The roles of special educators and classroom teachers in an inclusive school

The research examined one school's attempts to include and integrate deaf and hard-of-hearing children. Interviews with teachers and observations of classrooms over a 3-year period revealed the critical roles played by the special educators and the classroom teachers. The responsibilities of the special educators, the adaptations and accommodation made by the classroom teachers, issues regarding ownership and attitude of the classroom teachers, perceptions of the special educator role, and specific areas of concern expressed by the special educators and classroom teachers are described.     

探析翻转课堂模式下教师角色的转变

翻转课堂的优势在于改变传统课堂单向灌输的方式,增加师生互动、生生互动,实现学生个性化学习、教师差异化教学,改变教师教学理念和学生学习理念。翻转课堂中教师角色的转变为信息技术的应用者,自主学习的促进者,合作学习的指导者,分层次教学的规划者。     

Traditional and flipped classroom approaches delivered by two different teachers: the student perspective

The aim of this investigation was for students to express their views on teaching approaches delivered by two teachers under the perspectives of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) development, their preferences on learning material and learning activities. First year psychology students followed both the traditional and a flipped classroom approach delivered by two different teachers. One teacher introduced them to social and the other to clinical psychology. 81 students evaluated their experience on social psychology and 119 students on clinical psychology. Although all students had similar preferences on following either the traditional or the flipped classroom approach in both subject domains, a significant difference in students’ views related to the teachers’ contribution to teaching approach, students’ HOTS development and the choice of learning material was observed. This investigation concluded the importance of the intricate relationship between the choice of learning material and activities, and the teacher’s contribution to the flipped classroom approach and their expectation/behaviour toward technology.     

Towards an understanding of dynamics among teachers,teacher leaders,and administrators in a teacher-led school reform

A substantial amount of professional development and implementation has moved towards teachers and teacher leaders in recent years. Previous works have examined how teachers, teacher leaders, or administrators perceive teacher leadership in school reforms, but few have advanced all three perspectives simultaneously. Drawing upon over 200 interviews, we examine how leadership is distributed and the tensions and dynamics arising among these three groups in a teacher-led school reform. Two main themes emerged from our analysis: minimizing conflicts with teachers was important to teacher leaders, and the distribution of leadership between administrators and teacher leaders changed the status and normative roles of teacher leaders.     

探索翻转课堂中的高职英语校本微课程

本文以湖北职业技术学院医学英语的基础课程建设为例,以翻转课堂模式为载体,剖析了高职英语校本微课程建设的必要性和可行性,并通过建设微课程的实证研究,探索高职英语校本微课程的设计思路和实践策略。本文希望通过真实有效的研究,为建设高职英语校本微课程提供值得借鉴的经验。     

翻转课堂在高中英语教学中的具体应用

随着社会的不断发展,教育业已经逐渐的得到了广泛的重视。对于语言的学习已经成为现阶段学生选择的流行趋势,而英语是国际通用的语言,已经在我国的教育体系中长久的进行了使用。对于高中英语的教学中,为了丰富语言文化和学生外语能力的培养,学校引进了翻转课堂的教学模式,主要是将老师作为主体的课堂学习模式转变为学生主导自己的课堂,而老师起到指导和答疑解惑的作用。本文通过对翻转课堂教学模式的介绍,提出了现阶段翻转课堂模式在英语教学中的具体应用,分别从听、说、读和写四个方面介绍,加强了该模式的实际应用价值和意义。     

Supporting primary school teachers in differentiating in the regular classroom

Many primary school teachers experience difficulties in effectively differentiating in the regular classroom. This study investigated the effect of the STIP-approach on teachers' differentiation activities and self-efficacy, and children's learning outcomes and instructional value. Teachers using the STIP-approach for their science lessons were compared to teachers using their regular programme. 16 teachers and 306 children were observed and received questionnaires at four different times. Results show that using the STIP-approach resulted in more differentiation in task, content, and process. Moreover, children of STIP-teachers who showed many types of differentiation activities learnt more than children of STIP-teachers who differentiated less.     

Performance Government: Activating and regulating the self-governing capacities of teachers and school leaders

This article analyses ‘performance government’ as an emergent form of rule in advanced liberal democracies. It discloses how teachers and school leaders in Australia are being governed by the practices of performance government which centre on the recently established Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL) and are given direction by two major strategies implicit within the exercise of this form of power: activation and regulation. Through an ‘analytics of government’ of these practices, the article unravels the new configurations of corporatized expert and academic knowledge—and their attendant methods of application—by which the self-governing capacities of teachers and school leaders are being activated and regulated in ways that seek to optimize the performance of these professionals. The article concludes by outlining some of the dangers of performance government for the professional freedom of educators and school leaders.     

