Secondary Education and Teaching Commons^™

Suburban Leaders Who Have Made A Difference: Jose Torres, José M. Torres

José M. Torres

This week we are featuring Dr. Jose Torres, the president of Aurora-based Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy. Torres was superintendent of Elgin Area School District U-46 from 2008 to 2014 and has served in various leadership roles, including regional superintendent/area instruction officer in Chicago Public Schools, and as the only superintendent on the Federal Equity and Excellence Commission of the United States Department of Education. Torres was one of three educators nationwide to receive the 2014 Dr. Effie H. Jones Humanitarian Award from the AASA, the school superintendents association.

Sequencing The Presentation Of Grammar Items To Attract Student Interest, Arshad Abd Samad

Arshad Abd Samad

The teaching of grammar is a challenging task as teachers need to present technical information about the language in such a way that would interest and attract the attention of students. In addition to the lesson itself, the presentation sequence of grammatical items as in the grammar syllabus can also influence how well students respond. Teachers often decide to present and focus on grammatical items to beginner, intermediate and advanced level students based on criteria such as level of difficulty and order of acquisition. Biber (1998), however, proposed that grammar should be presented according to narrative, informational and interactive text …

Succeeding In The City: A Report From The New York City Black And Latino Male High School Achievement Study, Shaun R. Harper, Ph.D., And Researchers From The Center For The Study Of Race And Equity In Education

Shaun R. Harper, Ph.D.

This report is the first publication from the New York City Black and Latino Male High School Achievement Study, a project that entailed individual interviews with 415 students from 40 public high schools – 90 were enrolled in 44 colleges and universities, the rest were college-bound high school juniors and seniors. Understanding how these young men succeeded in and out of school, developed college aspirations, became college-ready, and navigated their ways to postsecondary education was the primary aim of this project. Instead of further amplifying deficits and documenting failures in urban schools, 13 Black and Latino male researchers from the …

Cartooning In Algebra And Calculus, Lauren Jeneva Moseley Ph.D.

Lauren Jeneva Moseley

This article discusses how teachers can create cartoons for undergraduate math classes, such as college algebra and basic calculus. The practice of cartooning for teaching can be helpful for communication with students and for students’ conceptual understanding.

Engaging Youth In Lifelong Outdoor Adventure Activities Through A Nontraditional Public School Physical Education Program, Keri Schwab, Daniel L. Dustin

Keri Schwab

Engaging Youth in Lifelong Outdoor Adventure Activities through a Nontraditional Public School Physical Education Program

Turkish And Lithuanian Efl Instructors' Professional Development Experiences: Worth The Effort, Or Waste Of Time?, Servet Celik, Nemira Mačianskienė, Kübra Aytin

Servet Celik

Effective EFL instructors must have a good command of English, as well as sound pedagogical knowledge and adequate communication and classroom management skills. Professional development has been indicated as significant in developing these attributes. This comparative study was designed to analyze the viewpoints of EFL professionals working in Turkey and Lithuania using a scalar survey. The results revealed that Turkish instructors found their professional development experiences to be largely irrelevant, while the Lithuanian instructors perceived professional development as beneficial. In both groups, obstacles such as financial concerns and heavy teaching loads impaired the participants’ ability to grow professionally. The findings …

Are Teacher Education Programs Failing The Nation’S Urban Schools? A Closer Look At Pre-Service Teachers’ Beliefs About Working With Inner-City Students, Servet Celik

Servet Celik

To address the issue of pre-service teachers being under-prepared for work in multicultural and impoverished environments in America’s urban schools, teacher education programs have taken steps to improve diversity-oriented curricula and provide relevant fieldwork experience. However, research indicates that a large proportion of teacher candidates still do not have the necessary skills to deal with students from divergent upbringings. This interpretive study investigated the beliefs of pre-service teachers about urban students and how well their teacher education programs are addressing the issues of working in inner-city schools. The results revealed that, although some progress has been made, a significant gap …

The Impact Of Analyzing Correct Versus Incorrect Student Work Samples On Students’ Mathematical Proficiency, Lauren Jeneva Moseley

Lauren Jeneva Moseley

The purpose of this study is to determine if any gains in mathematical understanding differ if calculus learners analyze correct or incorrect student work samples and to investigate students’ perceptions of the effect of analyzing student work samples on their understanding of mathematical concepts. Calculus students will be assigned to two groups: one group analyzing correct student work samples and one group analyzing incorrect student work samples. What difference, if any, exists between groups in determining correct solutions to problems similar to the work samples analyzed? What difference, if any, exists between groups in whether they replicate errors similar to …

