73
practitioner it is the potential for change which may provide the
challenge .
Whilst the subject method group is seen to be pivotal in the emergence
of a professional
ident ity
its possibilities need to
in relation to knowledge of the importance of elements within the
PGCE which Lacey refers to as sub-cultural. The idea of sub-culture
enables
links
to be made between
the
formal
and
informal
aspects
of the
initial training year as well as
to link various aspects
of the overall structures of the course.
Subject sub-culture is
shown as a pervasive reality
of teacher education which because
it has its effect in contexts which are insulated from each other
it may be rendered invisible to practitioners.
Lacey himself reported that he required considerable immersion in
the situation as a participant observer to μbecome aware of the
radically different preoccupations and orientations of the different
(subject) groups” and to become aware that this was "one of the
characteristics that most coloured their early reaction to the course”
(1973 Ch7 P9). This became effective over a whole range of structures
in which students worked aside from the subject group itself. He
mentioned the mixed (education) group noting that they were ’’gener-
ally more
and tense” than the subject group and also that
student behaviours varied between the two (1973 Ch7 P6).
For Lacey
consideration of his data produced the idea of student
composition
of the
seminar
becoming
a situational
determinant of
behaviour giving rise to distinct patterns of behaviour which were
observed in and out of seminars, in the classroom and in the staffroom.