Ethics in classroom assessment practices: Issues and attitudes

Student evaluations should “be ethical, fair, useful, feasible, and accurate” [JCSEE (2003). The student evaluation standards. Arlen Gullickson, Chair. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin]. This study focuses on defining ethical behavior and examining educators’ ethical judgments in relation to assessment. It describes the results from a web-based survey of educators in which they read a brief scenario and indicated whether the student evaluation practice in the depiction was ethical or unethical. Results showed strong agreement among the educators on fewer than half of the scenarios presented in this study. These findings suggest that assessment is currently an educational realm without professional consensus.     

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).     

The study of classroom contexts and practices

This process-product study identified classroom contexts and teaching practices related to the mathematics achievement and enjoyment of Year 5 students in Australia. Seventy-five classes were observed 8–10 times during a term with a low-inference observation schedule. Other student and teacher background data were collected with questionnaires. Individual student data were aggregated, and the class was used as the unit of analysis. Classroom context and teaching-practice variables significantly related (at the 0.05 level) to either achievement or enjoyment were identified. For each outcome, a causal model of teaching was developed and tested using multiple linear regression and path analyses. The more effective teachers more frequently presented to large groups, engaged in small-group work incorporating teacher and peer tutoring, provided opportunities for individual practice which they actively monitored, and marked homework assignments which they varied to meet student needs.     

生物学课堂教学实效性的实践和探索

前苏联教育家巴班斯基创立的教学最优化理论指出：“教学最优化可以说是从解决教学任务的有效性和师生时间消费的合理性着眼,有科学根据地选择和实施该条件下最佳的教学方案。”这就是说,衡量教学最优化有两个标准：一是教学效果的最优化;二是时间消耗的最优化即“师生用于课堂教学和课外作业的时间不超过学校卫生学所规定的标准”,用“师生耗费合理的时间去取得这些成效。”根据这一理论上好课既要提高教学质量,使学生在德育、智育、体育诸方面获得全面发展;又要减轻负担,不搞加班加点,用合理的时间取得最大的成效。为此,就必须进行教学方法的改革,选择最优化的教学方法。     

CAI课室的教学方法与实践

本文介绍了利用CAI课室的多媒体功能进行教学的新方法。该方法对传统的计算机基础课教学进行了改进,并在教学实践中证明是行之有效的。     

Using effective teaching practices in the special education classroom

Abstract

Research on effective schooling has led to conclusions regarding classroom practices. This research has implications for special educators, who need to become familiar with it. The implications which are discussed in this article are related to the need for planning, high expectations of student performance, monitoring student progress and providing feedback, establishing classrom routines, grouping, academic learning time, personal relationships and the use of incentives and rewards. These conclusions regarding effective teaching can be used diagnostically by teachers to evaluate and improve their own performance in the classroom. In this article some conclusions based on a review of effective teaching research will be outlined and implications for the special education classroom will be discussed.     

Sustainable changes in teacher practices: a longitudinal analysis of the classroom practices of high school mathematics teachers

This study examines the effects of professional development on various aspects of teachers’ mathematics instruction. Using data collected between 2005 and 2009, we examined the extent to which the instructional practices of 49 US high school teachers who participated in content-based, sustained professional development changed over time. We found that changes in several aspects of their instructional practices followed somewhat different patterns. Teachers made statistically significant and steady changes in mathematical discourse, instructional clarity, and the development of students’ mathematical habit of mind, but not in student interactions or in the use of multiple representations.     

Codeswitching techniques: evidence-based instructional practices for the ASL/English bilingual classroom

The authors present a perspective on emerging bilingual deaf students who are exposed to, learning, and developing two languages--American Sign Language (ASL) and English (spoken English, manually coded English, and English reading and writing). The authors suggest that though deaf children may lack proficiency or fluency in either language during early language-learning development, they still engage in codeswitching activities, in which they go back and forth between signing and English to communicate. The authors then provide a second meaning of codeswitching--as a purpose-driven instructional technique in which the teacher strategically changes from ASL to English print for purposes of vocabulary and reading comprehension. The results of four studies are examined that suggest that certain codeswitching strategies support English vocabulary learning and reading comprehension. These instructional strategies are couched in a five-pronged approach to furthering the development of bilingual education for deaf students.