Elementary Education and Teaching Commons^™

From Classroom Conversations To Public Dialogue: Preservice Teachers Engaging With Diverse Children’S Literature, Janell Pycior

Midwest Social Sciences Journal

Preservice teachers often engage with issues of diversity, equity, identity, and representation within the safety of their university classrooms; however, opportunities to extend these conversations into public and professional settings may be less common. This practice-based reflective article examines the experience of moving seven undergraduate preservice teachers enrolled in an upper-level Diversity in Children’s Literature course beyond their familiar classroom environment and into a professional academic conference. The students, majoring in early childhood, elementary, or special education and minoring in reading, participated in a roundtable discussion at the Indiana Academy of Social Sciences focused on diversity and representation in children’s …

Preparing Teachers To Read The Data: Strengthening Data Literacy For Early Literacy Decision-Making, Tevia Q. Strand

The Interactive Journal of Global Leadership and Learning

Teachers are increasingly expected to use literacy screening and benchmark data to guide instruction, identify student needs, and participate in multi-tiered systems of support. However, pre-service and early-career teachers may enter the profession without sufficient preparation to interpret assessment data or connect benchmark patterns to instructional action. This white paper examines the gap between teacher preparation and the realities of K-12 data use, with particular attention to early literacy decision-making. Drawing from Bradbury’s discussion of teacher preparation and the changing realities of education, this paper argues that data literacy is an essential part of preparing teachers for equitable classroom practice. …

Preservice Teachers’ Knowledge, Skills, And Perceptions Related To Data-Based Decision Making In Elementary Reading Instruction, Erin K. Washburn, Samantha A. Gesel, Miranda S. Fitzgerald, Corinne R. Kingsbery

Reading Horizons: A Journal of Literacy and Language Arts

Teachers’ knowledge of and ability to use reading assessments and assessment data to inform instruction has long been recognized as a core teaching competency. Data-based decision making (DBDM) is a process by which educators examine assessment data to identify student strengths and needs and apply those findings to their practice. DBDM has been linked to student achievement/engagement and positive teacher self-efficacy. However, DBDM, specifically in reading, is a complex process for teachers. Preservice teacher preparation has been deemed a space for the introduction of DBDM in reading. However, few studies have explored how targeted instruction in reading-related DBDM may impact …

Building Efficacy In Special Educators: An Examination Of Basic Readiness Factors, Clarice Wright Edwards

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This phenomenological study examined the perceptions of self-efficacy of elementary special education teachers (SETs) providing services for students with disabilities (SWD) in the general education classroom setting. Additionally, this study explored the effect of job-embedded supports and the skill sets deemed essential to meet the needs of SWDs. Understanding methods that can enhance the skill sets and pedagogical knowledge of SETs beyond teacher preparation can provide schools and school districts with opportunities to build highly efficacious teachers and improve student outcomes. Participants were asked about the perceived impact of teacher preparation programs on the self-efficacy of practicing SETs and about …

A Qualitative Study Of Teachers’ Knowledge Of Anxiety And Their Feelings Of Preparedness To Support Students With Anxiety, Jessica Minahan

Educational Studies Dissertations

The incidence of anxiety disorders, one of the most prevalent mental health disorders, in students has increased since the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, these disorders continue to be underdiagnosed and untreated in schools, leading to impaired learning, social relationships, and health issues. If teachers, who spend a considerable amount of time with students, identify anxiety and enforce successful interventions, it can lead to positive student outcomes. Therefore, this qualitative study examined teachers’ knowledge of anxiety and their feelings of preparedness in teaching students with anxiety. Thirteen general education elementary teachers with two to three years of experience were interviewed. The participants …

Role Play: Actualizing The Iep Meeting For Pre-Service Teachers, Courtney A. Toledo

