Teacher Education and Professional Development Commons^™

An Investigation Of The Relationships Of Teacher Professional Development, Teacher Job Satisfaction, And Teacher Working Conditions, Thomas Meagher

Dissertations

Demands to changes of instruction for mathematics classrooms are presented in

standards promoted by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Illinois State

Board of Education and other government reports creates a demand for teacher

professional development to support teachers to adapt to these changes of instruction.

The overall purpose of this study investigated characteristics of effective professional

development and how those characteristics are associated with teacher job satisfaction

and teacher working conditions. With the completion of this dissertation, this study adds

to the literature relevant to teacher professional development by demonstrating an

association between teacher professional development and teacher …

Implementation Of Document Based Question Essays In Regular Education History Classes, Christine R. Berrong

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate what strategies high school teachers are using to teach Document Based Question essays (DBQs) in non-Advanced Placement (AP) history classes. DBQs are essays in which students are given a question and a set of primary and secondary source documents that they must use to support an argument in answering the question. They must write a well-developed five-paragraph essay that includes a thesis statement in the introduction and must analyze the documents, not simply mention them in the essay. In the researcher's experience, many students in non-AP history classes have difficulty with this …

Effectiveness Of An Inquiry Based Professional Development Program, Lynne Beyah El-Amin Muhammad

Dissertations

Pre-service and in-service teacher education programs are designed to disseminate large quantities of knowledge in a short period of time (Deng, 2004). However, they have been found to be ineffective with implementing teacher change (Deng, 2004). To increase the level of effective implementation, as measured by the ability of teachers to utilize what they have learned, designers of pre-service and in-service programs for teachers should include cognitively engaging activities (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999). This study explored the relationship between student achievement and the level of teacher participation while attending an inquiry-based professional development program. Six teachers at a private school …

Benefitting The Educator And Student Alike: Effective Publications Strategies For Supporting The Academic Language Development Of English Learner (El) Teacher Candidates, Katya A. Karathanos, M Aminy

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Multiple Solutions To Problems In Mathematics Teaching: Do Teachers Really Value Them?, Erhan Bingolbali

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Solving problems in different ways is strongly advised for mathematics learning and teaching. There is, however, little data available on the examination of teachers’ openness to and evaluation of different solutions to the problems. In this paper, the author examines classroom teachers’ openness to different solutions (or to what extent they value different solutions) to problems and how they evaluate (grade) these solutions. For this purpose, two questionnaires including items on students’ different solutions are applied to about 500 classroom teachers. In this paper, only two items related to the focus of the study are analysed. The findings show that …

Tailoring Mentoring For New Mathematics And Science Teachers: An Exploratory Study, Christine Ormond

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper explores some aspects of effective professional mentoring practice for early career mathematics and science teachers, and discusses the Early Support Program (ESP), a research project conducted in 2009 and 2010 at a large Australian metropolitan university. It is argued that better outcomes may result from a more strategic “tailoring” of mentoring “type” for different aspects of new teacher induction, especially as school-based mentors often have insufficient time or training to support them. The ESP has been trialling its more “distanced” mentoring model, tracking the issues that a group of new teachers chose to discuss with their mentors, and …

Achieving The Impossible? Teaching Practice Component Of A Pre-Service Distance English Language Teacher Training Program In Turkey, Ilknur Kecik, Belgin Aydin

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The aim of this article is to describe the model developed for the teaching practice component of the pre-service Distance English Language Teacher Training Program (DELTT) at Anadolu University, Eskişehir, Turkey. The steps taken to improve the model over a six-year period will be explained and the recent developments in the teaching practice area of the current program will be discussed in the light of recent research on learning and personal development. Lessons learned and the steps taken during this developmental process will be explored and recommendations for other programs concerned with the teaching practice component will be made.

