How Does Leadership Matter? Developing and Teaching a Definition of Hands-On Science, a Prerequisite for Effective Inquiry Teaching

This descriptive case study describes leadership skills and planning for setting clear directions by program leaders for a statewide professional development initiative to extend improvement in science teaching and learning. For science teachers and leaders in Virginia, a critical part of setting clear goals that everyone can understand is defining key science terms. One of the four key terms, hands-on science, is defined here. Materials to develop teachers\u27 understanding of the term for effective implementation of classroom inquiry activities are shared, along with a rubric for evaluation by and for teachers. Understanding of the term hands-on science is necessary before inquiry-based science teaching can be fully implemented. Authentic science materials, when safe, are necessary for doing authentic, inquiry-based science teaching in a way similar to how a scientist investigates science

TTA school-based research consortium initiative, the evaluation, final report

This is the final report of the evaluation of th School-Based Research Consortium Initiative which ran in England from 1998 to 2001. The initiative was sponsored via a public/private partnership between the Teacher Training Agency (TTA), a UK Government agency, and the Centre for British Teachers (CfBT), a private not-for-profit company. The aim of the initiative was to create local infrastructures of support and action for teachers to engage ‘in and with’ research. Those infrastructures were made up of consortia, consisting in each case of a small number of schools together with a university department of education and at least one local education authority (LEA). Over the three years that it ran, the initiative spawned a considerable range and volume of research activities, including peer observation of teaching, peer review of videos of teaching, interview-based study, surveys measuring such things as rewards and sanctions in the classroom. In addition to well-developed teacher-university collaborations and some joint work with local education authorities, there were many examples of teacher-teacher collaboration (some of it between different schools), and also times when teachers and pupils worked together to devise, carry out or interpret research activity. In practice, the initiative created an environment in which it was possible to develop new research relationships across a range of partners, rather than merely transfer the locus of research to schools. Three aspects of teacher experience of the initiative are important to highlight. The first was the overwhelming testimony of teachers that the value of the initiative for them was the rediscovery of their professional confidence in a climate of low trust accountability, characterised by constant monitoring, target setting and bureaucratic demands. The second was the growth of familiarity with research practices that teachers gained through working collaboratively with their peers, with pupils, and with colleagues from the university. The third was how the process of research itself was necessarily situated in teachers’ own practices

A review of mentorship measurement tools

© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. Objectives: To review mentorship measurement tools in various fields to inform nursing educators on selection, application, and developing of mentoring instruments. Design: A literature review informed by PRISMA 2009 guidelines. Data Sources: Six databases: CINHAL, Medline, PsycINFO, Academic Search Premier, ERIC, Business premier resource. Review Methods: Search terms and strategies used: mentor* N3 (behav* or skill? or role? or activit? or function* or relation*) and (scale or tool or instrument or questionnaire or inventory). The time limiter was set from January 1985 to June 2015. Extracted data were content of instruments, samples, psychometrics, theoretical framework, and utility. An integrative review method was used. Results: Twenty-eight papers linked to 22 scales were located, seven from business and industry, 11 from education, 3 from health science, and 1 focused on research mentoring. Mentorship measurement was pioneered by business with a universally accepted theoretical framework, i.e. career function and psychosocial function, and the trend of scale development is developing: from focusing on the positive side of mentorship shifting to negative mentoring experiences and challenges. Nursing educators mainly used instruments from business to assess mentorship among nursing teachers. In education and nursing, measurement has taken to a more specialised focus: researchers in different contexts have developed scales to measure different specific aspects of mentorship. Most tools show psychometric evidence of content homogeneity and construct validity but lack more comprehensive and advanced tests. Conclusion: Mentorship is widely used and conceptualised differently in different fields and is less mature in nursing than in business. Measurement of mentorship is heading to a more specialised and comprehensive process. Business and education provided measurement tools to nursing educators to assess mentorship among staff, but a robust instrument to measure nursing students' mentorship is needed

Professional self-efficacy scale for information and computer technology teachers: validity and reliability study

This study aims at developing a valid and reliable scale to measure information and communication technology (ICT) teachers' self-efficacy related to the Turkish national framework of ICT competencies. For statistical procedures, data were respectively analyzed with exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Furthermore, test-retest procedure was carried out to confirm the time invariance of the scale. EFA results revealed that the scale's seven-factor structure accounts for 65.90 percent of total variance. CFA results produced an acceptable statistical support for model-data fit between the observed item scores and the seven-dimension scale structure (X-2/df = 1.98, RMSEA = .073, CFI = .86). The standardized regression weights between the latent and observed variables ranged from .57 to .89 and Cronbach's alpha coefficient of the scale sub-dimensions ranged from .80 to .88. Besides, the item-scale correlations varied between values of .53 and .79. As a result, the developed scale is a likert questionnaire and composed of 33 five-point items with seven sub-dimensions

A Development Evaluation Study of a Professional Development Initiative to Strengthen Organizational Conditions in Early Education Settings

High quality instruction is essential to producing developmental gains for young children and can mitigate risk factors such as family poverty and low parental education. Even in programs with highly qualified teachers, teacher-child interactions often do not provide the level of instructional support that children need to be well-prepared for success in kindergarten. In order to improve instructional quality, an emerging focus on early childhood professional development involves supporting leaders in creating a web of supports for teacher learning and child growth. The purpose of the 3-year evaluation study was to assess the effectiveness of an Early Childhood Education Professional Development Initiative (ECE PDI) in advancing the knowledge, skills, and dispositions of community-based early childhood leaders and teachers in relation to creating the conditions for superior developmental outcomes for low-income students served by these community-based centers. Findings from the implementation and impact studies are reported

