In both the United States and Europe, concerns have been raised about whether preservice and in-service training succeeds in equipping teachers with the professional knowledge they need to deliver consistently high-quality instruction. This article investigates the significance of teachers’ content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge for high-quality instruction and student progress in secondary-level mathematics. It reports findings from a 1-year study conducted in Germany with a representative sample of Grade 10 classes and their mathematics teachers. Teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge was theoretically and empirically distinguishable from their content knowledge. Multilevel structural equation models revealed a substantial positive effect of pedagogical content knowledge on students’ learning gains that was mediated by the provision of cognitive activation and individual learning support.

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Teachers’ Mathematical Knowledge, Cognitive Activation in the Classroom, and Student Progress:

Continuing to learn is universally accepted and expected by professionals and other stakeholders across all professions. However, despite changes in response to research findings about how professionals learn, many professional development practices still focus on delivering content rather than enhancing learning. In exploring reasons for the continuation of didactic practices in professional development, this article critiques the usual conceptualization of professional development through a review of recent literature across professions. An alternative conceptualization is proposed, based on philosophical assumptions congruent with evidence about professional learning from seminal educational research of the past two decades. An argument is presented for a shift in discourse and focus from delivering and evaluating professional development programs to understanding and supporting authentic professional learning.

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Reframing Professional Development Through Understanding Authentic Professional Learning

International Society for Technology in Education.

The technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) framework is increasing in use by educational technology researchers around the world who are interested in issues related to technology integration. Much that is good can be found in the TPACK framework; however considerable theoretical work needs to be done if TPACK research is to cohere and constructively strengthen the field of educational technology. This paper uses Whetten's (1989) criteria for theory building as a lens for examining the TPACK framework. Specific weaknesses are identified, which in turn suggest areas needing theoretical development. This paper calls for researchers to increase emphasis on using research findings to constructively build common definitions and understandings of the TPACK constructs and the boundaries between them.

Theoretical considerations for understanding technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK)

Virtual worlds, where thousands of people can interact simultaneously within the same three-dimensional environment, represent a frontier in social computing with critical implications for business, education, social sciences, and our society at large. In this paper, we first trace the history of virtual worlds back to its antecedents in electronic gaming and on-line social networking. We then provide an overview of extant virtual worlds, including education-focused, theme-based, community-specific, children-focused, and self-determined worlds - and we analyze the relationship among these worlds according to an initial taxonomy for the area. Recognizing the apparent leadership of Second Life among today's self-determined virtual worlds, we present a detailed case study of this environment, including surveys of 138 residents regarding how they perceive and utilize the environment. Lastly, we provide a literature review of existing virtual world research, with a focus on business research, and a condensed summary of research issues in education, social sciences, and humanities.

Virtual worlds - past, present, and future: New directions in social computing

Exhilarated and exhausted, hopeful and cynical, fulfilled and dejected--these adjectives depict the emotional spectrum characterizing teachers' 1st-year experiences. Narratives of teachers' initial years speak to the gritty reality of "really learning to teach." Their stories tell of the challenges experienced as they come to understand the depth and texture of their students' lives and their unique developmental needs. They work to develop humane, yet efficient, routines to manage the daily business of classroom and school life. They struggle to design engaging curriculum and to build knowledge of rigorous and fair standards for student work. They try to fend off fatigue, seeking to balance career demands with activities and connections that rejuvenate. They grapple with the absurdities and paradoxes of school bureaucracies, choosing when to critique and resist ill-framed policies and practices. They stumble in some interactions with colleagues, administrators, and parents. They wonder why their trying work and hard-won accomplishments are viewed with such low regard by the general public. In short, narratives of first years pivot between epiphany and disillusionment (e.g., Johnston, 2002; Kane, 1991; Michie, 1999). The challenges brought to life in these narratives are persistently documented in the research literature (Fuller, 1969; Roehrig, Pressley, & Talotta, 2002; Veenman, 1984). Difficulties in the first years of teaching have implications for both practice and policy, particularly because the estimated financial cost of teacher turnover is US$2.6 billion annually (Alliance for Excellent Education, 2004). Furthermore, although we expect most 1st-year teachers will encounter some difficulties, there is emerging evidence that those prepared in powerful teacher preparation programs seem to manage the vicissitudes more adeptly than others (Darling-Hammond, 2006) and that quality induction programs matter (Britton, Paine, Pimm, & Raizen, 2003; Johnson & The Project on the Next Generation of Teachers, 2004; Molner-Kelly, 2004). With these realities in mind, what can and should we expect of teacher education? Is teacher education doing too little or too much to prepare teachers for the first years of teaching? To educate and support beginning teachers, we need to know about their development and the contexts in which it takes place. THE FIRST YEARS Studies of new teachers' development outline typical stages (e.g., Berliner, 1994; Bullough & Baughman, 1997; Feiman-Nemser, 1983; Huberman, 1989). Whether beginnings are easy or painful, survival remains a prominent theme for the initial months, as new teachers resolve discipline and management problems. The intense survival stage gives way, often by the middle of the 1st year, to a focus on curriculum, teaching practices, and eventually student learning. Most studies present a progression toward mastery or expertise, achieved some time in the 4th year of teaching or beyond. (1) More recent frameworks to conceptualize teacher learning and development draw on the notions of adaptive expertise (Hammerness, Darling-Hammond, & Bransford, 2005), progressive differentiation (Snow, Griffin, & Burns, 2005), and a professional learning continuum (Feiman-Nemser, 2001). Teachers as "adaptive experts" frames expertise along two dimensions--efficiency and innovation. That is, expertise involves both the ability to "perform particular tasks without having to devote too many attentional resources to achieve them" and the ability to "move beyond existing routines ... to rethink key ideas, practices, and even values in order to" respond to novel situations (Hammerness et al., 2005, pp. 358-359). In a similar manner, Snow and her colleagues' (2005) conception of "progressive differentiation" outlines five levels of knowledge teachers draw on (declarative, situated procedural, stable procedural, expert/adaptive, and reflective/analyzed). …

