Integrating the ontological, epistemological, and sociocultural aspects: a holistic view of teacher education

Abstract

The three aspects of teacher change – ontological, epistemological, and sociocultural – are traditionally regarded as independent. Usually only the epistemological aspect is highlighted in formal teacher education. In this paper, I argue that a holistic and interdependent view of these aspects is needed. Thus, this paper aims to explore the process of teacher learning from a holistic perspective. Through deliberative discussions and selection, 13 ‘good’ teachers were interviewed in this study. The findings indicate that there may be a two-stage pattern (the II-VA model) that describes two different sorts of teachers. The first sort refers to those teachers who developed strong identities before beginning their teaching service and who tended to have a clearer educational vision which had a direct impact on their practices and professional development. As for the second sort, the teachers’ identities were vague in their first years of teaching, but their professional identities gradually developed within the referential community with affective and professional functions. These stages imply that we should replace ‘abstract theory’ with ‘subject reflection’ in the center of teacher education. Three kinds of reflection (theory-rationale, identity-integration and vision-accomplishment) are thus identified from a holistic view of teacher change.