Developing Accomplished Teaching and Teachers

This paper discusses the question of the development of accomplished teachers and teaching in Scotland and examines a number of emerging issues including the definition of accomplished teaching, the enhancement of teaching quality, the role of accomplished teachers including chartered teachers in schools, the contribution of accomplished teachers and impact on pupil learning, the question of teacher agency and enhanced professionalism and opportunities to engage with the wider social and educational context. The origins of this work on accomplished teachers and teaching were in a series of symposia at ECER (European Conference for Educational Research, 2009, 2010) organized by Dr Margery McMahon, University of Glasgow who brought together stakeholders in Scotland with international partners including academics and professional associations to examine the issues related to the recognition and development of expertise and accomplishment in teaching. These symposia were followed by an International Symposium on Developing Accomplished Teachers and Teaching (ISAT&T) co-hosted by the University of Glasgow and the GTCs and sponsored by the Scottish Government. Participants in the ISAT&T were drawn from the universities of Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge, Wales, Glasgow and Stirling and representatives from HMIe, Local Authorities and the GTCs. This paper is a synposis of the proceedings of the International Symposium

When does it get any easier?: Beginning teachers' experiences during their first year of teaching.

Studies of beginning teachers' readiness to teach indicate a range of areas in which these teachers feel nervous about teaching, prior to beginning their first teaching position. Studies of the first year of teaching demonstrate that the reality shock of teaching is something that affects beginning teachers in a variety of ways. The literature on the stages of teacher development tells us that the "survival" stage in teaching can last throughout the whole first year of teaching. This New Zealand study follows seven beginning teachers through their first year of teaching and identifies the points at which the teachers began to say, "I'm getting on top of it now"

Preservice teachers’ observations of their mentors’ teaching strategies for differentiated learning

Tensions exist between teacher-centred and learner-centred approaches with constructivism as being favoured for learning in the 21st Century. There is little evidence of teaching strategies being used in the field for differentiating student learning. In addition, preservice teachers need to learn about teaching strategies for which observations of their mentor teachers can provide practical applications. This study explores 16 preservice teachers’ observations of their mentors’ teaching strategies over a four-week professional experience. They provided a minimum of five written observations during this period. Findings indicated that these preservice teachers observed their mentors’ practices and recorded four key teaching strategies used to differentiate learning, namely: (1) designating facilitators for students’ learning, including teacher, peers, parents, and support staff such as teachers aides, (2) managing student groups, (3) contexts for learning, and (4) using a range of teaching aids (visual, auditory, games) and resources. Preservice teachers’ observations of their mentor teachers indicated that they can commence at early stages for identifying teaching strategies and how they work for differentiating student learning

THE PROBLEMS FACED BY PRACTICE TEACHERS OF ENGLISHDEPARTMENT IN WRITING LESSON PLAN

Lesson plan is guidance and teaching outline of the teacher, used to teach in teaching learning process. It is the reminder for the teachers about what they have to prepare, what they will bring, and what they will do in the classroom. The present study is intended to know the problems faced by practice teachers of English Department in writing lesson plan, describe the reasons underlined practice teacher having problems, and the suggestions that can be given by supervisor teachers. In this study, the researcher used descriptive qualitative research design. The research subjects were six practice teachers of English Department of University of Muhamadiyah Malang who have finished conducting practice teaching at SMPN 3 Malang. The instruments used to collect the data were interview and document. The interview was used for both practice teachers and supervisor teachers to obtain the data on the problems faced by practice teachers of English Department in writing lesson plan and to find the suggestions that can be given by supervisor teachers to cope practice teachers’ problems. And document were used is practice teachers’ lesson plan. The data of the study were analyzed qualitatively. The result of the study shows that practice teachers faced problems in writing lesson plan. The problems concerned with objective, indicator, material, method, teaching activities, and media/source. It caused by less of knowledge in develop lesson plan and how to create the variation of teaching preparation. The other problems that often faced were in connecting the objectives and the teaching learning activities because it was hard to arrange various teaching learning activities to reach the objectives. To cope the problems, supervisor teachers gave the suggestions they were; consult the lesson plan to the supervisor regularly; share the problems with the teams of practice teachers or ask to the supervisor directly. It is concluded that practice teachers having problems caused by less of knowledge in how to develop lesson plan and how to create the variation of teaching preparation though they have guided by experienced supervisor teachers and understand the standard objective of the school. They also solve the problems by themselves not by consult it to the supervisor teachers directly

