We know that students learn more when they receive high-quality instruction. We also have findings suggesting that some teacher preparation programs produce graduates that are more capable than others. These two pieces of evidence have led many teacher educators, researchers, and stakeholders to conclude that we need better studies of activities and experiences that are part of teacher preparation to learn about their impact on what teacher candidates know and can do.
To help support the progress toward these kinds of studies, American Institutes for Research brought together 35 researchers, teacher preparation providers, and school leaders to discuss research that would answer these questions. They collectively agreed on some key themes to guide study designs: The research should be nuanced, actionable, formative, and contextualized. The themes could inform research designs that can fairly quickly lead to findings to inform teacher preparation-findings that are at the right grain size, speak directly to what goes on in preparation programs, and can be useful to providers who desire to improve teacher preparation.
Participants also discussed challenges to conducting research within teacher preparation, and they prioritized some research questions in the following areas:
- Selection of candidates into teacher preparation
- Diversity in teacher preparation
- Coursework
- Clinical experiences
- Skills necessary to be a teacher educator
For a full summary of the convening, see http://www.air.org/sites/default/files/downloads/report/Teacher-Education-Research-Agenda-July-2017.pdf
