national agendas. Absent from consideration is what a person is capable of doing
and being, and the ways education can contribute to the development of students’
capabilities so that they are able to live lives they have reason to value (Nussbaum
2011 ).
We think that having regard for the development of students’capabilities—
specifically those that students need in order to live lives they value, rather than the
narrow range of capabilities privileged by governments—is a more socially just
place to start to reimagine what kind of teaching is required and thus what kind of
teacher education. A capabilities approach to teaching and TE:
has direct implications for curricular materials and pedagogical practices. Curricular
materials, the quality of learning experiences and of learning outcomes, need to be eval-
uated against the capabilities of students (i.e. their substantive freedoms), not solely on the
basis of economic returns such as employment and income or, more broadly, students’
contributions to the national economy. The capability perspective...recognizes that
education generates economic and non-economic returns, promotes agency and supports
social mobility. (Gale and Molla 2015 : 825)From a capability perspective, then, the issue is not simply how students perform on
standardised literacy and numeracy tests, but what capabilities students need and
desire in order to“form a conception of the good and to engage in critical reflection
about the planning”(Nussbaum 1992 : 222) of the lives they, their parents and
communities have reason to value. A good life in this sense might not simply align
with the aspirations of government and its conception of an educated person as
possessing particular skills and knowledges (Gale and Molla 2015 ).
The questions for teaching and TE then become, what capabilities do teachers
need themselves in order to enable their students to develop these capabilities? Such
questions refocus the purpose, intent and content of TE education away from the
performative aspects of mandated literacy and numeracy programs towards a more
expansive view of teaching and its contribution to students’lives. It has as its
starting point a different logic of teaching and TE, which is broadly educative and
more socially just.
References
Beauchamp, G., Clarke, L., Hulme, M., & Murray, J. (2015). Teacher education in the United
Kingdom post devolution: Convergences and divergences.Oxford Review of Education, 41(2),
154 – 170.
Berliner, D. C. (2013). Problems with value-added evaluations of teachers? Let me count the
ways!The Teacher Educator, 48(4), 235–243.
Berliner, D. C. (2014). Exogenous variables and value-added assessments: A fatalflaw.Teachers
College Record, 116(1), 1–31.
Cameron, D., & Clegg, N. (2010). Forward by the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister. In
Department for Education (England) [DfE]. (2010).The importance of teaching: The schools
white paper(pp. 3–5). London: The Stationery Office.
Comber, B. (2012). Mandated literacy assessment and the reorganization of teachers’work:
Federal policy, local effects.Critical Studies in Education, 53(2), 119–136.
35 The Prevailing Logic of Teacher Education... 533