Sources of Stress for Class Teachers in New Zealand Primary Schools

The authors report on the findings of a case study of parent–teacher conferences in a secondary school in Hong Kong. They explored through interviews parents’ and teachers’ perspectives of parent–teacher conferences. They noted that parent–teacher conferences were sources of stress for teachers and embarrassment for parents. Parent–teacher conferences were useful for problem‐clarification. The building of mutual trust was the most important conferencing skill. They drew out some practical guidelines which were useful to teachers of the case study school but are also valuable to all teachers who wish to work effectively and positively with parents.     

Teacher contact with parents of children with special educational needs: a comparison over two decades

The paper addresses aspects of teacher contacts with the parents of children with special educational needs in the broader context of parent–teacher relations. Data are presented from a large-scale survey of teachers of Key Stage 2 children (7–11-year-olds) in England in 1998 and are compared with data from a similar survey in 1981. Levels of consultation with parents have increased across the two surveys and it is very unusual for a teacher not to have had a meeting with a parent of a child with SEN during the current school year. There is a tendency for levels of contact with the parents of ethnic minority pupils to be lower than that for other pupils. There is also a markedly higher level of non-contact in schools serving areas of poverty compared with more affluent schools. A tension is identified between an agenda of home–school partnership and a set of attributions for the causes of children's difficulties which locates these in deficiencies in the home. However, teachers in the later survey were less likely to identify the home as the source of problems than were teachers in 1981. The paper suggests that considerable progress has been made towards fulfilling the conditions for home–school partnership, but that there remain areas of concern.     

The interactive attribution of school success in multi-ethnic schools

The study shows how explanations for school success are expressed and dialogically constructed during teacher–parent conferences at school. Attribution theory is used to conceptualize the various explanations for school success that were expressed. However, instead of only looking at attributions as beliefs which individuals or groups ‘have’, the aim of this study is to show how attributions are part of co-constructed processes in which multiple partners impact upon each other’s attributions over the course of a conversation. The results indicated that in the conversations between teachers and minority parents, school performance is more often attributed to effort while in conversations with majority parents, psychological attributions were more common. Besides these differences in content, the process through which these accounts were constructed was different. While the diagnosis on what went wrong was more commonly constructed in case of the conversations with majority parents, they were more characterised by opposition or a passive position by the parent in case of the conversations with minority parents. The analyses show that instead of a simple mismatch between explanations of the home and the school, these explanations are interactionally co-constructed as both parents and teachers necessarily ‘re’-act on each other’s claims and understanding of school success. The results ultimately reveal how the interactive process impacted upon the construction of the attributions and the possibilities this creates for partnerships between parents and teachers to create an understanding of the child’s academic potential across home and school.     

Consultation outcome as a result of in-service resource teacher training

The effects of learning disabilities teacher training for consultation with classroom teachers were investigated. Twelve learning disabilities resource teachers and 60 elementary school classroom teachers within one school system served as subjects. Four learning disabilities resource teachers received communication skills training, and four resource teachers received conceptual assumptions training. In addition, four resource teachers served as a control group for the study. Each resource teacher conducted three 20- to 30-minute conferences with each of five elementary school teachers. Following the third conference, information was collected concerning: (a) classroom teacher ratings of satisfaction with services, (b) joint ratings of the child's progress toward goals set during the first conferences, (c) the percentage of recommendations implemented, and (d) classroom teacher ratings of joint responsibility, and of resource teacher respect, empathy, and congruence. There were three findings in this study. First, no differences resulting from either type of training were found at posttest for classroom teacher respect, resource teacher congruence, joint responsibility, or joint ratings of the child's progress. Second, training resource teachers in communication skills resulted in significantly higher classroom teacher ratings of resource teacher empathy. Finally, significant differences due to resource teacher experiences prior to this study were noted with classroom teacher ratings of the child's progress, and the number of recommendations implemented.     

