[Editorial] Trends in teacher education: a review of papers published in the European journal of teacher education over 40 years

Abstract

The journal of the Association for Teacher Education in Europe (ATEE) was first published in 1978. At that time it was known as Revue ATEE Journal (1978–1982). It began by inviting members of the ATEE to publish papers and by inviting authors of note-worthy papers presented at the ATEE Annual Conferences to submit papers to the journal. In 1982 the journal became known as the European Journal of Teacher Education. For the purposes of this Special Issue, which is the last issue focused on the theme of all the issues in the 40th Volume of ETJE – Looking back, Looking forward in Teacher Education – we have undertaken an analysis of all the papers that have been published since the inception of the journal in 1978. The analysis has given a fascinating insight into the topics of the papers published, the context(s) in which the particular topic was considered and the methodologies used in the research reported in the papers. We were particularly interested in the trends emerging: similarities and differences in the topics considered over the 40 volumes of the journal; topics that were re-visited and those that were not; changes within and across countries in Europe and beyond; and similarities and differences in the methodologies used.