Given the development of Masters level Post Graduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) teacher education courses in England, the importance of fostering critical reflectivity in beginning teachers has assumed ever more central importance. The significance of this issue has also been placed in sharp focus by the sheer number of reforms and initiatives under which teachers, student teachers, and teacher educators have to conduct their professional lives, both in England and (as was evident from the 2009 Vienna Conference contributions) elsewhere in Europe and further afield. The need for criticality in the face of this apparent onslaught is clear, even - perhaps especially - when theories and practices are to be seriously questioned. The continuing research is focused especially on writing undertaken by student teachers of English at several English universities, and is guided by the following areas, issues and questions: • The positive challenge of integrating theoretical and practical perspectives, in ways unlike most other (purely theoretical) Masters level courses; • Constraints (and opportunities?) of moderating across subject boundaries and research paradigms; • Subject knowledge auditing / development as the basis of critical reflection, including subject knowledge journals; • Peer assessment of writing; opportunities and limitations in examining previous students’ work in exemplar assignments; • Critical appraisal of appropriate published papers and theoretical positions; • Questions of critical appraisal of recent and relevant classroom practice reforms; • Criticality in student teachers’ own assessment of their pupils’ work: the nature of formative assessment; • Criticality as relational to its particular focus.

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