Conversations with student teachers — enhancing the dialogue of learning to teach

There is a need to hear the voices of student teachers as they grapple with the dilemmas during theor school experience brought about by their dual role as students and teachers. In this paper, the story of Roger is told and the issues raised in his story are highlighted through the contrast provided by a briefer presentation of Diane's story. The concept of personal practical knowledge and images of teaching are used to explore the perspectives of these two student teachers. The discussion focuses on differences in the dialogue in which each of the student teachers is involved. Suggestions are made that the dialogue during practice teaching should focus on self-awareness, that the process should be one of negotiation and re-construction and that a collaborative experience should be the primary aim.     

Learning to See in Classrooms: What are student teachers learning about teaching and learning while learning to teach in schools?

Using sociocultural understandings of learning, the authors probe a rationale for training programmes which are extensively school based and involved school‐based teacher mentors as supporters of student teachers' learning. They ask what it is that student teachers are learning while in schools and how that learning is supported. Drawing on evidence from a study of 125 student teachers on two training programmes, the authors suggest that student teachers' learning is heavily situated and that students are not acquiring ways of interpreting learners that are easily transferable, but they are learning about curriculum delivery. It also seems that there is a participatory version of training which is not underpinned by an understanding of the implications of learning through participation and which, as a consequence, does not make the most of the strengths of mentors.     

Feedback as an assessment for learning tool: How useful can it be?

This study investigates the feedback practices and perceptions of lecturers and students in a UK university setting. To assess how lecturers give feedback in practice, 47 pieces of lecturer-written feedback were categorised into a total of 571 analytical points. Analysing the feedback from lecturers’ perspectives in terms of the value of feedback, the role of feedback and the effectiveness of feedback helps in an understanding of the rationale for and effects of feedback provision. The results of feedback analyses from students’ perspectives show the impact of individual background and intercultural communication barriers on the effective reception of feedback. Differences were identified between students and lecturers’ views of feedback as an assessment for learning tool.     

Seeing institutionally: a rationale for ‘teach the University’ in student and staff partnerships

ABSTRACT

Students as Partners (SAP) initiatives are often framed as opportunities to reanimate university education so that students become active participants in their learning, and change agents capable of transforming their institutions. Embedded in these framings is a view that students are also the primary ‘experts’ of their learning experiences. This shift marks curious terrain about how staff come into partnership when students are encouraged to understand themselves as experts at the very same time the purpose of universities is beset with multiple and contradictory narratives, and the whole notion of expertise – even for academics – has become unsettled by the politics of a post-truth era. If the advocacy of student expertise is to be understood as a radical intervention to the marketised neoliberal university, as is often claimed, we argue that the desire for expertise has a more compelling basis when students are engaged with what Gina Hunter calls learning to ‘see institutionally’. In this article, we both describe, and put to work, Jeffrey J. Williams’s idea ‘teach the university’ as one mechanism for students and staff working in partnership to ‘see institutionally’. We then examine the nascent efforts of our own SAP initiatives to make a case for why ‘the university’ – as idea and institution – deserves to be introduced to, studied and critically interrogated by students as part of a long tradition of inquiry. While a good many SAP initiatives aim to address where students are absent, under-represented or disempowered in the university, very few appear to take seriously that there is a field of scholarship about universities that lends credibility and contest to the notion of expertise. By staging a conceptual encounter between Williams, Hunter and our own partnership work, the potential for SAP is expanded as project that cares for the future university.     

Assessing learning: How can classroom-based teachers assess students’ competencies in numeracy?

This paper examines a procedure measuring student competencies in numeracy using school-based assessments, and demonstrates how the procedure informs the school system on quality improvement. The sample consisted of 7648 students, attending three different types of urban schools including government, formal private and low cost private in poor informal settlements in Kenya. The numeracy tool measures six curriculum outcome areas. Each outcome area is defined by 2–11 measured items based on the emphasis given to an area in the curriculum. Within each of the outcome areas, items are also hypothesised to measure categories of the cognitive domain of learning. Using the Rasch, we examine the item difficulties, person location and differential item functioning. The paper provides important implications to provision of evidence to inform teaching in poor urban informal settlements in Kenya and this can also be replicated in other sub-Saharan African countries.

