Dangerous practices : the practicum experiences of non-Indigenous pre-service teachers in remote communities

This paper seeks to explore the risks of providing preserviceteachers with professional experiences in remote communities.In particular this paper focuses on the risks associated with this kindof professional experience. Twelve pre-service teachers wereinterviewed whilst on a three-week practicum around Katherine andin Maningrida in the Northern Territory during 2012. The dangersoutlined in this paper relate to the way their experiences continued tobe mediated by stereotypes and perpetuating colonial practices. Thepre-service teachers’ limited understandings of Indigenousknowledges and languages are discussed before exploring the vexedissue of reverse culture shock that some of the participants identifiedwhen they returned home. The paper concludes by exploring thenotion of ‘allies’ as a way to negotiate the problematic nature of thiswork.

Teacher confidence and professional capital

This paper illustrates the role of professional learning in building teacher confidence, and explicates how confidence relates to professional capital. It reports on data from the Victorian State-wide Professional Mentoring Program for Early Childhood Teachers (2011–2014), and focuses on the experiences of both new to the profession and professionally isolated early childhood teachers and their more experienced early childhood teacher mentors who participated in this purposely designed program. The findings show that participants' gains in confidence are aligned with expansions in professional capital encompassing the acquisition of knowledge and skills (human capital), participation in networks of collaborative learning communities (social capital), and the ability to exercise professional agency (decisional capital). We conclude that teacher confidence is a function – and a constitutive feature – of teacher professional capital, and that professional learning through mentoring is one way of building this vital professional attribute. Theoretical insights and empirical evidence on this intricate interconnection have strong implications for policy and practice.

Multiliteracies in the wild : learning from computer games

The growth of interest in virtual worlds and other online spaces for children and young people raises important issues for literacy educators and researchers. This book is a timely and much-needed collection of current research in the area. It provides a synthesis of knowledge and understanding and will be a key resource for scholars, students and teachers, particularly those interested in digital literacies. The work presents a coherent vision of current knowledge, and some of the most engaging, empirical research being undertaken on virtual worlds and online spaces in and beyond educational institutions. It contains international studies from the UK, North America and Australasia.This is an important time for those researching virtual worlds, videogaming and Web 2.0 technologies, since there is growing professional interest in their significance in the education and development of children and young people. Whether these technologies are solely associated with informal learning or whether they should be incorporated into classroom contexts is hotly debated. This book provides a principled evaluation and appreciation of the learning, teaching and instruction that can occur in digital environments, showing children, young people and those who work with them as active agents with possibilities to navigate new paths.

An entrepreneurial adventure? Young women pre-service teachers in remote Aboriginal Australia

Following global interest in how pre-service teacher education might engage with social justice imperatives, this paper reports on interviews with three non-Aboriginal young women pre-service teachers taking part in a professional placement in remote Aboriginal Australia, and explores how their identity work reinscribes and/or challenges racialized forms of power. I argue that theories from the sociology of youth around 21st century girlhood can illuminate these young teachers’ identity work in useful ways that raise important issues and questions for teacher educators to consider. Simultaneously, I show how empirical research into teacher identity can enrich theory and research on young femininities.