- Teacher educators’research into perceptions, and changing behaviour of student
and young teachers.
Student teacher research - Student teachers research into the ways of being of migrant groups in the form
of sociological or nomadological (Deleuze and Guattari 1986 ) inquiry. - Student teacher research into existing material on the beliefs and culture of
migrant groups.
General research which will benefit student teachers and migrant children. - Research into specific issues relating to a defined place—city, country, school or
village—a sociology of interaction (not a‘deficit’account of migrant behaviours!). - A general approach to research which respects the‘other’and deconstructs the
privileges associated with hegemonic social constructions.
31.2 The Matter of Research into Teacher Education
Regarding the Teaching of Migrant Children
This paper explores how research and teacher education can better prepare migrant
and non-migrant teachers to support migrant children. Our work is based on a
phenomenological claim, because all three of us are migrants and researchers, and
we draw on our experience and our research. The technique we used to background
this paper, and in other related research, is‘talanoa’, a Tongan convention of
conversation which allows all participants to have their say in a supportive but
purposeful context (Vaioleti 2006 ).
31.3 Consciousness Raising in Teacher Education
Ethnic and cultural diversity is changing the social landscape and hence the edu-
cational landscape all over the world. New Zealand has been the beneficiary of
immigration for 1000 years approximately, with the numbers intensifying in the
middle of the nineteenth century and again in the middle of the twentieth and early
twenty-first century. Each wave of immigrants brings with it increasing social
complexity, and an increasing challenge for the education system. Because of the
rapid change of cultural contexts in the social landscape of our country, there is now
an increased focus on the issues of diversity and multiculturalism in all walks of life
and within different communities (Arndt 2012 ). We argue that the challenge of
increasing diversity for the education system can be productively addressed by an
attitude and practice of inquiry, that is, of research, at all levels of the system, but
most importantly in initial teacher education.
472 N. Devine et al.