Researching Teacher Education in Changing Times: Politics and Paradigms of New Hampshire

Abstract

Teacher education has been a contested enterprise since its emergence in the mid19th century. From the beginning, research has played a prominent role, particularly in disputes about which disciplines are appropriate to the study of education, what counts as educational scholarship and how evidence should be used to make the case for or against particular approaches to the professional preparation of teachers (Borrowman, 1965; Lagemann, 2000). Although the history of teacher education has been braided with the history of educational research for many years, the role of research is more prominent today than ever before. In many of the most important contemporary debates about teacher quality and teacher preparation, the central focus-at least on the surface-is research itself, particularly on the fundamental question of whether there is a research basis for teacher education and, if so, what that research base suggests.