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This article reports the results of an empirical study exploring the discourses of physics teacher educators. We ask how the expressed understandings of a physics teacher education programme in the talk of teacher educators potentially support the identity construction of new teachers. Nine teacher educators from different sections of a physics teacher programme in Sweden were interviewed. The concept of discourse models was used to operationalise how the discourses of the teacher education programme potentially enable the performance of different physics teacher identities. The analysis resulted in the construction of four discourse models that could be seen to be both enabling and limiting the kinds of identity performances trainee physics teachers can enact. Knowledge of the models thus potentially empowers trainee physics teachers to understand the different goals of their educational programme and from there make informed choices about their own particular approach to becoming a professional physics teacher. We also suggest that for teacher educators, knowledge of the discourse models could facilitate making conscious, informed decisions about their own teaching practice.

In this chapter we use the concept of disciplinary literacy (Airey, 2011a, 2013) to analyze the goals of university physics lecturers. Disciplinary literacy refers to a particular mix of disciplinary-specific communicative practices developed for three specific sites: the academy, the workplace and society. It has been suggested that the development of disciplinary literacy may be seen as one of the primary goals of university studies (Airey, 2011a).

The main data set used in this chapter comes from a comparative study of physics lecturers in Sweden and South Africa (Airey, 2012, 2013; Linder, Airey, Mayaba, & Webb, 2014). Semi-structured interviews were carried out using a disciplinary literacy discussion matrix (Airey, 2011b), which enabled us to probe the lecturers’ disciplinary literacy goals in the various semiotic resource systems used in undergraduate physics (i.e. graphs, diagrams, mathematics, language).

The findings suggest that whilst physics lecturers have strikingly similar disciplinary literacy goals for their students, regardless of setting, they have very different ideas about whether they themselves should teach students to handle these disciplinary-specific semiotic resources. It is suggested that the similarity in physics lecturers’ disciplinary literacy goals across highly disparate settings may be related to the hierarchical, singular nature of the discipline of physics (Bernstein, 1999, 2000).

In the final section of the chapter some preliminary evidence about the disciplinary literacy goals of those involved in physics teacher training is presented. Using Bernstein’s constructs, a potential conflict between the hierarchical singular of physics and the horizontal region of teacher training is noticeable.

Going forward it would be interesting to apply the concept of disciplinary literacy to the analysis of other disciplines—particularly those with different combinations of Bernstein’s classifications of hierarchical/horizontal and singular/region.

This study explores the culture of physics departments in Sweden in relation to physicsteacher education. The commitment of physics departments to teacher education iscrucial for the quality of physics teacher education and the way in which physicslecturers’ talk about teacher education is significant, since it can affect trainees’ physicslearning and the choice to become a physics teacher. We analysed interviews witheleven physicists at four Swedish universities, looking for assumptions in relation toteacher training that are expressed in their talk. We found five tacit assumptions aboutphysics teacher training, that together paint a picture of trainee physics teachersmoving in the "wrong" direction, against the tide of physics. These are the PhysicsExpert Assumption: the purpose of all undergraduate physics teaching is to createphysics experts. The Content Assumption : the appropriate physics content for futureschool physics teachers is the same as that for future physicists. The GoalAssumption: the role of a school physics teacher is to create new physicists. TheStudent Assumption: students who become physics teachers do not have the abilityto make it as successful physicists. The Teaching Assumption: If you know physicsthen it’s not difficult to teach it. We suggest that these five assumptions, if perpetuatedwithout reflection, risk working against high quality physics teacher education. Forphysics teacher educators, our results can be used as a lens to reflect on the localdepartmental culture and its effect on teacher education.

High school physics teachers have a difficult job to do. On the one hand, they are charged with contributing to the creation of a scientifically literate society, while on the other they play a pivotal role in the recruitment of future physicists. Given the importance of this dual role, one might expect that the training of future physics teachers would be a priority for any physics department. However, research suggests that this is often not the case. While concerns have been raised about future physics teachers' understanding of physics content, less work has focussed on the sociocultural experiences of the learning environments trainees meet when learning undergraduate physics. This case study examines how a sample of trainee physics teachers perceive learning undergraduate physics content together with engineering and physics bachelor students in a large, high-status, research-oriented physics department. The findings aim to be of interest to physics lecturers when examining their own practice. We interviewed 17 trainee physics teachers about their experiences of learning undergraduate physics, how they perceived the relevance of their physics courses for their future role as teachers, and how this affected their physics learning. Here, we identified four central themes of the students' experiences: (1) teacher programme invisibility, (2) passive classroom culture, (3) perceived relevance of physics courses, and (4) no incentive to do well in physics. We discuss how this study illustrates the potential struggles trainee physics teachers may encounter when learning undergraduate physics. We also suggest how our findings may be used to inform the practice of university physics lecturers who come in contact with trainee physics teachers, and comment on the structure and organization of physics teacher education as a whole.

Female underrepresentation in physics is a global issue, and it has been suggested thatphysics teachers should be one part of the solution. In this paper, we explore how femaletrainee physics teachers negotiate their positioning as women and trainee teachers to createspaces for themselves as learners of physics. The empirical data consists of interviews with17 trainee physics students, and the analysis focuses predominantly on the identitynegotiations of three of the female students. We find that the women simultaneouslysubmit to and master a “physics nerd” discourse that connects physics with nerdiness,masculinity, and intelligence, which enables them to successfully create subject positionsof physics student, teacher student, femininity, and constructive study practice. This is ofparticular importance to trainee physics teachers who are going to be responsible forcreating inclusive and productive physics learning environments for their students.