Teacher agency and professional learning in cross-cultural teaching contexts: Accounts of Chinese teachers from international schools in Hong Kong

This study examined how teacher agency shaped professional learning in cross-cultural teaching contexts. Interviews with 14 Chinese language teachers showed that teacher agency varied in different dimensions of professional learning. Social suggestions, power relations, teachers' professional and social positioning and the imposed identity and social roles in the school contexts interacted to shape teacher agency. The findings suggest both creating school cultures and structures that value and share diverse discursive and pedagogical practices and managing teachers' professional identity and self-positioning to enhance teachers' agency to engage in mutual learning and remaking of their work practices.     

Teacher perceptions of the goals of effective school reform and their own role in it

The role of the teacher in the modern school system is increasingly important and complex. A teacher needs a high level of professional knowledge and autonomous decision‐making when faced with professional challenges. The curricular reform in Slovenia has encompassed several areas of teachers’ professional activities. This paper establishes that declarative goals by themselves are not enough for successful introduction of reform, as the achievement of reform goals in practice is highly dependent on teacher perceptions and how actively they are involved in all phases of the reform. The empirical study examined how teachers understand the main aim of the reform, and how they evaluate their own level of competence in areas which have gained in importance as a result of the reform. The study included 468 primary and grammar school teachers. The results show that teachers have a fairly narrow view of the goals of the reform. The categories stressing a more active and responsible role of the learner (in line with modern models of instruction and learner‐centred paradigms of curriculum development) did not rank highly. The study also points at areas where teachers need additional training. The importance of quality teacher education at pre‐service and in‐service levels is stressed as a pillar of effective school reform.     

Integrated initial and continuing training as a way of developing the professional agency of teachers and student teachers

In this paper, we discuss training aimed at supporting the professional agency of teachers and student teachers. Drawing on socio-cultural and post-structural theories, we conceptualize professional agency as achieved by participation in professional practices. We employ our conceptualization in an analysis of a Finnish pilot training that combined initial and continuous training for preschool and primary school teachers. We argue that the practices of reflection and collective enquiry inherent in the model offer a fruitful starting point for further efforts to understand how to support the development of the professional agency of teachers and student teachers simultaneously.     

Professional development design: Embedding educational reform in New Zealand

Teacher professional development variously supports ongoing skill development, new knowledge, and systems change. In New Zealand, the implementation of major assessment reforms in senior secondary schools provided opportunity to investigate teacher professional development as a function of the particular stage of an educational reform. Multi-method data sources including teacher surveys and school case studies were employed to evaluate professional development during the embedding stage of a standards-based assessment system, revealing a positive relationship between professional satisfaction and teacher involvement in setting priorities for the professional development. Other positive features were networking, personalized learning, and facilitator expertise. This research illustrates the importance of tailoring professional learning to implementation phase of an organizational change.     

Teacher commitment trends: Cases of Hong Kong teachers from 1997 to 2007

This article examines the commitment of Hong Kong teachers in the decade after the political transition in 1997, when large-scale education reforms were launched. The life history method was employed to investigate teachers’ self-appraisal of their commitment levels in their career course and factors contributing to such trends. Findings not only affirm the previous view that teacher commitment involves the interplay of personal, workplace and education systemic factors but also illuminate how these factors interplay differently to effect sustained/increased or decreased commitment. ‘Love for students’ is argued to be a crucial personal factor which counteracts unfavorable external conditions to sustain teacher commitment.     

One teacher's identity, emotions, and commitment to change: A case study into the cognitive–affective processes of a secondary school teacher in the context of reforms

This paper presents a cognitive social–psychological theoretical framework on emotions, derived from Richard Lazarus, to understand how teachers’ identity can be affected in a context of reforms. The emphasis of this approach is on the cognitive–affective processes of individual teachers, enabling us to gain a detailed understanding of what teachers have at stake or what their personal, moral, and social concerns are. To illustrate the usefulness of this approach, a case of a reform-enthusiast Dutch secondary school teacher of Dutch language and literature is presented. The analysis of his emotions of enthusiasm for the reforms, and his emotions of anxiety, anger, guilt, and shame related to the way the reforms unfold in his school and influence his work, show the many ways his identity and concerns are affected, resulting in a loss of reform enthusiasm. The paper ends with a reflection on the possible risks of current educational policies to the commitment and quality of the current and next generation of teachers.     

