From novice to effective teacher: a study of postgraduate training and history pedagogy

Abstract

The question of what makes for effective initial professional development of teachers is both complex and contested. From 1992 in England there have been major changes to the pattern of initial teacher training [ITT], changes that have been centrally imposed with minimal or no consultation with the Higher Education Institutes' [HEI] teacher training community involved. The revolution has seen initial professional development move its locus from HEIs to schools and colleges, with a downgrading in both the role and status of HEIs in the process. The study reported below is a longitudinal one from 1996-2000 into the factors that affect the professional development of teachers of history to 7-11 year olds. Because of the disruption caused by changes in government policy towards both schools and HEIs the research adopted a case study approach, examining the career paths of 18 initial trainees within the context of developing their professionalism. The findings are accordingly tentative but suggest that professional development in terms of the teaching of history is a highly complex long-term process that has two dominant influences: the students' prior experience of both learning and being taught history and the Initial Teacher Training within the HEI. The paper examines within the ITT course the affect that an Intervention Strategy for the teaching of History had upon the student teachers. The conclusion is that where students have a well developed and syntactic understanding of the discipline prior to the course that the Intervention Strategy builds upon and complements, they are able to develop many of the features of proto-expert teachers of history. Where their prior experience of history as an academic discipline is limited, both the overall college course and the Intervention Strategy have a relatively superficial impact upon their development as teachers of history.