This study summarizes the history of the policies for teachers’ study and self-improvement in Post-war Japan and considers issues to realize voluntary and independent study and selfimprovement suitable for professional teachers. The focus is on consideration from the viewpoint of the system and operation of the opportunities guaranteed by the clauses of study and self-improvement （currently Articles 21 and 22） of the Law for the Special Regulations concerning Educational Public Service. Particular attention is paid to Article 22（2）. Legislators had the following four intentions regarding the Law for the Special Regulations. First, it was enacted as “provisions for the advocacy of teachers” or “provisions for the protection of educational public servants.” Second, study and self-improvement were both an obligation and a right. Third, in the case where teachers themselves strive for study and self-improvement and in the case of those provided with opportunities from the administrative authorities, they were located as the accomplishment of duties in both cases. Fourth, “freedom of study and selfimprovement” was basically guaranteed. After the local education administration law was promulgated and enforced in 1956, the control aspect of the policies for the aforementioned was rapidly strengthened. In the 21st century, voluntary and independent study and self-improvement have been further in decline. There are four issues to be improved. First, it is necessary for teachers themselves to consciously and proactively apply for study and self-improvement leaving their place of service. Second, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology （MEXT） should return to the legislative purpose of the clause to encourage and support the voluntary and independent study and self-improvement of teachers, and amend the June 2019 notice. Third, while emphasizing “passion for the teaching profession” and “comprehensive human power,” it is necessary to change the actual situation in which there are no support measures for “selfimprovement” actions to acquire it. Fourth, the guarantee of “freedom of study and selfimprovement” is another important pillar of improving the environment for study and selfimprovement as well as addressing the issues of long hours and overcrowding work.

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This paper traces the paradigm shift in teacher education and its discourse over the past two decades, and identifies the changes in teacher education research necessary to respond to the latest paradigm shift. Through analysing the rhetoric used to demand and／or promote ways to ensure that teachers gain necessary knowledge and skills to meet expectations and changing needs in their practice, this study identified the paradigm shifts in teacher education: these shifts move from In-Service Teacher Education, Continuous Professional Development, and to Continuous Professional Learning. The shifts in paradigm can be characterised by changes in (1) the perception of teachers as an occupational body, changing to an autonomous practitioner; (2) the recognition of and moving away from uncritical objectification of teachers as objects to be monitored for quality; and (3) the approach to quality assurance from external monitoring, to more of an organisational practice with collaborative and ongoing reflections. This paper then concludes with the important remark that teacher education research needs active engagement in adding another layer of reflection on its potential objectification, of teachers as “objects to be studied,” both in their practice and discourse. Sensitivities to the subject-object relation are necessary in order to bring about a new culture intended to deconstruct the unexamined relationship that research community has with teachers and practitioners. This new culture would bring a whole new approach to invite practitioners as participating actors in knowledge creation in the field of teacher education. The key to the success and failure of teacher policy lies in the hands of teachers. However, teachers have long been objectified as instruments to implement pedagogy, much like the education research had long objectified learners as the object to be taught. It is thus necessary to reflect upon the rhetoric that surrounds the questions of teacher education research, in order to make teachers into participants in their own professional growth and in the system of quality assurance.

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This study analyzes Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT)’s ins titutional philosophy on teacher training. As proposed by Aoki (2021), institutional philosophy is a basic idea shared by the entire organization. Hargreaves and Shirley (2012) divided national education policy into four phases : the quantitative expansion phase, the second phase for improvement based on the principle of competition, the third phase for improvement by setting standards and goals, and the fourth phase that respects the autonomy of schools and teachers. MEXT’s institutional philosophy on teacher training and teacher development has focused primarily on supplying teachers quantitatively and providing training opportunities for teachers. Once quantitative assurance of teachers and training opportunities was achieved, the Ministry intended to promote training based on the independent judgment of boards of education, schools, and teachers, rather than reform based on the principle of competition as in other countries. In other words, MEXT has an institutional philosophy of reform in the first and third stages. There was a time when the Central Council for Education sought to respect the autonomy of teachers, but in reality, measures related to the formulation of standards for teacher training are being developed. The teacher license renewal system was initiated as part of the measures seeking standards, but it was abolished when it began to impede the quantitative supply of teachers. This is believed to be due to MEXT’s strong institutional philosophy, which aims to secure a quantitative supply of teachers. MEXT has not gone so far as to adopt an institutional philosophy of respecting the autonomy of schools and teachers.