教师专业发展背景下信息技术教师专业认同初探

由于特殊的文化背景和复杂的学校环境,信息技术教师的专业发展现状仍然不容乐观。而专业认同作为信息技术教师专业发展的内源性动力,有着极为重要的意义。现实中,影响信息技术教师专业认同危机的主要因素可以从外部因素和内部因素两方面来考察,我们可以通过改善学校环境、重视职前教育、促进教师的反思等途径增强信息技术教师的专业认同感,促进信息技术教师专业发展。     

Teacher agency,positioning, and English language learners: Voices of pre-service classroom teachers

This study explores the identity (re)negotiations and agency of three pre-service classroom teachers who received their ESL (English as a Second Language) endorsement at a research university in the United States. An analysis of interview data and teachers' journal entries, from a narrative positioning perspective, indicates that the teachers took on various, and sometimes conflicting, positional identities in relation to their social context (e.g., mentor teachers, ELLs, etc.). The findings further indicate that those positional identities have shaped teachers' agency and self-reported classroom practices. The analysis presented provides implications for teachers of ELLs and teacher educators.     

Teacher identity development in the first year of teacher education: A developmental and social psychological perspective

The present study examined the development of teacher identity in a cohort of first year student teachers from a developmental and social psychological perspective, relying on Erikson's (1964) theory of identity development and Turner, Oakes, Haslam, and McGarty's (1994) self-categorization theory. As hypothesized, aspects of both personal identity development and social identity were significantly associated with higher teacher identity after controlling for several covariates. The findings have several implications for teacher education programs and point to the potential utility of applying well-researched psychological theory when examining the processes by which student teachers develop a professional teaching identity.     

The relevance of identity style and professional identity to academic commitment and academic achievement in a higher education setting

Student retention remains an ongoing concern for higher education institutions worldwide. In the present study, we examine the predictive utility of identity styles, professional identity and academic commitment to academic achievement. We asked 120 second-year students in the profession of engineering in an augmented degree programme to complete the Identity Styles Inventory, the Engineering Identity Factors Inventory and the Academic Commitment Scale. We found that a normative identity style predicted professional engineering identity and meaningfulness, which predicted the participants’ investments in their studies. Additionally, a diffuse-avoidant identity style negatively predicted professional identity, meaningfulness and satisfaction, which provides empirical evidence of the contribution of identity to academic commitment. None of the variables we studied predicted academic achievement. Our findings are relevant, given current debates on access, equity and decolonisation in higher education, because it suggests that students’ sense of identity largely influences whether they feel a sense of belonging at university. Although identity styles and meaningfulness are not significant direct predictors of academic achievement, they probably do have an indirect effect on academic achievement through their direct influence on investment.     

High school identity climate and student identity development

This research investigated whether schools characterized by high school students as being rich in identity promoting features contribute to student identity development. A theoretical model posited that student perceptions of teachers as caring role models and their school as cultivating the whole student will foster student exploration and confidence about future identity development. Hypothesized mediators of these effects were student perceptions of a positive social climate, of experiencing meaningful studies and of affirmation of their agency and exploration. Participants were 2787 male and female students from the Jewish public-religious sector in Israel in 152 classes of 25 high schools. Results indicated that (a) schools with identity promoting features contribute to student identity development, (b) teachers as role models is a more potent variable than teacher caring in predicting student identity development and (c) experiencing meaningful studies is an especially important contributor to student exploration and identity confidence.     

一位中学语文特级教师的专业认同研究

文章采用个案研究的方法,探究了一位中学语文特级教师是如何建构其作为学科专家、教学专家、教育专家的认同．如何不断地往返“结构一能动”之间反思地建构其专业认同的。研究结果发现,Z老师专业认同经历了一个从被动顺服、觉醒反思到主动创造的建构、解构和重构过程。其在有为的执著与无为的洒脱之间的游走有着鲜明的时代烙印。Z老师专业认同建构的能动性不仅表现在他对自己专业知能和教育理念的提升、发展和修正,还表现在他与结构互动中在行动上的审时度势、深思熟虑和灵活性。     