The Assessment of Student Teachers’ Academic and Professional Knowledge in School‐Based Teacher Education

The aim of this study was to scrutinize the assessment of teacher knowledge in a school‐based course at one Swedish pre‐service teacher education program. In a general education school‐based course, teacher educators visited the student teachers at their school placements and met them and their school mentors in student‐teaching conferences to assess their teacher knowledge. The findings primarily show that the assessment procedures are influenced by teacher educators’ organization of the school visits and conferences. Secondly, the organization of the school visits and conferences influences who the potential and actual assessors at the conferences can be and are. Thirdly, the assessed student teacher knowledge at the conferences is described as procedural knowledge in a knowledge‐in‐practice perspective, almost exclusively in the area of relational, emotional, and caring learning objectives and aspects of teaching activities. Fourthly, the findings show that propositional knowledge in a knowledge‐for‐practice perspective is hardly mentioned or assessed.     

Video production as a tool for raising educator awareness about collaborative teacher–parent partnerships

Background:?This article describes research undertaken with teachers working in a South African township school, where parental involvement is a persistent problematic issue.

Purpose:?The purpose of the study was to explore the use of video production as a tool for assisting teachers to explore their perceptions about parental involvement in education and how these perceptions impact on their relationships with parents.

Sample:?Nine teachers participated voluntarily in the study, seven from two different primary schools and two from the high school in the township. All the teachers were isiXhosa speaking and had grown up in communities similar to the one in which the school was situated.

Design and methods:?Following a participatory research approach, we guided the participating teachers to design and produce short videos about issues that they perceived to impact negatively on their teaching and learning. We then facilitated critical reflection on these videos, specifically exploring how they had portrayed the teacher–parent relationship in each case.

Results:?Through a content analysis of a structured focus group and their written responses to questions, we identified emergent themes that made it apparent that the participating teachers viewed parents in a negative light, indicating a lack of the respect that would be required for the formation and sustainment of co-operative relationships. These themes were then used to facilitate discussion to raise teacher awareness of how the teachers' perceptions of parents could hinder meaningful parental involvement.

Conclusion:?The article offers an example of how visual methodologies can be useful tools for beginning to raise teacher awareness around issues, as a precursor to helping teachers to take action to improve a given situation.     

“I had no idea”: Developing dispositional awareness and sensitivity through a cross-professional pedagogy

This research scrutinized the diffusion of a medical education pedagogy to the context of teacher education. Specifically, it focused on the use of standardized parents as an emerging pedagogy in teacher education. Preservice teachers taking part in a six case, fifteen-week intervention showed advances in multicultural awareness and ethical sensitivity as they engaged in multiple simulated parent–teacher conferences. Implications center on the use of this pedagogy within teacher education contexts to further advance the professional dispositions of teachers as they prepare to teach in diverse scholastic environments schools.     

Teacher perception of ethnic and linguistic minority parental involvement and its relationships to children's language and literacy learning: A case study

A year-long ethnographic study conducted in a British multiethnic primary school examined the influence of teacher perception of Pakistani ESL parent involvement and interest in their children's education on teacher expectation of Pakistani ESL children's language and literacy achievement. Results revealed that the ESL parents were very interested in their children's learning. They demonstrated their interest in their children's education in a culturally different way than middle class parents which was misinterpreted by the teachers as lack of interest. Consequently, the children's learning and achievement was frequently underestimated. Several implications for teacher practice are discussed.     

The anatomy of accountability

This discussion reconsiders issues of educational accountability. To do so, I report on a qualitative case study of a public elementary school that identified how a model of educational accountability threatened to punish educators through a sophisticated network of surveillance. Data indicated that district personnel used standardized tests to monitor teachers in attempts to coerce them into accepting normalizing judgments of their practice. The study also described the surveillance within the school, including strategies by curriculum developers, reading facilitators, parents, and the principal to monitor teachers’ work. The analysis examined the effects surveillance had on participants and described the ways teachers amplified the effects of surveillance in the school. The analysis rethinks such punitive accountability practices and suggests replacing them with opportunities for teacher education and teacher learning.     

