Tracking Pre-service Teachers’ Changing Conceptions of Good Science Teaching: The Role of Progressive Reflection with the Same Video

A CD-ROM consisting of videos of two lessons by different teachers demonstrating exemplary science teaching was used to elicit, develop and track the changing conceptions of good science teaching of student teachers enrolled for the one-year Postgraduate Diploma in Education (PGDE) at several stages during the programme. It was found that the videos acted as an effective probe to elicit student teachers’ conceptions and had significant impact on those conceptions at different stages of the programme through the provision of teacher models demonstrating exemplary teaching. The experience has extended novice teachers’ awareness of alternative teaching methods and approaches not experienced in their own schooling, broadened their awareness of different classroom situations, provided proof of existence of good practices and prompted them to reflect on their current conceptions of good science teaching. Most importantly, the strategy of asking student teachers to watch the same videos on three separate occasions at different times of the course was recognized by them as a crucial element in facilitating their reflection on their changing conceptions of good science teaching. PGDE is the standard form of pre-service teacher education in Hong Kong. It provides qualified teacher status within Hong Kong. Student teachers enrolled for the PGDE have completed a relevant undergraduate degree.     

Science Teachers’ Professional Development and Changes in Science Practical Assessment Practices: What are the Issues?

This paper considers the circumstances under which science teachers can respond positively and productively to educational policy reforms in the area of science practical assessment. To understand what might be involved in linking science teachers’ assessment capacities and their professional development, we present illustrative data from recent research studies conducted in Singapore and Hong Kong showing contrasting approaches taken in the implementation of reforms in science practical assessment. In Singapore, teachers worked together to select, discuss, clarify and refine their practices as they made decisions about what to teach and assess. In Hong Kong, teachers took a critical stance towards the new policy and learnt from their own experiences in order to build their confidence. With the same policy initiative, one group of teachers focused more on the technicalities of complying with requirements imposed on them while in the other group had their professional consciousness of what they thought was best for their students provoked so that their practices would be transformed. In an attempt to draw lessons for other contexts in supporting the implementation of assessment policy reforms through professional development work, we identify and discuss a range of factors in science teachers’ professional development that arise once in situ professional development work has started. Overall, our intent in this article is to recast assessment reform as a driver or pivot in teachers’ professional development and learning. To do this it is necessary, we argue, to afford teachers’ experiences and the processes involved in learning from them greater emphasis in order to ensure the continuance of innovation in the assessment of laboratory-based work.     

Turning Crisis into Opportunity: Enhancing student‐teachers’ understanding of nature of science and scientific inquiry through a case study of the scientific research in severe acute respiratory syndrome

Interviews with key scientists involved in research on severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), together with analysis of media reports and documentaries produced during and after the SARS epidemic, revealed many interesting aspects of nature of science (NOS) and authentic scientific inquiry. This novel insight into practice in the rapidly growing field of molecular biology was used in the development of instructional materials for use in the pre‐service and in‐service teacher education programme at The University of Hong Kong. The elements of NOS and scientific inquiry identified in the scientific research on SARS were explicitly emphasized in our instructional materials. The contemporary real‐life context of SARS was found to be effective in promoting student‐teachers’ understanding of NOS and scientific inquiry, particularly in terms of: the realization of inseparable links between science and the social, cultural, and political environment; deeper understanding of how science and technology impact on each other; and a richer appreciation of the processes of authentic scientific inquiry and the humanistic character of scientists. The effectiveness is attributed to immediacy, relevance, and familiarity, making the abstract tangible, personal experience of science history, and the powerful affective impact of the interviews with scientists.     

Queering communication studies: a Journal of Applied Communication Research forum

ABSTRACT

Genders and sexualities continue to remain underexplored in the field of communication studies and the academy in general. This essay examines possibilities for incorporating queer perspectives into communication studies. At the invitation of the Journal of Applied Communication Research editor, 9 communication scholars who use queer theory or queer perspectives in their own work responded to a series of questions addressing how queer theory and perspectives can be used in the discipline, both by those who are new to queer theorizing and those who are looking to expand their knowledge and practices. The answers to these questions provide an understanding of what queer theory is and its relationship with LGBT studies; allow practical considerations for incorporating queer perspectives into communication scholarship in multiple methodological areas; offer considerations for welcoming queer voices in the classroom, the communication discipline, and the larger academy; and indicate several scholarly resources for those who want to learn more about queer theory and LGBT studies.     

Three views of fairness in a school-based assessment scheme of practical work in biology

This interpretive study of the implementation of a school-based assessment scheme of biology practical work in Hong Kong examines three teachers' struggles with the issue of fairness in relation to their classroom actions. Though the teachers' discourses were dominated by, and their classroom actions were pre-eminently influenced by, the notion of fairness, they did so in three qualitatively different ways: (1) fair in the sense of assessing students on a fair basis; (2) fair in the sense of not jeopardizing students' chances to learn the subject matter while they are being assessed; and (3) fair in the sense of not depriving students' of opportunities of receiving all-round education. The implication is that assessment innovation is a necessary, but not a sufficient, mechanism for changes within our educational system. The role of the teacher is challenged by the new assessment scheme?the co-existence of assessment and learning requires a significant change in the teacher's pedagogy. For teachers to implement the new programme their existing understanding and beliefs concerning assessment must be challenged and opportunities provided for them to come to terms with the philosophy of the new assessment scheme. Most importantly, the teachers themselves must undertake such a learning process.     

The influence of teachers’ interests,personalities and life experiences in intercultural languages teaching

This paper reports on a study that investigated teachers’ perceptions about the significance of intercultural understanding (IU) in the modern foreign languages (MFL) curriculum. The research was conducted in the wake of a National Curriculum revision in 2007 in England that for the first time listed ‘IU’ as one of the four key concepts underpinning the study of languages in the Programme of Study. In contrast to other writers who frequently explain MFL teachers’ attention to intercultural learning as a consequence of their (lack of) knowledge about intercultural languages theory or pedagogy, or as the result of contextual factors, our findings suggest that the significance attached to IU seems to be profoundly affected by the interests, personalities and life experiences of individuals. This finding emerged from a qualitative study involving semi-structured interviews conducted with 18 teachers in 13 secondary schools in the North-West of England between May 2008 and June 2009. We illustrate our point by mapping the narratives of four teachers, conveyed through pen-portraits, with an adapted version of Kelchtermans’s personal interpretive framework, and thus draw on narrative inquiry as our research approach. We claim that our hitherto relatively unnoticed finding, i.e. the central influence of the teacher as an individual on intercultural language teaching, has important implications for MFL teacher education. We suggest that the stories of the four teachers could be used as a professional development tool to identify motivators and inhibitors in developing IU that may resonate with practitioners’ own beliefs and practice, and that parallel to this, our adapted Kelchtermans’s framework may be used as a blank template to scaffold self analysis. Whilst this article considers teacher development in intercultural languages education, it also seeks to make a contribution to the literature on the usefulness of teacher narrative as a professional development tool.     

The television generation's relation to the mass media in Germany: Accounting for the impact of private television

This study extends earlier research on the television generation's media‐related behavior. Those who have grown up with TV are often said to be (therefore) more devoted to TV and less inclined to read than people born earlier. To provide evidence, data on TV and newspaper use and on attachment to both media in Germany, 1970–1995, were cohort‐analyzed, controlling for the age‐specific effect of the introduction of private TV in the mid‐eighties. While younger birth cohorts are less interested in the newspaper, the TV generation is not more devoted to TV than most of the preceding cohorts.