Designing and Evaluating the Effectiveness of Physlet-Based Learning Materials in Supporting Conceptual Learning in Secondary School Physics

Many educational researchers have investigated how best to support conceptual learning in science education. In this study, the aim was to design learning materials using Physlets, small computer simulations, and to evaluate the effectiveness of these materials in supporting conceptual learning in secondary school physics. Students were taught in two different physics courses (conditions): one group of students (n = 40) was taught using Physlet-based learning materials, and the other (n = 40) was taught using expository instruction. To evaluate the designed materials, we assessed students’ thinking skills in relation to physics after the course and analyzed the results using an independent t test, multiple regression analyses, and one-way analysis of covariance. The results showed better thinking skills among students in the experimental group and supported a clear relationship between the physics course using Physlet-based materials and this improvement (p < 0.05). These results indicate that properly designed Physlet-based materials can effectively support conceptual learning.     

From School Effectiveness and School Improvement to Effective School Improvement: Background,Theoretical Analysis,and Outline of the Empirical Study

School effectiveness and school improvement have different origins: school effectiveness is more directed to finding out “what works” in education and “why”; school improvement is practice and policy oriented and intended to change education in the desired direction. That means that in the orientation on the outcomes, input, processes, and context in education, school effectiveness and school improvement also have much in common. In the project Effective School Improvement (ESI), the merger of the 2 traditions has been pursued. In the theoretical part different orientations have been analysed and combined in a model for effective school improvement. Based on this analysis the framework is developed for the analysis of the case studies on school improvement projects in the participating countries.     

Transforming Perceptions of Urban Education: Lessons From Rowan University's Urban Teacher Academy

To be an effective urban educator requires teachers to understand the contextual factors of students, the school, and the community, and their cumulative effects on learning. Urban teacher academies support a better understanding of urban classrooms and challenge stereotypes of the urban context. The focus of this study was to compare participants' perceptions of urban settings before and after 2 weeks spent at an urban teacher academy for high school students.     

A literature review of school leadership policy reforms

This literature review aims to understand the factors that influence the adoption of school leadership policy reforms and whether there are some common trends that lead to policy changes in this area. The main question driving the study was the following: what are important reasons or contextual factors that have influenced the adoption of school leadership policy reforms? The analysis shows that there is an eclectic set of research that covers school leadership from different perspectives. Each tackle the question of school leadership reform adoption from different angles. A policy perspective associates school leadership reforms to contextual changes in relation to decentralisation, school autonomy, accountability or an increasing emphasis on education outcomes. School improvement perspectives acknowledge the key role of school leadership in education change. The research on school leadership impact has contributed to the adoption of school leadership reforms. The school leadership policy perspective shows that countries have introduced school leadership reforms, with practices varying by country and context. Some have been interpreted as a response to a new public management agenda or to the globalisation of education policies. Findings from this review indicate that whilst there is much research on school leadership, nevertheless, analysis and promotion of policies to support and strengthen school leader roles to support school improvement appears to have received less attention.     

Raising reading achievement in an ‘at risk’, low socioeconomic,multicultural intermediate school

This article focuses on a multicultural, low socioeconomic, intermediate school that over the 4 years of this longitudinal, qualitative, case study made substantial positive shifts in developing a more effective learning environment and improving students' reading achievement. The study found that the factors appearing to have the most influence on this improvement were: effective and collaborative school leadership; ongoing school‐wide professional development on teaching reading led by an externally appointed literacy expert; the appointment, within the school, of a literacy leader charged with supporting this development; assessment data being used to inform teaching and a school‐wide action plan directed at literacy improvement; the implementation of reading programmes that were regular, focused and sustained; the school leadership proactively ensuring school‐wide support for management of appropriate student behaviour; the fostering of home–school partnerships; and ongoing external reviews of school effectiveness.     

Professional learning community process in the United States: conceptualization of the process and district support for schools

Abstract

As the Professional Learning Community (PLC) process becomes embedded within schools, the level of district support has a direct impact on whether schools have the ability to re-culture and sustain highly effective collaborative practices. The purpose of this article is to share a professional learning community conceptual framework from the US, and to highlight recent findings relating to district level support for the PLC process in schools. The professional learning community conceptual model is organized around five dimensions: shared and supportive leadership, shared values and vision, collaborative learning and application, shared personal practice, and supportive conditions. The overarching question guiding this qualitative research study is: How do school district personnel (central office staff) support schools in the professional learning community process? Findings reveal the importance of transformative and proactive district involvement, and the use of transparency, trust, accountability, and autonomy in school re-culturing. It was also found that developing leadership capacity, embedding professional development, and focusing the culture on student success were critically important. As districts provide support for the PLC dimensions and themes, school leaders will have a foundation of curricular strategies, collaborative skills, and necessary resources to serve teachers and students through continuous school improvement.     