International Field Experience – What Do Student Teachers Learn?, Jackie Fung King Lee

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This inquiry aimed to examine the benefits of having international field experience for a group of Hong Kong postgraduate student teachers who joined a six-week immersion programme in New Zealand. Through participants’ reflections, interviews and programme evaluations, the present investigation found that the overseas field experience not only enriched their cultural understanding, pedagogical knowledge and skills, but also enhanced their language awareness, classroom language and recognition of different English varieties

A Mixed Methods Study Of How The Transition Process Impacts The Autonomy Of Pre-Service Secondary Mathematics Teachers, Linda Kasal Fusco

Department of Educational Administration: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This mixed methods study sought to identify the impact that transition into the practice of teaching had on the autonomy of pre-service secondary teachers of Mathematics.  It was based on the belief that a Mathematics teacher’s autonomy depended on: beliefs about Mathematics and how it was learned, reflections on the teaching practice, and social constraints of a secondary school culture. Data was collected between January 2009 and March 2010.  In Phase I (Quantitative) the participants (N = 30), selected from ten State University of New York teacher preparation colleges and universities, completed five instruments to quantify the three factors of …

Turning Into Teachers Before Our Eyes: The Development Of Professional Identity Through Professional Dialogue, Jessica Mantei, Lisa Kervin

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper examines the development of professional identity in early career teachers enrolled in an “add-on year” of an undergraduate teacher education degree. Through a series of readings focused on reflection and pedagogy, participants engaged in professional dialogue as they made connections between the themes in their professional readings and their own understanding of the professional practice of a teacher. Dialogue was recorded and shared on a developed website. Participation in this dialogue afforded teachers opportunities to reflect on their professional identity in connection with literature, personal experiences and experiences of others. Further, uploading audio files to the site created …

Becoming A Teacher And Staying One: Examining The Complex Ecologies Associated With Educating And Retaining New Teachers In Rural Australia?, Margaret Plunkett, Michael Dyson

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The problem of teacher retention has intensified in Australia, particularly in rural areas, with a number of studies suggesting that beginning teachers are not entering the profession with a commitment to remaining there. This paper reports on a study of 102 new teachers graduating from a rural campus of a major Australian university. Utilising a self devised survey over a 3 year period, graduate reflections were captured on what it meant for them to become a teacher. The research sought to determine graduates’ goals and aspirations for working in the profession in both the long and the short term. Participants …

Teacher Identity And Early Career Resilience: Exploring The Links, Jane Pearce, Chad Morrison

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

A collaborative research project that explored the impact of professional, individual and relational conditions on the resilience of early career teachers revealed the importance of understanding how they engage in the formation of professional identities. Drawing on the traditions of narrative enquiry and critical ethnography, this article focuses on the story of Norah, one of sixty beginning teachers interviewed for this study, as she experienced becoming a teacher. Norah’s story provides an insight into how early career teachers engage in shaping a professional identity, and leads us to suggest that resilience may be enhanced when early career teachers engage consciously …

' Who We Are ' And ' How We Are ' Are Integral To Relational Experiences: Exploring Comportment In Teacher Education, David Giles

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper reports on findings from a phenomenological inquiry into the nature of the teacher-student relationship. Participants’ stories showed that ‘who we are’ and ‘how we are’ is integral to our experiences in education. More specifically, a teacher and a student’s way-of-being is essential to the nature of relational experiences. A teacher’s comportment (‘way-of-being’) has been found to have a communicative aspect that is felt and sensed by others. Such comportment is embodied and integral to how teachers and students relate. In a primordial manner, the comportment of the other is felt in the act of relating. When the way …

Pre-Service Teachers' Epistemological Beleifs And Conceptions Of Teaching, Harun Yilmaz, Sami Sahin

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This study aimed to investigate pre-service teachers’ views about teaching and the relation of those views to epistemological beliefs, gender, and subject areas. The data collection tool was adapted from “The Traditional Teaching (TT) and Constructivist Teaching (CT) Scale,” developed by Chan and Elliot (2004). Participants consisted of 490 pre-service teachers from different teacher education programs in Turkey. Principal component analysis was carried out, and nine items were removed from the adapted questionnaire because of low loadings. The data analysis showed that pre-service teachers preferred constructivist teaching views more than traditional teaching views, and this correlated with their epistemological beliefs. …

