Inquiry-Based Professional Development: What does it take to support teachers in learning about inquiry and nature of science?

This study examined the geologic and evolutionary subject matter and views of inquiry and nature of science (NOS) of a group of 5th–9th grade teachers, and a comparison group, before and after participating in an inquiry-based professional development (PD) experience. Project teachers participated in an intensive, week-long, resident institute where they learned about geology, evolutionary concepts, NOS, and inquiry while engaging in an authentic scientific investigation. They were also given support in how to teach these topics using an inquiry-based approach. Analyses of data indicate that project teachers showed greater gains in subject matter than comparison teachers and the relative change was significantly different statistically. Furthermore, most project teachers demonstrated a shift from less informed to more informed views of inquiry and NOS and the relative change between participant and comparison teachers was significantly different statistically. These gains are promising because they suggest that short-term and intensive PD can support teachers in enhancing their knowledge and views. Moreover, analysis of post-programme questionnaires and interviews indicated that supporting teachers in reflecting on the relationship between their former classroom teaching practice, and new knowledge acquired during PD, may be an important link in enhancing teacher knowledge and supporting change in practice. This suggests that enhanced knowledge and views may not be the only factor contributing to changing one's practice. The study points to the importance of reflection in promoting teacher change. Results from this study add insights to supporting teachers in enacting inquiry-based instruction and teaching about NOS in their classrooms.     

Student-centred learning environments: an investigation into student teachers’ instructional preferences and approaches to learning

The use of student-centred learning environments in education has increased. This study investigated student teachers’ instructional preferences for these learning environments and how these preferences are related to their approaches to learning. Participants were professional Bachelor students in teacher education. Instructional preferences and approaches to learning were measured by means of questionnaires. Results showed that most students preferred teacher direction, cooperative learning and knowledge construction, and adopted a deep approach. Moreover, significant correlations were found between approaches to learning and instructional preferences. Students adopting a deep approach preferred knowledge construction and cooperative learning, while students adopting a surface approach had a preference for teacher direction and passive learning.     

What does it look like and what can it do? Category structure influences how infants categorize

Despite a large body of research demonstrating the kinds of categories to which infants respond, few studies have directly assessed how infants' categorization unfolds over time. Four experiments used a visual familiarization task to evaluate 10-month-old infants' (N = 98) learning of exemplars characterized by commonalities in appearance or function. When learning exemplars with a common function, infants initially responded to the common feature, apparently forming a category, and only learned the individual features with more extensive familiarization. When learning exemplars with a common appearance, infants initially learned the individual features and apparently only formed a category with more extensive familiarization. The results are discussed in terms of models of category learning.     

Inter-generational learning of teachers: what and how do teachers learn from older and younger colleagues?

This paper examines how and what teachers learn from their older and younger colleagues. Data were gathered from interviews and written reports from 27 Belgian and Finnish teachers. Thematic qualitative analysis was used. The results revealed differences in what teachers learn from older and younger colleagues. Teachers reported learning innovative teaching methods and ICT skills from younger colleagues, whereas practical information, classroom management skills, self-regulation and community building were learned mainly from older colleagues. Attitudes regarding teaching and different ways of being a teacher were learned from both younger and older colleagues alike. Similarities were also found in how teachers learned from their older and younger colleagues. Informal activities and relationships, different forms of mentoring, and working in subject teams or seminars were important sources of learning. An intergenerational learning perspective is important with respect to demographic changes in school staff and in preventing knowledge loss and teacher dropout.     

New medical technology: to what does it lead?

In this paper I first discuss the concept of medical technology. (I thank Knut Arnesen, Arvid Fennefoss, and Aslaug H?ye for many informative and educational conversations about problems pertaining to technology). Then, I review some different meanings of the term, and then discuss the relationship between ethics and the scientific method. Finally, the understanding that emerges from this account is applied to a special problem: the relationship between technology and deafness.     

The ‘truth’ of academic development: how did it get to be about ‘teaching and learning’?

