Assessing the Outcome of Teacher Education Programs in Norway: An Analysis and Discussion of the Factor Structure in Domains of Teacher Practicum for Student Teachers at Three Norwegian Universities

Abstract

This article contributes to our understanding of teacher education by presenting the results of a large pilot study of quality assessments of teacher education programs at three Norwegian universities. We present an assessment instrument that corresponds to the California Standards for Teaching Professions and the practice domains developed by Darling-Hammond. The research question is: To what extent does the reported five-factor structure in the reported revised instrument (Darling-Hammond) fit the Norwegian context? We have revised this instrument to better cover both the documented dimensions of teacher professionalism and the demands regarding teacher quality in Norwegian educational policy. This has been accomplished by incorporating and modifying the items of the Darling-Hammond instrument. The modification process involved a selection of students, teachers, teacher educators and a school headmaster who discussed the relevance and content validity of the items. The final questionnaire was piloted at three Norwegian universities in three different education programs, with the participation of 419 students. The results show high inter-correlation between the original practice domains of Darling-Hammond, but the original factor structure is reproduced and to some extent supported. The results are discussed, and we conclude that the reported assessment instrument is valid as a measure of the teacher education program contributions to students’ competence in the five reported domains of the teacher practicum. Therefore, the instrument may be used as an overall evaluation of the complete program or may be slightly modified using the item format to assess distinct aspects of teacher education.