Showing papers on "Professional development published in 2014"

Inside the Black Box: Raising Standards Through Classroom Assessment

Abstract: Formative assessment is an essential component of classroom work and can raise student achievement.

Professionally Developing as a Teacher Educator

Abstract: There is growing interest in the professional development of teacher educators as the demands, expectations, and requirements of teacher education increasingly come under scrutiny. The manner in wh...

Understanding “Core Practices” and “Practice-Based” Teacher Education Learning From the Past

Abstract: In recent years, a small but growing strand of research has investigated ways of focusing teachers’ professional education on “core” or “high leverage” practices of teaching. These efforts are easi...

Engaging Students In STEM Education

Abstract: With the "flattening" of the global economy in the 21st century, the teaching of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) has taken on new importance as economic competition has become truly global. STEM education has evolved into a meta-discipline, an integrated effort that removes the traditional barriers between these subjects, and instead focuses on innovation and the applied process of designing solutions to complex contextual problems using current tools and technologies. Engaging students in high quality STEM education requires programs to include rigorous curriculum, instruction, and assessment, integrate technology and engineering into the science and mathematics curriculum, and also promote scientific inquiry and the engineering design process. All students must be a part of the STEM vision, and all teachers must be provided with the proper professional development opportunities preparing them to guide all their students toward acquiring STEM literacy. By focusing on student engagement, educators from institutions of higher education and K-12 schools can work together to develop pedagogical models that provide rigorous, well-rounded education and outstanding STEM instruction. This paper defines the necessary attributes of STEM programs designed to engage all students, describes a number of model programs focused on student engagement, and discusses assessments in progress.

How and Why Educators Use Twitter: A Survey of the Field

Abstract: While the microblogging service Twitter is increasingly popular among educators and offers numerous affordances for learning, its relationship with formal education systems remains complicated by generally ambivalent educator attitudes and institutional policies. To better understand the role Twitter plays in education, we conducted a survey of 755 K–16 educators that yielded quantitative and qualitative data concerning how and why the medium is used. Respondents reported intense and multifaceted utilization of the service, with professional development (PD) uses more common than interactions with students or families. Educators valued Twitter's personalized, immediate nature, and the positive and collaborative community it facilitated. Many cited Twitter's role in combating various types of isolation and described it as superior to traditional professional development. We finish by discussing implications for educators, researchers, and educational institutions.

Differentiated Instruction, Professional Development, and Teacher Efficacy:

Abstract: Teachers often struggle to provide all students access to specific learning activities that work best for them—and what works best for some students will not work for others. Differentiating instruction makes sense because it offers different paths to understanding content, process, and products, considering what is appropriate given a child’s profile of strengths, interests, and styles. This study focused on teacher efficacy as a way to explain teacher willingness to differentiate instruction. We found that a greater number of professional development hours in differentiation of instruction was positively associated with both teacher efficacy and the teacher’s sense of efficacy beliefs. This study demonstrated that teacher efficacy is an important dimension in implementing the process of differentiation regardless of what level or what content area the teacher taught (elementary, middle, or high school). Implications and future directions for research are also discussed.

Learning in landscapes of practice : boundaries, identity, and knowledgeability in practice-based learning

Abstract: If the body of knowledge of a profession is a living landscape of practice, then our personal experience of learning can be thought of as a journey through this landscape. Within Learning in Landscapes of Practice, this metaphor is further developed in order to start an important conversation about the nature of practice knowledge, identity and the experience of practitioners and their learning. In doing so, this book is a pioneering and timely exploration of the future of professional development and higher education. The book combines a strong theoretical perspective grounded in social learning theories with stories from a broad range of contributors who occupy different locations in their own landscapes of practice. These narratives locate the book within different contemporary concerns such as social media, multi-agency, multi-disciplinary and multi-national partnerships, and the integration of academic study and workplace practice. Both scholarly, in the sense that it builds on prior research to extend and locate the concept of landscapes of practice, and practical because of the way in which it draws on multiple voices from different landscapes. Learning in Landscapes of Practice will be of particular relevance to people concerned with the design of professional or vocational learning. It will also be a valuable resource for students engaged in higher education courses with work-based elements.

