For a few different purposes, I’m working on a “manifesto” of sorts and could use some help. I suppose it’s not a coincidence that I’m using a blog to ask for guidance/assistance in my own learning and knowledge creation. But, I’m looking to produce a narrative (a white paper?) that synthesizes the information that is “out there” related to my own understanding of Learning 2.0 and to advocate for a new teaching/learning paradigm for Schools of Education. Thus, I’ll be bringing together ideas and information such as, but not limited to, connectivism, personal learning networks/environments, rhizomatic learning, etc. and then posing challenges to and recommendations for Schools of Education. I suppose the question I’m attempting to answer is “What is the place and/or role of Schools of Education in the face of new learning paradigms?”
If you have any ideas, thoughts, comments. resources, links, etc., I’d be GREATLY appreciative. Thanks in advance!
If I were you, I would take a look at the curriculum of ed schools (are you focusing on teacher ed programs?). I’ve found that the curriculum varies widely from school to school/state to state. Many schools already have a focus on educational technology and teacher driven innovation. I’m not sure how you should choose ed schools to look at – maybe find reports about the best schools of ed and then look at the programs that most teachers attend.
When you write that “I’ve found that the curriculum varies widely from school to school/state to state…,” have you found that empirically? As in, is that conclusion based on observation? Do you have any data? I ask both because I’m curious and because your conclusion runs a bit counter to what I understand to be the case. I know for sure that it’s not the case in ed. leadership programs!
I will say that you would be surprised a little in ed. leadership programs. In the study we did in Indiana (http://www.doe.in.gov/ipla/pdf/Looking_in_the_Mirror.pdf) there was more variation than expected. Most principal-level programs had the standard classes you think of, but past the standard classes there was some pretty wide variation on the fringes.
I will also say I think there is more variation in the pre-service teacher program than you might expect. Again, I think it is a fringes thing where there are a variety of standard classes, but that there might be 1-2 unique classes at each place. If you were wanting to research this at the teacher ed. level, I found a good place to look for this is in NCATE documents which are kept at the DOE in most states and should be publicly available if you ask. They are horribly boring to look though, but I think you would get a good sense of their curriculum from that and it is a better method of obtaining data than just using a survey.
I will be interested to see your manifesto on this. After you write a general school of ed. one, you might consider doing on specifically on ed. leader prep. That would make for a nice UCEA presentation that I would be interested in attending. Some of my implications in my dissertation are related to this idea.
Just my personal experience researching teacher ed programs – there was surprising variety in the number of teacher ed models, types of classes. etc. Teacher ed programs reflect their state content standards as well as teacher cert standards – so I saw differences based on state. But even within states, I saw that two different programs could have different models.