The Qualitative Report

Teacher preparation programs provide numerous teaching and learning opportunities for pre-service teachers; however, participating in an Individualized Education Program (IEP) meeting is not an experience that can be guaranteed. Leading and participating in IEP meetings are a responsibility that all special education teachers will be held accountable for, but many pre-service teachers will never be able to observe a real IEP meeting before entering the field. In this qualitative case study, the researcher utilizes a simulated IEP meeting to provide pre-service teachers with experience in participating in an IEP meeting prior to entering the profession. The case study method is …

Examining Elementary Teacher Perceptions And Experiences Of Transitioning From Knowledge-Based To Inquiry-Based Social Studies Standards, Benjamin Stephen Pinnick

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Elementary educators are responsible for the earliest years of student learning in a public setting. The amount of content students are expected to master continues to grow in scope, and the methods that are utilized shift to align with educational research and social momentum. After a decade of Common Core policies, social studies education in elementary schools has become a deemphasized subject. Reading and math, as well as science, have taken a greater precedence in today’s classrooms.

Yet, expectations for the creation of knowledgeable and participatory citizens continue to serve as a goal in elementary schools. Conceptualization of citizenship form …

Investigating The Theoretical Orientations Of Select Louisiana Preservice Teachers Regarding Teaching Reading: A Mixed-Methods Study, Megan Jenny

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Teacher quality is one of the most significant factors contributing to student success, and Teacher Preparation Programs (TPPs) are traditionally responsible for teaching preservice teachers how to teach reading. Effective reading instruction is responsive, complex, and equitable. Acknowledgement of a disconnect between preparation programming and critical teacher knowledge for teachers of reading indicated a need for this exploratory mixed-methods study. The purpose of the current study, grounded by the theoretical framework of Sociocultural Theory, was to investigate what a select group of 21 preservice grades 1-3 elementary teachers were taught about teaching reading, preservice teachers’ theoretical orientations for teaching reading, …

A Primer For Incorporating Pre-Service Co-Teaching Into Teacher Residencies, Prepared To Teach, Bank Street College

Prepared to Teach

Pre-Service co-teaching – where teacher candidates engage as co-teachers during student teaching – is a strong instructional model, especially when combined with yearlong teacher residencies. This brief features a combination of resources, ideas, and activities that can help your preparation program/school district partnership create a shared understanding of pre-service co-teaching.

Registered Apprenticeship Programs And Teacher Residencies: Building Shared Understandings Between Workforce Development And Education, Prepared To Teach, Bank Street College

Prepared to Teach

This brief is the first in a series exploring principles that Prepared To Teach has surfaced as helpful for designing Registered Apprenticeship Programs for teacher residencies to promote and support high-quality teacher preparation systems. Sign up for our monthly newsletter for future releases.

Review Of Teaching In Rural Places: Thriving In Rural Classrooms, Schools, And Communities, Rachelle Kuehl

Virginia English Journal

This is a book review of Teaching in Rural Places: Thriving in Classrooms, Schools, and Communities, a first-of-its-kind textbook geared for preservice teachers interested in teaching successfully in rural schools.

Cultivating Culturally Responsive Elementary Teachers In A Suburban Title I School, Angela L. Mack

Doctor of Education in Teacher Leadership Dissertations

Research suggests increased enrollment of students with diverse cultural, racial, linguistic, and social backgrounds will continue in schools across the United States over the coming years; thereby, imposing a challenge for some teachers with differing backgrounds to instruct culturally and linguistically diverse students. Without adequate professional development focused on culturally responsive teaching, it has been purported teachers will continue to adopt deficit perceptions and subpar practices that negatively impact students of culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds. Thus, this study aimed to explore how a series of in-service professional development focused on culture, race, and pedagogy may influence teacher perceptions and …

Principals’ Perceptions Of The Importance Of Teacher Certification In Rural Christian Schools, Ronda L. Dry

Doctor of Education (Ed.D)

