Education Commons^™

Social Constructivist Mentoring Program To Support Teacher Professional Development: An Action Research Approach, Kurniawan Yudhi Nugroho, Choiril Anwar, Hartono Hartono

The Qualitative Report

Despite the presence of various TPD initiatives from governmental and non-governmental organizations, English teachers in the private universities in Indonesia continue to encounter challenges in accessing TPD programs, that fit their specific needs. This study explored the implementation of a social constructivist mentoring program to support the professional development of seven teachers teaching English academic writing. Using an action research approach, this mentoring emphasized collaborative inquiry, reflective practice, and continuous improvement. We opted for a qualitative approach to gain a deeper understanding and exploration of the learning process within the program. Data were collected from multiple resources such as interviews, …

Teacher Professional Dialogue For Justice-Oriented Practice: A Qualitative Action Research Study, Megan Leigh Normandin

Antioch University Full-Text Dissertations & Theses

This study used a qualitative action research approach to engage a group of secondary English teachers in a collective inquiry to determine the best model for transformative teacher reflexivity and dialogue. Through solution-focused conversation, the goal was to design a sustainable framework for professional development that fosters creative, just, and compassionate instruction. The primary question explored was: What is an effective structure for sustained reflective dialogue among teachers in a comprehensive public high school? The action research model provided the context for a cyclical process of reflection, discovery, and growth. Findings of this study will form both a blueprint for …

Gaps In Teacher Professional Development For Technology-Supported Learning: Implications For School Leaders And Policymakers, Steven Bingham

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to develop an understanding of mobile technology integration in K-12 classrooms from the teacher’s perspective. This research was intended to help understand how mobile devices are being integrated into the classroom, including recommendations for teachers, school administrators, policymakers, and future researchers

Professional Learning For Educators To Gain Knowledge On Incorporating Trauma-Informed Teaching Practices To Support All Students, Morgan Pueschel

Culminating Experience Projects

Teachers and other school personnel need to take time to meet the basic needs of students and build relationships with them. Schools need to teach, model, and allow students to practice social and emotional skills which will in turn, provide students with the ability to learn and increase academic performance (Brackett & Rivers, 2014). The purpose of this project is to create a teacher professional learning opportunity for all school staff that work directly with students to teach them about trauma, the prevalence, how it impacts students, and trauma-informed teaching practices such as the use of social and emotional learning …

K-12 Teachers’ Retention Of Arts Integrated Professional Development, Roxane Mcwilliams

Dissertations

Arts integration is an interdisciplinary teaching model in which the arts become a conduit for the contextualization and understanding of non-arts content. Research has shown this approach increases academic engagement and content retention (Rinne et al., 2011). The use of arts integration also provides gains for teachers. Teachers perceive their practice more innovative and better able to reach the needs of diverse learners (Bellisario & Donovan, 2012). For the benefits of arts integrated learning to be achieved, teachers must acquire the knowledge and techniques of this teaching model. This requires knowledge in both arts content as well as the pedagogical …

A Queens Community Teacher Storytelling Project: A Qualitative Research Study Of Five Local Afro-Caribbean And Latina Public School Teachers And Community Teachers In New York City, José Alfredo Menjivar Ortéz

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation thesis examines the lived experiences, life stories, and storytelling of five Afro-Caribbean and Latina people, who are all local from the borough of Queens, alumni of New York City’s public schools, and since then, became their local public school teachers, classroom practitioners, and local community teachers. We refer to this specific and unique population of teachers as alumni-community teachers and to these and other similar stories as teacher life stories.