Absorptive capacity: A conceptual framework for understanding district central office learning

Globally, school systems are pressed to engage in large-scale school improvement. In the United States and other countries, school district central offices and other local governing agencies often engage with external organizations and individuals to support such educational change efforts. However, initiatives with external partners are not always productive. We draw on the idea of absorptive capacity to present a conceptual framework for understanding when and under what conditions partnerships are likely to foster district learning and support change efforts. We contend that prior knowledge, communication pathways, strategic knowledge leadership, and resources to partner are preconditions for a district central office’s absorptive capacity, and we identify the features of the external partner that likely matter for productive partnering. We argue that the relationship between district absorptive capacity and features of the partner is mediated by the nature of the interactions between district and partner, with likely consequences for organizational learning outcomes. For researchers, this framework serves as a tool for understanding how a district central office can learn from an external partner for educational improvement efforts. For school district leaders and external partners, this framework provides a structure for thinking strategically about when and under what conditions a partnership is likely to be productive.     

Improving quality and equity in schools in socially disadvantaged areas

Background: Recent effectiveness studies have investigated the relationship between two dimensions of effectiveness – namely, quality and equity. Specifically, the question of whether effective schools can also reduce the initial differences in student outcomes attributed to student background factors has been examined. In this context, the Dynamic Approach to School Improvement (DASI) makes use of theory and the research findings of effectiveness studies to try to improve school effectiveness in terms of quality and equity.

Purpose: This study aimed to examine whether the implementation of DASI in primary schools in socially disadvantaged areas in four European countries (Cyprus, England, Greece and Ireland) was able to promote student learning outcomes in mathematics and to reduce the impact of student background factors on student achievement in mathematics.

Design and methods: A sample of 72 primary schools across the four countries was randomly split into experimental and control groups. At the beginning and at the end of the school year, mathematics tests were administered to all students of Grades 4–6 (n = 5560; student ages 9–12 years). The experimental group made use of DASI. Within-country multilevel regression analyses were conducted to evaluate the impact of the intervention and search for interaction effects between the use of DASI and student background factors on final achievement.

Results: In each country, the experimental group achieved better results in mathematics than the control group. At the beginning of the intervention, the achievement gap based on socio-economic status (SES) was equally large in the experimental and the control groups. Only in the experimental group did the achievement gap based on SES become smaller. However, DASI was not found to have an effect on equity when the equity dimension was examined by focusing on the achievement gap based on either gender or ethnicity.

Conclusions: Implications of findings are drawn and the importance of measuring equity in terms of student achievement gaps based on different background factors, rather than only on SES, is emphasised. We propose the evaluation of the impact of interventions on promoting equity by the use of various criteria.     

Personal and Contextual Influences on Township School Learners’ Motivation and Self-Regulated Learning

Learners’ self-regulation, which includes motivational variables, is influenced by personal variables within learners themselves, as well as by contextual factors. A great deal of research has focused on personal variables in learners that influence their self-regulated behaviours; yet contextual influences that operate outside of formal schooling of township school learners, although generally acknowledged, remain under-researched. The research presented in this paper explored 14 secondary township school teachers’ perceptions of the factors that influence learners’ motivation to achieve academic success. A better understanding of contextual motivational factors could influence teaching and learning, as well as provide the needed support that ultimately will enhance the academic achievement of South African township school learners. Participants perceived autonomy-supportive, extrinsic motivation, schools as positive learning environments, study and job opportunities, community projects, friends and peers, poverty, and encouragement from the local community as strong sources of motivation.     

Introducing Large-Scale Innovation in Schools

Education reform initiatives tend to promise higher effectiveness in classrooms especially when emphasis is given to e-learning and digital resources. Practical changes in classroom realities or school organization, however, are lacking. A major European initiative entitled Open Discovery Space (ODS) examined the challenge of modernizing school education via a large-scale implementation of an open-scale methodology in using technology-supported innovation. The present paper describes this innovation scheme which involved schools and teachers all over Europe, embedded technology-enhanced learning into wider school environments and provided training to teachers. Our implementation scheme consisted of three phases: (1) stimulating interest, (2) incorporating the innovation into school settings and (3) accelerating the implementation of the innovation. The scheme’s impact was monitored for a school year using five indicators: leadership and vision building, ICT in the curriculum, development of ICT culture, professional development support, and school resources and infrastructure. Based on about 400 schools, our study produced four results: (1) The growth in digital maturity was substantial, even for previously high scoring schools. This was even more important for indicators such as vision and leadership” and “professional development.” (2) The evolution of networking is presented graphically, showing the gradual growth of connections achieved. (3) These communities became core nodes, involving numerous teachers in sharing educational content and experiences: One out of three registered users (36 %) has shared his/her educational resources in at least one community. (4) Satisfaction scores ranged from 76 % (offer of useful support through teacher academies) to 87 % (good environment to exchange best practices). Initiatives such as ODS add substantial value to schools on a large scale.     

