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This research study explores the perceptions of the importance and meaning of innovation in education by qualified teachers. The authors deliberately selected geography teachers for the research because the extraordinary dynamics of changes and innovations the teacher has to deal with are significantly reflected, particularly in geography teaching.

The main aim of the research was to determine geography teachers' views on the importance, role and meaning of innovation in teaching. The research group consisted of 12 qualified teachers, and a semistructured interview was chosen as the research method. The research was conducted over six months, from October 2020 to March 2021.

This research confirmed the interest in introducing innovations into teaching by the teachers interviewed. Teachers mainly think of innovation as new ways of teaching that aim to revive and make teaching more attractive, to increase the motivation of all actors in the learning process. While teachers with more ample teaching experience connect innovations mainly with presentations, education games, and excursions, teachers-beginners and teachers with shorter teaching experience understand innovations mainly as the application of new trends in education, such as research projects and working with GIS and digital technologies. The research confirmed that lectures supported by presentations are the most frequently used teaching method for explaining the geography curriculum in primary and secondary schools. Presentations in which teachers focus on linking relationships and explaining connections more deeply replace existing textbooks and teaching texts for most teachers interviewed.

The number and qualifications of the teachers involved in the research.

Teachers see the quality of the school environment and the education system as the significant barriers to providing better geography education. They often come to innovations through their own study and activities and feel a significant lack of available materials for the practical application of innovations in teaching. They also perceive the support for creation by state authorities and educational institutions as insufficient. Most teachers interviewed would welcome regular training courses and vocational education on the appropriate introduction and use of innovations in the classrooms in the form of practical examples and developed methodologies.

The selection of teachers for the research was deliberate and included active teachers of both genders working in primary and secondary schools. The selected teachers had varying teaching experiences and studied different combinations of teaching subjects with geography.

Collaborative professional development for inclusive teaching is a limited area of research, although there is an extensive need for special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) teachers. Research findings of how teachers’ professional development can contribute to support the development of powerful learning situations for all students are presented in this special issue. The aim is to contribute to the knowledge of how the use of lesson study can develop teachers’ capabilities to offer high-quality education for students with SEND.

The guest editor presents each of the papers and introduces key themes and concepts.

The collection of papers is divided into two themes; the first has a focus on lesson study used by teacher educators during SEND in-service training. In this theme, the teachers are the students who are studying different fields of SEND, supported by teacher educators. The second theme studies different forms of lesson studies carried out by researchers and teachers in the collaboration focused aspects of content that are of importance for students in SEND.

The papers focus on areas of education with a limited research tradition, and as a result, the studies may be seen as starting points for further research. The results so far lack generalisability. Therefore, the researchers have to test the findings further under different conditions and with wider groups of teachers and students.

The results of the papers can be used to develop both SEND teacher education, and collaborative professional development for in-service SEND teachers. This issue will, therefore, be of interest to school and system leaders.

The papers contribute initial findings from an under-researched area and also combine lesson study with methods and designs not previously explored.

The primary research question in this study concerns the establishment of a platform for intercultural collaborative lesson study, which promotes reciprocal dialogue between culturally distinctive educational research groups. Therefore, this study aims to introduce a case of intercultural collaborative lesson study projects between Hiroshima University and Leipzig University and to illustrate the issues in intercultural collaborative lesson study.

This study reconstructed the sequence of the project as a case under the narrative structure. Data were retrieved from a collaborative project between Hiroshima University and Leipzig University, which corresponds to the theoretical framework, as they represent a clear cultural contrast. The description of the project is reconstructed and reduced into a linear storyline of procedure.

This study identifies three key issues: (1) sharing data and culture, (2) visualising methodology and process, and (3) responding to research questions and answers.

This platform does require one cultural group neither throwing their own norms away nor creating an utterly new paradigm beyond their own cultures. It is a place “between” original places that enables groups to capture their own culture and another culture, which does not compel to change but effectively allows reflection and changing themselves.

Although several transcultural reports find that one cultural asset is imported and exported, the arena of bi-directional intercultural dialogue remains undeveloped. The collaborative project between Hiroshima and Leipzig is then introduced and examined to overcome the current problems in transnational lesson study.

