Empirical contribution

This thesis has contributed with empirical knowledge about the extent and characteristics of the opportunities teacher candidates have that are grounded in practice within their

coursework at campus, as highlighted in the research questions. The literature review in Chapter 3 revealed a need for this type of knowledge (see also Cochran-Smith et al., 2016).

For instance, van Veen (2013) argued that instructional practices of teacher education, such as reflection and the use of portfolios, are “hardly explored in terms of effectiveness” (p. 29).

This thesis to some extent corroborates earlier knowledge about the scarcity of connections to practice in teacher education coursework (Darling-Hammond, 2006), but it has also shown that teacher candidates do have opportunities to learn that are grounded in practice. More specifically, based on the decomposition of opportunities to learn that are grounded in practice outlined throughout our conceptual framework, this thesis has contributed with more detailed knowledge about the characteristics of these opportunities, as well as their strengths and weaknesses across the programs in our sample. This thesis has shown, primarily through Article 1, that the more established ways of grounding in practice (e.g., taking the pupils’

perspective) are used more frequently in coursework; significantly, these instructional practices point back to the seminar tradition in the Nordic countries (Kvalbein, 2003;

Rasmussen, 2008). The candidates had, however, rather few opportunities connected directly to routine classroom teaching practices, such as to practice and rehearse teaching, analyze pupils’ learning, and see models of teaching. Even though the observations covered a limited part of the complete programs, the emergence of similar patterns across the programs

strengthened these findings. Further, these findings were corroborated by survey data measuring the candidates’ perceptions across the whole program as well as the whole

academic year (Canrinus, Bergem, Klette, & Hammerness, 2016). Thus, while discussing the everlasting challenge of making teacher education relevant for actual classroom practice, this thesis has contributed with empirical knowledge reminding us that this can be done with relative emphasis on specific aspects of practice.

Second, and related to the last part of the overall research question, this thesis has also contributed to empirical knowledge about the quality and characteristics of the different dimensions of opportunities to learn that are grounded in practice and included in our

69 framework. As argued in Chapter 3, many of the reviewed studies have noted the importance of the careful scaffolding and support by the teacher educators when employing these

practices, and this thesis contributes with specific knowledge about what this support might entail. In particular, Articles II and III specified this in detail for the two chosen dimensions, talk about field placement and analysis of pupils’ learning. In addition, the use of the coding book in Article I, together with analysis of the dimensions across all three articles, have shown that, even though there are opportunities grounded in practice in coursework, some

opportunities are more rigorous and developed than others. For instance, in Articles II and III, we showed how talk about field placement and the analysis of pupils’ learning are

opportunities grounded in practice that have great potential, but that suffer from lack of detail, specificity, and connectedness to theory. We have argued that this talk could be more complex and analytic, and that the analysis of pupils’ learning could also be done more in depth and according to research on how to make learning visible. Again, this is related to a pedagogy of teacher education, the quality of the instructional practices of the teacher educators, and the scaffolding and support provided. Seeing teaching as a complex activity that needs to be decomposed, approximated, and rehearsed (cf. Forzani, 2014) invokes the emphasis on the role of the teacher educators and their instructional practices.

Finally, it is also interesting to look at the empirical contribution concerning differences between the programs in our sample. Since the observation data constituted a small slice of the overall teaching on campus within these programs, I do not make overall claims about the individual programs in Article I. In Article II, however, I showed how the opportunities to talk about field placement at Stanford were perceived as greater by the teacher candidates, but also that the talk there was more frequent and performed with greater quality than at the two other programs, partly due to the teacher educators’ instructional practices. I chose to highlight Stanford in this article because it seemed like something could be learned from the atypical finding (cf. Stake, 2006) from this program. The finding was triangulated by survey data, which accentuated the argument of highlighting Stanford related to that specific dimension.

Similarly, in Article III, I found that the candidates in the Helsinki program perceived less opportunity to analyze pupils’ learning than candidates from the other two programs, even though all candidates perceived few opportunities. The survey data included reports from only the programs for which we had robust survey data (Oslo, Helsinki, and Stanford), and the differences discussed below thus apply only to those three programs. In Article II, I

questioned whether the differences found had to do not only with the size of the programs—

Stanford being smaller, having more time and resources to follow up the individual

70 candidates—but also if they had to do with the organization of field placement and the

connectedness between the teacher educators at the school site and the field placement site within this program. Stanford was the only program of these three that had organized its field placement concurrently with the teaching at campus. One might think that this had an impact on the extent to which talk about field placement was connected to, or grounded in, practice.

In Article III, I pointed to variation in reform efforts as a way to explain differences across programs, as both Stanford (Hammerness, 2006) and Oslo (Engelien et al., 2015) have emphasized ways of grounding coursework in practice in their fairly recent reforms, whereas this was not the case for Helsinki.

Finnish scholars have argued that there are close connections between fieldwork and coursework in Finnish teacher education due to arrangements such as the training schools and teacher educators with split positions in these schools and at campus (Niemi &

Jakku-Sihvonen, 2006; Niemi & Kohonen, 1995; Tirri, 2014). However, a professional struggle in Finland (Niemi, 2016), as well as in Norway (Munthe & Rogne, 2016), has led teacher education to aim for recognition by moving away from the traditional seminar into the more academic tradition of the university. This academization of teacher education might have resulted in a less practical teacher education due to a fear of being too instrumental and technical (Munthe & Rogne, 2016; Niemi, 2016). Research from Finland has shown that the explicit focus on research in Finnish teacher education might have undermined a focus on the more practical skills (Groom & Maunonen-Eskelinen, 2006; Säntti, Rantala, Salminen, &

Hansen, 2014). Säntti et al. (2014) showed that the amount of practice and the amount of tutoring during practice has deteriorated from 1982 to 2006, and has been replaced by more self-studies. They argued that this makes the integration of theory and practice even more difficult for the teacher candidates. Groom and Maunonen-Eskelinen (2006) found that there was less focus on teaching skills in Finnish teacher candidates’ portfolios, as compared to their UK peers. Similarly, while comparing teacher education at the University of Helsinki and at Oslo University College, Afdal and Nerland (2014) concluded that the Helsinki program was more closely connected to theory while the Oslo University College program was more closely connected to practice. There is no doubt that the Finnish version of research-based teacher education represents a strong model for a practice-based teacher education, but perhaps the “general level” in Finnish teacher education has been overemphasized at the cost of the “basic level,” as Kansanen (1991, 2004) framed it.

As stated, experts have issued a critique about teacher education being disconnected from practice in Norway (NOKUT, 2006) and in the US (Darling-Hammond, Bransford, et al., 2005)

71 as well. However, the US discourse has included a push for what I have called the enactment approach to a practice-based teacher education, and the Californian programs included in this thesis are examples of programs taking this approach into account. Similarly, from the

contextual descriptions of programs outlined in the introduction and in the methods section, it seems that Oslo has worked specifically on connection to practice and the enactment of practice, while the same was not as evident in Helsinki, which might help explain the differences we found between the programs.