Can Professional Environments in Schools Promote Teacher Development? Explaining Heterogeneity in Returns to Teaching Experience:

Abstract: Although wide variation in teacher effectiveness is well established, much less is known about differences in teacher improvement over time. We document that average returns to teaching experience mask large variation across individual teachers and across groups of teachers working in different schools. We examine the role of school context in explaining these differences using a measure of the professional environment constructed from teachers responses to state-wide surveys. Our analyses show that teachers working in more supportive professional environments improve their effectiveness more over time than teachers working in less supportive contexts. On average, teachers working in schools at the 75th percentile of professional environment ratings improved 38% more than teachers in schools at the 25th percentile after 10 years.

The Professional Development of Teachers: Practice and Theory

Abstract: Part 1: The Issues and Some Attempted Solutions. Abbreviations and notes. 1. Introduction. 2. Evolving principles: experience of two large scale programmes. 3. Professional development for cognitive acceleration: initiation. 4. Professional development for cognitive acceleration: elaboration. Part 2: Empirical Evidence. 5. Measurable effects of cognitive acceleration. 6. Testing an implementation model. 7. A long term follow up of some CASE schools. 8. Teachers in the school context. 9. Making the process systemic - evaluation of an authority programme. Part 3: Modelling Professional Development. 10. Researching professional development: just how complex is it? 11. Elaborating the model. 12. Evidence based policy? References. Index.

Strengthening Clinical Preparation: The Holy Grail of Teacher Education

Abstract: Efforts to improve teacher education have recently focused in on the importance of well-supervised clinical practice as a critical element of effective preparation. This article outlines the challenges to creating productive clinical experiences for prospective teachers, and identifies strategies that have been found successful in confronting these challenges. These include the development of professional development school relationships that strengthen practice in partner schools and the use of teacher performance assessments that focus attention on pulling together practical skills and providing feedback to candidates and programs.

A study of social participation and knowledge sharing in the teachers' online professional community of practice

Abstract: To facilitate professional development of teachers in the online context, the online community of practice (CoPs) has become an important platform in which individuals with similar interests or common goals get together to share their resources, develop working strategies, solve problems, and improve individual as well as organizational performance. In this study, we have collected self-reported knowledge-sharing behaviors from 321 members of the largest online professional CoP of teachers in Taiwan. The results show that closer connections among online CoP members can lead to greater recognition of and altruism towards others. Moreover, performance expectation and self-efficacy belief play essential roles in knowledge-sharing participation. Thus, the development of social relationships among online teacher members helps them obtain potential resources and reliable support through their social network. Also, teachers' membership in the online professional CoP fosters a prosocial attitude that heightens their willingness to share useful resources and solve other members' problems, both emotionally and instrumentally. Consequently, knowledge-sharing behaviors, in terms of knowledge giving and knowing receiving, are significantly predicted by prosocial commitment and performance expectation respectively. The implications to both research and practice are provided in this paper. The strength of ties and prosocial commitment help obtain resources and support in the online professional CoP.Self-efficacy reflects a mediating effect on knowledge sharing through prosocial commitment and performance expectation.Knowledge sharing as a form of social participation is predicted by prosocial commitment and performance expectation.

Research on science teacher knowledge

Abstract: Teacher knowledge may have a variety of origins, including formal schooling in the past, that is, initial disciplinary training and teacher education, or continued professional training (cf. Calderhead, 1996), as well as practical experiences, occurring in day-to-day teaching practice. In this sense, teacher knowledge is not opposite to theoretical or academic knowledge. Obviously, teachers may differ enormously in the extent to which they have merged or integrated knowledge from different sources into conceptual frameworks that guide their actions in practice.

Understanding Continuing Professional Development: The Need for Theory to Impact on Policy and Practice.

Abstract: This article reflects on my 2005 article in this journal, entitled ‘Models of Continuing Professional Development: a framework for analysis’. Having been invited to reflect on the original article as part of Professional Development in Education’s 40th anniversary celebrations, I have taken the opportunity not only to reflect on the structure and content of the original framework, but also to position it within the current state of literature in the area of teacher professional learning. In so doing, this article proposes an updated framework for analysis, focusing more explicitly on the purpose of particular models than the categorisations of the models themselves. It then goes on to expand on this by considering how various aspects of continuing professional development policies might be analysed according to what they reveal about underlying perspectives on professionalism. The article concludes with some thoughts on how theory about teacher professional learning might better help us to understand poli...