The nature of academic development in contemporary universities has been a recent focus in the literature. Highlighting the diversity of practices that exist under its name, ‘academic development’ has been described by some as an ambiguous project and a fragmented field, while others suggest a more coherent project, pointing out a near universal concern with, in particular, teaching and learning. Through an exploration of the practices of the first academic developers in New Zealand, and a consideration of the particular institutions in which they were operating, this article draws on the work of Foucault to consider the modalities of power that were available to them. This exploration is used as a basis from which to consider the systems of truth that began to emerge as a result of the early appointees' practice, in particular their original and enduring concern with teaching and learning as objects of knowledge.     

Prospective elementary teachers’ aesthetic experience and relationships to mathematics

Previous research has adopted various approaches to examining teachers’ and students’ relationships to mathematics. The current study extended this line of research and investigated six prospective elementary school teachers’ experiences in mathematics and how they saw themselves as learners of mathematics. One-on-one interviews with the participants were conducted, and their written reflections were collected. A grounded-theory approach and a framework for analyzing mathematics identities were adopted in data analysis. The findings showed that the participants’ development of obligations-to-oneself was associated with not only their opportunity to exercise conceptual agency but also their aesthetic experience with mathematics. Their views on themselves as learners of mathematics had cognitive, affective, and aesthetic dimensions. The findings suggest that teachers and students can engage in a reflection on their aesthetic involvement in doing mathematics. There is a need for a local theory of aesthetics in K-12 mathematics.     

Argument in Reading: what does it involve and how can students become better critical readers?

ABSTRACT

One of the biggest problems in Higher Education, but one which is often not fully recognised by either students or teachers until some way into academic courses, is the problem of reading, perhaps because reading in itself is not assessed. However, the results or output from reading are assessed. Students are often overwhelmed by the quantity of reading required and fail to adequately exploit or benefit from their reading efforts when they themselves write or give presentations. Tutors complain about the lack of critical argument in much student work. This paper takes argument in reading as a central touchstone to academic study, discusses some views of the source of the difficulty and makes some suggestions which have proved to be helpful.     

Veteran teachers’ identity: what does the research literature tell us?

This paper provides an overview of research on veteran teachers and teacher identity. It analyses issues at the personal, situated and professional levels that have been shown to impact on veteran teachers’ identities. The search included empirical studies published in peer-reviewed journals between 2005 and 2016. In total, 19 papers were analysed. Findings revealed that many studies focused on veteran teachers’ resilience. Issues concerning veteran teachers’ identities are key to understanding why they remain in the profession and are able to sustain their motivation and commitment over time. Many veteran teachers portrayed in the literature built on their confidence regarding their professional competence and relied on internal and external issues to maintain their motivation and commitment to teaching. The role of emotions in the transformation of veteran teachers’ identities and the permeable boundaries of the personal, situated and professional scenarios influencing veteran teachers’ identities are highlighted in the paper.     

Teachers’ use of learning progression-based formative assessment to inform teachers’ instructional adjustment: a case study of two physics teachers’ instruction

ABSTRACT

To explore the affordances of learning progressions (LP) in support of teachers’ formal and informal formative assessment (FFA and IFA) practices, we conducted a case study with a fine-grain-sized energy LP. The study first theorises an LP-based formative assessment model, which proposes the use of LPs in clarifying learning objectives, eliciting and interpreting students’ understanding, and acting in instruction. Then, we examine multiple iterations of two high-school teachers’ lesson plans and their enactment of the lessons to identify the instructional adjustments teachers made as part of the LP-based FFA and IFA after professional training. We found that both teachers refined the learning objectives and activities and most of their adjustments promoted students’ learning progression; their adjustments have an interdependency between objectives and activities. Both made more adjustments in the IFA than in the FFA, but the alignment with the LP was higher in FFA than in IFA. Contrary to the researchers’ expectations, both teachers perceived the LP as a content structure. However, in practice, both employed it as a reference to interpret students’ responses by comparing these responses against their own expectations. The teachers also reported collecting assessment information during teacher-student interactive activities and using this material to infer the level of students’ understanding in order to decide on the next instructional activities. Both teachers reported that the process of directly engaging with the LP formatively resulted in their having a much more nuanced sense of students’ understanding when they revisited and altered the sequence of the learning activities.     

