Peter Jarvis, Professor of Continuing Education in the School of Education Studies at the University of Surrey, has written extensively on teaching, learning, and education, most recently The Theory and Practice of Learning (1998) and The Age of Learning (2000). He has assembled a team of his colleagues at Surrey to offer The Theory and Practice of Teaching, a gathering of essays intended to explore contemporary approaches in pedagogy and the theories underpinning them. The book is organized in three parts: the first set of essays looks at a range of theoretical matters informing the contexts in which teaching occurs and the implications that arise out of the new pedagogies; part two takes up an array of important teaching practices-Socratic method, directive facilitation, experiential learning, learning communities, and problem-based learning, among several others-in order to explore their possibilities and limitations; and part three examines the assessment of education, with a brief look also at distance education. Just about every essay begins with a concise introduction of what is to follow and a very useful summary offering a set of conclusions on the material covered. A reference list accompanies each essay.

One of Jarvis's primary concerns, both as the editor of the volume and as author or co-author of six of its seventeen essays, is the way in which education must accommodate and adapt to the "consumer society" that is coming to define our modern moment. As Jarvis and Gill Nicholls make clear in "Teaching, Learning-The Changing Landscape," this consumer metaphor and heightened government interest in the outcomes of education have played major parts in moving the field in new directions. It is up to educators, they argue, to define the profession as a whole and their own roles as teachers so that student learning is relevant to changing social realities.

The essays that make up Part One offer some helpful, if brief, summaries of the issues propelling pedagogical innovation. Essays on "Teaching Styles and Teaching Methods" and "Radical and Feminist Pedagogies" survey key developments, although readers familiar with the practice of teaching today will likely find little new here. Bob Brownhill and Jarvis's "Ethics and Education" inquires into the moral foundations of the student-teacher relationship, a topic of particular importance in a socio-economic environment that seeks "to produce autonomous individuals who have the ability to appraise differing concepts and situations and act independently, without relying on the authority of others" (31).

In Part Two, Jarvis puts together eight essays on contemporary teaching practices, exploring their fundamental characteristics, their theoretical bases, and the consequences of employing one or the other. These chapters offer valuable overviews of contemporary pedagogy, with a view to examining the particular kinds of learning that arise out of each methodology. Again, the essays are brief, so veteran educators may find them lacking a certain depth, but readers new to the profession and educational administrators at a remove from the frontlines of teaching will gain much from what Jarvis and his colleagues have to say. Especially interesting is Colin Griffin's essay "Didacticism: Lectures and Lecturing." Most writers on teaching and learning rehearse the old saw that lecturing is a passive and outmoded method of instruction, without seriously addressing the potential that the approach may afford. While Griffin shares this view to an extent, he raises a number of interesting issues, from the varieties of authority employed in the practice of lecture to the restructuring of lectures and lecturing to meet the needs of contemporary learners.

Readers of this book will discover that a good deal of it is specifically aimed at the British system. Often, discussions of institutional practice, government interventions, and historical backgrounds may have little relevance for readers outside Britain. At times the chapters are abstract, offering what might be useful information about pedagogical approach had the author thought to include clarifying examples. But without the benefit of illustration, the analysis of important trends quickly becomes confusing and obscure, even for readers acquainted with the approaches under consideration. This is especially true in Paul Tosey's chapter "The Learning Community: A Design for Teaching and Learning," which proposes to "differentiate applications in practice" (143) and yet offers no fully examined programs to illustrate them. Part Three is likewise superficial in its examination of assessment: readers in the United States, where continuous quality improvement and assessment have taken the field of education by storm, will find this section rather lacking.

In a sense, Jarvis has intended The Theory and Practice of Teaching to serve the interests of so varied an audience that it meets the needs of few. Still, those looking for an introduction to teaching theory and practice might give it a serious look.

Edward J. Katz
UNC Asheville