In an era of science education reform, the topic of teacher education and the content and impact of our science methods courses is timely. A cursory survey of recent conference programs of the Association for the Education of Teachers of Science and the National Association for Research in Science Teaching reveals several sessions dedicated to community dialogue about the nature of these courses. This interest underscores the renewed recognition that teacher preparation programs in general and the science methods courses in particular are critical junctures in teacher development. In 1995, Tom Dana, then coeditor of the Science Teacher Education section of Science Education, told me excitedly about a paper set that he had recruited from an AERA presentation by Peter Hewson and his colleagues. The reason for Tom's excitement is obvious as one reads the articles included in this issue. The six-article set includes a comprehensive description of the theoretical underpinnings and teaching practices used at the University of Wisconsin -Madison with the concomitant exploration of the complex relationships among the teacher preparation program, teacher thinking, and teacher practice.
Three points stand out upon reading this article set. First, as in the Salish project (1997), the rich description of the program, its courses, and the provision of data collection tools allows for cross-institutional program comparison and potentially parallel conversations about the incoming and outgoing beliefs, knowledge, and experiences of preservice teachers (Hewson et al., 1999a). Second, these articles can act as a prototype of the much needed research that explores the complex interactions of teacher preparation programs on preservice teachers' knowledge, beliefs, and practices. Such complexity can rarely be portrayed in a traditional-length research report. Finally, this paper set illustrates the components necessary to create an effective teacher preparation program: agreement on explicit goals and outcomes; determination and implementation of teaching practices that emulate these goals; and creation, use, and analysis of matching evaluation measures. One major contribution of this article set is the concrete example it provides of program development and evaluation based on constructivism and reflective practice through conceptual change teaching strategies and action research. As a community, we should be challenged to equally articulate, implement, research and report on the successes and failures of our programs.
Personally, this paper set has allowed me to explore the assumptions on which many teacher preparation programs are based. What emerges from this examination are a number of questions stimulated by these articles and by reflection on the programs at my own institution. I would like to highlight and extend the findings and recommendations of these