The literature associated with principals' perceptions of certified/uncertified teachers within private Christian schools is limited, specifically in rural communities. Therefore, little is known about principals’ perceptions of the importance of teacher certification in rural Christian schools. The purpose of the study was to evaluate principals’ perceptions concerning the pedagogical practices of certified teachers as compared to the pedagogical practices of teachers who are not certified. Specific to this study, teacher certification was defined as certification earned through the state or certification through a school-accrediting organization. A total of 82 principals were surveyed and asked to identify their perceptions of the …

Voices Of Teacher Graduates: Preparation For Black Mattering In Schools, Loyce E. Caruthers, Jennifer Waddell, Bradley Poos, Ashley N. Smith

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

The Institute for Urban Education (IUE) began in 2005, following unitary status of Kanas City Public Schools in 2003, as a four-year undergraduate urban teacher preparation program to prepare students to interrupt school-centered practices of Eurocentric identity and antiblackness. A program feature entails recruitment of high school students from urban communities and scholarships to support fulltime preparation without employment distractions. Graduates commit to teach for a minimum of four-years in an urban school. Our investigation incorporated BlackCrit with in-depth interviews to capture the experiences of nine graduates in the schools where they teach or engage in school leadership. While testimonials …

Student Teachers With Mental Health Conditions Share Barriers To Success: A Case Study, Michael Houdyshell, Diane Kratt, Jackie Greene

The Qualitative Report

Universities are trying to address student mental health needs through counseling centers and other outreach initiatives. However, do individual colleges know how to address the mental health concerns of their own students? Three faculty members in the College of Education at a university located in the southern United States posed two questions to find out what it is like for student teachers to live with a mental health condition, and what would support academic performance in the College. Seventeen undergraduate students who self-reported as having a mental health condition and were completing their senior year as student teachers volunteered to …

Spilling The Lgbt(Ea)Q: A Study Of Lgbtq Youth Early School Experiences, Nicholas Catania

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this arts-based qualitative study, I explore the experiences of LGBTQ youth regarding inclusion during their early schooling. The purpose of this study was to examine the experiences of youth participants regarding inclusion during their early school experiences to better assist educators and policy-makers at all levels with information to provide safe and equitable learning environments for LGBTQ youth to succeed. The intent of this study was to uncover the ways schools may marginalize or be inclusive of LGBTQ youth by examining school experiences with a particular focus at the elementary level. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews, focus groups, …

Reading Knowledge Transfer From The Pre-Service Teaching Phase To The Novice Teaching Phase: A Phenomenological Study, Natalie Sajko

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Capstones

This qualitative study explored the experiences of eight novice teachers as they transferred knowledge of reading instruction from their teacher education programs (TEPs) into their first classrooms in a rural district. Specific mechanisms for learning transfer (prior knowledge, motivation, context, and culture) and their perceived influences were also explored. Phenomenology was utilized to help explore these experiences and perceptions. Social constructivism, Situated Learning Theory (Lave & Wenger, 1991) and critical pedagogies (hooks, 2014; Love, 2019) were used to interpret findings in this study. This study centered on the following questions: (1) how do elementary novice teachers perceive reading knowledge transfer …

Creating A Meaningful Experience: On Service Learning And Teacher Preparedness, Nhat-Dzu T. Bui, Telia M. Krown

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The focus of this Capstone project is on the effectiveness of service learning and its role in teacher preparedness. This is an important issue for Liberal Studies students, professors, and the community because in the Integrated Teacher Education Program, service learning is treated as preparation for teaching, and it can be seen that way for Traditional Pathway students as well. It is argued that while service learning works towards an admirable goal, there are obstacles and design decisions that keep it from being fully effective in preparing Liberal Studies students in becoming teachers. The three primary stakeholder perspectives chosen were …

Preparing Elementary Writing Teachers: An Inquiry-Driven, Field-Based Approach To Instruction, Lisa K. Hawkins, Nicole M. Martin, Jennifer Cooper

