9: Transition to Teacher Educator: A Collaborative Effort

The vision of teaching mathematics outlined in documents such as the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Standards (1989, 1991, 2000) has required mathematics educators to rethink teacher education. Although there has been much thought about how teacher education should change, little attention has focused on how to prepare mathematics teacher educators who will need to provide this education. In this chapter, we describe one university’s attempt to prepare mathematics teacher educators and discuss the struggles three novice teacher educators faced as they transitioned into their new role.

Most of the doctoral students in our program who are interested in becoming teacher educators are experienced school teachers. As such, they bring with them a wealth of knowledge about curriculum, how students think, how to facilitate learning, classroom management, and other instructional practices. They have formed opinions about “what works” in the classroom and often have strong beliefs about how students learn. Much of this knowledge is not based on research, but rather on their own experiences. Although school teaching experience can certainly be an asset, these experiences alone will not ensure success as a teacher educator. The transition from experienced school teacher to teacher educator is complicated and does not occur automatically or quickly. In fact, Murray and Male (2005) found that the evolutionary process of establishing a new professional identity requires two to three years for most people. A large part of this transition involves identifying how former school teachers can “draw on their accumulated professional knowledge and understanding of school teaching to achieve feelings of personal confidence about inducting student teachers into the profession” (Murray & Male, 2005, p. 136).