ABSTRACT
Introduction Th is chapter focuses on the nature of student teacher (ST) learning as the development of a professional identity through “legitimate peripheral participation” (Lave & Wenger, 1991) in a community of practice. It examines the ways in which school-university partnership facilitates the participation of STs and shows that in order for legitimate peripheral participation to bring about powerful learning, STs should be provided with opportunities to gain legitimate access to participation in the community’s practice to appropriate its culture and to construct their identities. It argues that the kinds of participation that are made available to STs and the extent to which legitimacy of access to practice is granted to them profoundly aff ect the fashioning of their incipient professional identities.
