Subject Knowledge and Teacher Education

The Development of Beginning Teachers' Thinking

Viv Ellis

• Publisher: Continuum
• Year: 2007
• Print ISBN: 9780826419880
• eBook ISBN: 9781441119018
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Teachers' knowledge of the subjects they teach has been of enduring interest to governments, the profession and the wider society. In this book, Viv Ellis traces the development of three beginning teachers thinking about their subject knowledge in the context of Standards-based teacher education and the practice of auditing student teachers' subject knowledge. Ellis puts forward a theory of subject knowledge development that moves on from the objectivist and individualistic epistemologies associated with Standards and the practices of auditing to more a contextualist and sociocultural understanding of teachers' cognition and learning. An important implication of this study is that if teacher education wishes to have greater impact on the development of beginning teachers, teacher educators need to pay greater attention to the schools and subject department settings in which these beginning teachers learn.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• List of Tables and Figures
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Working on and being worked on: developing knowledge in practice
• 3 Know, understand and be able to do: professionalizing knowledge
• 4 Culture, activity, agent: designing the research
• 5 Ann: thinking about the subject knowledge of English
• 6 Grace: thinking about the subject knowledge of English
• 7 Liz: thinking about the subject knowledge of English
• 8 Personal trajectories of participation: interpreting beginning teachers' development
• 9 From 'making little ticks' to building professional communities: some implications for teacher education
• Notes
• References
• Glossary
• Appendix A: The progression of questioning foci across the three interview schedules
• Appendix B: A note on transcription