A Technological Teacher Education Program Planning Model

The purpose of the paper is to briefly state the case for a revised technological1 teacher education program and describe a conceptual model developed at the Faculty of Education, The University of Western Ontario. The model outlined assumes that a re-thinking of how technological teachers learn to teach is necessary if new ways of teaching are to be fostered. The need has three dimensions. First, technology and the way we transmit knowledge about it in schools, is changing. Second, substantive analysis of past practices in technological teacher education are overdue. Third, teacher development is a complex human and professional process combining personal and environmental factors that are often poorly understood. The curriculum design represented herein is a starting point for research, reflection and development only. A more comprehensive technological teacher education pedagogical model will evolve differently from one institution to another. There are two aspects to the design put forward for reader analysis: the elements which give the design its structure; and the program activities themselves. The description of both is condensed. The paper gives the reader information about the features of the model and, to a lesser extent, information about how to use it. A more detailed description of the teacher development project which led to the adoption of the new model and detailed information on its use is available (Hansen, R., Froelich, M., Fleisser, C., and McClain, J., 1991).