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0022487106291976

Too Little or Too Much: Teacher Preparation and the First Years of Teaching

This telephone has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us. An internal Western Union memo, 1876 I think there is a world market for maybe five computers. IBM chairman Thomas Watson, 1943. There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home. Ken Olson, founder, chairman and president of Digital Equipment Corporation, 1977. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Arthur C. Clarke (1963), English physicist and science fiction writer, p. We've come a long way and at an incredible pace. What was magic less than a generation ago is now part of everyday life. Digital technologies are changing the way we live, work, and learn. Their potential to transform K-12 education motivated our decision to devote a theme issue of Journal of Teacher Education to the innovative uses of technology for teacher learning. (1) Although optimistic about the possibilities new technologies offer to support K-12 learners' achievement, teachers' productivity, effectiveness in classrooms, and teacher learning, we also recognize that teaching and learning with new technologies represents a "wicked problem" (Koehler & Mishra, 2008). Rittel and Webber (1973) characterized wicked problems as problems that include a large number of complex variables--all of which are dynamic, contextually bound, and interdependent. The rapid growth of digital technologies, coupled with the complexity of classroom life, increases both the potential transformative power and the difficulty of problems associated with incorporating innovative technologies in teaching and teacher education. Our aim in organizing this theme issue was to explore these possibilities and complexities. Our call for this issue invited "research manuscripts that address how these technologies inform teacher candidates' understanding of real classrooms and veteran teachers' professional development ... that examine the unique opportunities and obstacles presented through these inventive uses of technology, or that provide evidence for their impact on teachers' learning and practice." Perhaps it is not surprising that our understanding of what it takes to integrate technology effectively into teaching and teacher education has grown through the process of putting together the theme issue. We now have a sharper sense of the relationship between issues involved in using technology to support teacher learning and those that must be addressed to support the uses of technology to foster K-12 student learning. In the big picture, innovative teacher educators are creating technology-rich approaches that promote the development of tech-savvy teachers--teachers who regularly use digital technologies to guide their own learning, recognize the pedagogical potential of technology to help children and youth understand content, and know how to embed new technologies in their instructional practices. We recognize that the call for this theme issue did not invite articles examining how teachers learn to embed technology in their classroom practice to teach content in powerful ways. The six articles in this issue tackle the role that new technologies--particularly video and online communities--play in learning to teach. Taken together, they examine the promise digital technologies hold to help teacher educators overcome persistent dilemmas encountered when designing scalable, sustainable programs to support teacher learning. The different approaches described in the articles illustrate why developing tech-savvy teachers is a "wicked problem" and why teacher education must be involved in understanding and managing the dilemmas associated with integrating technology into teacher education and K-12 classrooms. In the remainder of this editorial, we contextualize the issue's articles. We consider pedagogical affordances and constraints of digital technologies, uses of digital technology in teacher education and professional development, and the conceptualization of a new form of teacher knowledge related to integrating technology-technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK; Mishra & Koehler, 2006). …