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The purpose of this study is to clarify the problems in the ongoing draft proposal for the reform of the training system for in-service teachers and to propose the possible future roles of university faculty members involved in teacher education and in-service training. Specifically, this study provides an overview of the recent collaboration between professional graduate schools for teaching and local boards of education under the project launched by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology in FY2017, which aims to promote the integrated reform of teachers’ education, recruitment, and in-service training. In addition, this study proposes the following three roles that universities should play to address the problematic nature of the recent guidelines for recording and managing the training course portfolios under the new training system, which are currently open for public comment. First, using their academic expertise, universities should contribute to the design of teacher development indicators by boards of education. Second, they should participate in local teacher training programs to understand the reality of in-service teacher training. Finally, they should run a website where teachers can effectively build their own training course portfolio online and acquire in-service training information. Overall, prior to discussing the kinds of training that should be recorded and their corresponding formats, a training environment in which teachers can take pride and initiative in enhancing their own professionalism should first be created. If teachers who continue to learn were to serve as models for children, they must first have the leeway to learn.

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Teacher education and professional development for early childhood education and care (ECEC) teachers are marginalized in Japan. One reason is its dual system between the certificate to work at child welfare facilities, such as childcare centers under the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (MHLW), and the kindergarten teacher licensure regulated by the Ministry of Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). Other reasons are that the pedagogical approach in ECEC fundamentally differs from compulsory education and that the critical importance of the early years has not yet been recognized in the society. As in other countries, global common knowledge among the countries participating Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and Japanese local knowledge from research and practice influenced recent reform of teacher education programs. First, MHLW, MEXT, and ECEC research communities cooperated to propose a model curriculum to manage the dual system program, which required ECEC-specific five subject areas. This change requires teacher educators to have ECEC-specific expert knowledge rather than that of traditional academic subject areas. Second, “Talis Starting Strong Survey 2018” revealed strengths and potential challenges in the Japanese ECEC pedagogy and teacher education. Some results reflected curriculum guidelines' philosophy and represented characteristics of Japanese ECEC pedagogy. However, other factors, such as considerations for cultural and linguistic diversity and different family backgrounds, needed renewed attention. Third, for a better professional development system, there is an ongoing project for the MEXT to establish ECEC professional development centers and ECEC advisers in municipalities to provide equal opportunities for quality professional development across different circumstances between public or private, nursery or kindergarten, and rural or urban areas. In this vision, teacher educators are critical in actualizing access-equality for quality programs.

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This study discusses trends in early childhood education（ preschool education）, particularly from ages 3 to 5, and the Early Childhood Education and Care （ECEC） teachers who are responsible for it. The field of ECEC is being actively approached not only from pedagogy and ECEC studies but also from economics and other fields that recognize the value of investments in the field. In the past, there was a strong interest in improving access to early childhood education (ensuring quantity), but as the prospects for securing this situation have become more promising, the international trend has shifted from ensuring quantity to quality, and various measures, such as the establishment of preschools, are now being proposed. Meanwhile, to follow this trend, Japan also faced a major shift from quantity to quality around 2020. This discussion is having a direct impact on the nature and trends of childcare facilities, such as kindergartens, daycare centers, and ECEC centers, as well as on the roles and training of childcare personnel (qualified kindergarten teachers and nursery teachers) who work in these facilities. The contents of the National Curriculum for Kindergarten Education, the Guidelines for Nursery School Education and Care, and the National Standards for ECEC center have become interlinked, and a new qualification system for ECEC teachers has also been considered. On the other hand, the current situation is one of dualization in many areas, and each site is under pressure to make a difficult decision.Uchida (2016) has already raised these trends and issues in JSSTE Annual Report No. 25. This paper examines Uchida’s discussion and examines the latest trends and issues considering subsequent trends and changes.

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This study provides an overview of trends in the collaboration and connection between early childhood and elementary school education and discusses the challenges of teacher education to nurture leaders in this field. In 1989, with the revision of the elementary school course of study the “Living Environment Studies” was newly established. With the revision of the kindergarten course of education in the same year, the “six areas” of childcare content were reorganized into “five areas.” Around the year 2000, the “Elementary 1 Problem” began to become a social problem. The results revealed that the importance of collaboration and connection between early childhood and elementary school education was widely recognized from the perspective of “to solve the Elementary 1 Problem.” In 2010, a report from the “Conference of Research Collaborators for the Smooth Connection between Early Childhood and Elementary School Education” was published. It became clear that the collaboration and connection between early childhood and elementary school education are intended to guarantee the continuity of children’s development and learning. Both the Elementary School Course of Study and the Kindergarten Course of Education, which were revised in 2017, aim to realize making the “curriculum open to society.” The collaboration and connection between early childhood and elementary school education is a philosophy that values the natural way of learning of children and human beings, enhances that learning to competencies through school education, and aims to lead to the formation of a future society. The aim is to create educational practices based on this. To this end, it is important to activate the teacher’s intellect and to perceive the child’s actions as an expression of their inner world.