Content Area Reading And Writing: Practices And Beliefs, Mustafa Ulusoy, Hakan Dedeoglu

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The main purpose of this study was to investigate science, social studies, and classroom teachers’ reading and writing practices, and to investigate their beliefs about content area reading and writing. One hundred and forty-three teachers filled out the survey developed to learn their content area reading and writing practices and beliefs. In the second part of the study, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 teachers. The study results showed that teachers did not employ specific reading and writing strategies. They used question-asking strategy before, during, and after reading. This study concluded that there is a need for content area reading …

Characteristics And Competencies For Teacher Educators: Addressing The Need For Improved Professional Standards In Turkey, Servet Celik

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Although a great deal of attention has been given to the nature of teaching and the qualities a good teacher ought to possess, there has been little emphasis on the specific characteristics and competencies that teacher educators should have. This paper discusses whether setting explicit standards for teacher educators would help or hinder efforts to improve the quality of teaching about teaching, touching on the viewpoints of student teachers versus professional organizations regarding standards of quality and exploring the implied and explicit standards of academic institutions for language teacher educators in the U.S. and Australia, in comparison with the less-defined …

Measuring Student Support For Participative Assessment And Related Strategies: Development And Testing Of The Beliefs About Participative Assessment Instrument (Bapai), Christine Brew, Philip Riley

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Participative assessment is well established in higher education. However, students’ concerns about the appropriateness of participative assessment create resistance to successful implementation. Strategies for addressing student concerns are needed because participative assessment practices appear to improve learning outcomes. The literature lacks validated scales to measure the subjective support for participative assessment. Presented are validated scales measuring support for self- and peer-assessment, group assignments and a proposed correlate, support for a discussion-oriented classroom derived from the responses of 213 pre-service teachers (both first year under-graduates and graduates). Graduates were more supportive of self- and peer-assessment than first year undergraduates and level …

Self-Efficacy Beliefs Of Novice Teachers And Their Performance In The Classroom, Hasan Ozder

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This study examined the data related to the novice teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs and their performance in the classroom. The researcher collected both qualitative and quantitative data for this study. According to the findings, teacher self-efficacy beliefs of the novice teachers were found to be at a sufficient level. The novice teachers reported that they frequently use “verbal reprimands” , “establishing classroom rules and routines collaboratively with students”, “daily lesson planning”, “reinforcement towards student achievement”, “multiple intelligences activities”, “discussion technique”, “concrete exemplification”, “visually supported extra activities”, “oral questioning”, and “itneractive teaching methods” in the classroom.

Sustaining School Colleagues’ Commitment To A Long-Term Professional Experience Partnership, Judith Peters

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper presents findings from a qualitative study that investigated school participants’ perceptions of the benefits, challenges and supportive factors related to their involvement in a long-term school/university professional experience partnership. Data were collected through interviews with coordinators and a written survey completed by mentor teachers from 4 schools. The findings indicate that participants perceived the program to have a number of benefits for both staff and school students and that participation was supported by effective communication, flexible funding arrangements, local autonomy to interpret and adapt the program and the continuity arising from the long-term nature of the partnership. The …

Pre-Service Teachers’ Attendance At Lectures And Tutorials: Why Don’T They Turn Up?, Grace Oakley, Graeme Lock, Fiona Budgen, Brenda Hamlett

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Research indicates that attendance at lectures and tutorials is associated with university students’ level of success and satisfaction, and pre-service teachers’ relatively low levels of attendance at scheduled classes is of significant concern to many lecturers. However, little research has been undertaken to investigate the factors associated with absenteeism among pre-service teachers. This study investigates rates of absenteeism among different groups of pre-service teachers in a large School of Education in a Western Australian university and considers pre-service teachers’ self-reported reasons for being absent from lectures and tutorials. The results show that levels of attendance and reasons for absence at …