Practice, theory and research in Initial Teacher Education: international perspectives

Initial Teacher Education (ITE) has been discussed from a wide range of perspectives, focusing on its structure and curriculum, on field experiences and coursework, and the interplay between them, as well as on the learning experiences of student teachers (Darling-Hammond, Newton and Wei 2010; Townsend 2011; Flores 2016). In a recent review, Craig (2016) argued that the structure of education is not only shaped by history, culture and economics, but increasingly dictated by politics.CIEC – Research Centre on Child Studies, IE, UMinho (FCT R&D unit 317), PortugalNational Funds through the FCT (Foundation for Science and Technology) and co-financed by European Regional Development Funds (FEDER) through the Competitiveness and Internationalization Operational Program (POCI) through CIEC (Research Centre on Child Studies, of the University of Minho) with the reference POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007562o pelo Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER) através do COMPETE 2020 – Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização (POCI) no âmbito do CIEC (Centro de Investigação em Estudos da Criança, da Universidade do Minho) com a referência POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007562