Constructing Our Identities through a Writing Support Group: Bridging from Doctoral Students to Teacher Educator Researchers

We are recent graduates of a graduate faculty of education in a research-based university in Canada. Our aspirations to become successful teacher educators and to write our dissertations brought us together to form a writing support group. During the 2010–2011 academic year, we conducted a self-study to better understand how the support group helped us to navigate the process of writing our dissertations as well as our endeavors to become teacher educator researchers. The results of our self-study indicate the importance of a supportive writing group in developing an identity as a teacher educator, developing research and writing skills through being a critical friend, and preparing graduate students for the complex role of teacher educator.     

Using Tasks to Explore Teacher Knowledge in Situation-Specific Contexts

Research often reports an overt discrepancy between theoretically/out-of context expressed teacher beliefs about mathematics and pedagogy and actual practice. In order to explore teacher knowledge in situation-specific contexts we have engaged mathematics teachers with classroom scenarios (Tasks) which: are hypothetical but grounded on learning and teaching issues that previous research and experience have highlighted as seminal; are likely to occur in actual practice; have purpose and utility; and, can be used both in (pre- and in-service) teacher education and research through generating access to teachers’ views and intended practices. The Tasks have the following structure: reflecting upon the learning objectives within a mathematical problem (and solving it); examining a flawed (fictional) student solution; and, describing, in writing, feedback to the student. Here we draw on the written responses to one Task (which involved reflecting on solutions of $ {\left| x \right|} + {\left| {x - 1} \right|} = 0 $ ) of 53 Greek in-service mathematics teachers in order to demonstrate the range of teacher knowledge (mathematical, didactical and pedagogical) that engagement with these tasks allows us to explore.     

Assessment Practices and Students Knowledge Profiles in a Problem-based Curriculum

Learning Environments Research - Since the mid-1980s, many new terms have enriched the assessment literature, such as performance assessment, authentic assessment, direct assessment and...     

高师大学生心理健康水平与社会支持的相关研究

目的：了解高师大学生心理健康水平与社会支持的关系。方法：采用SCL—90、社会支持量表对陇东学院788名师范专业大学生进行测查、结果：高师大学生在心理问题的表现、获得社会支持的程度方面存在显著的性别差异?获得高社会支持的高师大学生心理健康水平也高；获得低社会支持的高师大学生心理健康水平也相应较低、结论：高师大学生心理健康水平与其所获得的社会支持之间存在着显著的相关关系。     

大学英语听力教学中的师生互动

目前,在大学英语教学中,听力课受到越来越广泛的重视.如何上好听力课,普遍提高学生的听能已成为主要的教学课题之一.本文拟从大学英语教学的现状,对大学英语听力教学模式作一概要的探讨.     

Using Everyday Language to Support Students in Constructing Thematic Interpretations

Research in literary response indicates that in classroom contexts, high school students have difficulty constructing thematic interpretations of literary texts, tending instead to summarize or build happiness-bound morals that ignore a text’s potentially negative tones. However, studies in out-of-school contexts show students building thematic interpretations that include positive and negative elements. These conflicting findings suggest that some challenges of thematic interpretation lie not in students’ interpretive limitations but in school-based discourses that define thematic interpretation. In this study, students constructed thematic interpretations with sentence stems using everyday interpretive language, such as “Reading this story suggests the world can be a place where _____.” With no additional instruction, experimental groups constructed more thematic interpretations and made fewer happiness-bound interpretations than a comparison group. Results suggest that students are more capable of thematic interpretation than some research indicates and that everyday interpretive language may help disrupt students’ school-based framing of thematic interpretation.     

Relationship of Online Teacher Professional Development to Seventh-Grade Teachers' and Students' Knowledge and Practices in English Language Arts

Online professional development (OPD) has potential to improve teacher quality by improving teachers' knowledge and instructional practices. These changes, in turn, have potential to improve student achievement. Unfortunately, there is a dearth of scientific research on the effects of OPD on teachers and, more importantly, on students. This article presents the results of a randomized controlled trial exploring the effects of a series of three learning-community model OPD workshops on teachers' content knowledge, teachers' instructional practices, students' content knowledge, and students' practices in the context of seventh-grade English language arts. There were statistically significant effects on teachers' vocabulary and overall English language arts content knowledge and on vocabulary and writing practices. The effect sizes of these changes ranged from small to medium. There were statistically significant effects on students' reading comprehension practices.     