Teacher agency in the Canadian context: linking the how and the what

Even though there is no common conceptual basis guiding teacher education in Canada, over the past two decades teacher educators both in Canada and around the world have called for teacher candidates to become agents of change. While researchers across Canada strive to demonstrate how to prepare pre- and in-service teachers to be agents of change, few scholars have examined in detail what teacher agency might mean in the Canadian context. This paper reviews the conceptualisation of agency from five theoretical perspectives (psychology, sociology, critical theory, historical studies, and post-structuralism) and examines how empirical studies in the Canadian contexts align with these perspectives. This paper makes explicit the connections between the how and the what of agency, and as such informs current approaches to preparing pre- and in-service teachers and their potential role as agents of change, and maps out how the notion of agency is taken up in a particular jurisdiction.     

Teacher professional leadership in support of teacher professional development

Counteracting perceptions of teaching as a profession with a flat career trajectory may require professional leadership opportunities for experienced teachers that differ substantively from those typically available. This evaluation study investigated the results of a professional development initiative for subject specialist teachers seconded to a leadership role in their curriculum areas. Interview and survey data supported teacher growth in subject expertise and leadership capacity attributed to the opportunities provided by the new teacher-leadership role. The findings of this study indicate expanded leadership roles may further develop experienced professionals while simultaneously supporting teacher knowledge during a period of embedding educational reform.     

《旅行社经营实务》课程教学模式改革

社会的快速发展,企业越来越倾向于能马上胜任企业工作的实用型毕业生,而各高校也开始更加注重培养专业知识与实践技能同时兼具的高素质大学生。《旅行社经营事务》作为旅游管理专业的主干课程之一,是学生掌握旅行社经营实践能力的关键所在。但是,当前的《旅行社经营实务》课程受到传统教学模式的束缚,根本无法充分发挥其课程价值。因此,对《旅行社经营事务》课程教学模式进行深化改革势在必行。     

新课程培训与教师成长——来自一线小学教师的心声

八年来在新课程实践中发现:面对新课程教师要想实现专业发展,需要进行不同方面、不同层面的培训。骨干教师需要进行新理念支撑下新的教学技能的培训,从而生成教育智慧;经验型教师需要得到专家在教育教学理论层面的指导,在理论支撑下提高新的教学技能;新手教师需要校内传帮带式的培训,提高教材使用、教学方法和课堂组织与管理的能力。教师自身要加强理论学习,大胆挑战自己,从而实现从教书匠向科研型教师的转变。     

教师成长档案袋对教师专业发展的促进价值

教师成长档案袋是在教师角色重新认同、课程发展以及学校管理转型等大背景下出现的新事物。教师成长档案袋对教师专业发展具有重要的促进价值:建立教师专业成长档案,有利于教师享受职业幸福感;教师本人是档案袋的主人,有助于教师专业化的反思成长;教师成长档案袋是一种实质性文档,学校能够为教师的个体专业化成长提供帮助;探讨教师成长档案袋有助于教师形成自己的教学风格,彰显教学的艺术性。     

Teacher learning in collaborative curriculum design

The Interconnected Model of Professional Growth (Clarke & Hollingsworth, 2002) was used to identify processes of teacher learning during the collaborative design of curriculum materials in the context of curriculum innovation. Nine published studies from six different countries about teachers’ collaborative curriculum design were analyzed to identify the learning processes that collaborative curriculum design fosters. It was concluded that the Interconnected Model of Professional Growth, although initially developed to recognize learning processes in individual teachers, can also be used to identify learning processes that are fostered by collaborative curriculum design in teams of teachers.     

Development and validation of Teacher Intentionality of Practice Scale (TIPS): A measure to evaluate and scaffold teacher effectiveness

Teacher evaluation instruments frequently fail to support teacher growth and improvement—particularly in critical constructs surrounding pedagogical content knowledge that promote student growth and achievement. The current study details the development and validation of the Teacher Intentionality of Practice Scale (TIPS), an observational protocol designed to measure intentional teaching practices and provide support for teacher growth over time. Findings suggest that TIPS provides a valid and highly reliable research-based teacher observational instrument that also serves as a professional development model to help scaffold the growth and improvement of K-12 educators. This paper details the theoretical foundations of TIPS, reports reliability and validity measures (including both Exploratory and Confirmatory Factor Analyses), and discusses applications and implications of TIPS for teacher evaluation and professional development.