Exploring the role of university students’ online self-regulated learning in the flipped classroom: a structural equation model

ABSTRACT

The flipped classroom has gained a great deal of attention in educational research and practice in recent years. The purposes of this study are to understand the relationship between students’ online self-regulated learning (SRL) and their perceptions of learning in a flipped classrooms (FC), to identify possible mediators in this relationship, and to explain how this relationship predicts students’ intentions to participate in an FC. Two questionnaires were used to gather data from 576 undergraduate or graduate students in Taiwan. The structural equation model showed that students’ in-class interactions and online SRL are predictors of their perceived quality of usefulness of online learning activities and positive experience of FC, and these, in turn, associate with their intentional behaviours of participating in FC. While students’ perceived value of interactions in physical classrooms directly related to their intentions to participate in FC, their online SRL predicts their intentions to participate in flipped learning only when mediated by the perceived quality of the usefulness of the online learning activities and positive experience of FC.     

翻转课堂教学模式下高校教师角色转换及其实现路径

翻转课堂作为新兴的教育理念及教学模式,为教师提供了个性化教学平台。这就要求教师合理转换角色,成为教学视频的设计者和研发者,成为学习活动的指导者、组织者和参与者,成为与时俱进的学者。这一系列的角色转换需要通过教师转变教育观念、提升自己信息技术素养、终身学习、师生之间平等对话等途径来实现。     

Exploring classroom assessment practices: the case of teachers of English as a foreign language

The research investigated the factors which underlie the perceptions and usage of alternative assessment procedures among EFL teachers in Israel. The research was conducted within the framework of an earlier model by Hargreaves and colleagues comprising four perspectives – technological, cultural, political and postmodern – to account for teachers’ assessment practices and beliefs. The sample included 113 EFL teachers who responded to a self‐report questionnaire. The model’s four perspectives were validated using a two‐stage factor analysis. Results show that the predominant factor related to the usage of alternative assessment is the technological one, followed by the cultural and postmodern perspectives. The political perspective yielded mixed results. The findings highlight the complexity of teachers’ assessment practices reflecting not merely a testing approach but a social and educational paradigm encompassing micro constraints (technological), macro influences (political), ideologies and commonly‐held beliefs (cultural) as well as evidence of critical pedagogy (postmodern).     

Performance and perception in the flipped classroom

Changes in the conceptualisation of higher education have led to instructional methods that embrace technology as a teaching medium. These changes have led to the flipped classroom phenomenon - where content is delivered outside class, through media such as video and podcast, and engagement with the content, through problem-solving and/or group work, occurs in class. Studies investigating the impact of the flipped classroom have mainly looked at the student experience with little focus on whether exam outcomes are enhanced by flipping. An undergraduate Material Technology course at The University of the West Indies was taught in two formats over two successive years. The course was taught during the 2012/13 academic year in a ‘traditional’ format but, after reflecting on student feedback and personal pedagogy, the lecturer restructured the class and taught it in a flipped format during the 2013/14 academic year. This research examines whether the flipped format improved the learning experience in relation to exam performance and student perception. Data was gathered through analysis of course grades and student evaluation questionnaires. The lecturer’s reflective comments were also reviewed before and after the study. Analysis of the qualitative data shows that the flipped format led to a slight improvement in how students perceived the course and the lecturer’s reflection shows that they are keen to continue with the flipped format as it allowed more time for them to work with students at an individual level. While no significant change in relation to average cohort exam performance was found, fewer students in the flipped classroom achieved marks at the highest level. It is therefore recommended that practitioners who intend to flip their classroom pay as much attention to student performance as they do to student perception.     

Comparing the roles and correlates of emotions in class and during online video lectures in a flipped anatomy classroom

The present study compares the structure, the longitudinal relation, and the predictive roles of emotions in-class and emotions while watching online video lectures outside of class. Participants (N = 269) reported their emotions, attentional control, and behavioral engagement associated with in-class activities and online lecture viewing at two time points in a large “flipped” undergraduate anatomy course. Overall, the longitudinal and cross-contextual relations among emotions, from emotions to learning behaviors, and from emotions to achievement were similar, whereas distinct patterns of relations were found for learning behaviors, and from learning behaviors to academic achievement. These findings are discussed within the Control-Value Theory and provide implications for supporting adaptive emotions and learning in flipped classrooms.     

Supporting the transition to secondary school: The voices of lower secondary leaders and teachers

ABSTRACT

Background: The primary-secondary transition is recognised as a challenging time for students, and poor transition processes can negatively affect the students’ development. School professionals play an important role in enhancing the students’ transition experience, but international literature calls for more research concerning their perspective on this transition.