Preceptorship: Exploring The Experiences Of Final Year Student Nurses In Acute Hospital Setting, Lorraine Varley, Patricia Mannix Mcnamara Dr., Catherine Macnamara

Dr. Patricia Mannix McNamara

Background: Preceptors play a pivotal role in inducting, supporting, teaching and assessing students on clinical placement. This research sought to examine student nurses’ experiences of preceptorship during their clinical placement in their final year of studies in order to further illuminate what is known about preceptorship in Ireland.

Method: A qualitative research design was adopted for this study. Forty-seven final year nursing students were questioned using a structured enquiry schedule about their experiences of preceptorship during clinical placement. All participants were female. The data were analysed thematically according to Smith, Flowers and Larkin’s (2009) framework.

Results: The results indicate that …

Core Competencies Of Health Education Teachers, Sharon Moynihan, Leena Paakkari, Raili Välimaa, Patricia Mannix Mcnamara

Sharon Moynihan

No abstract provided.

Connect & Thrive: Perspectives Of A Newly Tenured Professor, Corey A. Ciocchetti

Corey A Ciocchetti

This essay encapsulates my perspective (newly-tenured and seven years into my career) on how average professors can become highly effective professors. The secret rests in the ability to genuinely connect with students. Connecting really matters - even if it takes some personality adaptation and thrusts academics out of their comfort zones. Many professors fail to connect with students in a meaningful way. My evidence for this assertion is simple and straightforward. In addition to teaching, I am blessed to travel the country and speak on college campuses.3 After extensive discussions on these trips, students consistently claim their professors are boring, …

Beyond “Talent, Technology And Tolerance”: What Are The Lessons For Education In The Future?, Marie Parker Jenkins Prof., Patricia Mannix Mcnamara Dr.

Dr. Patricia Mannix McNamara

Richard Florida, an American theorist has argued that in the future we need to develop three things: Talent, Technology and Tolerance. Using this framework to inform our discussion, we examine key issues concerning policy and practice to support education for the future. This will be informed by perspectives drawing on British and Irish contexts and what these two States tell us about current issues. Global concerns over raising the academic attainment of all children for employability; responding to cultural diversity in the classroom; and having access to knowledge which informs young peoples choices are the three underpinning themes. We problematise …

Fostering Speaking Across The Room, Across The Curriculum, Patricia L. Rieman

Patricia L Rieman

While secondary educators worry about covering content in the face of preparing for standardized testing, best practice methods that provide students with opportunities to speak in the classroom may fall to the wayside. Rieman describes landmark and current research that support the use of speaking in the classroom, delineates professional standards that promote speaking, and provides specific methods and examples that may be used across the curriculum to foster student engagement. Methods described include discussion webs, Intra-Act, Save the Last Word, grand conversations, and informal debates.

'Using Drama In Education To Develop Pre-Service English Teachers' Understanding And Capacity In Teaching Social Justice At Post-Primary Level', Jennifer Hennessy

Dr. Jennifer Hennessy

One of the most common forms of non-recognition in education is for a group to be generally left outside educational discourse by not being named or known (Lynch and Baker 2005). Addressing inequalities of respect and recognition involves, amongst other things, the development of critical and empathetic perspectives and of educational experiences which enable critical dialogue (Lynch and Baker 2005). This paper examines a project conducted in the University of Limerick in 2010 with a cohort of 3rd year pre-service English teachers. The aim of the project was to facilitate an understanding of how drama in education could be used …

Cde 2011 Ca Distinguished Schools Program: Middle And High School Application Cesar E. Chavez High School, Jamon F. Peariso Ed.D.

Jamon F. Peariso, Ed.D.

The narrative discusses an overview of Cesar E. Chavez High School and the two specific signiture practices that CCHS attributes to their success as part of the California Distinguished Schools application process.