Changing practice in Malaysian primary schools: learning from student teachers’ reports of using action, reflection and modelling (ARM)

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Education for Teaching on 15 March 2018, available online at doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/02607476.2018.1433468. Under embargo until 1 August 2019.Curricular and pedagogical reforms are complex inter-linked processes such that curricular reform can only be enacted through teachers teaching differently. This article reports the perspective of emergent Malaysian primary teachers who were expected to implement a Government reform that promoted active learning. The 120 student teachers were members of a single cohort completing a new B.Ed. degree programme in Primary Mathematics designed by teacher educators from Malaysia and the UK. They were taught to use a tripartite pedagogical framework involving action or active learning, supported in practice through reflection and modelling. Drawing on findings from surveys carried out with the student teachers at the end of their first and final placements this article examines evidence for the premise that the student teachers were teaching differently; illustrates how they reported using active learning strategies; and identifies factors that enabled and constrained pedagogic change in the primary classroom. The students’ accounts of using action, reflection and modelling are critiqued in order to learn about changing learning and teaching practice and to contribute to understanding teacher education and early teacher development. The students’ reports suggest diversity of understanding that emphasises the need to challenge assumptions when working internationally and within national and local cultures.Peer reviewe

National models for CPD: The challenges of C21st knowledge management

Teacher quality is the most critical factor in improving educational outcomes (McKinsey, 2007). This paper proposes analytical frameworks for national models for continuing professional development (CPD). It examines the unacknowledged problem of the quality and extent of the evidence base underpinning teachers’ CPD. In the 21C through the use of ICTs the research and evidence base underpinning educational practice surely could be made accessible to all teachers and all providers of initial teacher training and CPD. The evidence base available internationally appears to be patchy. Yet this is taken for granted in the literature, and is rarely if ever acknowledged in the discourse about school and system improvement. This lack of research based professional knowledge, is a particular problem for subject specialist issues and is further compounded by the fact that research published in journals is not generally designed around questions teachers want answered. In short, the knowledge that is produced and the management of it within the education sector is lacking systemic organisation and dissemination. The paper outlines opportunities which exist for low cost interlinked national and international e-infrastructures to be developed to support knowledge sharing, but such collaboration may pose an insurmountable challenge for national and international agencies

Management into design education: a case study

The design project set in a studio learning environment remains central to much of the under- graduate curriculum activity for the aspiring architect. Yet much recent discussion has identified the need to look beyond this design curriculum horizon and to extend into studies in management. The Burton Report, among others, has encouraged diversity in architectural education. A degree course in Architectural Design and Management has been developed at Northumbria University as a direct response to this encouragement. However, challenges continue as students tend to see supporting studies such as management as peripheral, or even irrelevant and professional accreditation authorities seek evidence of performance via an academic portfolio only. Subsequently, management and professional studies in the programme have been developed as the process within which design happens and which allows a direct link into the studio programme. So, as for the professional practitioner, student design activity happens in teams, and has deadlines, studio design programmes have group projects and deadlines and these are structured with learning outcomes such as teamwork, timekeeping, and reflective learning

Preparing adolescents attending progressive and no-excuses urban charter schools to analyze, navigate, and challenge race and class inequality

Background/Context: Sociopolitical development (SPD) refers to the processes by which an individual acquires the knowledge, skills, emotional faculties, and commitment to recognize and resist oppressive social forces. A growing body of scholarship has found that such sociopolitical capabilities are predictive in marginalized adolescents of a number of key outcomes, including resilience, academic achievement, and civic engagement. Many scholars have long argued that schools and educators have a central role to play in fostering the sociopolitical development of marginalized adolescents around issues of race and class inequality. Other scholars have investigated school-based practices for highlighting race and class inequality that include youth participatory-action research, critical literacy, and critical service-learning. Objective of Study: The present study sought to add to the existing scholarship on schools as opportunity structures for sociopolitical development. Specifically, this study considered the role of two different schooling models in fostering adolescents' ability to analyze, navigate, and challenge the social forces and institutions contributing to race and class inequality. Setting: The six high schools participating in the present study were all urban charter public high schools located in five northeastern cities. All six schools served primarily low-income youth of color and articulated explicit goals around fostering students' sociopolitical development. Three of these high schools were guided by progressive pedagogy and principles, and three were guided by no-excuses pedagogy and principles. Research Design: The present study compared the sociopolitical development of adolescents attending progressive and no-excuses charter high schools through a mixed methods research design involving pre-post surveys, qualitative interviews with participating adolescents and teachers, and ethnographic field notes collected during observations at participating schools. Results: On average, adolescents attending progressive high schools demonstrated more significant shifts in their ability to analyze the causes of racial inequality, but adolescents attending no-excuses high schools demonstrated more significant shifts in their sense of efficacy around navigating settings in which race and class inequality are prominent. Neither set of adolescents demonstrated significant shifts in their commitment to challenging the social forces or institutions contributing to race and class inequality. Conclusions: Both progressive and no-excuses schools sought to foster adolescents' commitment to challenging race and class inequality, but focused on different building blocks to do so. Further research is necessary to understand the pedagogy and practices that show promise in catalyzing adolescents' analytic and navigational abilities into a powerful commitment to collective social action-the ultimate goal of sociopolitical development