ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the role of knowledge and practice in teaching and teacher formation, with a particular focus on teaching in primary and secondary contexts, employing Bernstein’s sociology of knowledge as a starting point for theorising specialised knowledge and practice in education. It is argued that the development of teacher expertise relies on a conceptualisation of the relationship between disciplinary (subject) and educational knowledge, accompanied by a notion of teaching as a specialised professional practice based on studies of professional knowledge, the characteristics of practice outlined by Noddings and MacIntyre, and the development of criteria by which the quality of practice can be assessed.