Teaching/Writing: The Journal of Writing Teacher Education

Pre-service teachers’ [PSTs] preparation for teaching writing is foundational to writing instruction in elementary schools and children’s writing. Prior research has identified elements in writing-focused methods coursework that support their preparation. In this article, an innovative component in a stand-alone writing teacher preparation course that incorporated the research-based elements is showcased: a process for deconstructing and modeling inquiry-driven writing pedagogy. This process includes five phases: (1) using mentor texts during initial immersion, (2) using mentor texts to study structure, (3) using mentor texts to study writer’s craft, (4) using mentor texts to study sentence structure, sentence fluency, and language, and …

A Narrative Inquiry Into Experiences Of Indigenous Teachers During And After Teacher Preparation, James Alan Oloo, Lydiah Kananu Kiramba

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

This narrative inquiry is informed by a concern to increase the number of Indigenous teachers in Canadian classrooms. While the Indigenous population is younger and growing faster than the non-Indigenous population, educational attainment gap remains between the two groups of Canadians. The gap is widening at the university level. This study explores the experiences of two Indigenous teachers during and after teacher education in an Indigenous teacher education program and attempts to reframe teacher education to enhance the meaningful engagement of pre-service Indigenous teachers. We conducted interviews as conversations with the study participants as guided by open-ended unstructured research questions …

Preparing Teacher Candidates To Collaborate With Families And Communities: Standards, Research, And Practice, Karen S. Buchanan, Thomas D. Buchanan

Northwest Journal of Teacher Education

Preparing teacher candidates to engage with family and community in ways that align with the reality of today’s classroom is a critically important aspect of fostering student academic success and well-being. This paper examines how a set of professional preparation standards, the teacher preparation literature, and a qualitative inquiry into the practices and challenges of kindergarten teachers working with family and community converge to inform the work of teacher educators. Implications of these three sources of expert knowledge are instructive for teacher educator practice. Implications for the preparation of teacher candidates around family/community engagement include: the shaping of teacher candidate …

Fape, Lre, And Related Laws: Implications For Inclusion And Co-Teaching, Tori L. Colson, Moriah J. Smothers

Kentucky Teacher Education Journal: The Journal of the Teacher Education Division of the Kentucky Council for Exceptional Children

Unfortunately, IDEA implementation is still a problem for many schools today (Hill, Martin, & Nelson-Head, 2011). What are the causes of this? Could it be because many teachers do not have knowledge of the law? More and more students with disabilities are being served in the general education program with their peers. This is a result of several federal laws enacted to ensure that students with special needs are educated in the least restrictive environment. Inclusion of students with disabilities in the general education curriculum is a way to make sure that students are taught in the least restrictive environment …

Shattered Ground: Mental Health Disorders In Children – A Hidden Crisis, Yvonne Hefner

National Youth Advocacy & Resilience Conference

This session will offer teachers an in-depth understanding of mental health disorders, including basic information about these disorders, background information to assist in identifying early warning signs, and strategies for supporting students that may suffer from a mental health disorder. Teachers will learn classroom strategies that will foster a positive learning environment which will help to support these students

“Inquiry Is Confidence”: How Practitioner Inquiry Can Support New Teachers, Rachel Wolkenhauer, Angela Hooser

Journal of Practitioner Research

This paper focuses on the profile of “Hannah,” who was having a successful first year of teaching until February when her principal shifted gears. At this point administration expected, as Hannah quoted her principal, “to walk into your classroom, at any point of the day, and see you in front of the classroom and the kids sitting at desks answering bubble-in questions and not talking to each other.” Hannah teaches first grade. Rather than being discouraged by this, Hannah turned to her knowledge of practitioner inquiry to systematically study and stand behind the professional decisions she knew she needed to …

Understanding The Differences Between Novice And Experienced Reading Teachers, Katie Anderson