This qualitative research and study were conducted through a series of writing workshops and semi-structured interviews. The study’s main examination is preoccupied to understand how local teachers make …

Teacher Experiences In A Community-Based Rural Partnership: Recognizing Community Assets, Tawni Paradise, Malle R. Schilling, Jake Grohs, Jordan L. Laney

Journal of Pre-College Engineering Education Research (J-PEER)

The purpose of this research study is to understand teacher experiences throughout their second year of engagement in the Virginia Tech Partnering with Educators and Engineers in Rural Schools partnership. This partnership is an assets-based community partnership in a rural environment between middle school teachers, regional industry, and university affiliates that is focused on implementing recurrent, hands-on, culturally relevant engineering activities for middle school students. This qualitative study uses constant comparative methodology informed by grounded theory on teacher interviews to capture both teacher experiences in the partnership as well as teacher-identified assets in their classrooms and school communities. Using the …

Supporting English Language Learners: Preparing Content Area Teachers To Promote Academic Achievement Among Culturally And Linguistically Diverse Learner Populations., Molly K. Roesler

Culminating Experience Projects

Teachers throughout the United States continue to be ill-prepared to support the evergrowing English Language Learner (ELL) population. ELLs often experience less academic achievement than their non-ELL peers. One factor in this academic gap is the amount of preparation content area teachers receive. Content area teachers are not sufficiently prepared to teach ELLs because of the lack of training they receive in Second Language Acquisition theories and strategies. This project examines what the research has identified as negative factors that result in lack of teacher preparation, and how to address these factors. Additionally, the project examines what the research highlights …

Global Perspectives On Teacher Professional Development: Navigating The Pandemic, Justin J. West Phd, Alfredo Bautista Phd

International Journal for Research in Education

Educational researchers, policymakers, and administrators agree that providing in-service teachers with high-quality professional development (PD) opportunities is essential to educational success. Despite the substantial sums invested in teacher PD by countries and jurisdictions, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused serious challenges to teacher learning around the world. As conventional face-to-face initiatives became impracticable (e.g., workshops, conferences, school-based PD) and the need to prioritize pandemic-specific topics intensified (e.g., emergency remote teaching), teacher PD was recast both formally (where and how teachers engaged in PD) and substantively (what teachers sought to learn from PD). Amidst the international upheavals caused by COVID-19, how have …

Preparing English Teachers To Teach Global Englishes Language Teaching In Thailand: My Personal And Professional Journey, Denchai Prabjandee

Journal of Educational Research and Innovation

The global spread of English has implications for English language teaching (ELT), in which teachers need to prepare learners to use English with culturally diverse English users outside of the classrooms. This requires teachers to change how they conceptualize the kind of English they teach and how English should be taught. An emerging ELT paradigm of Global Englishes Language Teaching (GELT) was developed to respond this change. Based on a teacher educator’s experiences to equip English teachers in Thailand with GELT knowledge and skills to implement it in the classroom, this article explores his personal journey of learning about GELT …

Balancing The Needs Of The School Community: Implementing Trauma-Informed Behaviour Supports In An Australian Regional Primary School., Kay Ayre, Govind Krishnamoorthy, Bronwyn Rees, Emily Berger Dr

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Exposure to adverse and traumatic events in childhood has been found to lead to poorer academic and social-emotional outcomes in school settings. The psychological impact of exposure to such events, referred to as childhood trauma, has been identified as a key driver of these educational difficulties. First Nations students have been found to experience higher rates of childhood trauma compared to non-First Nations students, with historical and intergenerational adversity contributing to such difficulties. There are national guidelines in Australia for the use of trauma-informed care practices in schools to reduce the impact of childhood trauma on educational engagement. This pilot …

Salient Experiences In Student Development: Impact Of An Undergraduate Stem Teacher Preparation Program, Amie Sommers, Kelly Gomez Johnson, Paula M. Jakopovic, Julio Rivera, Neal Grandgenett, John A. Conrad, William Tapprich, Christine Cutucache

Teacher Education Faculty Publications

The need for a comprehensive, high-quality pipeline for the development of undergraduate pre-service teachers, especially those that represent a diverse student body, within STEM disciplines is acute. Here, we studied the Noyce SCIENCE program to determine the most impactful experiences offered to undergraduates through the lens of student development theory. We used qualitative coding to analyze data collected from journals written by students of varying backgrounds, and at varying levels within the program (i.e., the Scholar and Intern level) over a 3-year program running period. We observed that faculty mentorship, the ability of undergraduates to mentor others, volunteer experiences, and …