Relevance of student and contextual school variables in explaining a student’s severity of violence experienced

Teachers conceptualise and interpret violent behaviour of secondary students in different ways. They also differ in their estimates of the relevance of student and contextual school variables when explaining the severity of violence experienced by students. Research can assist here by explicating the role of different types of contextual school variables. The research question is twofold: (1) Do contextual school variables, in addition to a student’s personal, family and educational variables, explain a student’s violent behaviour? (2) If so, what is the role of student composition variables compared with variables indicating the social cohesion of the school? A hypothetical model was developed in which personal, family, educational and school variables of different types simultaneously explain the severity of violence experienced by a student. The method used to test the model empirically is secondary analysis of data collected in a Dutch national survey on school safety in secondary education (N students = 78,840; N schools = 219). Severity of violence experienced is assessed by the Mokken Scale on Severity of Violence Experienced (MSSVE). Multiple regression analyses reveal that a student who is older, a young male, born in the country of residence, feels at home in another country, does not have an intact family, is not religious, is enrolled in the highest educational track and is achieving lower marks in the school subjects of language and mathematics, experiences more severe violence than other students (explained variance 3.4%). Simultaneously, different types of contextual school variables are differently relevant. Mean severity of violence experienced by students at school indicates clearly more variance (2.3%) than the combination of student composition variables (.4%). The conclusion is that the theoretical model is empirically supported, which also underlines the validity of the MSSVE. The discussion focuses on a comprehensive multilevel approach to stimulate and check improvement of social cohesion at school.     

Food for Education in Honduras: Psychosocial correlates of childhood literacy

School feeding programs in low- and middle-income countries tend to focus on school attendance and literacy. Some evidence suggests that bolstering schools as a nexus of community plays an important psychosocial function for children and families. This study examines the extent to which childhood literacy rates are associated with parents’ and teachers’ perceptions of community violence and cohesion, following participation in a large-scale school feeding program in the Department of Intibucá, Honduras. Primary school children (n = 3,147) from 176 schools completed standardized literacy tests. Scores were linked to parents’ (n = 328) and teachers’ (n = 537) responses about community cohesion and violence. Social bonding among parents was positively associated with children’s literacy. Community violence reported by teachers exerted a negative influence. The authors discuss these results in light of how vertically focused interventions such as school feeding can be integrated to account for the specific contextual factors that affect, and are affected by, the program itself.     

Innovative use of ICT in schools based on the findings in ELFE project

The European e-Learning Forum for Education (ELFE) is a project initiated by the ETUCE (European Trade Union Committee on Education). An important objective of the project has been to study good experiences with implementing the use of ICT in schools. This objective has been broken down in seven operational research questions. Three of these questions will be discussed in this article: (1) What difference does the use of ICT make in schools where ICT is intensively used for instructional/pedagogical purposes? (2) How are the students influenced by this different way of teaching as compared to the traditional classroom education, both individually and as a collective? 3) What factors influence the intensive pedagogical use of ICT? The ELFE study applied a case study approach. Three innovative schools in each of five European countries (Denmark, England, Germany, Norway and Portugal) were purposively selected. Data were collected via questionnaires, interviews, observations and school documents. The findings resulting from the ELFE schools case studies illustrate that the implementation of ICT for teaching and learning may influence the functioning of schools in a number of ways. One can also conclude that students like working with computers and that they have no ‘instrumental’ problems. A number of factors seem to influence the successful implementation of ICT at school level such as a good infrastructure, a clear vision, policy and strategy. A crucial factor is support from national, regional and local authorities, as well as from the school leadership and parents.     

Designing research to improve students’ learning: ‘industry/university’ collaborations for educating teacher-researchers

University/industry partnerships provide a vehicle for synthesizing knowledge from the fields of teachers’ professional learning, higher degree research training and research impact. This analysis outlines a conceptual framework for having a direct research impact on socio-cultural, economic and environmental learning (SEEL). The particular case that informs this analysis is called the Sydney–Ningbo Partnership, a longitudinal (10 year) program of research oriented, school engaged teacher-researcher education. ‘SEEL research impact’ provides a framework for understanding the underpinnings of the case study of the partnership which is presented here. This paper identifies how the organisation of a university/industry partnership contributes to teachers’ professional learning and HDR training so that their research impacts on students’ leaning.     