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0022487108328488

Wicked Problems and Other Thoughts on Issues of Technology and Teacher Learning

One hundred days pass swiftly. In the week this editorial goes to press, President Obama is 80 days into his presidency. President Obama and the First Lady traveled to Europe for their first international trip, Congress passed Obama's budget, and Secretary of Education Duncan announced federal stimulus money will begin flowing to states and schools. The hard work to launch Obama's administration and enact his call for change is underway. Central to Obama's vision to transform the nation is a commitment to give all America's youth access to a quality education. Thus, teacher quality is a focal point in his education agenda. The Obama Education Plan: An Education Week Guide (Education Week, 2009) devotes an entire chapter to outlining policies for recruitment, preparation, retention, and rewards for America's teacher force. Professional development, while mentioned several times throughout the book, plays a more peripheral role. Reflecting a human capital policy approach, many education initiatives under consideration rest on the assumption that developing talent within the teacher force is essential to opening educational opportunity and narrowing achievement gaps. Policies that emphasize recruiting the best and brightest, retaining only the most effective teachers, and rewarding teachers for meritorious performance are most prominent in policy discussions (Glaeser, 2008). From our perspective, central to talent development is an understanding that teaching is a complex intellectual and emotional task. Learning to teach well is a developmental process that unfolds over time when teachers have appropriate support and opportunities to learn (Feiman-Nemser, 2001; National Commission on Teaching and America's Future, 1996). Thus, although we agree that recruiting, retaining, and rewarding talent matters in winning the "race to the top," growing talent may prove to be the critical step in transforming the teacher workforce. The timing of this themed issue on "Powerful Professional Development Models and Practices" is particularly fortuitous. Acknowledging the key role that teacher professional development plays in improving teacher quality and classroom practices, we solicited manuscripts addressing the design, implementation, and impact of professional development models and practices, and the opportunities and obstacles that professional development designers and providers encounter. To frame the articles we feature, this editorial highlights the new administration's commitment to education and then offers several suggestions to guide the design of professional development programs and research. Supportive Times for Educational Change Obama's commitment to educational change is apparent in several of his initial acts as President. For example, his remarks when nominating Arne Duncan as Secretary of Education: We cannot continue on like this. It is morally unacceptable for our children--and economically untenable for America. We need a new vision for a 21st century education system--one where we aren't just supporting existing schools but spurring innovation; where we're not just investing more money but demanding more reform; where parents take responsibility for their children's success; where we're recruiting, retaining, and rewarding an army of new teachers; where we hold our schools, teachers and government accountable for results; and where we expect all our children not only to graduate high school, but to graduate college and get a good paying job. These are precisely the goals to which Arne Duncan has devoted his life.... When it comes to school reform, Arne is the most hands-on of hands-on practitioners. For Arne, school reform isn't just a theory in a book--it's the cause of his life. (Obama Press Conference Announcing Arne Duncan for Education Secretary, 2009) The President's commitment to education is also evident in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. …

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0022487109337280

Growing Talent: Promising Professional Development Models and Practices

Common sense suggests a good teacher matters. Personal experiences with inspirational and challenging teachers reinforce this notion. Research has also shown some teachers have a more significant impact on student achievement than others (McAffrey, D.R., Lockwood, J.R., Koretz, D.L., & Hamilton, L.S., 2003; Rivkin, Haushek, & Kain, 2005; Rockoff, 2004). Teacher quality is seen as a key policy lever to narrow achievement gaps that exist along racial and economic lines. Ensuring the quality profile of the teacher workforce is crucial to extend the democratic mission of public schooling to an unprecedented number of students who are more diverse than at any point in US history. Two recent publications, timed to go with the 2008 legislative sessions, underscore the importance of the teacher quality movement as part of the larger educational reform conversation. Education Week's Quality Counts 2008: Tapping into Teaching issue (Education Week, Jan. 10, 2008) and the National Council for Teacher Quality's (NCTQ) state-by-state Teacher Policy Yearbook (NCTQ, 2007) evaluate state policies and performance in enhancing teacher quality. These reports, aimed at policy makers, describe the teaching profession from 30,000 above ground. To those whose daily work is preparing quality teachers, the terms of the debate feel distant and removed. And, they are. Teacher preparation, particularly university-based teacher preparation, is seen as part of the problem and to be circumvented. Key players shaping the policy debate and funding initiatives are working from outside Schools of Education, and often outside universities altogether. In effect teacher educators have been marginalized and are taking part in their own marginalization. The activity and urgency around teacher quality challenge us to ask this central question: What is the teacher educator's role in enhancing teacher quality? We argue that a more systemic framing is needed, one that examines teacher quality from 30,000 above and on the ground. First, we review definitions and arguments that have framed the movement thus far. DEFINING TEACHER QUALITY Defining teacher quality has been both problematic and elusive. Three terms heard in the discussions are highly qualified teacher, effective teacher, and good teacher. These focus on teacher characteristics or qualifications, teaching outcomes, and teaching practices, respectively. None adequately captures the complexity of a system that supports teacher quality. Legislatively, the federal law, No Child Left Behind (2001) defines highly qualified teacher as having the following qualifications: a bachelor's degree, a state teaching certification or a passing score on the state teacher licensing examination, and subject matter knowledge (Hess & Petrilli, 2006). Critiques of this definition emphasize the overly narrow focus on content preparation, the imprecision of measures for each qualification, and the variability across states to define when a teacher has met criteria. For example, given the wide variation in states' licensure requirements and pathways to certification, holding a state teaching license, though relatively easy to measure from state databases, does not say much about a teacher's knowledge or practice. Overall, the federal definition of highly qualified teacher sets a minimum base for teacher knowledge and focuses on input measures. The term effective teacher generally refers to teachers' ability to foster student achievement. There is a long tradition of research on teacher effectiveness, dating back to the 1960s and 70s (Shulman, 1986). Much of this research examined specific teaching practices (e.g., teachers' questioning strategies) and correlated them with student learning gains. More recent and sophisticated extensions of this line of research include work done by Just for the Kids (http://www .just4kids.org/en/) or by Marzano and colleagues at the Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning (Marzano, R. …

