The knowledge base for teacher education in Quebec, Ontario and Switzerland

This article focuses on teacher education programs in Quebec, Ontario and French-speaking and German-speaking Switzerland. The general objective is to identify the professional knowledge transmitted to teachers through the initial education programs of Canadian universities and Swiss Hautes Ecoles pedagogiques. To do this, we analyzed a sample of 27 elementary teacher education programs through the course descriptions found on the respective Internet sites (through a comparative and descriptive approach). We analyzed 1534 course descriptions in these three social contexts. We find that teacher education differs from one institution to another, even within the same province or country. Nevertheless, comparing teacher education programs across different contexts also allows for reflection on some similar issues in education that are not specific to a single institution, and also allows for the presentation of relevant innovations such as the bilingual training program in Switzerland.