THE SUBJECT MATTER PREPARATION OF （标的物的准备）.pdf

1 THE SUBJECT MATTER PREPARATION OF TEACHERS 2 Deborah Loewenberg Ball and G. Williamson McDiarmid If anything is to be regarded as a specific preparation for teaching, priority must be given to a thorough grounding in something to teach. (Peters, 1977, p. 151). That subject matter is an essential component of teacher knowledge is neither a new nor a controversial assertion. After all, if teaching entails helping others learn, then understanding what is to be taught is a central requirement of teaching. The myriad tasks of teaching, such as selecting worthwhile learning activities, giving helpful explanations, asking productive questions, and evaluating students learning, all depend on the teachers understanding of what it is that students are to learn. As Buchmann (1984) points out, It would be odd to expect a teacher to plan a lesson on, for instance, writing reports in science and to evaluate related student assignments, if that teacher is ignorant about writing and about science, and does not understand what student progress in writing science reports might mean. (p. 32) Although subject matter knowledge is widely acknowledged as a central component of what teachers need to know, research on teacher education has not, in the main, focused on the development of teachers subject matter knowledge. Researchers specifically interested in how teachers develop and change have focus