The language teacher’s development

This paper provides a commentary on recent contributions to the subject of teacher development and growth, focusing particularly on our understanding of some of the processes and tools that have been identified as instrumental and supportive in teacher development. Implicit in the notions of ‘reflective practice’, ‘exploratory teaching’, and ‘practitioner inquiry’ is the view that teachers develop by studying their own practice, collecting data and using reflective processes as the basis for evaluation and change. Such processes have a reflexive relationship with the construction of teacher knowledge and beliefs. Collaborative and co-operative processes can help sustain individual reflection and development

Professional Development\u27s Complex Ecology: Examining a Whole-School Balanced Literacy Professional Development

This descriptive study reports on the structure and implementation of a school wide professional development model in a southwest public elementary school. The professional development effort was designed to support educators’ understanding and teaching of balanced literacy. The paper reports on the components of this professional development and discusses the strengths of this model in relation to educational research and findings on professional development. We conclude by discussing this model from the perspective of involved administration, facilitators, and teachers, as they consider the process of crossing the borders from professional development into their classrooms. The study is strengthened by teachers’ opinions about the model in their school

Cultivating teachers\u27 knowledge and skills for leading change in schools

Australian policy initiatives and state curriculum reform efforts affirm a commitment to address student disengagement through the development of inclusive school environments, curriculum, and pedagogy. This paper, drawing on critical social theory, describes three Australian projects that support the cultivation of teachers&rsquo; beliefs, knowledge and skills for critical reflection and leading change in schools. The first project reports on the valued ethics that emerged in pre-service teacher reflections about a Service-learning Program at a university in Queensland. The second project reports on a school-based collaborative inquiry approach to professional development with a focus on literacy practices. The final project reports on an initiative in another university in Victoria, to operationalise pedagogical change and curriculum renewal in Victoria, through the Principles of Learning and Teaching (PoLT). These case studies illustrate how critical reflection and development of beliefs, knowledge and skills can be acquired to better meet the needs of schools.<br /

‘Always In The Process of Becoming’ (Freire, 1998) How Five Early Career Drama Teachers Build Their Worlds Through Language and Discourse

This thesis is concerned with the way early career drama teachers utilise, adapt, challenge, absorb and assimilate the big Discourses of drama in the process of developing their identities as new drama teachers. A key focus of the study is to capture the ways in which these drama teachers use language to talk about the work they do as teachers and the effect of their ideological predispositions on the way they recruit and teach drama pedagogy, in order to improve the life chances of the students they teach. The study examines the ways that the early career teachers conceptualised their role as drama teachers and to what extent the discourse of social justice shaped, influenced and informed their professional identity as teachers. As the early career teachers wend their way through the classroom and their new practices, they find their ideological alignments are tested and challenged by the work they do and the schools and systems that they teach in. This study endeavours to understand and provide insight into the complexities faced by the early career at this critical juncture of their careers as drama teachers. The study reveals that the early career drama teachers conceptualised their role as teachers, with deference to the part that social justice played in shaping their identity and how this was influential in the way they taught their students about, ‘knowing the world’ (Harris, 2013). The study also found the early career teachers’ personal proclivities and subjectivities ideologically aligned with some of the big Discourses that are privileged by the drama community generally

Pedagogy, curriculum, teaching practices and teacher education in developing countries

This rigorous literature review focused on pedagogy, curriculum, teaching practices and teacher education in developing countries. It aimed to: 1. review existing evidence on the review topic to inform programme design and policy making undertaken by the DFID, other agencies and researchers 2. identify critical evidence gaps to guide the development of future research programme

Reflecting in and on post-observation feedback in initial teacher training on certificate courses

This article examines evidence from two studies that concern the nature of post-observation feedback in certificate courses for teaching English to speakers of other languages. It uncovers the main characteristics of these meetings and asks whether there is evidence of reflection in these contexts. In considering reasons why making space for reflection is potentially difficult, the paper also examines the relationship and the role of assessment criteria and how these may impact on opportunities for reflection. The final part of the paper considers how a more reflective approach could be promoted in feedback conferences

The Western Sydney Rustbelt: Recognizing and Building on Strengths in Pre-service Teacher Education

Preparing pre-service teachers to address the disparities in educational attainment that occur in settings with complex demographics such as high poverty and super diversity (Vertovec, 2007) require a theoretically driven contextual and spacial (Soja, 1996) understanding of disadvantage. This understanding highlights the structural and systemic inequalities that exist between the rich and the poor and limit social and economic mobility for disadvantaged students in schools. This paper uses a conceptual and spacial understanding to focus on the strategies implemented by a primary and secondary pre-service teacher program to support and improve pre-service teacher learning of disadvantaged schools. We detail approaches to learning that support pre-service teachers in attempting to consider how their own ethnicity and culture shapes practice and may disrupt the effects of poverty on educational outcomes to make a difference in the lives of their students