Abstract
Viewing learning as a social and cultural process the premise of this paper is that learner teachers’ developing expertise should not only reside in the knowledge domains typically established by universities and schools. A crucial knowledge domain that is often overlooked by schools and teacher education institutes (TEIs) is the community beyond the walls of the school classroom and university lecture hall. This paper attends to the question of what constitutes an effective teacher in an era of rapid change and throws light on the process of becoming a twenty-first century educator through examining an innovative curriculum design which has made experiential learning (EL) mandatory for all novice teachers at a TEI in Hong Kong. This challenging curriculum initiative in teacher training has enabled a powerful synergy between the core functions of our teacher-training faculty and the wider community. I seek to present findings that point to real impact on student teachers’ professional development – or their sense of becoming – and also in the way TEIs work within their local communities which are positioned as a powerful knowledge space and knowledge holder in the teacher education process. I will also show how community partners such as non-governmental organisations (NGOs) play a highly significant role in the development of beginning teachers and how they might even be seen as ‘co-educators’ in the complex but compelling process of teacher preparation.
Highlights
This paper outlines the establishment of a mandatory experiential learning (EL) block across multiple subject disciplines on teacher preparation programmes at a leading teacher education institute (TEI) in Hong Kong
This paper suggests that carefully structured communitybased settings can provide invaluable knowledge that connects and supplements traditional university and school partnerships and offers hybrid or “third” spaces with diverse expertise to novice teachers (Hartley, 2007; Brayko, 2013; Zeichner et al, 2015); in sum, it posits the community as a rich and powerful knowledge space, which is non-hierarchical and where academics, teacher educators, school heads, and teachers and communities bring together different expertise that are conducive to the development of teachers in the Twenty-first century (Hartley, 2007; Zeichner, 2010)
Our teacher candidates consistently made reference to the importance of the learner through their EL work even though many EL projects organized for the novice teachers were not school-based and did not involve working with young learners
Summary
This paper outlines the establishment of a mandatory experiential learning (EL) block across multiple subject disciplines on teacher preparation programmes (undergraduate and postgraduate levels) at a leading teacher education institute (TEI) in Hong Kong. The study presented here is set against a complex backdrop in the field of teacher education today and attends to the question of what constitutes an effective teacher in an era of globalization. It throws light on the process of becoming a twenty-first century teacher with education playing a pivotal role in shaping the skills required by today’s modern workforce including critical thinking, creativity, problem-solving, and effective collaboration. One of the reasons for this challenging educational landscape is the growing neoliberal focus on the commercialization and accountability of the teaching profession which has undoubtedly taken preeminence over more rigorous ways of preparing and sustaining a culturally competent, social-justice oriented teaching force for today’s rapidly changing society
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