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Education researchers have documented that first-year teachers are often less effective at reading instruction than their more experienced peers. Accordingly, this qualitative, comparative case study was designed to assess the instructional skills and strategies utilized by first-year and experienced teachers using Danielson's Framework for Teaching as the conceptual framework. The research questions were used to examine two groups of teachers using the framework and the Teacher's College Reading and Writing Project's defined levels of performance for effective reading instruction. The goal was to identify the instructional differences between the two groups of teachers. Purposeful sampling was used to select 3 …

Examining How Video-Elicited Reflection Mediates Teacher Candidates’ Beliefs About English Language Learners: A Multiple Case Study, Monica M. Gonzalez

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

English Language Learners (ELLs) are students who speak a language other than English; they are the fastest growing student population in United States’ (US) public schools and will include over 17 million students by the year 2020 (NCES,2015). The dramatic increase in the ELL student population means that all mainstream classroom teachers will teach at least one ELL within their first year of graduating from a teacher preparation program. However, most US teachers hold misconceptions about ELLs and feel unprepared for ELL instruction (Coady, Harper, & de Jong, 2011). More empirical research is needed to inform teacher preparation programs on …

Pre-Service Teachers’ Perceptions About The Effectiveness Of The Toon Comic Books In Their Guided Reading Instruction, Ewa Mcgrail, Alicja Rieger, Gina M. Doepker

Georgia Educational Researcher

Recently, education and literacy researchers have acknowledged educational merit in guided reading that incorporates interactive and authentic reading texts, such as graphic novels, which meet the needs of today’s predominantly multimodal learners (Jennings, Rule, & Zanden, 2014; Kist & Pytash, 2015). This qualitative study explores through interviews and a questionnaire the perceptions of pre-service teachers about the effectiveness of the comic book series known as TOON comics in guided reading with struggling readers and writers, from kindergarten through fifth grade. Pre-service teachers have expressed positive views concerning the use of these comic books in guided reading instruction with their struggling …

Why “Correcting” African American Language Speakers Is Counterproductive, Alice Lee

Language Arts Journal of Michigan

In this article, I address the topic of AAL usage in the classroom, particularly the line of thinking that assumes “correcting” the language is what will “set students up for success” in the future. By providing some abbreviated information on how children acquire language, I explain how AAL “correction” is actually counterproductive for student “success”—in both language acquisition and learning. Additionally, I will offer practical suggestions for how AAL can be incorporated in curriculum and instruction.

Enhancing Pre-Service Teacher’S Preparation — The Promise Of International Professional Learning Communities (Iplc), Valerie A. Storey

All Faculty and Staff Scholarship

The evolving landscape of teacher preparation emphasizes the importance of embedding clinical practice at its core. International research underscores the value of collaborative professional communities and the integration of global perspectives in teacher preparation to foster effective teaching. International experiences, including study abroad programs, have been shown to enhance sensitivity to diverse learning needs and promote lifelong learning. This paper explores an innovative International Professional Learning Community (IPLC) established between St. Mark and St. John University in Plymouth, England, and the University of Central Florida, USA. Despite their size differences, both institutions utilize communities of practice (CoP) within their Initial …

Site Joint Sig Symposia: A Collaboration Between The K-12 Online Learning Sig And Distance Learning Sig: How Higher Education And K-12 Online Learning Research Can Impact Each Other, Rick Ferdig, Leanna Archambault, Kerry Rice, Margaret Niess, Trisha Litz, Amy Garrett-Dikkers, Aimee Whiteside, Michael Barbour, David Marcovitz, Antoinette Davis

EKU Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Facilitated by Rick Ferdig of Kent State University and editor of JTATE, this Symposia brings together the work of the K-12 Online Learning SIG and the Distance Learning SIG communities and focuses on presentations from scholars in the field whose work has implications for both higher education and K-12 online learning. This Symposia will have nine panelists who will each present their work and then talk specifically about how their work can inform both K-12 and HE. Included in the list of Higher Education-focused panelists are Trisha Litz of Regis University, Maggie Niess of Oregon State University, Antoinette Davis of …