Discourse Contexts And Article Use Among Malaysian School Students, Arshad Abd Samad

Arshad Abd Samad

Several studies have examined the interconnection between discourse contexts and structural form. Chaudron and Parker (1990), for example, investigated the structural form used to encode the referent subject Noun Phrase in new, known, and current discourse contexts. These three contexts relate to when a new referent is used as the topic of a discourse, when a known referent is used as the topic and when there is continued reference to the topic after it has been established in the discourse. Mellow and Fuller (1995) also used the same three discourse contexts to examine article use for specific referent nouns. Investigating …

Teaching Grammar And What Students Errors In The Use Of The English Auxiliary "Be" Can Tell Us, Arshad Abd Samad, Hawanum Hussein

Arshad Abd Samad

In teaching grammar, teachers often are faced with the dilemma of either emphasising the formal properties of the language or its meaning aspect. One of the more popular language teaching approaches of the last three decades has been the communicative approach. This approach has had a signifi cant impact on the teaching of grammar as its objective of communicative competence has led to a diminished role for grammar teaching. However, of late, numerous voices have advocated a more prominent role for grammar in achieving this objective. The question of whether to emphasise form or meaning remains central. Several theorists have …

English Language Teachers’ Perception And Management Of Learners’ Oral Communication Apprehension, Arshad Abd Samad, Annisa Nor Jettey, Khairuddin Md.Idris, Samsilah Roslan

Arshad Abd Samad

This study reports on how English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers perceive and manage oral communication apprehension (CA) among learners in the language classrooms. The main purpose of this qualitative study was to understand language teachers’ perception and how they think they are addressing the phenomenon. A qualitative methodology was employed with data generated through interviews, classroom observations and document reviews. A total of twelve respondents from five Malaysian secondary schools were involved in this study. They comprised eight ESL teachers, who were the primary respondents, as well as one principal and three heads of the English language department. …

Poetry And Pedagogy: Exploring The Opportunity For Epistemological And Affective Development Within The, J. Hennessy, C. Hinchion, P. Mannix Mcnamara Dr.

Dr. Patricia Mannix McNamara

No abstract provided.

Poetry And Pedagogy: Exploring The Opportunity For Epistemological And Affective Development Within The Classroom, Jennifer Hennessy, Carmel Hinchion, Patricia Mannix Mcnamara

Dr. Jennifer Hennessy

This paper provides a review of the priority afforded to the development of pupils’ affective and epistemic development within the contemporary poetry class. The paper reports on the findings of a research project which explored the experience of teaching and learning within the post-primary Leaving Certificate programme in Ireland. The research includes interview and questionnaire data obtained over a three year period from 2007-2010 from 80 post-primary teachers of Leaving Certificate poetry and 200 post-primary Leaving Certificate pupils. The paper highlights the malign impact of summative assessment on teachers’ pedagogical aspirations, identifying widespread professional dissonance amongst the cohort. Resultantly, empirical …

Choices In Grammar Teaching And The Grammar Curriculum, Arshad Abd Samad, Hawanum Hussein

Arshad Abd Samad

The communicative language teaching approach has had a significant impact on the teaching of grammar. In general, the communicative approach, and its objective of communicative competence, has led to a diminished role for grammar teaching. However, of late, numerous voices have advocated a more prominent role for grammar in achieving this objective. As a result, various broad approaches as well as specific techniques have been suggested in teaching grammar to English as a Second language students. Celce-Murcia and Larsen-Freeman, for example, suggests that teachers use the challenge principle in order to identify the challenge a grammatical structure poses according to …

Participatory Decision-Making Vis-A-Vis Teachers' Morale And Students' Achievements In Public Secondary Schools In Zamboanga City, Philippines, Socorro P. Canaya

Frede G Moreno

Participatory decision-making and teachers’ morale are positively and significantly correlated in public secondary schools in Zamboanga City, Philippines. Public secondary school teachers in Zamboanga City have High Morale in their work performance as teachers. This is evident in decision-making processes and activities regarding high school students with disciplinary problems, selection of the honor students, planning of the yearly In-Service Training for Teachers (INSET), preparation of the calendar of activities and conduct of remedial classes for slow learners.

