Faculty at work: Focus on teaching

Within the framework of cognitive motivation theory, selected personal and environmental motivational variables for faculty in English, chemistry, and psychology from community colleges, comprehensive colleges and universities, and research universities were regressed against faculty allocation of work effort given to teaching. The data came from a 1988 national survey. Gender (sociodemographic); quality of graduate school attended, career age, and rank (career); self-competence, self-efficacy, institutional commitment, personal interest in teaching, and percent time preferred to give to teaching (self-valuations); and institutional preference, consensus and support, and colleague commitment to teaching (perception of the environment) were entered into regressions.R ² were generally strong (.86 for community college chemists) and significant. For all institutional types, self-valuation and perception of the environment motivators significantly accounted for the explained variance whereas sociodemographic and career variables did not.     

Mission and Diversity Statements: What They Do and Do Not Say

For this study we used institutional web sites to examine the mission statements of 80 higher education institutions for messages about diversity. Of the 80 institutions, 59 (75%) referenced diversity in their mission statements; but only 19% defined diversity in racial or ethnic terms. In addition to mission statements, 52 (or 65%) of the 80 institutions had a separate diversity statement; but only 18 of these were an official institutional statement. These treatments of diversity are interesting in light of the changing demographics of the incoming college student population and the recognized need for greater cultural development or awareness on campuses. If mission and diversity statements reflect the priorities of the institution, 35% of the institutions in the sample said nothing about diversity.     

An analysis of high impact scholarship and publication trends in blended learning

Blended learning is a diverse and expanding area of design and inquiry that combines face-to-face and online modalities. As blended learning research matures, numerous voices enter the conversation. This study begins the search for the center of this emerging area of study by finding the most cited scholarship on blended learning. Using Harzing’s Publish or Perish software (http://www.harzing.com/pop.htm), we determined the most frequently cited books, book chapters, and articles on the subject of blended learning, as well as the journals in which these highly cited articles appeared. Through these findings we offer some conclusions about where the conversations about blended learning are happening, which scholars are at the forefront of these conversations, and other emerging trends in blended learning scholarship.     

Making Generic Tutorials Content Specific: Recycling Evidence-based Practice (EBP) Tutorials for Two Disciplines

Librarians at the Boston University Medical Center constructed two interactive online tutorials, “Introduction to EBM” and “Formulating a Clinical Question (PICO),” for a Family Medicine Clerkship and then quickly repurposed the existing tutorials to support an Evidence-based Dentistry course. Adobe's ColdFusion software was used to populate the tutorials with course-specific content based on the URL used to enter each tutorial, and a MySQL database was used to collect student input. Student responses were viewable immediately by course faculty on a password-protected Web site. The tutorials ensured that all students received the same baseline training and allowed librarians to tailor a subsequent library skills workshop to student tutorial answers. The tutorials were well-received by the medical and dental schools and have been added to mandatory first-year Evidence-based Medicine (EBM) and Evidence-based Dentistry (EBD) courses, meaning that every medical and dental student at BUMC will be expected to complete these tutorials.     

An analysis of teacher questioning behaviour in constructivist primary science education using a modification of a descriptive system designed by Barnes and Todd (1977)

An analytical framework was developed (after Barnes and Todd 1977) to enable both the cognitive and social aspects of teacher questioning in constructivist primary science education to be explored. The data categorized within this framework were collected both before and after a period of questioning INSET in the forms of audio‐taped discussions between teacher and children; audio‐taped, focused interviews between teacher and researcher; and reflective written assignments. The categories used within the framework enabled distinctive individual profiles to be identified for the participating teachers, and the manner in which these profiles changed over time could be charted. The potential for developing the usefulness of this framework for future work is considered in terms of refining some categories and improving the research design. It is suggested that the framework could be a useful diagnostic tool to help teachers develop their use of a child‐centred, constructivist teaching philosophy in primary science education.     

How do teachers coordinate their work? A framing approach

Since the 1970s, schools have been characterized as loosely coupled systems, meaning that the teachers’ work is weakly coordinated at the local level. Nonetheless, few studies have focused on the local variations of coordination modes, their sources and their nature. In this article, the process of local coordination of the teachers’ work is analyzed, using a sociocognitive approach. A longitudinal study of the framing process conducted during two years in one school is presented, in order to capture the parallel evolution of the teachers’ cognitive structures and the school’s social structures. The results show that: (1) the framing process is at the heart of political games, meaning that the local definition of teaching and its conditions represent an important issue for the teachers; and that (2) the cognitive structures that emerge from the framing process appear to some extent to be decoupled from the teachers’ actual practices, contributing only partially to the local process of the teachers’ work coordination.     

The Treatment and Use of Best Practices for Diversity in Position Announcements for New Presidents

This study investigated how well institutions were communicating their commitment to diversity within position announcements for presidential openings and whether or not this communication reflected best practices in forwarding the diversity agenda for institutions. The sample included 70 institutions that advertised for a new campus president in The Chronicle of Higher Education. Using documents pertaining to the search, we applied content analysis to position announcements and campus websites dealing with presidential searches and diversity. Evidence indicated that within our sample only 13 (19 %) of institutions stated directly that they were looking for a diverse applicant pool and that only 28 (40 %) of the announcements mentioned diversity.     

Preservice Science Teachers' Perceptions of Their Practicum Classrooms

Practicum experiences in schools are highly valued in science teacher education programs. Yet, there are few studies examining secondary preservice science teachers' practicum classrooms. This mixed-methods study explored secondary preservice science teachers' perceptions of their practicum classroom learning environments, interpreted from an open-ended survey questionnaire, as well as from an adapted version of the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES; Taylor, Fraser, & Fisher, 1997). Twenty-two preservice teachers within secondary science methods courses volunteered to complete the survey. Qualitative survey findings were corroborated by quantitative results from the CLES survey. Overall, the preservice teachers perceived their practicum classrooms to incorporate some constructivist learning environment factors, but the critical constructivist perspective underpinning the survey was not found. Additionally, innovative practices cogent with these practices were not supported by most of their co-operating teachers. Implications of how preservice education programs can better support prospective science teachers' views and practices during practicum are discussed.