educators and, prospectively, can be fruitful for their professional development.

Science teacher education literature has emphasized the importance of prospective teachers’ prior knowledge of their K-12 experiences as a key factor influencing their professional development as future science teachers. The purpose of the study was to identify the teaching practices in prospective teachers’ prior knowledge of science instruction before their enrollment in a science teaching methods course. Constructs from the practice-based theory of teaching, reform-based science instruction, and the pedagogy of poverty framework collectively served as the conceptual lens to focus on teaching practices. Three-hundred and sixty-one prospective teachers took part in this qualitative study. Visual (drawings) and written (narratives) served as the data and thematic analysis was used to identify and categorize teaching practices. The predominant teaching practices were framed by the pedagogy of poverty (68.4%) (giving information and directions). Other teaching practices were framed by a combination of teaching practices (pedagogy of poverty and core science teaching practices) (28.0%) (giving information and directions, engaging students in investigations, and facilitating classroom discourse), and teaching practices that reflected only core science teaching practices (8.0%) (engaging students in investigations and facilitating classroom discourse). Prospective teachers in this study had identified and accepted as knowledge-for-practice from their K-12 experiences a set of limited teaching practices. The findings indicated that prospective teachers’ prior knowledge of science instruction reflected the inclusion and an over reliance on specific teaching practices that contradicted or limited current reforms in science education and imply that they are yet to experience science instruction as stipulated by the current reforms.

This study examined the knowledge, beliefs and efforts of five prospective teachers to enact teaching science as inquiry, over the course of a one‐year high school fieldwork experience. Data sources included interviews, field notes, and artifacts, as these prospective teachers engaged in learning how to teach science. Research questions included 1) What were these prospective teachers' beliefs of teaching science? 2) To what extent did these prospective teachers articulate understandings of teaching science as inquiry? 3) In what ways, if any, did these prospective teachers endeavor to teach science as inquiry in their classrooms? 4) In what ways did the mentor teachers' views of teaching science appear to support or constrain these prospective teachers' intentions and abilities to teach science as inquiry? Despite support from a professional development school setting, the Interns' teaching strategies represented an entire spectrum of practice—from traditional, lecture‐driven lessons, to innovative, open, full‐inquiry projects. Evidence suggests one of the critical factors influencing a prospective teacher's intentions and abilities to teach science as inquiry, is the teacher's complex set of personal beliefs about teaching and of science. This paper explores the methodological issues in examining teachers' beliefs and knowledge in actual classroom practice. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 44: 613–642, 2007.

The previous chief editor of the Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education, Professor Barbara Jaworski, often commented that each issue of the journal seems to have its own theme or common thread, even though the articles are published more or less in the order that they are ready for publication. It is intriguing to contemplate the commonalities that seem to link together otherwise randomly written articles. This issue of the journal includes four articles that happen to be now ready for publication. The first article, by Michelle Chamberlin, Jeff Farmer and Jodie Novak, titled Teachers’ perceptions of assessing their mathematical knowledge in a professional development course, addresses a key topic in mathematics teacher education that of mathematical content knowledge. Normally teacher educators shy away from assessing the mathematical knowledge and understandings of practising teachers with whom they work, but these authors overcome the usual concerns by including specific well-designed assessments of mathematics as part of a teacher professional learning experience. The examples they chose were designed so that failure would not have been a reflection on the teachers’ past learning, thereby reducing some of the obvious threats that such assessments create. Their finding was that the assessment and the emphasis on mathematical knowledge enhanced the teacher professional learning, and was recognised as such by the teachers. The second article, by Blake Peterson and Steven Williams, titled Learning mathematics for teaching in the student teaching experience: Two contrasting cases, examines the relationship between a supervising teacher and prospective teachers during student teaching or practical placements. One of the case studies is about a restricted range of supporting actions that perhaps reflected the perspective of the supervising teacher, and the other case study describes a set of productive experiences that clearly lay the foundation for rich, reflective learning. The implication is that the supervising teacher matters, and that the quality of the student teaching placement is directly connected to immediate opportunities for teacher professional learning. The third article, by Peter Grootenboer, titled Mathematical belief change in prospective primary teachers reports a prospective teacher program that focused on facilitating