Digital Heritage As A Dynamic Source In The School Of Information And Knowledge: Teaching Scenarios And Applications Using Infromation And Communication Technologies, Kosmas Touloumis

Kosmas Touloumis

Teaching with Information and Communications Technologies provides a significant opportunity for the study of cultural heritage and its management by the students. Τhe present paper discusses the need to develop a digital cultural heritage didactic and analogous learning scenarios, following the modern pedagogic principles and methods, based on: - The use of the official digitized cultural data and archives as multimodal semiotic resources in the ICT teaching context - The exploitation of digital nodes and digitized heritage archives, on the elaboration of interdisciplinary and collaborative projects by the students themselves - The social networking and the use of Web 2.0. …

Teaching Grammar And The Need To Ensure That Techniques Match Grammatical Structures, Arshad Abd Samad

Arshad Abd Samad

The teaching of grammar has always been bogged down by the issue of whether it should be taught explicitly or implicitly. The history of language teaching has seen numerous pendulum swings from teaching grammar explicitly to a more discovery or implicit teaching of grammar and back to didactic, teacher fronted approaches. We are aware of the Grammar Translation Method, the Direct Method, the Audiolingual Method, and more recently the Communicative Approach – all of which presented grammar either explicitly or implicitly to varying degrees. Writing recently, however, DeKeyser (2005) bemoans the lack of a serious and concerted effort to teach …

A Cross-Border Exploration Of The Professional Development Needs Of Heads Of Year, Patricia Mannix Mcnamara Dr., Eva Devaney, Tom Geary, Caryl Sibbett Dr., Willie Thompson

Dr. Patricia Mannix McNamara

Pastoral work in schools is about meeting student needs. However in the context of an increasingly changing society, students’ needs are also rapidly changing. The expectation that schools should assume more responsibility for mental health promotion, coupled with an increase in poor mental health and distress among young people, have placed increased pressures on parents and schools (Shucksmith et al. 2005). In schools it is often the pastoral care team, and in particular the year heads, who have to deal with situations that they often feel unprepared for (Wilson et al. 2004, Rothi et al. 2008). It is therefore important …

The School Based Oral English Test (Oet): Perceptions And Practices Of Selected Mara Junior Science College Teachers, Zaitun Abd. Majid, Mimi Looi Lin Eng, Arshad Abd Samad

Arshad Abd Samad

The school-based oral English test (OET) is one of the more recent innovations in assessment in the Malaysian school system. However, since its inception in 2002, the OET has been the topic of various discussions. The purpose of this qualitative study is to examine the perceptions and practices among a small group of MARA Junior Science College English teachers in relation to the OET. Teacher perceptions of the OET will not only influence the effective implementation of the test, but also teaching techniques in the classroom. Specifically, this study sought teacher views regarding the fairness and validity of the OET, …

Self Reports Of First And Second Language Ability By Academically Inclined And Challenged Students, Arshad Abd Samad

Arshad Abd Samad

Becoming proficient in a second language may involve several factors that are different from those involved in the first language. One factor that may influence performance in either language is academic aptitude. In this study, responses to statements regarding language abilities in Bahasa Malaysia and English by academically inclined and challenged students were analysed using the Chi-Square technique. The results indicate that while the academically inclined students do not have major difficulties in performance in either of the two languages, the academically challenged students report problems in basic linguistic abilities in the English language but not in Bahasa Malaysia. Several …

Οικοδομώντας Πολιτισμικές Συμπεριφορές Στο Σχολείο: «Παιχνίδια Ρόλων» Με Την Αρχαιολογία, Kosmas Touloumis

Kosmas Touloumis

Teaching with archaeology in Greek secondary education is the topic of this presentation.

Article Use And Specific And Known Reference Among Higher Proficiency Malaysian Esl Students., Arshad Abd Samad

Arshad Abd Samad

Huebner (1979) categorises articles into 4 categories according to whether the noun phrase the articles encode is of specific reference and whether it is known to the hearer. Ekiert (2002) adds a fifth category which is made up of the use of the article to encode noun phrases in idioms. In Ekiert’s study, the accuracy rates of ESL and EFL native speakers of Polish in these five categories were examined. This paper will report on a exploratory study that adopts and modifies the instrument used by Ekiert and examines the accuracy rates of Malaysian advanced ESL students. The results indicate …

Corpus Data And The Teaching And Learning Of Science In English In Malaysian Primary And Secondary Schools, Arshad Abd Samad

Arshad Abd Samad

The post independence Malaysian school system has gone through several curricular revisions not only in terms of content and subject matter but also in the medium of instruction used. In 1980, the national language, Malay, was adopted as the medium of instruction in schools in place of the English language. After more than twenty years of instruction in the national language, the medium of instruction for Science based subjects at the first year of primary and secondary schools in Malaysia has recently reverted to the English language. This has largely been due to increasing concern over perceived falling standards of …