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0022487108315581

The Teacher Educator's Role in Enhancing Teacher Quality

In fall 2006, Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings and President George W. Bush, while stumping for reauthorization of No Child Left Behind (NCLB), asserted, "It is working, and it is here to stay" (The White House, 2006). Though we find claims of its effectiveness premature, NCLB and the subsequent and less-noticed Education Sciences Reform Act (ESR) are without question changing the landscape of public education. Since their adoption in 2002, many of the laws' provisions have been implemented. For example, high-stakes testing and reporting systems to determine "adequate yearly progress" (AYP) are in place in all states. Indeed, as this editorial goes to press, headlines about schools not demonstrating AYP abound. Policies establishing criteria for "highly qualified teachers" (HQT) have been adopted, although wide variation exists across the states, particularly for veteran teachers. "Scientifically-based research" has become the stamp of approval for curriculum selection and instructional practices in many of the NCLB programs, notably Title I and Reading First grants. And the Education Sciences Reform Act supports the newly created Institute for Educational Sciences (IES), which is a major source of funding for educational research and is overseeing contracts to overhaul the ERIC Clearinghouse into the What Works Clearinghouse. Some flexibility will undoubtedly be introduced in the reauthorization of NCLB. Regardless of changes enacted, however, we expect that the specifics of NCLB, and the broader theme of accountability to close the "achievement gap," will continue to dominate education conversations in the years ahead. Initial scholarly responses to NCLB offered both critical analyses and defenses of the assumptions and research base underlying the laws (e.g., Carlson & Levin, 2005; Darling-Hammond & Youngs, 2002; Elmore, 2002; Hess & Finn, 2004; Linn, 2003; Thernstrom & Thernstrom, 2003). At the law's five-year mark, analyses describe evidence of its uneven effectiveness. For example, while district test scores are improving, NAEP scores do not show any significant improvement (Bracey, 2006; Center on Education Policy, 2006). In states that have taken a tougher stance implementing AYP goals, some schools have failed to make AYP for the second or third year, thus triggering NCLB sanctions that culminate in restructuring, despite rating in the top categories on state accountability measures. These multiple accountability systems have left the general public confused about the quality of their local schools (Dillon, 2006). Though the 2005-2006 deadline for teachers to meet HQT has been extended, most states report they are on track to meet these requirements. However, the wide variation in how states define teacher quality frequently dilutes the purpose of this provision (Henig, 2006). There is widespread skepticism among state and district officials that the teacher requirements are improving the quality of teaching (Center on Education Policy, 2006). And much needed empirical analyses of the effects of NCLB on students and teachers are just beginning to emerge (e.g., Center for Education Policy, 2006; Fuller, 2006; Lee, 2006). In 2007, with or without strong empirical evidence of its effectiveness, NCLB is very likely to be reauthorized. It passed in 2002 with broad bipartisan support. Even with changes in the legislature after the 2006 midterm elections, NCLB's lofty and worthy aims--its commitment to assuring all children achieve at a high level and its strong focus on accountability for results--will likely prevail. However, further analysis and discussion of NCLB are needed. We view this critical juncture as a time for teacher educators to participate more actively in current conversations about a number of important and highly contested questions regarding the way NCLB and ESR are shaping K-12 classroom practice, teachers' lives, and the work of teacher education. Here, we take stock of the laws' impact on teacher education research, practice, and policy. …

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0022487107299980

Jennie Whitcomb

Papers

Too Little or Too Much: Teacher Preparation and the First Years of Teaching

Wicked Problems and Other Thoughts on Issues of Technology and Teacher Learning

Growing Talent: Promising Professional Development Models and Practices

The Teacher Educator's Role in Enhancing Teacher Quality

NCLB and Scientifically-Based Research Opportunities Lost and Found