above clusters andfindings can also be used as a backdrop for the present approach,
although—as we aim to demonstrate—we will focus on the interplay involved
between intended and enacted designs or interventions and how agents face alter-
natives, or even conflicts, that require decision-making through co-configuration of
work.
A complementary study to that of Cochran-Smith and colleagues, but with a
specific focus on methodological approaches was done by Menter et al. ( 2010 ).
These authors reviewed 446 studies on, in and about teacher education in the UK
between 2000 and 2008, thus dovetailing in time with the mapping undertaken by
Cochran-Smith et al. Menter et al. summarize their classification of research
methods in the UK in a table where qualitative, small-scale studies based on
reflection and interviews dominate. Large-scale studies, longitudinal studies and
quantitative or mixed-method approaches are under-represented (Menter et al.
2010 , p. 131). Based on this, and other systematic summaries, the authors conclude
that what is missing is potential cumulative impact, there is relatively little attempt
to theorize approaches (resulting in methodological weaknesses), little evidence of
engaging in multiple methods or mixed methods, and that practitioner research in
teacher education is a neglected area. The consequence is a lack of coherence and,
we would add, a healthy knowledge base for thefield. Although the UK may differ
from other countries regarding teacher education programmes and policies (duly
noted by the authors) we recognize observations such as“...teacher education
research appears to be a relatively under-developed area, without a strong theo-
retical or methodological tradition”(p. 124).
From policy levels, but also from researchers, the response has been to require
research that can demonstrate“what works”and teacher education accountability
often embedded in effect sizes or mathematical tags that amount to audits. However,
such research, even at its best, is restricted by being fundamentally retrospective
and not focusing on many challenges that emerge when the turnover rate of valid
knowledge increases rapidly, when knowing and learning (and teaching) is dis-
tributed over multiple agents and artifacts, and when increasingly heterogeneous
groups of learners defy educational models where“one sizefits all”. The present
chapter, therefore, offers a different response than merely quantifying or measuring
processes (although this may befine depending on the research question). As
neither the overviews offered by Cochran-Smith or Menter point to methodological
approaches that aim to capture how student teachers (or teachers) face complexity,
transformation, potential expansion, and how they exercise agency when facing
alternatives or dilemmas, we will in the following propose a design approach for
examining such processes as future-oriented capacity building. Wefirst discuss our
conceptual framework before we present two cases, which willfinally be discussed
and related to further research on teacher education.
728 J.M. Vestøl and A. Lund