Providing school-based learning in elementary school mathematics: the case of a professional development school partnership

Abstract

School–university partnerships also known as professional development school (PDS) partnerships provide potential for universities and schools to establish partnerships that can benefit university faculty, school teachers, university students, and school students. This study examines the impact of a PDS partnership in which the author served as a school-based mathematics coach for two years in a high-need elementary school. Data sources included interviews, surveys, and field notes from classroom observations. Inductive qualitative analyses which were situated in a multi-level framework for researching professional development found that teachers posed more cognitively demanding mathematical tasks and high-level questions in year two compared to year one of this project. Further, student achievement was noted on both state-wide and district-created assessments. Also teachers reported that the school-based approach to professional development led to some teachers taking on more informal leadership roles to support their colleagues’ mathematics instruction. Implications for school-based learning opportunities across the world include the need to establish specific university–school partnerships, and carefully designing research studies to examine the impact of these learning opportunities.     

当代大学生发展任务的理论分析

《关于进一步加强和改进大学生思想政治教育的意见》中明确指出：＂以大学生全面发展为目标,深入进行素质教育。＂可见大学生的全面发展受到了高度的重视。本文通过对大学生发展理论的分析研究,从马克思主义人的全面发展学说出发,结合中国国情,借鉴国外相关理论,提出了大学生发展任务的模型,提出当代大学生的发展任务。明确大学生发展任务,对大学生形成健全的人格有指导作用,同时为高校开展学生工作具有参考价值。     

Effective teaching and learning strategies in outdoor education: findings from two residential programmes based in Australia

This paper aims to contribute to on-going discussion about the teaching and learning strategies used in effective outdoor education programmes. A naturalistic inquiry was conducted with two schools that participated in 28-day outdoor education programmes facilitated by the same outdoor provider in Australia. Data were collected through five semi-structured interviews with the school teachers and programme leaders and five focus groups conducted with the students. The Life Effectiveness Questionnaire was also administered to 261 students pre- and post-programme and results confirmed that the outdoor education programmes were producing desired improvements in the students’ perceptions of their general life skills. The findings of the qualitative analysis confirmed the importance of carefully sequenced activities, a facilitative teaching style, and active engagement as teaching and learning strategies. More research is needed to confirm the teaching and learning strategies that should be prioritised in the education of future outdoor education leaders.     

International school partnerships as a vehicle for global education: student perspectives

The UK government has recently demonstrated an unprecedented interest in global learning within primary and secondary schools. While the adoption and implementation of the global dimension varies, international school partnerships (ISPs) have been identified as a key vehicle for harnessing the potential of the global dimension in schools. Despite increasing global policy and practice interest in ISPs, little empirical research examines the influence of ISPs on students, teachers and leaders. Drawing on evidence nested in our 3-year research and development study of the British Council's Connecting Classrooms-Sub Saharan Africa programme, this paper examines students' own view of their international school partnership participation. We employ a multidimensional citizenship framework to frame our analysis of 694 student surveys from 66 schools across 12 countries. Based on this evidence, we argue that the influence of ISPs on global learning can be enhanced by intentionally designing partnerships to: celebrate school-based learning linked to international partners; create opportunities for students to engage in activity-based communication-driven ISP related learning; and, deliberately encourage students to discuss their partnership work with friends and family. We also make recommendations for policy and practice leaders and researchers.     

技校学生与中师学生人格特征比较研究

采用卡特尔编制的16PF问卷作为测量工具,对技校生和中师生进行调查,结果表明:技校生与中师生在聪慧性和有恒性人格特征上存在差异;二者在次级人格因素X2(内向与外向)X、3(感情用事与机警安详)和X4(怯懦与果断)上存在差异;二者在应用预测因子Y2(专业成就)、Y3(创造能力)和Y4(环境适应)上存在差异。     

教师教育的有效途径——教师发展学校

教师发展学校是借鉴美国专业发展学校的经验构建的，是大学与中小学合作、以中小学为基地建设的、促进教师专业发展的新型学校。教师发展学校的建立对于创造新型教师教育，培养新型教师，实现教师教育一体化具有重要的现实意义。     

Digital natives and digital media in the college classroom: assignment design and impacts on student learning

The use of multimodal learning techniques is becoming more widespread, however, the pedagogical discourse surrounding its implementation into classroom and course design is complicated as these technologies are either demonized or viewed as the panacea for curriculum ills. Educators are faced with unique challenges when investigating how to experiment with the best ways to produce classroom experiences that use digital media. This case study examines the implementation challenges and learning outcomes related to such an experiment by reviewing and assessing the use of digital media in a health communication course, specifically through the development of documentaries. Creating an effective assignment requires addressing the development of technical skills along with course content and providing guidance and feedback throughout a semester-long project. Creating an effective assignment is pointless without sufficient learning outcomes. Because this assignment engaged students with both the course content and digital media, their learning experiences were enhanced and improved their group collaboration, critical thinking and media literacy skills.     