The article deals with the actual problem of professional training of the prospective primary school teachers to work with intellectually gifted pupils. It has been shown that giftedness is determined by both innate gifts and social conditions and, of course, needs support and help on a part of a trained teacher. The level of readiness of prospective primary school teachers to work with intellectually gifted pupils in modern conditions has been investigated. For this purpose, a scientific study was conducted in 2021-2022 studying years in which the students of the 1st and 2nd courses of the Institute of Pedagogy of Zhytomyr Ivan Franko State University participated. The conducted research allows formulating certain methodical recommendations for the professional training of prospective teachers to work with intellectually gifted pupils. These recommendations outline the following imperatives: 1) there is a need to introduce a special training course into the educational process; 2) it is relevant to include in psychological and pedagogical disciplines the issues that characterize the peculiarities of working with gifted pupils; 3) the need to develop students' motivation for self-development and self-improvement is very important; 4) it is expedient to include psychological trainings, project tasks, methods of innovative computer training in the studying disciplines; 5) the prospective teachers should be motivated to study modern psychological and pedagogical literature in this field, since working with gifted pupils requires special training both in higher education and in further independent professional activity. The promising aspects of the research include research in the indicated direction using the synergistic concept «talent is the sum of talents and abilities». This approach corresponds to the synergistic principle of superadditivity («the whole is greater than its parts») when any system reveals certain systemic properties that are not inherent in the properties of its components. Under such conditions, the problem of human development in the context of «heredity VS environment» can be resolved.

Collaborative learning is a learning model that guides students to gather ideas and data to solve common problems. In this study, collaborative learning was integrated with Exe-media on reaction rate and salt hydrolysis to improve prospective teacher generic science skills. Specifically, this study aims to investigate Exe-media effectiveness to improve prospective teacher generic science skill. This study employed methods of a quasi experiment with a nonequivalent control group design. The subject of this research are prospective teachers of class Kim’B as experiment class and Kim’C as control class of Department of Chemistry Education, Faculty of Mathematic and Natural Science, Universitas Negeri Medan. Experiment class received treatment in form of learning used collaborative learning using Exe-media. Control class received treatment in form of learning used conventional model using power point as media. Data was collected through pretest and posttest results from prospective teacher in both classes. A t-test was used and it is found that level of significance is 0.002 (sig. < 0.05) proving that collaborative learning using Exe-media is effective to improve prospective teachers’ generic science skill.

This study intends to explore the characteristics of prospective teachers with a qualitative study based on the experience of students. To that end, the classes of prospective teachers and experienced teachers were compared through the students with focus on PE class. Practicum is the first teaching experience of prospective teachers and there are many related studies. However, there are few studies contributing to the reflective introspection of prospective teachers based on the experience of students. Thus, this study intends to promote their reflective introspection on their practicum, the first teaching experience. It was revealed that the majority of students find the prospective teachers' class less helpful than the class of experienced teachers. The detailed findings are as follows. First, the students find that prospective teachers only focus on the textbook and materials they have prepared. Second, most students find that prospective teachers do not consider the level of students as they focus on the textbook only. Third, most students find the class of prospective students uninteresting. Fourth, most students find that prospective teachers are unable to help students acquire various functions easily. The findings show that the majority of students find the prospective teachers' classes are inadequate. It implies that prospective teachers do not gain effective teaching skills at their universities (college of education). Prospective teachers should identify their areas of improvement based on their student experience.