The Focus of Teacher and Student Concerns in Discipline-Specific Writing by University Students

There has been considerable research into teacher feedback on student writing. Very little of this research has been done in those university classes focusing on the development of understanding of disciplinary content, especially in Australia. Furthermore, the relationship of feedback comments and assignment purposes has not been investigated for content classes. Nor is there much research on student understanding of the purposes of assignments and their expectations about the kinds of items that teachers will comment on. This study examines the interrelated aspects of the purposes of assignments, teacher feedback comments, and student perceptions and expectations. Data were collected in two university subjects. The findings show that in both subjects teachers and students broadly agreed on the purposes of the assignment. However, teacher feedback comments did not fully correspond to the purposes for the assignments, nor did feedback match students' expectations about the aspects of writing on which they predicted that their teachers might comment.     

美国数学教育改革与数学天赋学生培养的简略回顾--如何在鱼腹中发现珍珠

数学天赋教育是数学教育改革的重要分支，美国最近20多年的数学教育改革提供了关于数学天赋教育的有价值的经验，天才班并不是培养数学天赋学生的唯一选择，数学教师必须努力在一般课堂中识别数学天赋学生并开发他们的潜能；必须学会运用基本的策略来调整课堂教学以提高对天赋学生教学的能力；必须逐步建立自己的信念，调整自己的知识结构来培养数学天赋学生。     

Using Community Artifacts to Support Novice Math Teacher Educators in Teaching Prospective Teachers

Despite the centrality of math teacher educators (MTEs) in teacher education, we know little about the nature of professional learning opportunities for MTEs to develop and enhance the knowledge needed to teach prospective teachers. Existing models for supporting MTEs in developing their knowledge and practice do not address how to prepare novice MTEs in initially learning to teach prospective teachers. We present a professional learning model we have been pursuing for supporting novice MTEs and the generation of and role for community artifacts, namely lesson plans, in that model. We outline the process by which we implement, analyze, and collectively revise lesson plans so that they are continually improved over time to serve as artifacts that better instantiate what members of the local community are learning about how to support novice MTEs through identification of their problems of practice. Finally, we problematize the model we are investigating and propose implications of this model and questions raised by our work with the goal of inviting further discussion about supporting novice MTEs.

     

Using Automated Scores of Student Essays to Support Teacher Guidance in Classroom Inquiry

Computer scoring of student written essays about an inquiry topic can be used to diagnose student progress both to alert teachers to struggling students and to generate automated guidance. We identify promising ways for teachers to add value to automated guidance to improve student learning. Three teachers from two schools and their 386 students participated. We draw on evidence from student progress, observations of how teachers interact with students, and reactions of teachers. The findings suggest that alerts for teachers prompted rich teacher–student conversations about energy in photosynthesis. In one school, the combination of the automated guidance plus teacher guidance was more effective for student science learning than two rounds of personalized, automated guidance. In the other school, both approaches resulted in equal learning gains. These findings suggest optimal combinations of automated guidance and teacher guidance to support students to revise explanations during inquiry and build integrated understanding of science.     

Reconsidering the Study of Mathematics Instructional Practices: The Importance of Curricular Context in Understanding Local and Global Teacher Change

This paper discusses the case of one teacher, Jackie, whose instructional practices illuminate the importance of textbooks and student/parent expectations in shaping pedagogy. Jackie teaches in the Plainview district, which offers parents and students a choice between a reform-oriented, integrated curriculum (Core Plus) and a more conventional algebra sequence (the University of Chicago series). Each day, Jackie teaches two very different sections of accelerated eighth-grade mathematics using each of these curricular materials. Drawing from students’ survey responses, classroom observations, and teacher interview data, we show ways in which Jackie’s pedagogy differs considerably between the two courses and we shed light on reasons underlying this variation.By examining one teacher who enacts different practices in each of the two curricular contexts, this paper highlights factors that contribute to teachers’ enacted curricula – factors that have been understated in previous mathematics education research on teacher development. The study establishes the importance of distinguishing between global and local teacher change, and suggests implications for future studies of teaching and reform.     