Transforming Professional Development to Professional Learning.

Abstract: This article reviews teacher professional development norms as they are shifting toward collaborative practice. It is posed that passive and individual practices are inadequate to prepare teachers to integrate the academic skills that learners need for both workforce and college readiness. Promising practices in professional development are identified. Specifically, learning in a professional community is considered to be more effective than traditional professional development methods. This paper discusses aspects of professional learning communities that could be incorporated into Adult Basic Education programs to improve teaching and learning.IntroductionTeacher learning has gone through a "reform" movement over the past decade as prevailing belief links high-quality professional development (PD) to higher-quality teaching and high-quality teaching to student achievement (Borko, 2004; Smith, 2010; Desimone, 2009; Darling-Hammond, Wei & Andree, 2010; Yoon, Duncan, Lee, Scarloss & Shapely, 2007). Appropriate conditions and characteristics of PD augment the potential for depth of understanding that leads to change in teaching practice. This is a shift from passive and intermittent PD to that which is active, consistent, based in the teaching environment, and supported by peers in a professional learning community (PLC). PLCs that have demonstrated success are comprised of teachers from the same school who have autonomy to select their learning objectives and have gone through training on how to collaborate (Mindich & Lieberman, 2012).Learning communities thrive when all participants are invested in the work they are doing. If members of a learning group do not feel comfortable together, they may not be able to offer or receive feedback in a constructive manner. Difference of opinion and critical analysis of work should be discussed in an environment in which all have contributed to the organization of the group. This can be achieved in part with a needs assessment at the beginning of a group's time together. If a formal or informal needs assessment is conducted to organize and plan the group's work together, a group can become cohesive. If cohesion of the group does not happen, members are not able to honestly critique one another and the cycle of feedback and improvement will not take place which undermines the potential for a PLC to improve teaching.Knight (2011) lists seven partnership principles that outline a healthy group learning environment in which teachers are personally motivated (see Table 1). Attending to these seven principles invites dialogue between group members to facilitate an equitable working environment. This dialogue allows participants to construct a learning environment that is relevant to each. The foundation of the partnership principles is that people are motivated by goals that are their own. When all are committed to common goals resistance to constructive criticism is diminished (Knight, 2011). PLCs that attend to these principles invite honest feedback and can motivate teachers to innovate together.After a PLC is formed, collaboration should happen cyclically as teachers work together to identify needs for improvement and act upon those needs. These groups must commit to working together over the course of a semester or longer with the goal of professional improvement. The length of time is important, but more important is the process. Teachers should look critically at student work and data to identify specific gaps in student learning. Ideally, teachers work together in cycles to revise lessons and implement them with observation and feedback (Jaquith, Mindich, Wei, & DarlingHammond, 2010). The mission of a PLC is to gain a deeper understanding of how students learn content and then to apply that understanding to how content is taught.A PLC should understand all phases of a project that make up the cycle of continuous improvement (see Figure 1). …

Conceptions of Professional Competence

Abstract: Professional and practice-based learning is a process which manifests itself in many different forms. It differs by personal characteristics of the learners, levels of their professions, fields of practice, intentionality of their learning, and formalisation of the learning activities. Notions of competence have entered this diverse practice in many ways. The question is whether conceptions of professional competence have helped the practice of professional and practice-based learning. In this chapter it is argued that this is indeed the case. Although various attempts to implement competence-based professional learning programmes were heavily criticized, later developments in competence theory and research gave new insights which emphasized the integrative meaning of competence within professional practice. It helped in mapping professional fields from a domain-specific as well as a generic behavioural perspective. This chapter goes into the roots of the competence movement, and evaluates the contributions of these to the field of professional and practice-based learning. This is further illustrated with examples of different professions in which competence models have been and still are an effective means to map requirements for professional practice and to guide the evaluation and development of professional and practice-based learning programmes. What worked and did not work is then explained by distinguishing three approaches of conceptualizing competence which have been used in different contexts, and which have wide implications for professional and practice-based learning. The chapter concludes with the claim that current competence conceptions help mapping, focusing and assessing professional and practice-based learning.