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Although kindergartens are positioned as schools under the School Education Law, they differ from school education after elementary school, and thus the expertise of teachers differs in some respects from that of elementary school and beyond. This study analyzes the meaning of teacher expertise in kindergarten by tracing the history of the transition from the postwar guidelines for childcare to those for kindergarten education, with “education through the environment” defined as unique to early childhood education. The history of changes in kindergarten education guidelines since the publication of “Guidelines for Child Care and Education” in 1948 can be seen as a trail of trial-and-error in trying to incorporate the difficult concepts of “providing an appropriate environment” and “education through the environment” into the practice of kindergarten education. One of the reasons this concept is difficult to understand is that kindergartens have a history of providing education in advance of elementary school education or emphasizing watching over the children without providing any educational activities. Since the 1998 revision, when the term “planned environmental composition” was used, “education through the environment” has finally come to permeate practice in childcare settings. However, the concept remains ambiguous and difficult to understand. How to teach “education through the environment” in the field of teacher training is an issue for the future.

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This article discusses the integration of kindergarten and elementary school teacher training courses. The purpose is to identify practical issues and inevitable restrictions by describing the construction of teacher training courses under certain legal conditions with consideration of the number of credits. In particular, many universities that handle elementary education courses offer both kindergarten and elementary school teacher training courses because of social trends that connect kindergarten and elementary education. However, the revision of various systems related to the teaching profession from 2016 to 2017 has made it difficult for kindergarten and elementary school teacher training courses to coexist. Meanwhile, junior high school teacher training courses, driven by the “compulsory-education-school” concept, have easily permeated elementary school teacher training courses. Hence, the number of kindergarten and elementary school teacher training courses that should be integrated is expected to decrease. In a practical sense, the principle behind the composition of different teacher training courses has been limited to the minimum number of compulsory subjects for each course because of the limitation in the number of credits. Nevertheless, the specialty that differs from such “cooperation” and “connection” of courses is actively being discussed. In sum, this article highlights the need to deepen the discussion about the substance of teachers’ profession and to design related subjects and curricula.

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To gain insights into how learning about social issues can be viewed in teacher education, this study analyzes the narratives of those who have been involved in poverty issues prior to their teaching careers. Among social problems, the issue of “child poverty” has attracted significant attention in recent years. Teachers have been positioned as an important entity responsible for the inclusion of poverty. Therefore, teacher education has highlighted the necessity for teachers to learn about “poverty.” However, previous studies have seldom clarified what kind of meaningful experience learning about “poverty” in teacher training and education has after becoming a teacher. As an advanced case study, we analyze interview data from teachers who have experienced volunteer work in poverty. From an analytical perspective, we adopted ethnomethodology, which means that the analysis is conducted in line with the teacher’s narrative, rather than projecting the researcher’s framework. The analysis focused on two points: teachers’ operationalization of the concept of poverty and their narratives of “learning.” The analysis revealed that the teacher’s narrative of the “learning” of poverty is told through the “identification” of poverty and the “transformation” of the self of “knowing” poverty. The “transformation” of the self also includes the “transformation” of one’s own action of caring for the “environment” of children. Such a narrative of “learning” is a method used to achieve moral order as a teacher. On the other hand, the achievement of moral order as an individual was highlighted, and indicated the need to reconsider the linkage between teachers’ professional norms and “the social.” The outline of this study is as follows. First, after organizing previous studies in Japan and abroad, we examine the analytical framework for capturing teachers’ experiences. The details of the object of analysis are then described. The results of analyzing how learning about poverty is talked about and how the experience of such learning is discussed in relation to the teaching profession are presented. Finally, the findings are summarized and their significance discussed.

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By analyzing the author’s during the period of the development of kindergarten education in the United States, this study clarifies the characteristics of Vandewalker’s theory of teacher training, which emphasizes the kindergarten-primary school connection. The number of kindergartens in the United States increased rapidly after the 1870s, and with the spread of public school kindergartens, awareness of the connection between kindergarten and primary school increased. However, kindergarten teacher training is still centered on Froebel’s theoretical studies. Additionally, with priority given to the quantitative supply of kindergarten education, private training schools began to secure students as cheap labor through teaching practice, and kindergarten teacher training took a backseat. Considering the negative consequences of such a situation, to establish the significance of kindergarten education in the public school system as a whole, Vandewalker developed a theory of teacher training emphasizing the connection between kindergarten and primary school. First, she reduced the proportion of teaching practice and strengthened the theoretical study of educational content that spanned kindergarten and primary school. Second, by reinterpreting Froebel’s theory and adapting it to children’s diverse and changing interests, she sought to expand its scope of application to primary education. Third, she also attempted to reinterpret Froebel’s theory from an anthropological perspective, with an awareness of its relationship to Herbart’s theory. In conclusion, by emphasizing the connection between kindergarten and primary school, Vandewalker’s theory of teacher training reorganized the contents of study, which had previously been limited to kindergarten education, to include the primary grades. It also envisioned an open kindergarten education as the basis of kindergarten-primary education. At the root of this was an awareness of the problem that the theory and content of kindergarten education was viewed in isolation from that of education in other school stages.

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