Parents’ and teachers’ beliefs about children’s school readiness in a high-need community

This study compared the beliefs of preschool teachers, kindergarten teachers, and parents in one mostly Hispanic and Black high-need urban school district to learn their views of what children should know and be able to do at kindergarten entry. Beliefs regarding the importance of 12 school readiness “resources” were assessed with the CARES survey designed for this study. Parents held remarkably similar beliefs, regardless of ethnicity or education. Parents and teachers also agreed that children must be healthy and socially competent, and be able to comply with teacher authority, although parents rated this latter resource higher. However, parents rated all classroom-related readiness resources as more important than teachers did. They believed it was necessary for a child to be able to communicate in English and to have basic knowledge and skills, which was more important than a child’s approach to learning. Preschool teachers also believed that knowledge was more important than kindergarten teachers did. Directions for further research and implications for policy and practice are discussed.     

To Involve Parents in the Assessment of the Child in Parent–Teacher Conferences: A Case Study

This article explores the face-to-face interactions between parents and teachers in parent–teacher conferences in the Swedish preschool. The article highlights how the preschool teacher introduces the conference by using a specific artifact, so-called “strength cards” with words relating to characteristic behaviour and qualities. The theoretical framework is adopted from research of institutional talk and discourse analysis. The empirical material consists of two cases included in a larger study of parent–teacher conferences. The analysis reveals that the talk not only focuses on the assessment of the individual child but also is directed at the cards, the procedure, and the importance of parents being active and involved in learning the procedure. In addition, the cards are used by the teacher as a tool that governs parents towards becoming ‘good enough preschool parents’ who are cooperative and able to categorise and label their own children, that is, follow the institutional discourse. The analysis also shows that parents take control in order to overcome institutional barriers to parents’ involvement.     

The note of discord: Examining educational perspectives between teachers and Korean parents in the U. S.

This study examined and compared the educational perspectives of Korean parents of elementary school students and their teachers. 430 parents and 143 teachers in the New York metropolitan area participated in the survey and 16 teachers, administrators, and parents were interviewed. The findings indicated that the teachers not only misunderstood the parents' perspectives on the goals of schooling, but also underestimated the parents' ways of supporting their children's education. Regarding the current school/teacher practices, the two groups also expressed different perspectives. We discussed the urgency of educators' critical reflection on diverse cultures and the considerations for increasing parents' school involvement.     

Comparing teaching practices,teacher content knowledge and pay in Punjab

This study utilises a unique school based survey of public, private and Public Partnership Programme (PPP) schools in Punjab, Pakistan to identify the correlates of: teacher behaviour in the classroom, teacher content knowledge mastery, and teacher pay. The study finds that private school teachers are associated with lower classroom observation scores than public school teachers, and both private and PPP school teachers are less likely to exhibit content knowledge mastery in Urdu than public school teachers (however, this is not the case for math and English). Public school teachers recruited after the introduction of test-based teacher recruitment are 30 percentage points more likely to demonstrate math content knowledge mastery than teachers recruited prior to test-based recruitment. The study also finds evidence of a pay gap between male and female teachers in both public and PPP schools after controlling for other characteristics. Teachers’ math content knowledge scores were found to be statistically significant correlates of teacher pay for private school teachers, but not for PPP or public school teachers. For female PPP school teachers, having higher academic qualifications is associated with higher wages however, this is not the case for male teachers in these schools.     

From attitudes to practice: utilising inclusive teaching strategies in Kenyan primary schools

The purpose of this paper is to provide evidence of Kenyan primary school teachers using inclusive teaching strategies in a rural setting with many known barriers to the development of a sustainable inclusive education system. This qualitative study examines teachers’ uses of inclusive teaching strategies in primary schools following a series of teacher trainings, classroom observations, individual semi-structured teacher conferences, reflective lesson plans, and pre- and post-questionnaires. Moving beyond legal mandates and attitudinal assessments, the outcomes of this study demonstrate that in a short time, and among a small sample of teachers, administrators, and Ministry officials, a culturally responsive approach to implementing inclusive learning strategies proved beneficial for meeting the needs of diverse primary school students in western Kenya.     

