Standards have become the focus of education throughout the world, including standards for teachers and standards in teacher education. The main goal for teacher education is, in many places,  to prepare teachers-to-be to perform well in light of clearly expressed standards. The opponents of standards fear stagnation in development and an end to personal initiative and professional autonomy in teaching. Many foresee that teacher education becomes teacher training which stresses technical aspects of teaching listed as teaching competencies. The concept of standards, for whatever stage of a teacher's career they are applied, needs to be discussed in light of theories and research findings which point at advantages as well as disadvantages of  standard-based teacher education and on-going professional development, and on the underpinning constructions of teaching. There will be a special focus on the complex concept “teachership”, and the challenge we meet when we want to standardise the holistic teacher.  The discussion is developed from a small study which looks at student teachers’ and school-based mentors’ definitions of the quality of teaching and mentoring during pre-service practice teaching. The findings show that there is not much agreement about what good teaching  and good mentoring mean during the practicum. Disagreement about standards raises questions concerning the quality of assessment.