Teacher education: Evidence based research and the European benchmarks

Abstract

This paper is concerned with a reflexion on the training of teachers as “professionals” that are thus required to include themselves in Europe as such—hence, being consistent with the whole continent’s productive and cultural reality. A relevant aspect is given by the construction of her own image on behalf of the teacher: it is the ground for an identity-making relation that develops during the in-service learning of professional culture (internship), which
is propaedeutic for the fulfilment of the teacher’s new role (apprenticeship).
By going through these steps, professional experience is situated: teachers customize their own career development and acquire growing awareness, thus being concerned with the need for lifelong self-training. Another kind of awareness has to be adequately developed by teachers: the one about the social sphere which harbours their role as professionals. Such is the teamwork
context, which requires socialization processes, educational/training
models, and the sharing of decisional responsibility. It is finally identified the central role played by University in the training of professional teachers.