Abbreviations: APHRC: African Population and Health Research Center; CTT: Classical Test Theory; DIF: Differential Item Functioning; ICC: Item Characteristics Curve; INMS: Infit Mean Square; IRT: Item Response Theory; PASEC: Programme d’Analyse des Systèmes Educatifs de la Confemen/ The Programme for the Analysis of Education Systems; QUEST: The interactive test analysis system (software); RUMM: Rasch Unidimensional Measurement Models (software); SACMEQ: Southern and Eastern African Consortium for Monitoring Education Quality; SSA: Sub-Saharan Africa     

How to foster student�Cstudent learning of science? The student, the teacher and the subject matter

In this response to Konstantinos Alexakos, Jayson K. Jones, and Victor H. Rodriguez’s study, I discuss ways attending to student membership in groups can both inform research on equity and diversity in science education and improve the teaching of science to all students. My comments are organized into three sections: how underrepresented students’ experiences in science classrooms are shaped by their peers; how science teachers can help students listen to and learn from one another; and how the subject matter can invite or discourage student participation in science. More specifically, I underscore the need for teachers and students to listen to one another to promote student learning of science. I also highlight the importance of science education researchers and science teachers viewing students both as individuals and as members of multiple groups; women of color, for example, should be understood as similar to and different from each other, from European American women and from ethnic minorities in general.     

Pedagogical Content Knowledge: How do student teachers identify and describe the causes of their pupils' learning difficulties?

This study examines the pedagogical content knowledge of student teachers of biology during their teaching practice in school. The research focuses on the assessment of the teachers' ability to identify their pupils' learning difficulties and characterise their presumed sources. Diaries, kept by 40 student teachers in the course of the two stages of their teaching practice (comprising observation of their mentors in action and their own teaching experience), provided the data for a qualitative and quantitative analysis of the findings. A difference between the two stages was found only with regard to the identification of difficulties: the student teachers identified learning difficulties in most of the lessons they observed, but only in half of the lessons they taught. Their characterisation of the sources of the pupils' difficulties and their recurrence were similar during both stages. The sources of the difficulties were defined according to four categories: the pupil's cognitive and affective characteristics, the type of content, the teacher's methods, and factors inherent in the lesson. The characteristics of the pupil were considered the most frequent source of the difficulties. The study points to the need to increase the teacher educators' awareness of the important role of didactic processes, aimed at exposing the student teachers to their pupils' learning difficulties and help them deal with them effectively.     

Learning‐to‐learn and learning‐to‐teach: the impact of disciplinary subject study on student‐teachers’ professional identity

A coherent view of student‐teachers’ preparation and the learning experiences to which they are exposed are key to sustaining the relevance of university‐based teacher‐education programmes. Arguably, such coherence is lacking and the research base to an understanding of the student‐teacher experience is still a relatively limited one. This paper takes the view that student‐teachers’ epistemological growth is a key component of their professional development, their sense of identity as intending teachers, and their successful entry into a teaching career. In adopting a phenomenographic approach it explores a chain of evidence which demonstrates that immersion in the processes of learning and knowing, within a specific disciplinary context, had a significant impact on students’ emerging professional identities and on their values as teachers which extends beyond the subject matter itself. Arguably, the findings of this case‐study hold important implications for a teacher‐education programme and for effective pedagogic practice.     

