Listening to the Voices in Professional Development Schools: Steering Committee as Promoting Partnership

The article discusses the role and importance of the steering committee in professional development schools in advancing the partnership between the teacher education college and schools. Content analysis of the minutes of steering committee meetings held over a period of 10 years was carried out. The findings reveal the potential of the steering committee as a framework for building a relationship of trust among the partners and promoting discourse about different needs. The findings indicate changes that took place in the content discussed - from focusing on procedures to focusing on the needs of the partners and from ad hoc problem solving to a long-term design and from passivity to activity of the schools\u27 representatives. Over the years, the steering committee became very significant in leading the policy in the professional development schools

In Search of the Essence of a Good School: School Characteristics Leading to Successful PDS Collaboration

Professional Development Schools (PDSs) are collaborative ventures between schools and teacher training institutions. We identify the characteristics of a school that lead to successful PDS collaboration, relating them to Teitel’s model (2003) that merges the principal standards of collaboration with the stages necessary for developing a PDS. We then describe an external evaluation of a PDS in action in Israel, noting that it took several years to achieve some of the objectives; others have still not been met. Finally, we describe the school’s characteristics that contributed to its success as a PDS

Online tasks as a tool to promote teachers’ expertise within the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK)

AbstractIn the Information Communication Technology (ICT) era, teachers will have to wisely use the online environment in order to realize a new pedagogy. We developed a digital indicator for examining the extent to which technological knowledge is integrated with pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK). This indicator is used to examine online tasks developed by teachers in different subjects over time. It enables quantitative measurement of the integration of technological knowledge with content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge and thus affords a measure for the extent of integration. The digital indicator can be used to plan online tasks as well as for the teachers to test their own professional development in integrating technology in teaching. Use of the digital indicator can be implemented when training student teachers as well as in in-service training for teachers. Fifty-three online tasks developed by 14 high school teachers in different subjects were evaluated between 2001 and 2007. Evaluation of the online tasks was performed quantitatively using the digital evaluation instrument after it was validated and its reliability was examined. We examined the change and progress which took place in the integration of technological knowledge with pedagogical content knowledge over time as well as the contribution of guidance to the teachers’ professional development for integration of technology in teaching. The findings indicate that the effect of time, which is expressed by the acquisition of experience, contributes to the integration of the technological knowledge with the teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge. The findings also indicate that guidance plays a significant role in the implementation of the integration of technological knowledge with the teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge. We recommend that correct integration of TPACK should be emphasized when planning professional development for teachers in the field of online tasks. We also recommend the development of models for teachers’ professional development for integration of technology in teaching, with reference to the teachers’ professional knowledge, i.e. their pedagogical content knowledge. The best ways for integrating the technological knowledge must be examined, such that the focus will not be on learning technological tools, but rather on the integration of pedagogy in technology. It is necessary to start from the field of knowledge and the teaching methods appropriate for this particular field of knowledge, and there to integrate technology. Optimal integration will lead to a change in teaching, to relevance for the students and to meaningful learning