Showing papers in "Teachers College Record in 2000"

Instructional Policy and Classroom Performance: The Mathematics Reform in California

Abstract: Educational reformers increasingly seek to manipulate policies regarding assessment, curriculum, and professional development in order to improve instruction. They assume that manipulating these elements of instructional policy will change teachers’ practice, which will then improve student performance. We formalize these ideas into a rudimentary model of the relations among instructional policy, teaching, and learning. We propose that successful instructional policies are themselves instructional in nature: because teachers figure as a key connection between policy and practice, their opportunities to learn about and from policy are a crucial influence both on their practice and, at least indirectly, on student achievement. Using data from a 1994 survey of California elementary school teachers and 1994 student California Learning Assessment System (CLAS) scores, we examine the influence of assessment, curriculum, and professional development on teacher practice and student achievement. Our results bear out the usefulness of the model: under circumstances that we identify, policy can affect practice, and both can affect student performance.

Course Improvement through Evaluation

Abstract: The national interest in improving education has generated several highly important projects attempting to improve curricula, particularly at the secondary-school level. In conferences of directors of course content improvement programs sponsored by the National Science Foundation, questions about evaluation are frequently raised.1 Those who inquire about evaluation have various motives, ranging from sheer scientific curiosity about classroom events to a desire to assure a sponsor that money has been well spent. While the curriculum developers sincerely wish to use the skills of evaluation specialists, I am not certain that they have a clear picture of what evaluation can do and should try to do. And, on the other hand, I am becoming convinced that some techniques and habits of thought of the evaluation specialist are ill-suited to current curriculum studies. To serve these studies, what philosophy and methods of evaluation are required? And, particularly, how must we depart from the familiar doctrines and rituals of the testing game?

"To Be Part of the Story": The Literacy Practices of Gangsta Adolescents

Abstract: Despite a recent emphasis on conceptualizing literacy as a tool for changing thought and experience, when people—whether the popular media, school personnel, or educational scholars—speak of the literacy practices of marginalized adolescents, they rarely talk about such literacies as tools. Instead, the literacy practices of marginalized adolescents are often referred to in terms of deviance or resistance. Gangconnected youth, in particular, are routinely represented as engaging in acts of villainy or resistance, but are rarely represented as meaning makers, people who are expressing their beliefs, values, and interests. If literacy theorists want to claim that literacy is a tool for transforming thought and experience, however, then we need to extend that theoretical claim to all literacy practices by asking what unsanctioned literacy practices do for adolescents. Are these simply acts of resistance? Or do adolescent gang members, who are often placed outside the possibility of school success on the basis of physical characteristics and social affiliations, also use literacy as a way of exploring possible worlds, claiming space, and making their voices heard? This study uses data from three years of research with five gang-connected youth to illustrate how they used their literacy practices as meaning-making, expressive, and communicative tools. The data show how these youth used literacy practices “to be part of the story,” or to claim a space, construct an identity, and take a social position in their worlds. The paper concludes by arguing that literacy theorists, researchers, and practitioners need to acknowledge the power of unsanctioned literacy tools in the lives of marginalized youth and develop pedagogies that draw from, but also challenge and extend, these practices.

Reforming Teacher Preparation and Licensing: Debating the Evidence

Abstract: This article responds to Dale Ballou and Michael Podgursky's claims that the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future has misrepresented research data and findings. After reviewing and responding to each of their charges, the article indicates the ways in which their critique itself has misreported data and misrepresented the Commission's statements and recommendations. Ballou and Podgursky ignore and misconstrue the research evidence presented by the Commission in support of its key conclusions. Following an analysis of the ways in which the critique misrepresents the findings from research on teacher education to bolster the argument that training for teaching is unnecessary, this reply offers an argument for professional teaching standards as a key factor in achieving greater equity and excellence in American schools. What Matters Most, the 1996 report of the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future (the Commission), was the

Motivating People from Privileged Groups to Support Social Justice.

Abstract: One of the more challenging aspects of multicultural education is engaging people from dominant social groups (e.g., men, whites, heterosexuals) in promoting equity. This article presents a theoretical perspective for understanding what may motivate people from privileged groups to support diversity and social justice. The three main sources of motivation discussed are empathy, moral and spiritual values, and selfinterest. The complexities and limitations of each are considered. A model is also proposed that broadens the conception of self-interest. Educational strategies are suggested to address these different sources of motivation. By better understanding what motivates someone to support diversity and equity, educators can more intentionally choose approaches that will engage individuals, and thus more effectively promote personal and institutional change.