Student teachers’ and in-service teachers’ peer learning: a realist synthesis

The aim of this review in the form of a realist synthesis is to understand what makes peer (student) teacher learning activities effective. Three types of peer learning were explored: collaborative, coaching, and assessment activities. Hypotheses were developed and tested against a set of 63 studies. These hypotheses indicated what mechanisms (i.e., characteristics of the activities) would influence the effectiveness of the activities and which contexts (i.e., factors) influenced this process. Findings showed that activities wherein participants gain subject matter and pedagogical content knowledge and apply this into practice made such learning effective. Peer learning is also reinforced by facilitators, reflection, and feedback, and influenced by personal and interpersonal factors. The main contribution of this realist synthesis is the practical implications for developers of peer learning activities, for school leaders and teacher educators, and for (student) teachers.     

Conceptual knowledge in talk and text: What does it take to understand a science question?

What is referred to as conceptual knowledge is one of the mostimportant deliverables of modern schooling. Following the dominance of cognitive paradigmsin psychological research, conceptual knowledge is generally construed assomething that lies behind or under performance in concrete social activities. In the presentstudy, students' responses to questions, supposedly tapping conceptual knowledge,have been studied as parts of concrete communicative practices. Our focus has been onthe differences between talk and text. The most frequent approach for generatinginsight into conceptual knowledge is by means of written tests. However, the very mannerin which people handle the demands of this particular form of mediation is seldomattended to. This problem has been studied by means of two items taken from theinternational comparison of knowledge and achievement in mathematics and science, TIMSS.The results reveal that it is highly doubtful if the items test knowledge of scienceconcepts to any significant extent. In both instances, the difficulties students have, asrevealed in the interview setting, seem to be grounded in problems in understanding somedetails in the written questions. These difficulties are generally easily resolved in aninteractive setting. It is argued that the low performance on these items can to a largeextent be accounted for by the abstract and highly demanding form of communication that iswritten language.     

Why change to active learning? Pre-service and in-service science teachers’ perceptions

This article explores pre-service and in-service science teachers’ perceptions on active learning, and examines the effectiveness of active learning by pre-service science teachers in the Irish second level classroom through a two-phase study. In the first phase, data on perceptions were gathered from final year pre-service teachers and in-service teachers in Irish post-primary schools. In the second phase, pre-service science teachers, working with teacher educators, designed a comparative test for students in lower secondary science classrooms. This tested achievement differences for students taught in traditional ways and students taught using active learning approaches. While the test results show a significant difference between traditional teaching and active learning, overall analysis indicates that the majority of teachers in the study were not convinced of the value of this way of teaching. The findings have implications for science teaching and the enactment of curriculum reform measures in compulsory education.     

Assessment for learning: Why assessment does not always support student teachers’ learning

Numerous studies have dealt with the importance of assessment for learning (AfL) in higher education, arguing that AfL helps to promote students’ learning and supports them in becoming self-directed learners. The majority of the recent literature focuses mainly on the role of individual aspects of AfL. Less attention has been paid to the interrelation of different aspects of AfL. The current study argues that AfL combines authentic assessment tasks given to students, feedback from teacher educators, peer assessment and self-assessment. The aim of the current study is to understand student teachers’ experiences of AfL practices in higher education, focusing on the reasons why student teachers do not always find the practices supportive. The study conducted semi-structured interviews with 20 student teachers and analysed them using an inductive content analysis method. The findings indicate that student teachers have had some experiences with individual aspects of AfL. A critical finding is that, when teacher educators continually dominate in the assessment process, summative assessment remains the principal way of assessing student teachers, thus hindering the supportive role of other AfL practices. The current study also finds that learning in higher education is still quite grade-centred, which affects student teachers’ learning.     

Australia’s supervising teachers: motivators and challenges to inform professional learning

This paper offers an overview of what motivates and challenges Australian supervising teachers to work with preservice teachers in their classrooms. In the contemporary Australian context of new National Professional Standards for Teachers, a new national curriculum and new standards for Initial Teacher Education programs, what motivates and challenges supervising teachers becomes a focus for professional learning through analysis presented in this paper. Data are reported from a national data set that includes 314 responding supervising teachers who took the Mentoring Perspectives Inventory from 2012–2014. The MPI data are aggregated in this paper to suggest that the wider system of teacher education could benefit from attention at various levels of interest to develop the underlying knowledge base of supervising teachers and our understanding of how they are challenged and motivated in their work with preservice teachers.     

