Education Commons^™

Lighting Up Learning: Mathematics Becoming Less Of A 'Killer Subject' In Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa, Marguerite Maher

Marguerite Maher

This paper reports the findings of an evaluative study of an initiative, in its sixth year of implementation, enhancing the learning and teaching of mathematics in 20 disadvantaged secondary schools in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN), South Africa, twenty years after democracy. Findings highlight the importance of initial and ongoing professional development for under-qualified teachers. Support and strategies that have enhanced the achievement in mathematics of learners in these still under-resourced schools, are described.

Time For Teaching To Establish Its Own Professional Certification Authority, Lawrence C. Ingvarson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

The British Prime Minister David Cameron recently announced that his government would be supporting a proposal from the teaching profession to establish its own, teacher-led College of Teaching, fully independent of government. The announcement followed the release of a ‘Blueprint’ for an independent professional body developed by a broad cross-section of the education community, with professional certification as its core, unique function. The Blueprint provided the government with clear evidence of leadership at the level of the profession. This article argues that the teaching profession in Australia should work toward establishing its own blueprint for an Australian College of Teaching …

Standards-Based Professional Learning And Certification: By The Profession, For The Profession, Lawrence C. Ingvarson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

This chapter presents a model for a standards-based professional learning and certification system, a system controlled and provided by the teaching profession itself. It is a model of a highly educated profession, capable of defining research-based standards for effective teaching, promoting the development of its members toward those standards, and providing a rigorous and respected process for recognizing and certifying those who reach them. It is a model that calls for the teaching profession to be entrusted with the responsibilities of a profession; one of these is the responsibility and resources to establish its own standards-based professional learning and certification …

The Relationship Of Instructor Technical Literacy To The Academic Performance Of Students In Career Academies, Jorge Gomez

Jorge Gomez

Career Academy instructors’ technical literacy is vital to the academic success of their students. This nonexperimental ex post facto study examined the relationships between the level of technical literacy of instructors in career academies and student academic performance. It was also undertaken to explore the relationship between the pedagogical training of instructors and the academic performance of their students.

Out of a heterogeneous population of 564 teachers in six targeted schools, 136 teachers (26.0 %) responded to an online survey battery of four scales designed to determine teacher technical literacy, attitude toward technology, and their use of information and communications …

Exploring Teacher Professional Development Through The Lens Of Complexity Theory: The Technology Together Story, Renata Phelps, Anne Graham

Professor Anne Graham

Facilitating teacher professional development in complex and dynamic school environments continues to be a challenge for school leaders. This is particularly the case in the area of information and communication technology (ICT) integration, where a constant and rapid rate of change, expanding pedagogical possibilities, and the influence of individual teachers’ values, attitudes, beliefs and skills mean that simplistic approaches to teacher learning are unlikely to be successful. This chapter explores the potential of Complexity Theory, including notions of causality, self-organised adaptation, sensitivity to initial conditions, bifurcation and redundancy, for understanding teacher professional learning. Issues of collaboration, reflection, management and policy …

What Happened To The National Statement For The Teaching Profession?, Lawrence C. Ingvarson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

In 2003, 15 teacher associations put together a National Statement from the Teaching Profession on Teacher Standards, Quality and Professionalism. It recommended that A nationally coordinated, rigorous and consistent system should be established to provide recognition to teachers who demonstrate advanced standards . . . The enterprise bargaining process between employers and unions will be an important mechanism for providing recognition for professional certification. All employing authorities should be encouraged to provide recognition and support for professional certification as the process comes to demonstrate its credibility and its effects on professional learning. (p. 4) The Statement was the culmination of …

A Brimming Cup: The Life Of Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Elizabeth Kleinhenz

Dr Elizabeth Kleinhenz

Kathleen Fitzpatrick, born in 1905, was the grand - daughter of Melbourne real estate agent JR Buxton, whose investments in land and housing brought him wealth and significantly influenced much of his city's early development. In her memoir, Solid Bluestone Foundations, described by her great friend Manning Clark as 'a magnificent book of memories', Kathleen painted an evocative picture of family life at her grandparents' mansion Hughenden in Middle Park, and of middle - class living in early twentieth - century Melbourne. In adulthood she went on to become a brilliant academic and teacher whose former pupils became some of …

Comments On Deecd Discussion Paper: New Directions For School Leadership And The Teaching Profession, June 2012, Lawrence C. Ingvarson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

A New Vision Of Professional Development For Tertiary Teachers In Pakistan, Imran Anjum Chaudary

Dr Imran Anjum

No abstract provided.

Professor Marie Hulme To Attend Bread Loaf Writer's Conference, Marie A. Hulme

Marie Hulme

Marie Hulme has been invited to attend the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference this August in Middlebury, Vermont. Marie will be working on her fiction and non-fiction projects

Research On Performance Pay For Teachers, Lawrence Ingvarson, Elizabeth Kleinhenz, Jenny Wilkinson

Dr Elizabeth Kleinhenz

No abstract provided.

Estandares Profesionales De Practica Y Su Importancia Para La Ensenaza, Lawrence Ingvarson, Elizabeth Kleinhenz

Dr Elizabeth Kleinhenz

For more than three decades educators and policy makers in Australia have been interested in the development of professional standards for teachers. In recent years teacher associations in Australia have been developing their own standards to gain more influence over quality assurance in their profession. This paper aims to provide a broad overview of teaching standards and their use. It begins with an explanation of the idea of teaching standards, pointing out that standards are both statements about what is valued and tools for measurement. A distinction is drawn between ‘profession-wide’ teaching standards and standards developed by agencies like employers, …

Research On Performance Pay For Teachers, Lawrence Ingvarson, Elizabeth Kleinhenz, Jenny Wilkinson

Jenny Wilkinson

No abstract provided.