From diagrams to self-regulated learning: student teachers’ reflections on the construction of their PLE

This paper presents a study on the reflections on their PLEs by student teachers in an ICT subject of the fourth degree course in Teacher Education (Early Childhood Teacher Training) at the University of the Balearic Islands (UIB). There were four student teacher groups (n = 117) participating in this project, from the three Balearic Islands’ campuses (Mallorca, Menorca and Ibiza). The main research issues focused on in this study are: the topics highlighted from the reflections on the students’ PLEs and the reflection level achieved. To explore these issues, a content analysis technique has been used to interpret their final assignment of the students’ eportfolios, in which they had to carry out their reflections on their PLEs. For that purpose, two instruments have been designed: a system of categories and a rubric of assessment. Results show that the topics on which students reflect most are the conception of the PLE, its explicitness and its purpose. Although some improvement in students’ reflective skills was observed, conclusions lead us to the necessity of working further on the depth of reflections in order to adequately support self-regulated learning.     

Writing to learn: can reflection journals be used to promote self-reflection and learning?

The purpose of the present study was to evaluate whether there is evidence of reflection in student-written journals and to investigate whether students show improvements in their reflective skills through journal keeping. To that end, the reflection journals of 3460 first-year students enrolled in a polytechnic were studied by means of an automated coding procedure. Data used in the analyses were students' journals for an entire week, collected once at the beginning and again at the end of an academic year. Outcomes of the content analyses suggest that there is evidence of reflection in students' journals and that students reflected on three general categories related to their learning: critical review of past learning experiences, cognitive learning strategies and summaries of what was learnt. Furthermore, the findings also indicate that students show improvements in their reflective skills as they progressed through the academic year. The findings when taken together suggest that reflection journals can be used to promote self-reflection and learning amongst students.     

Teachers or learning leaders?: where have all the teachers gone? gone to be leaders,everyone

This paper traces the dramatic proliferation of leadership roles in English primary and secondar schools, due mainly to central government education policy of the past two decades. This has transformed schools from relatively simple to highly complex organizations and has impacted on the working conditions of, and demands on, teachers, together with many aspects of schooling. These changes are illustrated with typical examples of schools' leadership structures and their functioning. Interview data provide teachers' views on, and reactions to, the changes in school leadership. The paper also reviews the ways in which teacher education institutions have responded in terms of providing initial and in‐service education and training to equip the profession for this new and developing challenge. It examines the reception of such programmes by teachers and the reported impact on schools' management and the role of leadership within it.     

Using embryology screencasts: A useful addition to the student learning experience?

Although podcasting has been a well used resource format in the last few years as a way of improving the student learning experience, the inclusion of enhanced audiovisual formats such as screencasts has been less used, despite the advantage that they work well for both visual and auditory learners. This study examines the use of and student reaction to a set of screencasts introduced to accompany embryology lectures within a second year module at Brighton and Sussex Medical School. Five mini-lecture screencasts and one review quiz screencast were produced as digital recordings of computer screen output with audio narration and released to students via the managed learning environment (MLE). Analysis of server log information from the MLE showed that the screencasts were accessed by many of the students in the cohort, although the exact numbers were variable depending on the screencast. Students accessed screencasts at different times of the day and over the whole of the access period, although maximum downloads were predictably recorded leading up to the written examination. Quantitative and qualitative feedback demonstrated that most students viewed the screencasts favorably in terms of usefulness to their learning, and end-of-module written examination scores suggest that the screencasts may have had a positive effect on student outcome when compared with previous student attainment. Overall, the development of a series of embryology screencasts to accompany embryology lecture sessions appears to be a useful addition to learning for most students and not simply an innovation that checks the box of \"technology engagement.\"     

Water can be messy, but that’s OK: reflections on preparing elementary teachers to teach science

Building on Christina Siry and Johaira Lara’s account of one teacher’s (Johaira’s) identity formation, we describe how our own experiences with elementary teacher candidates inform, and are informed by, this account. Chris and Johaira provide a lens that helps us consider how experiences in elementary science teacher preparation courses and in elementary classrooms impact the development of a teacher candidate’s identity as a teacher. The course taught by Chris was one in which teacher candidates encountered uncertainty and ambiguity in the teaching process. While uncertainty and ambiguity can be uncomfortable, we suggest that uncertainty and ambiguity can help teacher candidates view science teaching as a process of continuous inquiry. Concomitantly, working within a context marked by ambiguity and uncertainty can prompt teacher candidates to confront—and possibly transform—their own assumptions about students and science. We suggest that the account by Chris and Johaira illustrates the importance of providing teacher candidates with a set of experiences and theoretical tools to assist them in conceptualizing the possibilities of practice as they construct their identities as teachers.     