Making learning last: teachers’ long-term retention of improved nature of science conceptions and instructional rationales

ABSTRACT

Despite successful attempts to improve learners’ nature of science (NOS) conceptions through explicit, reflective approaches, retention of improved conceptions is rarely addressed in research. The issue of context for NOS instruction has implications for this retention. Whether to contextualise has been the question occupying science educators’ attention. We think this question is misplaced. Instead, we build upon recent research addressing a context continuum – drawing on the strengths of both contextualised and noncontextualised NOS instruction – to improve retention. Although there are many different potential contexts for NOS instruction, this investigation focuses on science content as context. The present investigation focused on long-term retention of improved NOS conceptions and rationales for NOS instruction. Participants were all 25 teachers who completed a professional development programme (PDP) utilising a mixed contextualisation approach to NOS instruction. We classified teachers’ NOS conceptions into three levels of understanding using the Views of the Nature of Science Form-C responses and interviews three times over the year: pre-, post-, and 10-month delayed post-PDP. Results indicated that initially participants held many alternative NOS conceptions. Post-instruction, responses were substantially improved across all NOS concepts. Furthermore, nearly all of the participants’ conceptions were retained across the academic year following the PDP. Participants offered varied rationales for NOS instruction including its potential to improve students’ scientific literacy, perceptions of the relevance of science, improve positive risk-taking, and increase tolerance for differences. These results contrast favourably with previous reports of the retention of improvements in NOS conceptions over time.     

Prospective teachers’ teaching experience: teacher learning through the use of video

Background: Future teachers need to observe, interpret and analyse teaching during the initial teacher education period. The use of videoed teaching and learning in teacher education promotes reflection, and analysing videos of teaching is helpful in learning effective classroom practices that prospective teachers mostly do not have the chance to observe during fieldwork experiences. The analysis of videos of teaching can be seen as a way to enhance the development of prospective teachers’ professional vision, which, in turn, improves instruction. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine prospective teachers’ reflections on video examples depicting their own teaching experiences. It aimed to create a professional development environment to facilitate the prospective teachers’ reflection on their own videos and those of their peers to improve their professional vision. Sample: This study was conducted with over 200 (in 31 groups) third-year prospective mathematics teachers in a university in Western Turkey. The student teachers, receiving training to teach first- to fourth-grade elementary school pupils, were taking a teaching methods course. Design and methods: In the first week of the semester, the student teachers, working in groups, were assigned mathematics topics to teach the elementary school pupils. During the semester, each group prepared by trying out their activities in front of other student teachers in other groups. At the end of the semester, one student teacher from each group presented a short lesson related to their mathematical topic to the elementary school pupils. This lesson was videotaped, then later it was watched and discussed by the student teachers. Of the student teachers who undertook the teaching in the videos, 22 volunteers agreed to be interviewed. All groups of student teachers provided written reflections on their experience. Selected videos of the class discussions about the videos of teaching were also used for triangulation. The data were analysed to identify the issues the prospective teachers reflected upon. A content analysis technique was employed. Results: The data indicated that the prospective teachers were able to reflect on several issues related to effective teaching, connect their theoretical knowledge to their practice and consider issues related to pupil learning and difficulties. Conclusion: The findings suggested that the use of video, together with discussions between the student teachers, had the potential to create promising learning opportunities for prospective teachers.     

Reality aftershock and how to avert it: second-year teachers’ experiences of support for their professional development

Drawing on analyses of data from a large-scale, mixed-method study of new entrants to the teaching profession in England, this article presents new findings on beginner teachers’ experiences of post-induction support for their professional development, about which little was previously known. As well as highlighting positive and negative aspects of support provision, it is shown that the recognised phenomenon of ‘reality shock’ is not confined to the transition between initial teacher preparation and teachers’ first year in post, since some second-year teachers experience a new or additional shock associated with the cessation of the induction support introduced, in part, to cushion the impact of that transition. Amongst the potential implications of these findings, it is argued that where they do not already exist, formal mechanisms should be introduced to facilitate the provision of contingent support for beginner teachers’ professional development beyond their first year.