Elementary Educators

Beginnings and Professional Preparation

Transcript

Research has suggested a variety of reasons for individuals choosing to become teachers. These may include having a teacher in the family, having had positive experiences in school, identifying strongly with a favorite teacher, or seeing the work and nature of teachers’ schedules as compatible with family and other life choices. Dan Lortie's landmark study of U.S. teachers and the social environment of the school focused on career discernment as a product of various life experiences, especially the relationship that the prospective teacher had with his or her teachers and in his or her own schooling. These decisions are also influenced by the media images and status associated with teachers and teaching in the prospective teacher's cultural milieu.

In most industrialized nations, elementary teachers are required to complete an undergraduate college or university degree in a relevant area of study, as well as earn a teaching license or credential reflecting their understanding of pedagogical as well as content knowledge for the elementary grades. Some states in the United States require that teachers obtain or actively pursue a graduate degree, or have licensure only available at the graduate level. In several countries worldwide, there are also movements to create alternative routes to licensure that enable teacher candidates to complete their licensure requirements while working. These are especially encouraged in areas where a teacher shortage has made the fulfillment of compulsory elementary education difficult. In the United States, elementary teachers who have training and can teach in bilingual/English-as-a-second-language and math-and science-focused classrooms are particularly in demand and can be granted alternative licensure structures.

Teacher preparation has changed radically in the last quarter century, in part as a result of the increasing demands being placed on teachers and the widening parameters of teachers’ work, but also as a function of the now nearly universal national policies around compulsory elementary education. With more and more children in school, and government pressure to find ways to support schooling for all children, the needs for preparing teachers both competitively and quickly create special dilemmas worldwide. This means that organizations that prepare, and in some cases license, teachers must balance efficiency with quality in unique ways.

One contemporary means of addressing this tension lies in the standardization of teacher education at the elementary level. Organizations such as the Association for Childhood Education International offer standards that define a quality elementary teacher as a candidate

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