Postgraduate student teachers’ developing conceptions of the place of theory in learning to teach: ‘more important to me now than when I started’

Integrating theoretical knowledge within teacher education has often been portrayed as difficult, with previous studies reporting student teachers’ ambivalence, or even scepticism, about the value of research findings and theory to classroom practice. Moreover, the nature of teachers’ professional knowledge is itself uncertain and highly complex. This paper reports on the developing conceptions held by a group of postgraduate student teachers about the relationship of theory to classroom practice in learning to teach. The data are drawn from a small-scale longitudinal case study. They capture participants’ preconceptions about theory before beginning training and subsequent developments through the course and into the first teaching post. The research finds these students to be far from naïve at the outset, entering training open to a range of forms of learning, with a positive view of the potential contribution of theory to practice. Alongside a growing appreciation of the complex, situated and contested nature of theory, the data suggest that theory comes to be increasingly valued over time. As newly qualified teachers, the participants not only see theory as integral to their practice, but recognise the important, largely unanticipated, role of the university in this process. As a result of these insights, potential considerations for course design are offered, at a time when teacher education in many countries is becoming more school-based and new forms of partnership are being developed.     

The National Grid for Learning Initiative: Connecting the learning society?

This article considers what primary Subject Leaders are doing as a part of their role in schools, what their perceptions of the role are and how this relates to the TTA standards for Subject Leadership. The information presented is based on research conducted in 10 primary schools with 20 Subject Leaders. The argument is made that there is close agreement between Subject Leaders and Government agencies about the role a Subject Leader should perform. However, there is a need for greater clarity about what leadership means in this context and a need to support Subject Leaders' in their monitoring role.     

Improving engagement: the use of ‘Authentic self-and peer-assessment for learning’ to enhance the student learning experience

Innovative assessment practices have the potential to shift the way universities function. By focusing on well-designed assessment tasks, where students are expected to work collegially and are actively involved in self- and peer-assessment, the opportunity to engage students in the assessment process is realised. This article contends that students are significantly and detrimentally disengaged from the assessment process as a result of traditional assessments that do not address key issues of learning. Notable issues that arose from observations and questioning of students indicated that vast proportions of students were not proofreading their own work were not collaborating on tasks; had not been involved in the development of assessment tasks; and that students had insufficient skills in relation to their ability to evaluate their own efforts. These facts led the author to conceptualise new models of assessment focusing on authentic learning and the authentic assessment of that learning through self- and peer-assessment. Authentic assessment for sustainable learning (AASL) and Authentic self-and peer-assessment for learning (ASPAL) were trialled with approximately 300 undergraduate education students at the University of Notre Dame Australia. This article explains the conceptual development of the models and provides justification for their implementation.     

How well prepared are pre-service teachers to teach early reading? A systematic review of the literature

Abstract

This review examined studies that had addressed opinions of pre-service teachers (PSTs) concerning their preparedness for teaching early reading skills to all students, the extent of their content knowledge, and their attitudes towards code-based and/or meaning-based approaches to early reading. From the limited amount of research available, it would appear that although most PSTs were confident in their ability to teach early reading skills, they had reservations regarding their ability to teach children who struggle to learn to read. In addition, even though the majority of primary and early childhood PSTs favoured a code-based approach to teaching early reading, many lack both the necessary knowledge, and the confidence, to implement such an approach. A more comprehensive investigation across teacher training institutions is needed to confirm these findings.     

Getting to the root of the matter: pre-service teachers’ experiences and positionalities with learning to teach in culturally diverse contexts

Cultural Studies of Science Education - This study investigated the experiences of a group of pre-service secondary science teachers in learning to teach in culturally diverse contexts. The...