UCLA

This Ph.D. dissertation is a qualitative case study of a local discourse about teacher preparation in Finland. I have used structuration theory to analyze thirteen semi-structured, open-ended interviews. Participants were faculty and students in a graduate-level program preparing science teachers for upper secondary schools. Findings are presented as synthetic overviews of respondent articulations on six interview themes: (1) goals of teacher preparation, (2) the role of collaborative practices in teacher preparation, (3) the role of research in teacher preparation, (4) the role of critical thinking in teacher preparation, (5) different forms of knowledge and skills in teacher preparation, (6) the good teacher. The research contributes to research on pre-service teacher training. Notably, by articulating how context-specific culture and social norms contribute to a local variant of teacher preparation. Two characteristics of the discourse are identified as: (a) an emphasis on the role of theory for sound decisions in teaching practices, (b) a focus on the development of abstract thought in students.