Initiating Community Engagement for Enhancing Preservice Teacher Education

Facilitating community engagement in education is promoted and emphasised in university policies and strategic plans. How can a university facilitate innovations to develop collaborative partnerships with its community? This paper presents leadership processes for initiating community engagement with an Australian university and highlights examples of innovations in Science Education for Sustainable Living (SESL) with preservice teachers’ reflections on their teaching practices. Data collection included observations of practice, interviews, minutes of meetings, and written correspondence with a wide range of participants (i.e., senior QUT staff, lecturers, preservice teachers, principals, school executives and teachers, and other community members). A four-step process for implementing SESL innovations provided an example of university-community engagement, and was used as a catalyst for preservice teachers (n=14) to reflect on SESL, which provided opportunities for enhancing their science teaching practices. Results indicated that connecting the community with preservice teacher education aided in promoting understandings of sustainable living and kept environmental issues on the agenda. The four-step process implemented by the preservice teachers for SESL assisted to conceptually advance understandings of scientific causes and effects in order to propose appropriate solutions. Initiating university-community engagement required articulating visionary directions, understanding change processes, motivating potential key stakeholders, and promoting collaboration and team effort. In addition, distributing leadership aided in facilitating university-community collaboration and allowed for the implementation of a wider range of innovations. It was concluded that distributing leadership will be essential in order to sustain university-community engagement, particularly as key stakeholders in leadership roles can deploy energy and resources at levels required for successful collaborations

Converting theory to practice: University-school collaboration on devising strategies for mentoring pedagogical knowledge

There appears no shortage of theorists for preservice teacher education; however many ideas are abandoned without practical applications. Indeed, it can take years for theories to materialise into practice, if they materialise at all. The quality of preservice teacher education is central for enhancing an education system, and mentors’ roles can assist to shape preservice teachers’ development within the school context. Yet mentoring can be haphazard without being underpinned by a theoretical framework. A mentoring model (personal attributes, system requirements, pedagogical knowledge, modelling, and feedback) has emerged from research and the literature to guide mentors’ practices. This qualitative study investigates mentors’ pedagogical knowledge as one factor crucial to the mentoring process. More specifically, this study involves a questionnaire and audio-recorded focus group meetings with experienced mentors (n=14) who deliberated on devising practical applications for mentoring pedagogical knowledge. Findings revealed that these experienced mentors pinpointed practical applications around a mentor’s role for providing pedagogical knowledge to the mentee. These strategies were varied and demonstrated that any one mentoring practice may be approached from a number of different angles. Nevertheless, there were core mentoring practices in pedagogical knowledge such as showing the mentee how to plan for teaching, articulating classroom management approaches, and talking about how to connect learning to assessment. Mentors may require education on current mentoring practices with practical strategies that are linked to theoretical underpinnings

Distributing Leadership for Initiating University-Community Engagement

Facilitating community engagement in education is promoted and emphasised as an investment strategy (Garlick 2000). However, the responsibility for facilitating university-community engagement rests upon university personnel to initiate collaborations with the community. This paper describes and analyses leadership processes for initiating community engagement with the new Queensland University of Technology campus at Caboolture. Data collection and analysis involved observation of practices, and coding interviews, minutes of meetings, and written correspondence with a wide range of participants (i.e., senior QUT staff, lecturers, preservice teachers, principals, school executives and teachers, and other community members). Results indicated that leadership processes involved: (1) articulating visionary directions, (2) communication for instigating change processes, (3) motivating potential key stakeholders, (4) promoting collaboration and team effort, and (5) distributing leadership. This study highlighted the impact of creating positive working environments for developing collaborative partnerships. However, new campuses need to shape university goals to suit individual contexts, which will require considerable input from key stakeholders. Initiating community engagement requires university personnel to connect key stakeholders, and the distribution of leadership will be essential in order to sustain university-community collaborations

How can universities support beginning teachers?

Many beginning teachers struggle in teaching, consequently, tertiary education has been criticised for not preparing preservice teachers well enough. This qualitative study uses interviews and questionnaires to investigate 10 first-year teachers’ understandings of how universities can support them more effectively. The findings indicated that university preparation needed more literacy (particularly reading and spelling), numeracy, catering for lower socio-economic students, understanding behaviour differentiation, and communicating with parents. A two-prong approach may support beginning teachers: (1) timely induction and mentoring within school settings, and (2) research for advancing teacher education coursework to ensure currency of addressing beginning teachers’ needs

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

Developing an Instrument to Examine Preservice Teachers' Pedagogical Development

National and international reform documents have forged blueprints for advancing science education. Coursework for preservice teachers needs to correspond to these documents by providing learning experiences that develop preservice teachers' capabilities to plan and implement reform measures. Using a pretest–posttest design, responses from 59 2nd-year preservice teachers from the same university were compared after involvement in an elementary science pedagogy coursework. The survey, which was linked to the course outcomes (constructs) and multiple indicators, measured the preservice teachers' perceptions of their development towards becoming elementary science teachers. A pretest–posttest survey linked to course outcomes can be employed to assess perceived pedagogical development of preservice teachers, which can inform further teaching practices for implementing science education reform agendas

Mentoring for effective teaching of writing in the primary school

Effective mentoring in English is considered paramount to a preservice teacher’s development as it presents real-life contexts for pedagogical understandings. This study provided qualitative data (questionnaire) and quantitative data (survey) on 24 mentors’ perceptions of their mentoring for teaching English and in particular teaching writing. These mentors are cooperating teachers who had mentored second-year preservice teachers (mentees) from one Australian university. Qualitative data indicated that developing a good rapport in a mentor-mentee relationship keeps lines of communication open in order to assist the mentee’s learning. In addition, the mentor’s modelling of teaching writing, demonstrating specific writing strategies, and providing positive yet constructive feedback were considered successful mentoring strategies, while a mentee’s lack of content knowledge, inadequate personal writing skills, and not knowing how to multi-task with many students may contribute towards a mentee feeling unsuccessful as a writing teacher. Mentors advocated methods for enhancing mentoring practices, which included university-facilitated professional development, linking syllabus content and teaching approaches, and sharing pedagogical content knowledge with colleagues. The quantitative data presented mentors’ perceptions of their attributes and practices across five factors for mentoring (i.e., Personal Attributes, System Requirements, Pedagogical Knowledge, Modelling, and Feedback) with 67% or more of these mentors (n=24) agreeing or strongly agreeing they provided all the 34 items associated with the survey. The factor System Requirements had the lowest percentage range (67-71%) while Feedback had the highest range (83-100%). However, mentees may not agree with their mentors’ perspectives, hence, further research comparing the two perspectives may lead towards targeting more effective approaches for mentoring the teaching of writing

Identifying Chinese Secondary Teachers' Needs for Professional Development Abroad

China is at a crucial point for reforming its education system and seeks professional development abroad for selective secondary teachers. In this study, 13 experienced Chinese physics teachers undertook an intensive four-week professional development program in Australia. Early discussion with the participants and two surveys (i.e., mid-evaluation and end-evaluation surveys) aimed to gather qualitative responses for determining their needs for professional development. Data highlighted the essential nature of school visits for observing teaching practices, accurate translations, and the inclusion of physics-based excursions. Yet, apart from addressing personal and social needs, it was concluded future professional development must focus on delivering advanced content knowledge related specifically to the Chinese Curriculum Standards, and current pedagogical approaches and theories that branch beyond the transmission approach employed in China. The information in this study aims to assist other tertiary institutions conducting professional development programs for Chinese teachers