This special issue reveals how lesson study in China continues to serve as a powerful platform to support change in teaching. The papers included in this issue explore how university faculty members and researchers support teachers to cross boundaries resulting from the introduction of key competencies-based (hexin suyang 核心素养) curriculum reform (KCR).

The theme of continuity and change is examined against the backdrop of Chinese lesson study's (CLS's) consistent supporting role in enabling curriculum reform. These analyses make use of concepts involved in understanding boundary crossing, such as using boundary objects and their roles, to help make sense of the new theories, tools, and resources as well as relationships engendered in responding to the reform's demand. While recognizing the continuity at play in Chinese LS, the authors use the lens of learning at the boundary of research-practice partnerships (RPPs) (Farrell et al., 2022) to contemplate the future of CLS.

The papers touch on three major themes: (1) the role of university-school partnerships in meeting the new demands of key competencies reform; (2) resourceful tools, strategies and structures to support boundary crossing for teachers; and (3) roles and relationships for mutual learning in university-school partnerships. Together these three themes, considered across the papers in this issue, point to the need to redefine CLS to engender versatility and hybridity and to enlist mutual learning relationships in future university-school partnerships. Such redefinition positions lesson study to both continue and change.

The papers in this issue are expected to promote mutualist learning in future CLS research-practice partnerships. To do so, research needs to move from focusing on change of a single case teacher to clarifying what experts and teachers each learn from the LS and from each other. Attention also needs to focus on the collaborative discourse and ways such discourse is able to promote mutual learning, emotional support in facing change as well as critical and constructive problem solving.

Practically, to better support boundary crossing, this special issue encourages academics and teachers to identify and work around boundary objects and their enabling features to enhance knowledge and identity of both university and teacher participants for more effective research-practice partnerships.

This special issue offers a pioneering set of studies that contributes to an in-depth understanding of how CLS is supporting the current competencies-based reform in China. It also provides concrete future directions for research and practice to enhance university-school partnerships' response to reform.

The aim of this paper is to explore the rationale and findings of the implementation of a Chinese lesson study (CLS)-informed model of mathematics teacher education in Italian schools. The study focuses on the modifications and invariance when introducing CLS in a different culture.

In a previous work (Bartolini Bussi et al., 2017), the authors focused on a single case of activity inspired by the CLS in Italy, and identified some conflicts emerging between the cultures of teaching in China and Italy and explored the way to overcome the conflicts. In the following years, the authors implemented lesson study (LS) experimentations with dozens of in-service primary school teachers and pre-service teachers who were gradually introduced to the model of CLS. The tensions/constraints occurred prominently when extending the experiments with many dozens of other in-service teachers and pre-service teachers.

The authors highlighted how the process of deconstruction allowed the participants in the study to either appropriate or reject some features of the CLS, linking this process to the cultural differences.

The authors believe and argue that LS, and CLS in particular, must be modified in the transfer from one culture to another, considering the cultural beliefs of the involved teachers.

The authors claim that the features of CLS compels the Western researchers to adopt local and culturally determined choices and to be aware of the rationale of these choices.

Universities play an important role in the promotion and implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This study aims to examine the visibility of information about the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on the websites of Spanish and major international universities, by means of a quantitative and qualitative analysis with an online visibility management platform that makes use of big data technology.

The Web visibility of the universities studied in relation to the terms “SDG”, “Sustainable Development Goals” and “2030 Agenda” was determined using the SEMrush tool. Information was obtained on the number of web pages accessed and the queries formulated (query expansion). The content indexed by Google for these universities was compiled, and finally, the search engine optimization (SEO) factors applicable to the websites with the highest Web visibility were identified.

The universities analysed are content creators but do not have very high Web visibility in Web searches for information on the SDGs. Of the 98 universities analysed, only four feature prominently in search results.

Although research exists on the application of SEO to different areas, there have not, to date, been any studies examining the Web visibility of universities in relation to Web searches for information on the 2030 Agenda. The main contributions of this study are the global perspective it provides on the Web visibility of content produced by universities about the SDGs and the recommendations it offers for improving that visibility.