Teacher Education through Flexible Learning in Africa and other Developing Contexts (TETFLE) open journal
Theme: Empowering the Global South through Distance Teacher Education: Technologies, Pedagogies, and Leadership
Read More Read more about Call for submission for a special issue: Volume 9Teacher Education through Flexible Learning in Africa and other Developing Contexts (TETFLE) open journal
Topic: Teacher education through flexible learning in Africa and other Global South contexts: International comparative perspectives
Guest-editors:
Prof CC Wolhuter, Professor in Comparative and International Education, North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa
Prof NK Dash, Indira Ghandi National Open University, India
The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020/21 has precipitated a change in many teacher education systems, inducing the embracement of the latest technology in enhancing the education effort. In this way, a new normal has been created (Nel & Marais, 2021). Post-pandemic, many experiments are being carried out by higher education and school education systems in the Global South to design, develop and offer teacher education programmes online (Glietenberg et al., 2022). Many teacher education courses are also provided through massive open online courses (MOOCs). Such experiments, many times, extend beyond national frontiers. The aim of this special issue is to place the focus on how flexible learning systems in teacher education in Africa and other Global South regions were created and how these are operating in various Global South contexts.
In this volume, we seek to publish articles related to the changes teacher education has undergone due to the pandemic and the focus on innovative technology, the possible opportunities this offers to the way societies educate their prospective and in-service teachers, and how these changes were tailored for the various national Global South societal contexts.
As such, this special edition focuses on research and innovation with regard to teacher education practices, including:
Types of manuscripts sought
Volume 8 seeks to publish original research contributions that discuss issues relevant to teacher education practices. Practical solutions to a variety of challenges encountered in this field, as well as more theoretical approaches to how pre- and in-service teachers could be effectively and efficiently trained in open distance learning institutions, are expected to address post-pandemic teaching and learning environments.
Two further clarifications are apt. Firstly, it should be mentioned that, while manuscripts that explicitly compare two or more units are welcome, single-unit studies can also be considered comparative research. In fact, most publications in the field of comparative and international education are single-unit studies (see Flessa, et al., 2021; Wolhuter, 2008). Although this is an apparent negation of the “comparative” in comparative education, comparativists frequently advance several reasons why single-unit studies still constitute comparative research. These include the fact that such studies contribute to the fund of knowledge of education in particular contexts and that such studies hook onto general concepts used in comparative educational scholarship. Their value also lies in the refinement and modification of existing theory and, ultimately, in the creation of new theory when existing explanatory frameworks prove inadequate (Arnove, 2001, p. 496; see also Wiseman, 2023). The general contention is also that, rather than literally meaning the study and comparison of two or more education systems, the term “comparative education” refers to the study of reciprocal education and society relations in particular contexts (Brown & Schweisfurth, 2024). This is evident in David Wilson’s analysis of definitions of comparative education (Wilson, 1994) and Erwin Epstein’s study on the meaning of comparison in comparative education (Epstein, 1992). A case could, however, be made against the overwhelming dominance of single-unit studies and for more two-units-plus studies, as such studies throw into sharper relief education-societal relations in particular contexts. Arnove (2001, p. 496; see also Prakash, 2020) also cautions that it is dangerous to generalise from one case and to view the world only from the lens with which one is most familiar.
Sharing the experiences of flexible learning teacher education experiments - especially now in the post-pandemic time, when such experiments are in abundance - with global audiences though experiments may not be conceptualised from a comparative perspective, but will still have immense comparative value for readers and practitioners. Hence, articles focusing on such experiments or innovations in the national context may be encouraged.
Secondly, international comparative studies do not only entail research at the level of national education systems. While the national level predominates in publications in the field of comparative and international education research, the much-cited Bray and Thomas Cube (Bray & Hajar, 2024; Bray & Murray, 1995) spelled out that comparative education studies can take place at a variety of geographic levels: global, continental, national, sub-national, institutional, classroom and individual.
References
Arnove, R.F. (2001). CIES facing the twenty-first century: Challenges and contributions. Comparative Education Review 45(4),477-503.
Bray, M., & Hajar (أنس حجّار), A. (2024). Complexity of the contexts: Features of private tutoring and units for comparison in the GCC countries of the Middle East. ECNU Review of Education 7(1),42-65. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/20965311221113350.