Understanding silence: an investigation of the processes of silencing in parent–teacher conferences with Somali diaspora parents in Danish public schools

This article questions the dominant understanding that immigrant and refugee parents in parent–teacher conferences are silent because they come from a culture where one does not question the authority of the teacher. Instead, it is argued that they become silent through certain interactional processes. Building on material from an explorative case study of the home–school relations of Somali diaspora families in Danish public schools, the article argues that while these parents have many opinions about their children’s education that they wish to convey, there are institutional and interactional processes in the parent–teacher conference that systematically silence their voices. The understanding of culture as a stable structure that persons are situated within in a top-down manner is thus challenged, arguing that dynamic here-and-now interactions unfolding in a specific practice result in persons becoming, rather than being, silent.     

Teacher Mobility: Looking More Closely at "The Movers" Within a State System

This article summarizes the results of a 2-part study using both state databases and teacher surveys to examine teacher retention and mobility in Washington's teacher workforce. The first part of the research examined individual teacher records during a 5-year period. Statewide analyses were conducted, and 20 districts were selected for in-depth examination. Data were examined in relation to student demographics, measures of student learning, and poverty level of the school, with special attention given to novice teachers and teachers of color. The second part of the study surveyed a representative sample of teachers regarding their views on factors that influence their decisions to stay or leave their school or school district. Findings suggest that focusing on the nature of teacher mobility within a district is a useful way to examine a number of equity concerns.     

PARENT‐TEACHER COMMUNICATION ABOUT CHILDREN WITH AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER: AN EXAMINATION OF COLLABORATIVE PROBLEM‐SOLVING

Effective parent‐teacher communication involves problem‐solving concerns about students. Few studies have examined problem‐solving interactions between parents and teachers of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), with a particular focus on identifying communication barriers and strategies for improving them. This study examined the problem‐solving behaviors of parents and teachers of children with ASD. Participants were 18 teachers and 39 parents of children with ASD. Parent‐teacher dyads were prompted to discuss and provide a solution for a problem that a student experienced at home and at school. Parents and teachers also reported on their problem‐solving behaviors. Results showed that parents and teachers displayed limited use of the core elements of problem‐solving. Teachers displayed more problem‐solving behaviors than parents. Both groups reported engaging in more problem‐solving behaviors than they were observed to display during their discussions. Our findings suggest that teacher and parent training programs should include collaborative approaches to problem‐solving.     

The activities of a school‐based teacher educator: a theoretical and empirical exploration

Teacher education all over Europe is increasingly becoming school‐based oriented. This implies new roles for those who support student teachers learning in school. This article describes the way four school‐based teacher educators fulfill their role as educators of student teachers who learn how to teach while participating in the workplace. Based on theoretical notions derived from the literature on teacher education and workplace learning, the Cognitive Apprenticeship Model was specified and used in a case study as a framework to describe the activity of these school‐based teacher educators. They use tools (e.g., apprenticeship assignments) developed within the teacher education institute and rely on their professional knowledge as experienced schoolteachers. This results in student teachers being provided with useful tricks which, however, hardly helps them to interpret and elaborate their experiences from a more conceptual or theoretical perspective. Also the possibilities of the social context of the school as a learning environment are not systematically used.     

Representation and safe space: conflicting discourses in RE teacher education supervision

ABSTRACT

This article explores supervision conferences in RE teacher education in Sweden. Two discourses that are often articulated in supervision conferences are ‘representation’ and ‘safe space’. These are investigated and presented as necessary components for becoming a competent teacher of upper secondary school RE in Sweden. The empirical material consists of observations of six RE supervision trialogues and interviews with the participants – student teachers, upper secondary school supervisors and university-based teacher educators. Based on the analysis of the empirical material, representation and safe space emerge as essential ‘RE teacher knowledge’. Furthermore, the antagonism between representation and safe space that emerges in the supervision trialogues is explored and highlighted. By way of conclusion, the presented discursive struggle is reflected on as a battle over power within the supervision triad.