Exploring School Improvement in Hong Kong Secondary Schools

Scholars have increasingly sought to understand how the process of school improvement differs among schools operating in different school levels, conditions, and contexts. Using Rosenholtz's (1985 Rosenholtz, S. 1985. Effective schools: Interpreting the evidence. American Journal of Education, 93: 352–388. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) conception of “moving” and “stuck” schools as a framework for thinking about school improvement, this study examines the learning outcomes of 39 Hong Kong secondary schools over a 3-year period. We examine whether features of leadership and school capacity differed with respect to these learning outcomes within the sample of moving and stuck schools. This research in Hong Kong has identified several factors that appear to synergistically contribute to differences in patterns of improvement in learning across different subjects in both moving and stuck schools. These factors include resource management of principals and school capacity in terms of professional learning community; workload of teachers; alignment, coherence, and structure; and resource capacity. This study extends the research on leadership and capacity building as a means of school improvement, in the process elaborating on their impact within a non-Western society.     

International Comparisons of the Relationships among Educational Effectiveness, Evaluation and Improvement Variables: An Overview

This special issue of the Journal of Personnel Evaluation in Education presents information from five countries related to the following constructs and/or literatures: teacher effectiveness research, school effectiveness research, teacher evaluation, staff development, teacher improvement, and school improvement. This overview article presents brief summaries of five major issues that are addressed throughout the issue. A conceptual framework is introduced that presents links among the aforementioned constructs/literatures. While these links are theoretically viable, their actual existence varies widely by country, with several countries lacking many of the links. Implications of these missing links are discussed, as well as strategies for more tightly joining these literatures/constructs. Original research from each of the countries is also introduced.     

Exploring the Politics of Blame: School inspection and its contestation in New Zealand and England

This article examines how New Zealand's Education Review Office (ERO) and England's Office for Standards in Education (OFSTED) attempt to construct school failure as the clear responsibility of schools in order to gain ideological power as agents of accountability. These 'politics of blame' are contested in both settings by an alternative 'contextual' claim which seeks to take account of broader social and political constraints on schools. It is argued that whereas New Zealand academics have been distrustful of the ERO's agenda, English school effectiveness and school improvement researchers have often provided support for OFSTED's politics of blame. However this relationship represents a double-edged sword for OFSTED because some school effectiveness/school improvement researchers also partly support the contextual claim. The article concludes that the politics of blame and their contestation will continue to be important in these settings and elsewhere.     

Education Reform and Reconstruction as a Challenge to Research Genres: Reconsidering School Effectiveness Research and Inclusive Schooling

This project investigates the impact of the dynamic approach to school improvement (DASI) aiming to help schools face and reduce bullying through integrating research on bullying with educational effectiveness research (EER). A network of approximately 15 schools in each participating country (i.e., Belgium, Cyprus, England, Greece, and The Netherlands) received support to use DASI in order to improve the functioning of school factors included in the dynamic model of educational effectiveness which are associated with reduction of bullying. The Revised Olweus Bully/Victim Questionnaire was administered to students of the experimental (n = 1461) and control (n = 1535) group at the beginning and at the end of the intervention. With the use of multilevel modelling techniques, it was found that schools which made use of DASI were able to reduce bullying at a significantly higher level than the schools of the control group. Implications for the development of effective policies and practices in reducing bullying are drawn.     

The role of student characteristics in studying micro teaching–learning environments

This study explored the role of student characteristics in studying micro teaching–learning environments. The overarching hypothesis is that teachers teach differently to micro environments in their classrooms. This study is the first of a series exploring the following four questions: (1) What student profiles are identified at the beginning of a school year with respect to cognitive and motivational-affective factors? (2) How do students with different profiles perceive conditions in their learning environment? (3) To what degree do classrooms differ in the composition of student profiles? (4) What are possible consequences for examining micro teaching–learning environments? The study investigated 82 randomly selected high school science classrooms. Student characteristics were assessed at the beginning of the school year. After a video taped teaching unit, students were asked to rate the degree to which they experienced learning conditions as supportive. Latent class analysis (LCA) showed five distinct student profiles that varied along cognitive and motivational-affective dimensions. Multilevel analyses showed effects of student profiles assessed at the beginning of the school year on the students’ perception of learning conditions in a teaching unit 4 months later. To illustrate consequences for examining micro teaching–learning environments, student profiles were linked to video examples. The examples point to the special value of LCA in studying micro teaching–learning environments: they make it possible to focus on the individual student and to investigate the interplay of student characteristics and the learning environment.