Bray, M., & Murray, T.R. (1995). Levels of comparison in educational studies. Harvard Educational Review 65(3),472-490.
Brown, R., & Schweisfurth, M. (2024). Making context matter through Massey’s relational space: Methodological and theoretical implications for comparative and international education. Comparative Education Review 68(3),1-20.
Epstein, E.H. (1992). The problematic meaning of ‘comparison’ in comparative education. In J. Schriewer & B. Holmes (Eds.), Theories and methods in comparative education. Frankfurt-am-Main: Peter Lang (3-23).
Flessa, J., Bramwell, D., & Mindreau, G.C. (2021). Education administration research in comparative education, 1995-2018. Comparative Education Review 65(3),1-20.
Glietenberg, S.H., Petersen, N., & Carolin, A. (2022). Teacher educators’ experiences of the shift to remote teaching and learning due to COVID-19. South African Journal of Childhood Education 12(1),a1189. Available at: ps://doi.org/10.4102/sajce.v12i1.1189.
Nel, C., & Marais, E. (2021). Addressing the wicked problem of feedback during teaching practicum. Perspectives in Education 39(1),410-426.
Prakash, S. (2020). The concept of comparative education. In S. Prakash, A.C. Lal Kumar & A.R. Anandha Krishnaveni (Eds), Comparative Education. Solapur: Laxmi Books (1-14).
Wilson, D.N. (1994). Comparative and international education: Fraternal or Siamese twins: A preliminary genealogy of our twin fields. Comparative Education Review 38(4),161-177.
Wiseman, A.W. (2023). Area studies and regional developments. Annual review of comparative and international education 2022 (International Perspectives on Education and Society 46(B),93-96.
Wolhuter, C.C. (2008). Review of the review: Constructing the identity of comparative education. Research in Comparative and International Education 3(4),323-344.
Proposal for manuscript/abstract
Send a proposal for a manuscript to tetflemanager@up.ac.za
The proposal should include:
The closing date for the submission of the proposal is 28 March 2025. Authors will be given feedback on their proposal within three weeks of submission.
Manuscript submission instructions
If an abstract is accepted, manuscripts for this special issue will be submitted through the TETFLE online submission system at https://upjournals.up.ac.za/index.php/tetfle/index with the closing date of 31 July 2025.
When submitting your manuscript, please include a note in the comments field that you wish it to be considered for TETFLE Volume 8.
Carefully review the author’s guidelines and submission preparation checklist, and prepare your manuscript accordingly.
Information about the peer review process and criteria is also available on the platform.
Planned publication date
Timeline: Call for papers
1.1 Call for abstracts: 25 October 2024
1.2 Closing date: Submission of abstracts: 28 March 2025
1.3 Feedback on submitted abstracts: 18 April 2025
2.1 Invitation to submit manuscript for review: 18 May 2025
2.2 Closing date for manuscript submission: 31 July 2025
2.3 Feedback on manuscripts (tentative): 31 October 2025
2.3 Accepted manuscripts to be published (tentative): December 2025
Read More Read more about Call for submission for a special issue: Volume 8Teacher Education through Flexible Learning in Africa and Other Developing Contexts (TETFLE) Open Journal
Call for papers for a special issue
Editors of the special issue
Guest Editors:
Wits School of Education, University of the Witwatersrand
Theme: Inclusive Classrooms for Epistemic Access: Opportunities and Challenges for the present-day practitioner
Rationale and Background:
‘Education is a human right,’ UN Summit Adviser says, urging action to tackle ‘crisis of access, learning and relevance’ adding that ‘unless we act now, the 2030 Agenda will become an epitaph for a world that might have been’ (United Nations, 2023). Education plays a fundamental role in the lives of many families, communities and nations. Globally, people have implausible confidence in the power of education to build and transform lives (World Bank, 2018) and this has led to an increasing demand for quality education. For instance, education is frequently regarded as a means for fighting against social ills, such as poverty, exclusion in its different forms and shapes, natural disasters, social inequality, unemployment and employability. Whilst advancement has been made with regard to the 2030 education targets set by the United Nations, sustained efforts are needed to address persistent challenges and guaranty that quality education is accessible to all, leaving no one behind.
