Showing papers on "Teacher education published in 1971"

Performance Tests of Teaching Proficiency: Rationale, Development, and Validation.

Abstract: In the last few years, however, evolving conceptions of the nature of instruction seem to offer promise to teacher effectiveness researchers. In most of the early investigations in which measures of teacher competence were sought, there was an almost exclusive focus on the instructional means employed by teachers. Researcher after researcher attempted to identify "good teaching procedures" for, should such procedures be discovered, they would obviously have implications for teacher education as well as for the evaluation of teachers on the job. Only recently have many educators come to accept the proposition that there are diverse instructional means which can be used to bring about a single instructional end. Teacher effectiveness research based on this assumption will tend to focus on the results achieved by instructors, not merely the means they employ.

The Importance of Attitude in Foreign Language Learning

Abstract: good or poor attitude that makes life easy or difficult in the foreign language classroom. The teacher reading this title also assumes that the attitudes in question are probably of the unfavorable kind, otherwise there would be no problem to present and no solutions to offer. If this is, as I suspect, the typical reaction of foreign language teachers to the title of this article, it reveals two attitudes they hold commonly as a group: (1) it is the student's attitude that is the crucial factor in foreign language learning, and (2) this factor is ignored unless it presents a problem. Teachers think in terms of problems. Ten years ago the words attitude and motivation were not of primary importance to the foreign language teaching community. We were busy remodeling our profession with the help of linguistics, language labs, and government sponsored training programs. We thought that the future of foreign language instruction was assured. And in fact enrollments increased; we were thriving. By the mid-sixties disquieting feelings began to emerge on the pages of all the foreign language journals. Something was amiss. Something had been overlooked, an important factor that we are only now beginning to investigate: attitudes, not only the student's but attitudes of teachers, parents, administrators, and the community at large. What is an attitude? How is it formed? Can it be changed? And how can we change it if it is unfavorable? The range of individual preferences, beliefs, values, or attitudes is staggering. There are many reasons why this is true. Breer and Locke have attempted a fairly complete enumeration: "A complete explanation (of the wide variety in individual attitudes) would presumably include references to family socialization, peer group influence, specific events in the individual's past, sources of anxiety, basic strivings, mechanisms of defense, education, income, occupation, mass media, class affiliation, residence, religion, and a host of personal variables including intelligence, age, sex, interests, and aptitudes."' Let us now look at a specific definition of attitude. I offer this one of Milton Rokeach: "An at-

Student Influence on Teacher Behavior

Abstract: Despite recognition of the importance of studying classroom interactions, little attention has been focused upon student contributions to the classroom climate in general or to teacher behavior in particular. Rather, the importance of the teacher's contribution to the classroom process and the students' subsequent growth have been stressed (Amidon and Flanders, 1967; Flanders and Simon, 1969; Rosenshine, in press). While the results of these studies have been somewhat inconsistent, they appear to support a general trend that positive (i.e., accepting and encouraging) teacher behaviors are associated more frequently with student growth than are negative (i.e., rejecting and critical) teacher behaviors. Just as there may be some identifiable effective teacher behaviors that contribute to improved student achievement or attitudes, there may be such a thing as "pupil effectiveness" wherein the students are able to help their teachers improve their teaching behavior. Thus, as pointed out by Turner (1967), an important locus of control for a teacher's behavior may lie in the behavior of the students. Since little attention has been focused on student influence on teacher behavior, it is first necessary to examine related studies in both educational and social psychological research. In classroom research, studies of relationships between student and teacher behaviors have been largely correlational in nature. The results of these studies indicated systematic relationships between positive teacher

Humanizing Teacher Education.

Abstract: At about the same time, Combs and Soper conducted research with good and poor teachers to determine if the good ones knew better than the poor ones the characteristics of a good helping relationship1 They found no significant difference between the knowledge of the two categories of teachers What does distinguish between good and poor teachers? Certainly we all think we can tell the difference, but does research bear out our beliefs?

Career Education Now.

Abstract: Commissioner Marland suggests that general education be done away with, and he proposes that a universal goal of American education be "that every young person completing our school program at grade 12 be ready to enter either higher education or useful and rewarding em ployment." Marland also outlines the Office of Education's Plans to strengthen vocational- technical programs throughout the nation.

Twenty-Three Reasons Universities Can't Educate Teachers.

Abstract: Whatever is wrong with teacher education is wrong with higher education. With active student &dquo;help,&dquo; colleges and universities have been exposed as unable to meet a double-barrelled challenge: relevance for individual students and action against societal problems. Most critics of teacher education naively fail to recognize that any criticism of teacher education can be strengthened and amplified to include the higher education that functions as its parent and protector. If this contention seems a bit strong, it merely indicates that the clutching bear hug in which universities hold teacher education has dulled our senses. After a

An Application of Social Learning Theory in Affecting Change in a Group of Student Teachers Using Video Modeling Techniques.

Abstract: This research was conducted to determine the extent to which imitation can be employed in the education of student teachers. A pretest-posttest control group design was employed. A 20-minute, video taped, model teacher demonstration with a high I/D ratio was shown to twenty Ss. Another twenty Ss were exposed to a neutral movie. Specific lessons by the Ss were then audio taped and analyzed using the I/D and revised I/D ratios. Analysis of covariance revealed significant differences existing between treatment groups where posttesting was done within 48 hours after exposure. Results support earlier findings on imitation and suggest both theoretical and technical application for teacher education.

An Analysis of Factors Related to Choral Teachers' Ability to Detect Pitch Errors While Reading the Score

Abstract: mine whether differences exist between undergraduate music majors preparing for teaching careers in music and experienced secondary level choral teachers in regard to their ability to detect pitch errors. The aim of this investigation was to obtain certain kinds of data that might serve as the basis for recommending changes in teacher education programs in terms of what could be emphasized, improved, or changed in order to develop pitch error detection more fully.