Practical Strategies for Enhancing Doctoral Students' Preparedness to Teach

Overview & Synopsis

Doctoral education programs in physical education teacher education have a responsibility to train aspiring faculty members to be effective researchers and good teachers. Using occupational socialization theory as a framework, this article proposes a progressive approach to helping physical education teacher education doctoral students gain experience in the role of teacher educator. The authors acknowledge socialization factors that influence one's learning to become a teacher educator, discuss activities in which doctoral students can be engaged through a four-year Ph.D. program, and describe the potential role of larger university and professional structures. While doctoral training is context-specific and contextual differences result in this model being more feasible in certain contexts, it is believed that the general progression of activities would be beneficial for all aspiring faculty members.