Samenvatting

Research topic/aim
The professional development of teacher educators (T Eds) is increasingly being recognised as a topic of paramount importance, partly caused by the attention for the lifelong learning of those responsible for teaching student teachers. In this presentation we focus on the professional development T Eds with regard to their role as second order practitioner (Murray and Male, 2005). Many T Eds identify themselves as a teacher in higher education and they lack attention for their specific role of being a teacher of teachers. In the project we investigated the possibilities of encouraging T Eds to focus on this role, by altering the procedure in which T Eds and their team-manager set development agreements.

Theoretical and methodology framework
Teacher Educators have specific roles and tasks (Lunenberg et al, 2012) and they need special skills to fulfil these roles. In the Netherlands, the Dutch Association of Teacher Educators has developed a professional standard, in which the skills for an average experienced teacher educator are described. In our project the professional standard served as a tool in the development agreement procedure for T Eds. In total 16 T Eds from 5 teams participated. In their preparation for the conversation with their team manager, T Eds studied this professional standard and used this to write down their strengths and development possibilities. After that, they entered the conversation with their team manager and came to development agreements. To study the effect of this new procedure, T Eds (two group interviews) and team managers were interviewed (one group interview) about their opinion on the preparation phase and the conversation itself.

Results and conclusions
Findings appear threefold. First, T Eds appreciate the use of the professional standard in the preparation. It helps them to focus on their role as teacher of teachers. Second, both team managers and T Eds mention that they now have 'words' to talk about the profession. Third, Teds and team managers both hold the opinion that the conversation itself is more thorough than it used to be before.

Relevance to European educational research
Our findings contribute to the body of knowledge around professional development activities for teacher educators, especially with regards to their role as second order practitioner or 'teacher of teachers' .