Applying standard competency assessment in vocational teaching practices

Teaching in vocational education is focused on knowledge and skills. Psychomotor is an aspect that emphasized in teaching competency in vocational education. Teaching based on psychomotor is a way to provide students with the hands on skills. Teachers are the main character in the teaching session. Therefore, this paper explained the differences among teachers in teaching based Standard Competency Assessment with their expertise in particular field. Research used survey design involved 301 teachers from Vocational Colleges specifically teaching practical task in Technology Courses. The focused elements are experienced and qualification of expertise based on recognition by Malaysia Skill Certification. Result showed that there are differences in the application of the teaching methods between experienced and inexperienced instructors teaching at the workshop from the teaching and evaluation aspects. The skills certificates ownership by the instructors shows differences in the aspects of teaching methods compared to the teaching implementation. In summary, teachers or instructors who teaching in vocational courses need the basic requirement especially skills recognition to fulfill competency assessment

Examining Mentors' Practices for Enhancing Preservice Teachers' Pedagogical Development in Mathematics and Science

Mentoring is too important to be left to chance (Ganser, 1996), yet mentoring expertise of teachers varies widely, which may present inequities for developing preservice teachers' practices. Five factors for mentoring have been identified herein: personal attributes, system requirements, pedagogical knowledge, modelling, and feedback, and items associated with each factor have also been justified in context of the literature. An original, literature-based survey instrument gathered 446 preservice teachers' perceptions of their mentoring for primary teaching. Data were analysed within the abovementioned 5 factors with 331 final-year preservice teachers from 9 Australian universities responding to their mentoring for science teaching and 115 final-year preservice teachers from an urban university responding to their mentoring for mathematics teaching. Results indicated similar Cronbach alpha scores on each of the five factors for primary science and mathematics teaching; however percentages and mean scores on attributes and practices aligned with each factor were considerably higher for mentoring mathematics teaching compared with science teaching

The impact of an in-service professional development course on writing teacher attitudes and pedagogy

In education, it is commonly believed that the quality of teachers' learning experiences directly affects the quality of their students' learning experiences. Specifically, teachers' continuing learning may bring about positive effects on student learning. For the past ten years or so, research has emphasized the effects of professional development courses on teachers in hard science disciplines. Little attention has been paid to study the influences of those courses on teachers in the 'soft' sciences, such as English language, especially in the area of teaching of writing. Against this background, I undertook a study to investigate how an in-service professional development course influences the teaching attitudes of writing teachers who enrolled on the course and their teaching practice. I argue that the professional development course empowered the teachers with skills useful for the teaching of writing. I also argue that the course positively changed the attitudes of the teachers towards their practice in the teaching of writing. It is suggested that teachers need to engage in continuing professional development to improve the quality of their teaching

Surviving and sustaining teaching excellence: A narrative of ‘entrapment’

This paper discusses the key concepts of ‘surviving’ and ‘sustaining’ in the context of teaching excellence in contemporary universities, and reports the findings emerging from a work-in-progress study of Award Winning Teachers. It provides evidence that teachers recognized for their passion, commitment and expertise in teaching, work well beyond their paid hours to achieve excellence. Most become ‘entrapped’ in a culture of over-work that can have a negative impact on their lives and well-being. Factors that influence ‘teaching sustainability’ are presented, to support university teachers, administrators and managers in thinking about ways to improve the teaching and learning environment for teachers as well as for students