Do We Practise What We Preach?: putting policy into practice in teacher education

There are substantial pressures for changes in teaching practice which are now clearly reflected in government policy. It is argued that these pressures have emerged from changes in the culture of technologically based societies and the resulting changes in the needs of all students in schools. The implications of recent theories of learning and new needs for learners are discussed with respect to teacher education. An attempt to change the way in which students are prepared in mathematics education is reported. Data collected as part of the study indicate the need for a system‐wide approach to change.     

The paradox of virtue: (re)thinking deviance,anorexia and schooling

In this paper we posit a radical retheorization of anorexia as a form of deviance. We examine how the disciplinary practices and moral technologies typical of contemporary secondary schooling signify and enter into the articulation of three ‘virtue discourses’ (discipline, achievement and healthism), and tease out how these ‘virtue discourses’ play into the formation of the ‘anorexic’ subject. Informed by Foucauldian theory, our analysis draws on our life history interview study with teenage girls diagnosed with anorexia nervosa and their parents. We argue that anorexia can be understood not as a form of deviance but as a ‘paradox of virtue’ involving zealous compliance with and taking up of socially and culturally sanctioned ‘virtue discourses’ that are immanent in schooling and wider society.     

The impact of a professional development model on middle school science teachers' efficacy and implementation of inquiry

This study investigated a professional development model designed to improve teachers' inquiry teaching efficacy as well as the quality of their inquiry instruction through engaging teachers in practice-teaching and reflection sessions. The programme began with a two-week summer Institute focused on both inquiry pedagogy and science content and continued with academic year support for participants' inquiry implementation. An inquiry teaching efficacy instrument was administered 3 times to 25 teacher participants to gauge changes in their personal self-efficacy and outcome expectancy across 5 essential features of classroom inquiry. To examine actual practices, pre/post classroom observations of the teachers' inquiry enactments were evaluated using a quality of inquiry observation protocol. Following the summer Institute, teachers had statistically significant increases in their self-efficacy for teaching inquiry in four of the five essential features and increases in one of the five essential features for outcome expectancy. Teachers' quality of inquiry teaching also increased after the professional development programme. We discuss implications of this PD model for moving teachers towards implementation of new instructional techniques as well as the influence of a supportive school community on teachers’ efficacy with inquiry instruction.     

Measures of instruction for creative engagement: Making metacognition,modeling and creative thinking visible

The purpose of the current study was to estimate reliability, internal consistency and construct validity of the Measure of Instruction for Creative Engagement (MICE) instrument. The MICE uses an iterative process of evidence collection and scoring through teacher observations to determine instructional domain ratings and overall scores. The results demonstrated the sound inter-observer reliability, teacher stability and score validity of the MICE. We found (a) a low proportion of rater variance (0.14–5.99%), (b) moderate to highly correlated within-teacher ratings ranging from r(17) = 0.663, p < 0.01 to r(17) = 1.000, p < 0.01 and (c) a statistically-significant difference between classroom teachers and teaching artists, t(56) = 7.37, p = 0.000. These results relate to the development of classroom environment instruments and the substantive development of pedagogy that supports creative thinking and behaviours, both of which are a priority for enhancing teacher accountability and student learning.     

A responsive evaluation of a graduate seminar

It was in the late sixties when the formal evaluation of teachers and their courses by students in their classes first became routinized at the University of Illinois at Urbana. Students and teachers alike were told that the purpose of the evaluations was to improve college teaching. The instruments were advocated on the basis of being vehicles for student expression in the higher education process and as part of the whole move towards accountability. In practice, however, the evaluations were used by department heads or chairpersons as part of the basis for decisions about salary, retention, promotion, and tenure. Thus, the need for a new approach to course evaluation, concentrating on improving instruction was recognized. This paper is an account of a course evaluation using the responsive approach.     

CBM maze-scores as indicators of reading level and growth for seventh-grade students

The technical adequacy of CBM maze-scores as indicators of reading level and growth for seventh-grade secondary-school students was examined. Participants were 452 Dutch students who completed weekly maze measures over a period of 23 weeks. Criterion measures were school level, dyslexia status, scores and growth on a standardized reading test. Results supported the technical adequacy of maze scores as indicators of reading level and growth. Alternate-form reliability coefficients were significant and intermediate to high. Mean maze scores showed significant increase over time, students’ growth trajectories differed, and students’ initial performance levels (intercepts) and growth rates (slopes) were not correlated. Maze reading level and growth were related to reading level and/or growth on criterion measures. A nonlinear model provided a better fit for the data than a linear model. Implications for use of CBM maze-scores for data-based decision-making are discussed.     

Child and adolescent abuse and subsequent victimization: a prospective study

OBJECTIVE: We investigated the possible reciprocal relationship between victimization experiences and psychological functioning by assessing abuse experiences in childhood, adolescence, and during a 2-month follow-up period. METHOD: At the beginning of the study (Time 1), abuse histories, trauma and depressive symptoms, and interpersonal functioning were assessed in 551 college women. Subsequent victimization experiences and psychological outcomes were assessed at the follow-up (Time 2). RESULTS: Path analyses indicated that verbal abuse by the mother and father were predictive of various psychological outcomes as measured at Time 1 and emerged as the only significant predictors of adolescent dating violence. Adolescent dating violence subsequently predicted the experience of dating violence during the 2-month follow-up period. Paternal physical abuse predicted adolescent sexual victimization which subsequently predicted all symptom measures at Time 1. Conversely, the experience of adolescent physical dating violence was not predictive of any of the symptom measures at Time 1. For those women who experienced dating violence during the follow-up, however, the severity of their abusive experiences was related to both depression and interpersonal problems assessed at Time 2. In comparison, for those women who experienced sexual victimization during the follow-up period, the severity of their abusive experiences was related to trauma symptoms. Interpersonal problems emerged as both an aftereffect of adolescent sexual victimization experience and a predictor of a subsequent sexual victimization experience during the follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: Given that emotional abuse emerged as a predictor of adolescent dating violence and psychological outcomes, researchers and clinicians need to continue to explore this problem. Further, it is important to assess how interpersonal problems contribute to the risk of subsequent sexual victimization and to try to break the cycle between adolescent abuse experiences and subsequent physical and sexual assaults.     

The ‘individualized’ (woman) in the academy: Ulrich Beck,gender and power

This article considers the tensions and struggles that exist between men and women and between women and women in the academic workplace. The research reported here is a small‐scale case study of 22 academic women from two generations who were interviewed about their career experiences. The theoretical framework is materialist feminism and draws on Ulrich Beck’s model of the ‘individualized individual’ to evaluate its usefulness to researchers for understanding the attitudes and actions of social actors in contemporary society. The article, firstly, examines the ways in which power differentials emerged for the younger female academics through a combination of their age and gender. It then discusses intra‐gender tensions between women in the academy. It is argued that for Beck’s model of an ‘individualized individual’ to be useful in understanding the position of women in the second modernity then a much more complex and nuanced interpretation of power and power struggles is needed than the one he provides. A further key point raised by the article is that feminists need to be more prepared to recognize and engage with power struggles and tensions that exist between women (and feminists) in the academy.