A Framework for the Facilitation of Teachers’ Analysis of Video

Abstract: Video is being used more widely in professional development to help teachers learn to notice and systematically analyze teaching practice. Video captures the authenticity and complexity of teaching and can promote the examination of classroom interactions in a deliberate and focused way. However, simply viewing video does not ensure teacher learning. An important question concerns how to facilitate substantive analysis of teaching practice with video so that it becomes a productive learning tool for teachers. In this study, we examine the in-the-moment moves facilitators make in two different video-based professional development programs to offer a framework for facilitation with video. We then examine patterns in facilitation across both contexts and identify practices that are unique to the goals of each setting. The findings from this study have implications for the design of video-based professional development and for developing a knowledge base for professional education.

The Development of the STEM Career Interest Survey (STEM-CIS)

Abstract: Internationally, efforts to increase student interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers have been on the rise. It is often the goal of such efforts that increased interest in STEM careers should stimulate economic growth and enhance innovation. Scientific and educational organizations recommend that efforts to interest students in STEM majors and careers begin at the middle school level, a time when students are developing their own interests and recognizing their academic strengths. These factors have led scholars to call for instruments that effectively measure interest in STEM classes and careers, particularly for middle school students. In response, we leveraged the social cognitive career theory to develop a survey with subscales in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. In this manuscript, we detail the six stages of development of the STEM Career Interest Survey. To investigate the instrument's reliability and psychometric properties, we administered this 44-item survey to over 1,000 middle school students (grades 6–8) who primarily were in rural, high-poverty districts in the southeastern USA. Confirmatory factor analyses indicate that the STEM-CIS is a strong, single factor instrument and also has four strong, discipline-specific subscales, which allow for the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics subscales to be administered separately or in combination. This instrument should prove helpful in research, evaluation, and professional development to measure STEM career interest in secondary level students.

The Conversation Analytic Role-play Method (CARM): A Method for Training Communication Skills as an Alternative to Simulated Role-play

Abstract: The Conversation Analytic Role-play Method (CARM) is an approach to training based on conversation analytic evidence about the problems and roadblocks that can occur in institutional interaction. Traditional training often relies on role-played interaction, which differs systematically from the actual events it is meant to mimic and prepare for. In contrast, CARM uses animated audio and video recordings of real-time, actual encounters. CARM provides a unique framework for discussing and evaluating, in slow motion, actual talk as people do their jobs. It also provides an evidence base for making decisions about effective practice and communication policy in organizations. This article describes CARM’s distinctive practices and its impact on professional development across different organizations. Data are in British English.

Integrating theory and practice in the pre-service teacher education practicum

Abstract: This article reports on a study into student teachers’ perceptions about their professional development during practicum. Framed within a symbolic interactionist perspective, the study examined to what extent, and how effectively, one group of student teachers was able to integrate theory and practice during a three-week practicum in the first year of their degree. The context for this mixed methods study was a Master of Teaching, graduate-level entry programme in the Faculty of Education at an urban Australian university. Although there is a strong field of literature around the practicum in pre-service teacher education, there has been a limited focus on how student teachers themselves perceive their development during this learning period. Further, despite widespread and longstanding acknowledgement of the ‘gap’ between theory and practice in teacher education, there is still more to learn about how well the practicum enables an integration of these two dimensions of teacher preparation. In presenting three major findings of the study, this paper goes some way in addressing these shortcomings in the literature. First, participants in this study largely valued both the theoretical and practical components of their programme, which stands in contrast to the commonly identified tendency of the student teacher to privilege practice over theory. Second, opportunities to integrate theory and practice were varied, with many participants reporting the detrimental impact of an apparent lack of clarity around stakeholders’ roles and responsibilities. Third, participants overwhelmingly supported the notion of linking university coursework assessment to the practicum as a means of bridging the gap between, on the one hand, the university and the school and, on the other hand, theory and practice.

