ABSTRACT
Teacher education is defined as a set of activities deliberately intended to prepare candidates for the occupation of teaching. Nine broad categories of variables, referred to as the parameters of teacher education, are proposed and defined. These include: 1) the goals, 2) characteristics of the candidates, 3) characteristics of the staff, 4) content of the programme, 5) time and its allocation, 6) the ethos of the programme, 7) location and setting, 8) regulations, and 9) financial resources and restraints. These parameters are then displayed in a nine-by-nine matrix generating nine diagonal within-parameter cells, and 72 intersecting cells which can ‘contain’ summaries, analyses and syntheses of the available research on the variables within the parameters. In addition, some examples of how the matrix can be used to generate new research questions are presented.
