Education Commons^™

Introduction, Bruce Haynes

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The Minister for Employment, Education and Training, the Hon. Kim Beazley (1993, p. 11) announced the provision of $20 million over the following three years to support the development of key competencies and the "development of a prototype training and development package for teachers/trainers." This announcement highlights the significance currently accorded to competency based standards for teaching and teacher education. The identification of teacher competencies and the specification of competency based standards for entry (and promotion?) in the profession has the potential to restructure the workplace in schools by specifying what is done and who controls it. Together with the …

Teacher Training In Transition, A Commentary On Postgraduate Science Teacher Training In England, Arthur Jennings

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The radical reforms of recent years have affected all parts of the educational system in England. This paper discusses science teacher education and focuses on changes in teacher training programmes designed to equip teachers for the national curriculum and for work in the climate of greater accountability that now exists. Though the pressure for these changes is domestic it is suggested that the issues are of general significance.

Contextualizing The Competency-Based Schooling, Victor V. Soucek

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

To a classroom teacher the current debate about work-related competencies might appear far removed from his/her classroom and have no significance for teacher education. Yet the proposed policy changes are likely to affect the work and the professional status of teachers in a very direct way. As Whitty and Willmott (1991: 312) point out, one of the fundamental problems of competency-based teaching/training (CBT) approach consists in the difficulty to define just how narrow or broad the competencies might be. A too narrow definition based on observable work-related skills might indicate a radical departure from the traditional role teachers played in …

Teacher Education For Values Education : Is There A Way Forward Under Current Constraints?, Graham Haydon

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

How can teacher education best prepare teachers to contribute to values education in schools? If this was ever a question that could be asked and answered in the abstract, or with reference to some postulated ideal situation, it is not so now. I am raising and suggesting an answer to the question in the context of recent developments in education in Britain; but since those recent developments are by no means unique to Britain, the discussion may well be of broader relevance too. The context, then, in which I am raising the question is one of increasing political control, at …

Reading "Academic Writing", Mary Scott

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Helping studetns learn how to learn is now a concern for most U.K. institutions of higher education. The study skill given most emphasis is "academic writing", no doubt because it is on the quality of their written assignments that students' success or failure larely turns.

Competency-Based Standards In Teaching : Two Problems - One Solution, William Lauden

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Movement towards competency standards in teaching promises to bring together two parallel programs of reform: school improvement and skills formation. The first of these, school improvement has a history as long as the history of schooling. In recent decades, proposals for school improvement have led to changes in curriculum content, materials and structure; assessment; architecture; and governance of schools.

Selected Professions Observed : Competency-Based Standards And Their Implications For The Teachmg Profession, Leo Bartlett

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The emphasis on competency-based standards approaches to reform in teaching is the single most significant trend current in Australian education and in the professions generally today. Pressure for reform has come from industry, and government, and to a significantly lesser extent from the professions and parents. While there have been some reservations expressed about CBS among some sections of the Commonwealth bureaucracy in recent months, the idea of competency-based standards remains the overarching schema for micro-economic reform. The dominant press for reform can be attributed to federal (and state) interests and the policy-makers who for largely economic or rationalist reasons. …

Critical Thinking In Teacher Education: A Process-Oriented Research Agenda, Paul Hager, Michael Kaye

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

In recent years, critical thinking has become a central focus of education, especially in North America. Within this focus, there has been a major debate regarding the generalisability of specificity of critical thinking. The main issue in this connection appears to have been whether critical thinking needs to be closely linked with traditional disciplines. If critical thinking is really as vital as its proponents maintain, then it will also be important in applied fields such as teacher education. It is our intention in this paper to explore the implications, for teacher education, of taking critical thinking seriously.

In Defence Of Australian Academic Unionism, Grahame Mcculloch

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This paper does not aspire to be an objective account of academic unionism. It is written from my perspective as a committed union activist, and comes at a time when there is a real prospect of a substantial erosion of the role and authority of Australia's academic unions. I refer, of course, to the well publicised plans to developed a model of academic industrial relations in which working conditions would be radically deregulated, and in which unions would be given only a limited role. Unionism is seen as responsible for the debasement of collegial life in our universities, and the …

Never Mind The Edu, What About The Cate? The Background To Current Developments In English Teacher Education, Tony Becher

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

If anyone were misguided enough to offer a prize for the sector of English education most subject to government intervention, the institutions concerned with initial teacher training would win it hands down. The intervention (a less polite word would be interference) has, over time, taken three main forms: alterations to the structure and organisation of provision; attempts to match student numbers to subsequent demand; and control over curricular content. This paper is an attempt to take a relatively longterm view of relevant developments, setting the present situation in its historical context. It will thus necessarily adopt a broad-brush rather than …

In Search Of The Expert Pedagogue: How Is The Expert Physical Education Teacher Perceived?, Christine Albert

Theses : Honours

Like most professions, teaching needs to be concerned with the notions of expertise and effectiveness. This study aimed to determine how the expert physical education teacher is perceived by pupils, student teachers, and teacher educators. Perceptions were compared and contrasted to identify both areas of discrepancy and consensus with respect to subjects' views of expertise. Subject groups involved in the study consisted of 30 year 10 pupils, 30 student teachers completing a BArts degree majoring in physical education (3rd year), and 28 teacher educators (physical education specific). Perceptions of expertise were determined through the administration of a questionnaire which specifically …

A Gender Analysis Of Teacher Feedback In Coeducational Secondary Physical Education Lessons, Paul R. Watson

Theses : Honours

The purpose of this study was to examine whether the verbal feedback distribution patterns of teachers in coeducational secondary physical education lessons were gender equitable. Previous literature indicated that inequality in verbal interaction and feedback existed in coeducational secondary physical education classes. This inequality tended to favour males to the disadvantage of females.

Fourteen lessons by male teachers and fourteen lessons by female teachers were video-recorded. The study utilized a modification of the systematic behaviour observation instrument developed by Siedentop (1983). Data obtained were categorized for analysis and interpretation. Statistical procedures were applied to establish the significance of the findings. …

An Evaluation Of The Procedures Used To Assess And Remediate The Perceived Writing Difficulties Of Undergraduate Students In The Faculty Of Education At Edith Cowan University, Les Puhl

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The standards of written literacy of teacher-education students at Edith Cowan University are perceived by many staff to be inadequate. The Faculty of Education's response to this perceived inadequacy is to carry out a mandatory skills-based remedial writing programme for students whose literacy competencies are judged to be deficient, The instrument used to assess the students' literacy competencies is the English Skills Assessment test. The students' performances in the various skills which the test purports to measure, also determine the area in which they are given remedial instruction if the results of the test suggest this is necessary. However, many …

Staff Development Through The Colloquium Process, Tim Emery

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

This study examines the Colloquium which is a professional development process used in Catholic schools. The Colloquium was designed to help people employed in catholic schools renew their vision of care and service to students and to seek to reshape the curriculum to reflect Gospel values more clearly. This thesis was a research evaluation of the Colloquium process and aimed to exploreits effectiveness in te1ms of its impact on the teachers and their work in Catholic schools. The study is based on the theoretical domains of faith development, school improvement end staff development. The design of the study involved before …