Purpose: The aim of this study was to investigate what lower secondary school leaders and teachers in Norway emphasise when supporting the primary to lower secondary school transition.

Methods: A qualitative single case study approach was used. The participants were ten form teachers, their team leader and the principal (n = 12) within one lower secondary school. These were the individuals overseeing the transition process on behalf of a cohort of students who transferred to their school in August 2017. Data were collected through observations and focus group interviews. The data were transcribed and analysed qualitatively, inspired by the constant comparative method of analysis.

Findings and conclusion: Framed by their own experiences, the leaders and teachers emphasised ensuring predictability, establishing a safe psychosocial learning environment, giving the students time to learn to be lower secondary school students, and collaboration at the school level and with the families. These efforts are largely in line with what the research recommends. The findings indicate, however, that the teachers need more support during this process. The article concludes that a closer dialogical interaction with colleagues at the primary and secondary levels, parents and students could support the leaders and teachers to promote an even better transition.     

Human contact in the classroom: Exploring how teachers talk about and negotiate touching students

In a “risk society,” as defined by Beck [(1992). Risk society, towards a new modernity (M. Ritter, Trans.) Newbury Park, CA: Sage, see also Castel, R. (1991). From dangerousness to risk. In G. Burchell, C. Gordon & P. Miller (Eds.), The Foucault effect: Studies in governmentality (pp. 281–298). Chicago: The University of Chicago Press], teachers are risky individuals who, “must become permanent objects of their own suspicion” [Jones, A. (2003b). Touching children: Policy, social anxiety, and the ‘safe’ teacher. Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 19(2), 112]. The purpose of this study was to explore how four experienced, female teachers for whom “touching” students is a natural component of their teaching, talked about how they made choices about when and how to engage in the risky behavior of touching children. Findings are organized along two axes. The first represents how participating teachers perceived contexts as facilitating or constraining human contact. The second illustrates what conversations about human contact revealed about participants’ teaching selves. This study contributes to the literature on teacher–student relationships as well as the literature on teachers’ decision-making. Implications for future research in teacher decision-making, teacher–student relationships, and teacher education are discussed.     

Perceptions of student engagement in the flipped classroom: a case study

ABSTRACT

One of the blended learning strategies that researchers and educators commonly use in higher education is Flipped Classroom. The purpose of this case study was to explore how both professors and students perceive student engagement in flipped classrooms. Three college professors who implemented flipped classrooms and their 14 students participated in the study. Three individual faculty interviews and three student focus group interviewers were conducted. Five components of the utilization-focused evaluation model were used in the data coding. The findings revealed both positive and negative opinions depending on how they implemented the flipped classroom including the engagement of students and the environment. Faculty participants who fully implemented the flipped model had positive opinions about the implementation and student engagement, finding the model helped increase student performance and grades. In addition, the majority of student participants liked the challenges offered by the flipped classroom, which increased their engagement.     

‘Invisible’ teachers of literacy: collusion between siblings and teachers in creating classroom cultures

The promise to raise literacy standards significantly at age 11 in economically disadvantaged areas has been an important part of the present British Government's educational policy. Integral to this promise has been the introduction of official home/school ‘contracts’ or ‘agreements’, which oblige parents to engage in specific literacy activities with their children. However, evidence from a longitudinal study of family literacy practices in East London suggests that family and community members other than parents might play a crucial role in initiating young children into literacy. Siblings particularly have been found to be efficient ‘teachers’ of school literacy practices. In this paper, I investigate particularly ways in which an unspoken collusion takes place between teacher and older sibling revealed during ‘play school’ sessions in Bangladeshi British households in East London.     

Exploring the relationship between certification sources,experience levels,and classroom management orientations of classroom teachers

Teachers continue to report that classroom management is one of their greatest challenges in the classroom. Classroom management involves teacher's efforts to oversee classroom activities such as learning, social interaction, and student behavior. In this study, we examined the relationship between sources of teachers’ certification (traditional or alternative), teachers’ experience levels (experienced or novice), and teachers’ classroom management orientations (interventionist, non-interventionist, or interactionalist). We discovered that neither source of certification nor experience level alone impacts a teachers’ classroom management orientation. However, teachers with traditional certification and many years of experience exert significantly less control over classroom activities and students’ behaviors than do their colleagues with other educational and experimental backgrounds. Potential causes and ramifications of these findings are discussed.     

探究农村小学课堂教学中存在的问题及解决策略

近年来,国家教育改革在深层次展开,特别是在农村教育领域发生了很大变化,其存在的问题也逐渐凸显出来,被越来越多的人关注和研究。本文力图从农村小学课堂教学中存在的问题出发,分析其问题存在的原因,从而进一步有针对性地提出解决策略。