Constructivism has emerged as a dominant conceptual orientation of teacher education systems in the USA and worldwide. Nevertheless, it is underrepresented in the research conducted in Ukraine. The present paper thus aims at carrying out multifaceted overview of the constructivist theory and interpretive paradigm as a philosophical and epistemological foundation of the American teacher education. In the study such complementary research methods are employed as analysis, synthesis, interpretation, as well as the method of generalizing effective practices of constructivist teacher education in the USA. The paper begins with the discussion of philosophical and epistemological underpinnings of the US teacher education system, in which the theory of constructivism and interpretive paradigm feature prominently. The key categories of the aforementioned philosophical-epistemological stance are the teacher’s personality and socio-cultural context predetermining their professional development and growth. A number of diverse research traditions take up the issue of constructivism and its implementation into teacher education and development. Integration of the underlying tenets of constructivism in the USA establishments of higher education has led to the abandonment of the more authoritarian traditional models built around knowledge transmission. Prompted by constructivism, prospective teachers are viewed as the subjects of knowledge construction and self-development being delegated with responsibilities and the right to take an active stance with regard to personal and professional growth within a community. Features of effective teacher education programmes incorporating constructivist ideas across the USA include the following: reflective thinking development, student centeredness, collaborative learning, problem posing and solving of profession-related tasks, extensive teaching practice, involving prospective teachers in research and some others. As shown by substantial empirical research base, the advantages of incorporating the underlying principles of constructivism into teacher education are indisputable as compared to more traditional models, in terms of development of professional awareness, overcoming stereotypical views and biases of prospective teachers.

In this paper, I review both mathematics education and CSCL literature and discuss how we can better take advantage of CSCL tools for developing mathematical proof skills. I introduce a model of proof in school mathematics that incorporates both empirical and deductive ways of knowing. I argue that two major forces have given rise to this conception of proving: a particular learning perspective promoted in reform documents and a genre of computer tools, namely dynamic geometry software, which affords this perspective of learning within the context of mathematical proof. Tracing the move from absolutism to fallibilism in the philosophy of mathematics, I highlight the vital role of community in the production of mathematical knowledge. This leads me to an examination of a certain CSCL tool whose design is guided by knowledge-building pedagogy. I argue that knowledge building is a suitable pedagogical approach for the proof model presented in this paper. Furthermore, I suggest software modifications that will better support learners’ participation in authentic proof tasks.

The article deals with the mode of lin-guistic-and-methodological competence&nbsp; development&nbsp; in&nbsp; prospective&nbsp; foreign&nbsp; language teachers in the context of the analysis of particular disciplines of the general training cycle. The content analysis of educational and professional&nbsp; curricula&nbsp; and&nbsp; working&nbsp; plans&nbsp; of educational disciplines for prospective foreign language teachers is carried out; a number of disciplines&nbsp; of&nbsp; the&nbsp; general&nbsp; training&nbsp; cycle&nbsp; are analyzed in the context of their influence on linguistic-and-methodological competence development&nbsp; in&nbsp; prospective&nbsp; foreign&nbsp; language teachers. Potential&nbsp; opportunities&nbsp; of&nbsp; the&nbsp; cycle&nbsp; of professional and practical training for linguistic-and-methodological competence&nbsp; development, as well as their interaction on the basis of cross-curricular relations, are revealed.&nbsp;The features of the process of prospective foreign language teachers training, according&nbsp; to&nbsp; the&nbsp; character&nbsp; of&nbsp; the&nbsp; disciplines,&nbsp; practice/training,&nbsp; forms&nbsp; and&nbsp; methods&nbsp; of&nbsp; cooperation with prospective foreign language teachers in the course of their training are found out. As&nbsp; a&nbsp; result&nbsp; of&nbsp; the&nbsp; given&nbsp; research&nbsp; it&nbsp; is&nbsp; discovered that the disciplines under consideration contribute to the development of linguistic-and-methodological&nbsp; competence&nbsp; of&nbsp; prospective&nbsp; foreign&nbsp; language&nbsp; teachers&nbsp; providing future&nbsp; professionals&nbsp; with&nbsp; sociocultural&nbsp; and social&nbsp; knowledge,&nbsp; skills&nbsp; and&nbsp; competencies which&nbsp; not&nbsp; only&nbsp; ensure&nbsp; their&nbsp; adaptation&nbsp; to&nbsp; a foreign&nbsp; language&nbsp; environment,&nbsp; but&nbsp; also&nbsp; contribute to successful performance of teaching activities.

Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) is a pedagogical approach wherein learning takes place via social interaction using a computer or through the Internet. This kind of learning is characterized by the sharing and construction of knowledge among participants. This knowledge is shared through communication technologies embedded in CSCL systems. However in the context of globalization and the expansion of the internet and Information Technology (IT), communication becomes intercultural, so a complex and important dimension is added to CSCL and brings a new type of knowledge, socio-cultural knowledge, that needs to be shared and then presents new challenges. Therefore, in intercultural collaborative learning settings, we need to get and ensure better interaction, to get better learning. Better interaction is reached by promoting motivation to learn in groups, and this is obtained by enhancing user satisfaction which is achieved by the development of tailored CSCL tools to each user according to her socio-cultural background. Adapting the CSCL system to the culture of each participant will allow and facilitate group decision-making in the collaborative learning activity, as we take into account socio-cultural specificities of each learner, this latter will be more comfortable with the system and the other learners, and can collaborate with them to make decisions about the collaborative solution. So this article addresses the challenges started up by this context, which is how to consider socio-cultural specificities of each learner.

Aim/Purpose: Drawing on transactional distance theory (TDT) and collaborative learning, this research proposes a research model to examine the role of collaborative learning during the COVID-19 pandemic. It investigates the potential antecedents that influence students’ academic achievements, autonomy, and satisfaction with online learning platforms. Background: The coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic devastating the world has shaken the global educational system; such a transformation compelled all educational institutes to utilize online learning platforms. Malaysian higher educational institutions were greatly concerned by this disease and faced considerable transformations that affected higher education learners. Additionally, the campus closure and movement regulations impacted traditional education. Thus, the Malaysian Government ordered students at higher education institutions to return to their hometowns and continue their studies through online learning. Therefore, online learning was the most reasonable alternative to resume the learning process. Furthermore, in the educational world, collaborative learning is pivotal to forming students’ interpersonal skills. Collaborative learning practice is working in pairs or small groups to attain the learning objectives collaboratively. Collaborative learning refers to the process of acquiring knowledge in a collaborative setting as opposed to alone. Since the instructor and students are in separate locations, it is challenging for the teacher to facilitate collaborative learning. Methodology: This study utilized a quantitative method; purposive sampling was implemented, and the data were collected from 260 university students, both undergraduate and postgraduate, as long as they were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic in Malaysia. The questionnaire for this research was designed to fit the research hypothesis. The items of the questionnaire have been adapted to certify the content’s validity. The collected data were analyzed using Smart PLS software, which has been utilized as an essential data analysis tool. Contribution: This research contributes to: (1) a better understanding of the importance of communication and connection among students-students and teachers in online learning environments, as the results suggest that the more communication between students, teachers, and the environment itself, the greater the academic achievements, learners’ autonomy, and satisfaction; and (2) the role of both collaborative learning and TDT on learners’ academic achievements, autonomy, and satisfaction. Findings: This study advances by incorporating TDT and collaborative learning theories. This research model illustrates six main factors in online learning platforms that enhance students’ academic achievements, autonomy, and satisfaction through collaborative learning. The results showed a strong association between TDT and collaborative learning regarding the online learning platforms’ utilization for improving academic achievements, learners’ autonomy, and satisfaction. Recommendations for Practitioners: This model provided exceptional support to students during this sudden switch to online alternatives and helped them cope with the considerable challenges they faced under the current circumstances. Moreover, this model provides a guideline for higher education teachers and administrators for coping with online learning platforms. Recommendation for Researchers: Drawing on the association between TDT and collaborative learning regarding the utilization of online learning platforms for improving academic achievements, learners’ autonomy, and learner satisfaction, the research result presents a road map for researchers in the field of online learning. Accordingly, researchers are encouraged to utilize these theories, as they can lead to improvements among online learners in higher education institutions. Impact on Society: This preliminary model, which was developed throughout this research, will be a great support to both researchers and instructors to be able to utilize and elaborate in accordance with the role of online platforms on students’ satisfaction, autonomy, and academic achievements. It is critical for higher education administrators to pay more attention to the nature of communication between students and student instructors, which has been shown to have a positive influence on their academic achievements, to implement online learning. Moreover, instructors and course developers must be trained and skilled to achieve online learning platform goals. Future Research: Future research could include more information about blended learning environments and their relationship to the technology acceptance model as an online learning model. Researchers may extend the model used in this study.