Enhancing student engagement in pre-vocational and vocational education: a learning history

Interest in student engagement has increased over the past decade, which has resulted in increased knowledge about this concept and about the aspects that facilitate engagement. However, as yet, only a few studies have focused on engagement from the perspective of the teacher. In this study, we capture the experiences of teachers who were explicitly working with their teams on fostering student engagement. We used the learning history method to capture those experiences and at the same time to stimulate learning within the participating teams. A learning history includes the voices of the different participants involved in order to stimulate reflection and learning. Three teams of teachers participated in the writing of this learning history. Several teachers (n = 10), students (n = 10), and managers (n = 5) from or related to the teams were interviewed. The learning history shows that, on the one hand, teachers emphasized positive relationships and structure in relation to student engagement, yet, on the other hand, students continued to provide examples of negative relationships and mentioned a lack of structure, although they also mentioned improvements. Furthermore, the learning history showed that teachers in all teams reflected on their experiences and learned from the activities employed to foster student engagement, which included taking a more positive approach, conversations about a skills form, and being more consequent. These results taken together indicate that it is possible for teachers to do a better job of engaging their students and that their repertoire can be expanded to include more engagement-related actions. Finally, the learning history produced offers insight into the difficulties experienced by the teams. An important limitation mentioned by all teams was that teachers found it difficult to address each other’s behavior when someone did not act as agreed upon.     

科学发展观视野中的高校学籍管理建设

学籍管理信息系统的运用,对改善教务管理手段,指导教学,提高管理质量,促进教学管理的规范化、科学化和现代化等具有积极的作用。本文从科学发展观的视角阐释高校学籍管理建设,对于教育理论的丰富、人才培养以及高校教育管理的发展具有重要的理论意义和现实意义。     

关于大学生媒介素养教育的思考

媒介素养教育是指以帮助学生了解熟悉大众传播资源的内容，理解大众传媒的本质，掌握运用传媒的基本技能，学会管理自己的传媒事务和传媒生活，建立与传媒合理互动的关系为特征的教育活动。当前，开展大学生媒介素养教育具有重要的现实意义。高校开展媒介素养教育应充分利用自身的资源，加大媒体与社会机构的参与力度，加强大学生的自我学习，提高媒介素养水平。     

Restructuring a traditional student teacher supervision model: Fostering enhanced professional development and mentoring within a professional development school context

The purpose of this study was to pilot an alternative student teaching supervision model at a college of education in a US context. In the study, the collaborators used multiple paired dyads to supervise student teachers with multiple supports from college faculty. This study examined how teachers and university faculty planned the use of paired dyads and how participants responded to the innovation. The findings suggest teachers and junior faculty can undertake bottom-up reform within larger systemic constraints.     

幸福:学校教育的终极目标

学校教育是为了学生的幸福。但今天的学校教育并没有像我们想象的那样给学生幸福。学生要想得到真正的幸福要靠学生自身的努力,在学生走向幸福之路的过程中,作为教育者的成人要给予学生需要的东西,还要耐心地、充满爱心和希望地、带着教育智慧地等待。     

The nature of learning at forest school: practitioners' perspectives

This paper investigates forest school practitioners perceptions of learning at forest school to identify the topics covered, the learning styles, and the philosophies underpinning its delivery, based on interviews with experienced forest school practitioners. Practitioners identified the focus of learning at forest school as social development: teamwork, relationships with others, self-knowledge, and learning to take risks. Children also engaged with nature and developed an attachment to the woods where forest school took place. Learning styles were kinaesthetic, sensory, and experiential. Forest school leaders saw themselves as facilitators of learning rather than teachers.     

