This article reports on the fourth stage of an evolving study to develop a systems model for embedding education for sustainability (EfS) into preservice teacher education. The fourth stage trialled the extension of the model to a comprehensive state-wide systems approach involving representatives from all eight Queensland teacher education institutions and other key policy agencies and professional associations. Support for trialling the model included regular meetings among the participating representatives and an implementation guide. This article describes the first three stages of developing and trialling the model before presenting the case study and action research methods employed, four key lessons learned from the project, and the implications of the major outcomes for teacher education policies and practices. The Queensland-wide, multi-site case study revealed processes and strategies that can enable institutional change agents to engage productively in building capacity for embedding EfS at the individual, institutional, and state levels in preservice teacher education. Collectively, the project components provide a system-wide framework that offers strategies, examples, insights, and resources that can serve as a model for other states and/or territories wishing to implement EfS in a systematic and coherent fashion.

Increasing attention is being given to the inclusion of Education for Sustainability in pre-service teacher education. However, there is little research to explain why and how early-career teachers include Education for Sustainability in their work, or how teacher education providers can encourage and support them to do this. Through analysis of two interviews this paper examines the way in which a pre-service primary school teacher interprets her role in Education for Sustainability. Her personal reflections on the manner in which her life experiences, including her own schooling, have influenced her intentions as teacher are explored. Her university teacher education program in Education for Sustainability and her teaching internship experience also appear to have influenced her teaching goals. The profile presented in this paper outlines her intentions and sense of identity as teacher and how that has developed and is expressed. Conclusions centre on the relevance of her reflections for education for sustainability in pre-service teacher education. In particular, her example demonstrates how the development of pedagogical content knowledge relevant to Education for Sustainability during the pre-service years can play an integral part in an individual's decision-making when teaching.

This article describes an interpretive study that evaluated a new subject in teacher education called ‘Education for Sustainable Development’. The study evaluated the subject for its ability to prepare pre-service teachers for their roles as environmental educators. We used perspectives in place-based pedagogy and critical thinking to underpin the subject design and our analysis. Data sources include instructor journals, planning documents, interviews with students and student thinking books. Interpretive analysis of the data corpus was a collaborative process that involved both subject instructors and students who took the subject. Themes that emerged from the research were centred around: (1) how the students built connections between primary school education and environmental education; (2) how students developed action competence through the activities in the subject; (3) how students were challenged to think differently about themselves as educators; and, (4) how the subject design presented its own challenges for both instructors and students.

This article explores second year pre-service teachers’ ability to work with Indigenous students and their families during a small-scale project conducted in an Indigenous community. Supported field placements offered the pre-service teachers valuable opportunities to engage with the teaching of reading to Indigenous students ‘on their turf’. Given the high likelihood that pre-service teachers will be employed in schools with Indigenous populations, it is important that they develop an understanding of the reading process, the factors that impact on learning how to read, as well as cross-cultural aspects that affect the learning process. Pre-service teachers need to develop understanding of the factors that impact on the literacy development of students and how to engage them in culturally responsive pedagogical practices that focus on the positive aspects of the learner. Following the field placement, analysis of the data demonstrated that pre-service teachers were able to engage with the reading process through the use of running records, and develop field knowledge through understanding the impact of relationships on the learning environment. This information can be used by others to support field placements in Indigenous communities.