Using Peer Supports To Improve Positive-To-Negative Teacher/Student Interaction Ratios By Novice Teachers, Karen Robbie

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A critical teacher shortage continues to exist throughout the United States. Challenges with student behavior and classroom management are identified as a top reason for teacher attrition. Educational research has demonstrated that PreK-12 students who receive social-emotional-behavioral support through evidence-based classroom management (EBCM) practices are more likely to achieve academic success. When teachers deliver high ratios of positive interactions to their students, positive student outcomes are likely to occur. However, researchers have consistently found that, like other EBCM practices, this low-intensity, high-impact practice is typically implemented at significantly lower levels than necessary to promote positive student outcomes. This implementation gap …

Learning As We Grow: A Multiple Case Study Of Teachers Experiences With Graduate Online Courses, Erica K. Reid

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Teacher professional development in the United States has significant gaps in practical training. In the state of Nevada, research has shown discrepancies between the retention of skills from training sessions and the ability to transfer learned methods into daily classroom practices. Previous studies have investigated teacher professional development and understanding its influence on student learning. Furthermore, the limits in framework design for contemporary approaches to professional development in online mediums has created inconsistencies in measuring outcomes. Finally, current research has resulted in mixed reviews concerning training in nontraditional online courses offered through graduate courses in various organizations. This research explored …

Induction Coaches’ Experiences With Video-Augmented Coaching In A Video Club Model, Tara Barnhart, Victor Vega

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This study examines the results of the first phase of a multi-year programme to integrate the use of video to support induction coaches in a suburban school district. Seven coaches participated in a video club in which they analysed videos of both their coaching conversations and mentees’ classrooms. A typological analysis of interview and video club meeting transcripts revealed perceived benefits of participation in the video club on the coaches’ sense of professional community and the quality of coaching conversations. Coaches also noted reviewing video with mentees stimulated changes in their mentees’ classroom practice. Positioning themselves as learners learning from …

Investigating The Longer-Term Impact Of A Professional Development Program: A Five-Year Follow-Up Qualitative Study, Susan Kerwin-Boudreau

The Qualitative Report

Do changes in perspectives on teaching and learning that teachers experience in a professional development (PD) program persist over time? How might they evolve? In this article the author first summarizes the results of her original two-year qualitative study of Quebec CEGEP (college) teachers’ perspectives on teaching and learning within a PD program. She then describes the results of a follow-up qualitative study that she conducted with the same teachers five years later. Teacher interviews were coded using the constant comparative method (Maykut & Morehouse, 1994). Three major conceptual themes emerged: teachers reported engaging (outside of teaching), innovating (within teaching) …

Teacher Self-Efficacy And Teacher Work Engagement For Expatriate Teachers At International K12 Schools In China, Jennifer L. Johnson

Doctor of Education (Ed.D)

The purpose of this non-experimental, descriptive quantitative survey study was to evaluate if teacher self-efficacy predicts teacher work engagement for expatriate teachers in international schools in China. The purposive sample was composed of 103 expatriate, international school teachers who have worked in China during the past 10 years at an international K12 school and are personally known to the researcher or the researcher’s contacts. The Teachers’ Sense of Efficacy Scale (TSES) and the Engaged Teachers Scale (ETS) measured teacher self-efficacy and teacher work engagement. Results from simple linear regression indicated a statistically significant predictive relationship between teacher self-efficacy and teacher …

Teachers’ Experiences Of Educating Eal Students In Mainstream Primary And Secondary Classrooms, Jessica Premier

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Many schools in Victoria, Australia, are multicultural, with students coming from a variety of cultures and backgrounds. Content area teachers often educate EAL students in their classrooms, even though they may not have specialised EAL teaching qualifications. This paper presents the experiences of primary and secondary teachers working in multicultural schools in Victoria. It explores the way in which teachers meet the needs of EAL students in their classrooms, and the support that is available to assist them to do so. This paper reports that teaching practice, school leadership, professional learning, and identity, influence the way in which teachers educate …