Economic constraints, coupled with issues of learning outcomes and increased dropout rates, persevere in marginalised areas, highlighting the need for continued universal commitment to guaranteeing inclusive and equitable education for all. Other factors such as the learning environment, teacher and teaching, unequally distributed educational resources, crumbling infrastructure, teacher shortages, a lack of educational progress, and natural disasters affect the provision of quality education. Without educational transformation, many would not achieve their career potential and would not succeed in becoming the citizens they can be in this globalized world. With an increase in intra- and inter-national movement of people due to various reasons, institutions globally are enrolling large numbers of linguistically and culturally diverse students (Maringe, 2013), necessitating the need for ending the English monolingualism by adopting multilingual pedagogy for effective learning, transformation and decolonization.
As education becomes more widely available and more internationalised (Maringe, 2013), the acceptance of multilingualism and multiculturalism opens up windows of opportunity for multilingual students to understand the universe by employing all linguistic resources at their disposal. The challenge, however, is teacher preparedness as most are not fully equipped to handle these multilingual classes (GEM, 2016).
Another obstacle to effective education came at the end of 2019 through the emergence of COVID-19, an infectious disease spread through human-to-human transmission. This resulted in the suspension of contact classes as institutions tried to contain the widespread of the virus. Institutions were thus left with only one option: distance learning. Distance education has been used for decades to upgrade teachers’ skills (Öçal, Halmatov & Ata, 2021) and its methods such as Print-based Distance Education; Audio-based Distance Education; Televisually-based Distance Education; and Multimedia-based Distance Learning (Burns, 2011) are now used by HEI’s for initial teacher training, especially after the COVID-19 pandemic.
This special edition intends to address opportunities and challenges created by the ever-increasing diverse nature of our 21st century classrooms as institutions worldwide continue to enroll large numbers of diverse students. How do teacher trainers prepare teachers to meet these challenges as they work towards attaining the 2030 education targets and beyond?
Sub-themes
Types of manuscripts sought
The Special Issue seeks contributions that are stimulating, address challenging difficulties and possible solutions, and are well researched, showcasing innovative teaching and learning practices with evidence of results (e.g. preliminary). It is also interested in articles that focus on moving from practice to theory – a gap in the field of distance education.
Proposal for manuscripts
Send a proposal for a manuscript to tetflemanager@up.ac.za
The proposal should include:
The closing date for the submission of proposals is 15 February 2024. Authors will be given feedback on their proposals within two weeks of submission.
Manuscript submission instructions
If an abstract is accepted, manuscripts for this Special Issue must be submitted through the TETFLE online submission system.
Carefully review the Author Guidelines and Submission Preparation Checklist and prepare your manuscript accordingly.
Information about the peer review process and criteria is also available at https://upjournals.up.ac.za/index.php/tetfle/peer-review-process.
Planned publication date
Timeline:
Submission of abstracts call opens
15 January 2024
Closing date of abstract submission
4 March 2024
Feedback on submitted abstracts
Latest 14 March 2024
Manuscript submission closing date
29 April 2024
Accepted manuscripts will be published
October 2024
References
Burns, M (2011). Distance Education for Teacher Training: Modes, Models, and Methods. Education Development Center, Inc. Washington, DC.
GEM (2016). ‘If you don’t understand how can you learn?’, Global Education Monitoring Report, 2016. Paper 24, UNESCO, Paris
Maringe, F., (2013). Globalization and internationalization in higher education: Theoretical, strategic and management perspectives, Bloomsbury Academic, London.
Öçal, T., Halmatov, M. & Ata, S. (2021). Distance education in COVID-19 pandemic: An evaluation of parent’s, child’s and teacher’s competences. Educ Inf Technol 26, 6901–6921.
United Nations (2023). The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2023: Special Edition— A High-level Event Call to Action. UN Headquarters, New York.
World Bank. (2018). World Development Report. Learning to realise education’s promise. International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank.
Read More Read more about Call for papers for a special issue: Volume 7 (Extension)
Teacher Education through Flexible Learning in Africa and other Developing Contexts (TETFLE) open journal
Proposed topic: Teacher education practices in a flexible higher education environment
Read More Read more about Call for submission: Volume 5 (Extension)ISSN 2788-6298 (Online)
The work is licensed under the Creative Commons License 4.0 International https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
The Teacher Education through Flexible Learning in Africa (TETFLE) and other developing contexts online journal is a refereed, open-access e-journal that publishes original research on distance teacher education in Africa.
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