Using Case Study Analysis and Case Writing to Structure Clinical Experiences in a Teacher Education Program

This study reports on the design and results of a two-semester study on the use of case study analysis and case writing in clinical experiences in an undergraduate teacher education program. Findings indicated that structured experiences with case studies and case writing increase preservice teachers' informed decision making on educational issues.     

The Significance of Emulation in the Oral Interaction Between Teacher and Students

The lack of attention to the role of emotions generally has led modern learning theories to neglect the importance of emulation as a pedagogical support to students’ learning. One reason could be that the influence of teacher personality is not considered in relation to learning outcome. Another reason may be that the concept of emulation has been used as a psychological conception for one‐way transmission. From a pedagogical rhetorical perspective, it is here argued that emulation and its pedagogical function is rooted in three human conditions: the biological, moral and political. The framework for this reasoning is discussed, as well as historical changes in pedagogical focus. Finally, it is concluded that the educative character of the teacher has a crucial impact on how willing students are to interact and share the teachers’ knowledge, skills and values. Therefore, there is a need for a greater awareness of these aspects to be developed among teachers.     

素质教育中的教师与学生关系及内涵

素质教育以对社会人的素质提高为内涵,它强调知识的综合化和运用知识能力的培养,应试教育的师生关系存在着单向化、功利性、间离性的弊端,与素质教育的内涵是相悖的。素质教育的师生关系强调和谐化、互动性,以全面提高人的素质,使每个学生得到全面发展为己任。要处理好师生关系中的几个关键问题,从教师职业特性出发,做好教师整体素质提升的工作,使教师会教、乐教、善教。真正在素质教育中发挥关键性的作用。     

Relationship Between Teacher Efficacy and Self-Reported Instructional Practices: An Examination of Five Asian Countries/Regions Using TIMSS 2011 Data

Teacher efficacy in a particular content area is seen as an important factor shaping teaching practice and student learning in the Western literature. However, inadequate efforts have been made to examine this assumption empirically. Drawing on the Trends of International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2011 mathematics teachers’ data at the eighth grade level, this study examines the relationship between teacher efficacy in teaching mathematics and teachers’ mathematical instructional practices in five Asian countries/regions. Guided with Bandura’s social cognitive theory, this study finds that overall teachers in the five countries/regions reported much lower teacher efficacy in teaching mathematics and lower levels of instructional practices than the international norms. The relationship between teacher efficacy and instructional practices varied within these countries/regions. Teacher efficacies in teaching mathematics are not always statistically and positively related to their instructional practices in engaging students. Together, these findings challenge the theoretical assumption about the positive relationship between teacher efficacy and instructional practices. Possible reasons of these findings and future directions are discussed.     

描述型向问题型转变：师生非言语交往研究反思

自1980年以来,我国师生非言语交往研究在借鉴国外学术成果的基础上,开展了富有特色的研究,取得了一定的成绩。文章从师生非言语交往研究的思路及方法、理论出发点、学科支撑点和内容的侧重点等四方面探讨了描述型研究的成果及其不足,认为我国师生非言语交往研究逐步在从描述型向问题型转变,我们应该以“问题取向”为中心,理清研究的思路,在不同学科的支撑下,结合多种方法进行综合研究。     

Articulation of Conceptual Knowledge and Argumentation Practices by High School Students in Evolution Problems

The oral arguments of 12th grade students while solving tasks related to evolution are examined. Two groups (N = 45), taught by the same teacher, were studied during a complete teaching sequence. The paper focuses on data from the last sessions, devoted to solving problems in small groups, problems related to different dimensions of the evolutionary model. Data include video recordings, the students’ written productions and the researcher (first author) field notes. The objective is to examine the process of articulation of students’ argumentation practices with their use of evolutionary models. The results show that participants were able to apply notions such as common ancestors, radiation, or gradualism to different contexts. The arguments required the articulation of evolution notions with argumentative practices as coordinating evidence with claims at different epistemic levels. The influence of the teacher’s strategies in the students’ role is discussed.     

大学课堂互动式教学模式探析

现行大学课堂教学中互动式教学模式存在简单化、形式化、教条化等问题,为解决这些问题,教师授课应该由单动向师生多边互动转变、引导学生由教材向学科拓展、促进课堂内互动向课堂外互动延伸、实现个体"孤军奋战"向团队合作式学习过渡.