Intermediate Schoolteachers’ Perceptions Of The Impact Of Professional Development On Their Classroom Instruction, Gwendolyn Adams Lockett

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Despite increased district-provided professional development (PD) opportunities for teachers to improve classroom instruction, there has been a steady decline of academic achievement at an intermediate school in a large urban school district in the southwestern United States. One of the factors campus administrators attributed the lack of student success to was that the district does not provide PD that is effective in changing in intermediate schoolteachers’ instructional practices. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore intermediate schoolteachers’ perceptions of the impact PD provided by the district has on their classroom instruction, as well as the impact these trainings …

Digital Colleague Connectedness: A Framework For Studying Teachers’ Professional Network Interactions, Darci J. Harland

Journal of Educational Research and Practice

The coronavirus outbreak will likely highlight both strengths and weaknesses of the pre-corona educational system. Researchers have a responsibility to examine the experiences educators have had during the pandemic; however, there are no education-specific frameworks for researchers to use to examine teachers interacting with digital colleagues for professional purposes. This paper describes the literature used to design the digital colleague connectedness framework. The purpose of the framework is to operationalize terminology used to examine educators interacting in professional exchanges within a virtual network. This framework includes six behaviors in which digital colleagues engage and four roles they may assume that …

Review Of Collaborative Lesson Study: Revisioning Teacher Professional Development, Erin M. Faeth

Excelsior: Leadership in Teaching and Learning

This article offers a review of Vicki S. Collet’s (2019) book Collaborative Lesson Study: ReVisioning Teacher Professional Development. In this text, Collet provides a guide to the implementation of Collaborative Lesson Study, an ongoing, in-classroom, inquiry-based professional development strategy. The text includes scaffolding on how to (a) plan a lesson for lesson study, (b) observe the lesson in ways that will further the teacher’s understanding of their practice and students, and (c) debrief from the lesson to inform future instruction. This text supports educators in implementing this process in schools and higher education contexts to increase teacher agency and efficacy, …

The Effects Of Teacher Professional Development And Self-Efficacy On Classroom Uses Of Information And Computer Technologies, Elif N. Gokbel

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The uses of new technologies during mathematics instruction are essential for maintaining opportunities for students to gain better understanding of the content and become digital learners in the information age. Although scholars found technology integration is helpful in improving students’ mathematics achievement, the role of teachers’ preparedness for technology integration remains critical.

Technology professional development and self-efficacy are two major factors impacting teachers’ successful integration of instructional technologies. The purpose of this study was to provide a more in-depth look into (i) mathematics teachers technology uses during direct instruction, dialogic instruction, and assessment; (ii) the relationship between various types of …

Grassroots Professional Learning : The Homegrown And Human Dimensions Of Teacher Learning, Heather A. Frank Matteo

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

This qualitative study was prompted by the current climate of teacher accountability and educational reform efforts focused on teacher quality and effectiveness in the U.S. Initiatives, at both the national and state levels, reflect top-down professional development policies that tend to prioritize one-size-fits-all approaches to teacher development and ultimately serve to deprofessionalize teachers. As a result, little attention has been paid to understanding teachers’ professional learning in a grassroots sense. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine how a group of elementary school teachers of literacy engaged collectively in grassroots professional learning in the context of top-down professional …

Investigation Of Saudi Teachers’ Perceptions Of Teaching And Learning After A 12-Month Professional Development Programme In Australia, Gosia Klatt, Amy Berry, Anne Suryani, Veronica Volkoff, Hesham Khadawardi