It depends on the priorities: the presence and profile of outdoor education on school websites

School websites are one way in which school leaders inform the public about their school’s vision, values, achievements and the learning opportunities on offer in a way that highlights its distinctiveness in the most positive light. If outdoor education is perceived as a valued learning context and/or helps to differentiate one school from another, it is likely that it would be reflected on a school’s website. An interpretive thematic analysis of the websites of 20% of the secondary schools in New Zealand suggested that outdoor education has a presence in schools, although the magnitude of this presence depended on the priorities school leaders wished to promote. The positive outcomes and opportunities afforded by outdoor education were portrayed to emphasize a school’s appeal. However, policy and design constraints of websites restricted teachers’ input into their content, making it somewhat challenging to gauge the relationship between the presence of outdoor education on a school website and the quality of its pedagogical practice.     

我国中小学学校与学生的法律关系浅析

学校与学生的法律关系是委托监护关系，这是学生被保护的需要，也是学校和教师职责所决定的。但是学校对学生的监护是在特定时间和空间负有部分监护职责，对学校事故民事责任的承担，学校与监护人的责任有根本不同。     

加强大学生在就业过程中的思想政治教育

大学毕业生思想政治教育是高校思想政治工作的重要组成部分.在社会转型期,随着就业方式的转变,目前大学生在就业过程中存在着不少困难和问题.高校思想政治教育在大学生就业过程中也存在着一些不足.本文从研究目前大学生就业过程中的现状入手,探索如何在就业过程中加强大学生思想政治教育工作.     

学生发展理论在学生事务管理中的应用——美国学生发展理论简介

美国大学对学生发展理论的研究有着近百年的历史。美国学生发展理论包括个体与环境、社会心理、认知和价值观和整合型理论四个基本类型。这些理论分别从社会学、心理学、生态学等角度来解释学生成长和发展规律,理论研究的重点逐步从着眼于学生发展的某一特定方面转移到学生的总体发展上。近二三十年来,由于学生群体的不断变化,美国对女性学生、同性恋学生以及其他弱势群体学生的研究逐步增加。学生发展理论深刻影响了美国的学生管理实践,为学生宿舍管理、学务咨询、心理咨询等重要的学生事务管理领域提供了理论指导。     

Transformative learning through open listening: a professional development experience with urban high school teachers

This article relates how an English teacher in an urban high school described his efforts to listen and to perceive a seemingly disaffected student in his efforts to support her learning. He observed her responding to his efforts in positive and unexpected ways that involved her increased involvement in learning in his class. This teacher described how this student had presented many challenges to his teaching and how difficult attending to her overt anger and sullenness in his class was for him. However, by doing so, he said that his perceptions and understandings of her and subsequently, another student, shifted profoundly in ways that he believed helped him help these two students learn more meaningfully in his classes. This example of open listening on the part of a teacher toward his two students opened up new possibilities for learning for all three and may indicate a cycle of transformative listening which will be defined and discussed in this article. Stuart’s experiences in a professional development seminar, facilitated by the author, where teachers’ interpretive and evaluative ideas were listened to openly by colleagues and the facilitator may have influenced Stuart in his responses to his students. His involvement in this study group may have contributed to his learning to see his students in new, unique, and fuller ways, which he said he thought helped him help these students learn better in his classes.

Dialogic processes that enable student teachers' learning about pupil learning in mentoring conversations in a Lesson Study field practice

This study investigates dialogic processes in student teachers' mentoring conversations in field practice, where Lesson Study (LS) was used as a context for establishing a dialogic learning community in one student group in science. We apply an analytical framework associated with Sociocultural Discourse Analysis to identify utterances that have the potential to create a dialogic space and contribute to ‘interthinking’ among the participants. The findings show the important role of the mentor teacher as a facilitator and a ‘knowledgeable other’, challenging the student teachers to reflect on chosen activities using predictions and detailed observations related to pupils' learning.     

Teacher development through coteaching outdoor science and environmental education across the elementary-middle school transition

Abstract

This study considers the benefits of coteaching in the context of the outdoors. It explores the use of coteaching in a professional development program and investigates all the cited outcome categories for teachers: cognitive, affective, coteaching, and professional development. Coteaching pairs coplanned, cotaught, and coevaluated “Shared Learning Days” in the outdoors. Eight teachers took part with 180 students in their last year of elementary school or their first year of (junior) high school. This article demonstrates how a model of professional development, with coteaching at its core, is beneficial for the development of teachers who are teaching “outside” their comfort zone (outdoors) and expected to focus on skills-based teaching and learning. In particular, the benefits of attitudinal change among the teachers involved is discussed.