Asian American Resistance to Selecting Teaching as a Career: The Power of Community and Tradition

Abstract: In the face of noticeably low interest in K–12 teaching among young Asian American students, interviews first were conducted with undergraduate Asian American students in teacher education programs and then those same students conducted interviews themselves with a variety of Asian Americans in several California communities. Findings suggest the pivotal influence of the traditional Chinese role of teachers in undermining the confidence and interest needed for the choice of a K–12 teaching career by Asian Americans. The main sources of resistance to teaching as a career were identified as: intense pressure from parents to strive for positions perceived as having higher status, greater financial rewards, and stability; a sense of personal inadequacy due to standards set by Chinese culture for what it means to be a teacher; and fear of working outside a comfort zone defined by language, diversity, respect, responsibility for other people’s children, and separation of private from public selves. The majority of informants saw race-matched teaching as not valuable or necessary. Differences in American and Chinese traditions of K–12 education are discussed.

The Reciprocal Influence of Teacher Learning, Teaching Practice, School Restructuring, and Student Learning Outcomes

Abstract: This article discusses the reciprocal and dynamic relationship of teacher learning, teaching practice, school restructuring, and student outcomes in three high performing public secondary schools for at-risk students. Student outcomes include improvement in student graduation rates, course pass rates, college admission rates, and academic course-taking rates. The article describes each school’s context and the inquiry process that stimulated teacher learning; triggered changes in teaching practice, school organization, and student outcomes; expanded teacher learning; and extended improved outcomes to a wider population of students. It describes how the interaction of these variables produced practitioner knowledge that teachers used to the benefit of student outcomes. It discusses how in each of the three schools teachers’ learning was initially driven by their aspirations for specific student effects, which led them to develop and implement practices that drew on their school’s culture, and their knowledge of their students, successful practice, and their content area. In each case teachers made changes in their teaching practice and in school and curricular organization. The article also identifies a set of contextual conditions that support this change process. Lastly, the article presents implications for researchers, reformers, and practitioners who aim to improve student outcomes by changing teacher practice and school organization. The article is based on findings from a five-year multiplecase study of how three high schools connect disenfranchised students to their future.

Learning to Speak Out in an Abstinence Based Sex Education Group: Gender and Race Work in an Urban Magnet School

Abstract: This paper describes an abstinence-based sex education group for diverse girls in grades 7-12 in an urban magnet school. Data were gathered from a within-school program, My Bottom Line, which was designed to prevent or delay the onset of sexual activity, build self-esteem, and increase young women's self-sufficiency through an abstinence based, gender specific prevention program that students attend voluntarily. The program runs for 15 weeks and promotes abstinence in relationships, even after girls have had sexual relationships. It teaches that girls have control of their bodies and should not accept male control or abuse. A cornerstone of the sex education group is confidentiality, which allows girls to bare secrets without fear of recrimination or gossip. The girls weave a form of collective strength that goes beyond individual abstinence. This group offers a place where trite social stereotypes are contested. Girls learn that women ought not be victims. Working through sensitive cross-race issues also encourages more open attitudes toward racial issues in general. (Contains 27 references.) (SM) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. Learning to Speak Out in an Abstinence Based Sex Education Group: Gender and Race Work in an Urban Magnet School Lois Weis (with Doris Carbonell-Medina, Esq.) State University of New York at Buffalo U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Office of Educational Research and Improvement jUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) This document has been reproduced as received from the person or organization originating it. 1:1 Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. 01 PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND GO DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS CI BEEN GRANTED BY `11 CZ CO C) L. (Ale i s TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) 1 2 BEST COPY AVAILABLE Learning to Speak Out in an Abstinence Based Sex Education Group: Gender and Race Work in an Urban Magnet School Lois: Lois Weis (with Doris Carbonell-Medina, Esq.) Oh, Donna [a young woman in the group] was saying...looking at a sheet that you had given them, you know, instead of having sex, you go for a bike ride, watch television, et cetera, et cetera. And Donna looked at the sheet and said, "Well, we can't do these things. We're poor. We don't have bikes... We don't have a car." And you [Doris, the group leader] turned to her, and, without missing a beat, said, "Well, you're going to be even poorer if you have a baby or get AIDS." Recent research on sexuality education in schools suggests that the current state of affairs is dismal. From Michelle Fine's (1988) research on what she terms the missing "discourse of desire", to work by Mariam= Whatley (1991), and, more recently, Bonnie Nelson Trudell (1993), we learn that in these curricula young men are painted as biologically programmed sexual aggressors, while young women are scripted as passive victims whose only subject position is that of not provoking easily sexually aroused males. While it is generally acknowledged that there is not nearly enough sexuality education in schools, that which does exist leaves much to be desired. In addition, research shows that compulsory heterosexuality is inscribed throughout the school curriculum, and most prominently in sex education curriculum, where AIDS is often drawn as a disease solely of homosexuals (Friend, 1993). Taking into account these observations, and working from this perspective, it is clear that sexuality curriculum is about to become even worse. Due to the passage of recent legislation, abstinence based programs are slated to receive millions and millions of dollars under the Family Adolescent Life Act (AFLA, Title XX of the Public Health Act) and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (otherwise known as "welfare reform"). Despite this massive funding, there has been little research concerning the effectiveness of one