Teacher Professional Development: Myth And Reality, Imran Anjum Chaudary

Dr Imran Anjum

No abstract provided.

Getting Professional Development Right, Lawrence Ingvarson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

This paper examines the Western Australian Getting it Right reform as a strategy for professional learning and compares it with research on the characteristics of effective PD. The Getting it Right Strategy is clearly a comprehensive and well-resourced reform strategy with its main emphasis on building professional capacity among teachers and principals. The data we gathered as part of the evaluation, through school and classroom observations, interviews and surveys, left us in no doubt that the strategy was highly regarded by teachers and principals and was having a significant impact on practice. This paper will focus mainly on GiR work …

Evaluating The Quality And Impact Of Professional Development Programs, Lawrence Ingvarson, Marion Meiers, Adrian Beavis

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

The purpose of this paper is to review recent work that ACER has been doing to improve the usefulness of evaluations of professional development programs. This work includes the development of research-based instruments to measure: the nature and quality of the processes used to promote teacher learning; the impact of programs on teacher knowledge, practice and student outcomes; the relationships between these process and impact measures. The paper is based on approaches developed as part of four recent evaluations of professional development programs. These include: three evaluations of the Commonwealth Government’s Quality Teacher Program, as implemented in three separate states: …

Primary Teacher Work Study Report, Jenny Wilkinson, Lawrence Ingvarson, Elizabeth Kleinhenz, Adrian Beavis

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

This research was conducted by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) in 2005. The study was a result of the New Zealand Primary Teachers Collective Agreement 2004-2007 which specified that a workload study be complete to consider how the work of a teacher could be better structured, resourced and organised to support more effective classroom teaching. The purpose of the study was to gain an understanding of the nature and patterns of primary teachers' work. The research was commissioned by the New Zealand Ministry of Education.

The Vit Program For Supporting Provisionally Registered Teachers : Evaluation Of Implementation In 2005., Lawrence Ingvarson, Elizabeth Kleinhenz, Siek Toon Khoo, Jenny Wilkinson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

The VIT’s Program for Supporting Provisionally Registered Teachers and its registration procedures are increasingly seen as valid and fair. The Program is generally perceived as leading to improvements in teaching practice. Principals and mentors were very positive about the program, and consistently reported high levels of satisfaction with its implementation. Research has repeatedly found that significant reforms are often accompanied by a degree of unease and resistance, and this has been the case with the introduction of the VIT standards and registration requirements. School leaders play a vital role in leading their schools through these changes. This study has found …

The Victorian Institute Of Teaching : Standards And Professional Learning, Jenny Wilkinson, Adrian Beavis, Lawrence Ingvarson, Elizabeth Kleinhenz

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

The Victorian Institute of Teaching implemented its new registration procedures for Provisionally Registered Teachers (PRTs) in 2004. A pilot version of these procedures was trialled in 2003, and evaluated by ACER (Kleinhenz and Ingvarson 2004). Background information about the development of the Standards and Professional Learning Project can be found in this report. As part of the process for full registration, PRTs were required to prepare a portfolio with three components: an analysis of teaching and learning, collegiate classroom activities and a list of and commentary on professional activities undertaken. In 2004 the new requirements for PRTs were extended to …

Pre-Service Teacher Education In Australia : A Mapping Study Of Selection Processes, Course Structure And Content, And Accreditation Processes, Lawrence Ingvarson, Adrian Beavis, Elizabeth Kleinhenz, Alison Elliott

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

The main purpose of this study was to conduct a survey of Australian institutions that provide pre-service teacher education courses for primary and secondary teachers. The key elements of this mapping exercise included: Selection processes: The criteria and processes that teacher education institutions use to select students for courses. Course structure and content: The types of course content and structure that exist currently, including key components such as arrangements for the practicum and for ICT. Accreditation processes: The processes currently used, both internally and externally, for the accreditation and evaluation of teacher education courses. The survey instrument was sent to …

Development Of A National Standards Framework For The Teaching Profession, Lawrence Ingvarson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

This paper was prepared for the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment and Training Taskforce on Teacher Quality & Educational Leadership. The brief for the paper was to 'Develop an issues paper to provide a basis for discussion and, where possible, propose options. The paper covers the following broad areas: definitions and purposes for standards (the meaning of standards, rationale for teaching standards, purposes for teaching standards: mapping the territory); defining performance-based teaching standards (professional principles; content standards; evidential standards ; performance standards; how are standards structured?); teaching standards: whose responsibility?; a national standards framework: issues and areas for action (accreditation …

Initiatives To Address Teacher Shortage, Michele Lonsdale, Lawrence Ingvarson

Dr Lawrence Ingvarson (Consultant)

This paper is in response to an invitation from the Victorian Department of Education and Training to undertake a targeted review of effective teaching recruitment strategies. The paper provides a ‘snapshot’ of what is happening in other States and Territories and in selected countries overseas. The review is based mainly on information supplied by a small group of stakeholders (See Appendix 1) and derived from relevant printed and online resources. The main focus of the review is on the kinds of strategies that different educational jurisdictions have used to overcome teacher supply problems. The original intention of the review was …

A Constructivist Approach To Professional Development In Ict Leadership: Creating A Learning Community, Renata Phelps

Dr Renata Phelps

Management of ICT has emerged as a critical issue for schools and one which is impacting significantly on the work of principals and other senior staff. Theory, knowledge, information and even ideas relating specifically to ICT management in school contexts is not yet readily available. Much of the most valuable knowledge and information can be found in the day-to-day experiences and theorising of practitioners. This paper describes the constructivist approach being taken to ICT management through a particular unit in a postgraduate level professional development course at Southern Cross University. It is argued that engaging educational leaders in constructivist learning …