The Components of Effective Professional Development Activities in terms of Teachers' Perspective

Abstract: Teacher preparedness is linked to student achievement, yet regularly teachers are entering the profession unprepared. In-service training, or professional development activities, are increasingly being used to remedy this situation. There is little agreement regarding exactly what key components should be included in an effective professional development activity. This study seeks to provide the meaning of effective professional development activities and to offer a list of key components inherent in any effective professional development offering. Sixteen elementary school teachers (8 male, 8 female), from a large city in Turkey, were interviewed about their experiences with professional development activities offered over a 12-month period. They were asked to generate a list of the key components to be included in an effective professional development activity. Additionally, document analysis of result reports from Ministry of National Education trainings was performed. The findings indicate that any effective professional development activity should consist of the following components: 1) a match to existing teacher needs, 2) a match to existing school needs, 3) teacher involvement in the design/planning of professional development activities, 4) active participation opportunities, 5) long-term engagement, and 6) high-quality instructors. The researcher hopes that the Ministry of National Education will consider these findings and begin providing more effective professional development activities for teachers. With this means of on-going professional development Turkish teachers’ growth will be enhanced and students will be better prepared to compete in a 21st century global environment.

A Professional Development Framework for Online Teaching.

Abstract: The quality of online programs in higher education is strongly correlated with how the professional development approaches respond to the needs of online teachers. These approaches are critical in helping online teachers adopt online pedagogical practices and reconstruct their teacher persona in an online environment. This study proposes a nested professional development framework for online teaching. The proposed framework intends to recognize successful online teaching in higher education as an outcome of the interaction of support activities at teaching, community, and organization levels.

Leadership for professional development and learning: enhancing our understanding of how teachers develop

Abstract: The educational research community has made great strides in clarifying and enhancing our understanding of professional development and how it occurs. Yet in relation to one question – How do people develop professionally? – this knowledge base falls short, for while much research has been directed at addressing the question, findings have tended to lack the specificity that offers the kind of elucidation that may usefully inform professional development-focused leadership policy and practice. In particular, the micro-level cognitive process of professional development – what occurs inside an individual’s head in order for her/him to experience a professional development ‘episode’ – remains under-examined in educational research. This article makes a contribution towards addressing this short-fall. It presents the author’s conceptual analyses of professionalism and professional development – revealing the multidimensional componential structure of each – and examines how understanding of this multidimensi...

Effective professional learning communities? The possibilities for teachers as agents of change in schools

Abstract: The concept of the professional learning community (PLC) has been embraced widely in schools as a means for teachers to engage in professional development leading to enhanced pupil learning. However, the term has become so ubiquitous it is in danger of losing all meaning, or worse, of reifying ‘teacher learning’ within a narrowly defined ambit which loses sight of the essentially contestable concepts which underpin it. The primary aim of this paper is therefore to (re-)examine the assumptions underpinning the PLC as a vehicle for teacher led change in schools in order to confront and unsettle a complacent and potentially damaging empirical consensus around teacher learning. This paper examines the characteristics and attributes of the ‘effective’ professional learning community as identified in the literature, drawing out the tensions and contradictions embodied in the terms professional, learning and community. The paper considers the implications of this analysis for practice, and concludes by offering some insights into the nature of ‘school improvement’, and the role of PLCs in realizing this.

Evaluating the impact of teacher professional development: an evidence-based framework

Abstract: Does teacher professional development make a difference? How do we know? While researchers and policy-makers acknowledge that teacher professional development (PD) needs to be assessed and evaluated, there is often little clarity as to how this can be achieved. Evaluation of teacher PD by schools has been described as the weak link in the PD chain despite it being linked with improved PD experiences and pupil outcomes. A lack of skills and tools to carry out such evaluations may be contributing to this or indeed it may be linked to how PD is conceptualized. This article explores extant literature and models of evaluation revealing gaps in existing evaluation frameworks. Resulting from this a provisional PD evaluation framework was developed for use in a study that set out to formally evaluate the impact of a PD initiative on teachers’ professional learning in five urban primary disadvantaged schools in the Republic of Ireland. Following application within this study, the framework was critiqued and revise...