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This study investigates the perceptions of teaching and learning of teachers from Saudi Arabia who participated in a 12-month professional development programme based in Australia. Considering the design of the programme and the vast differences between the education systems and cultures of the two countries, this study examines Saudi teachers’ classroom practices and challenges while teaching at schools in their home country, and whether their perceptions of teaching practice changed during and after participating in the professional development programme in Australia. Factors that might have influenced the changes to and nature of their teaching aspirations and plans for their students …

Teachers And Research Practices: Perspectives From English Language Educators In A Philippine University, Veronico N. Tarrayo, Philippe Jose S. Hernandez, Judith Ma. Angelica S. Claustro

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Given the paucity of studies regarding research practices of teachers, particularly English language teaching (ELT) practitioners in the ASEAN region and in the Philippines, this study explores the research practices of English language teachers in the Philippines. Using purposive-convenience sampling, a total of 49 teachers of English from a Philippine university were asked to answer a survey. To validate the data, pertinent public university documents were examined, and interviews with the university research heads were conducted. Findings suggest that the teachers were cognizant of the link between teaching and their own and their schools’ research practices. This research also reports …

Understanding Teachers’ Experiences Implementing An Innovative Early Literacy Program, Stephanie Callaway

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The problem addressed in this study was the lack of effective literacy interventions for the development of reading skills for primary students who are at-risk for dropping out of high school. The purpose of this study was to examine early literacy instruction by exploring the insights and perspectives of primary educators who participated in a literacy intervention program known as the supporting literacy model. The conceptual framework was based on sociocultural learning theory and self-efficacy theory. The main research question for this qualitative multiple case study addressed the experiences of teachers and instructional coaches who implemented the supporting literacy model. …

Learning Linguistics, Teaching For Change: Preparing Secondary Educators To More Equitably Teach Disciplinary Literacies, Kathryn Accurso

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation explores ways to better prepare secondary teachers in the United States for more equitably teaching disciplinary literacies to English language learners (ELLs), a current goal of many teacher educators, literacy researchers, and applied linguists that is echoed in federal and state-level education policy. Specifically, it investigates the affordances and constraints of using a critical social semiotic approach to secondary teacher education for this purpose. The dissertation is structured as a set of three research papers, each of which addresses a different aspect of this topic. The first paper draws on existing literature to explore how a critical social …

The Paradoxical Implications Of Deported American Students, Edmund T. Hamann, Jessica Mitchell-Mccollough

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

This book chapter (which has no formal abstract) uses the case of two children who had to leave the United States because their father was deported to raise questions about how US schooling does or does not anticipate and support students who will need to negotiate schooling in two countries.

Principals and teachers throughout the United States (and world) have students with transnational ties. Sometimes students were born in another country. More commonly, one or both parents were. Sometimes that means students and/or parents lack documentation, which creates anxiety and ambiguity in students’ lives that schools need to negotiate. Suro …

Co-Design For Curriculum Planning: A Model For Professional Development For High School Teachers, Nick Kelly, Natalie Wright, Les Dawes, Jeremy Kerr, Amanda Robertson

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper describes a model for teacher professional development as co-design for curriculum planning in which facilitators with design and pedagogical expertise iteratively work with groups of secondary school teachers, one school at a time, to plan whole terms of work, as a form of teacher professional development. It contains preliminary results from a design-based research study involving co-design with digital technologies teachers in two Australian secondary schools. It describes two phases of design involving workshops, strategies and instruments that work to facilitate effective co-design with teachers. Results from this pilot study suggest that the co-design for curriculum planning model …

Hidden In Plain Sight : Knowledge Broker Teachers And Professional Development, Margaret M. Jusinski

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

This qualitative study was prompted by initiatives that addressed the need for teachers to engage in professional development that enables them to be 21st century ready. Recommendations put forth by government and business have stressed that professional development foster connected teaching and create networked educators by emphasizing peer-topeer collaboration and sharing. Despite this focus, little attention has been paid to the role that regular teachers play in becoming professional developers for their colleagues. My study investigated how four K-12 teachers, that I termed “knowledge broker teachers,” created new pathways for informal, teacher professional development in their schools.

Extending on the …