The Use of the Course Experience Questionnaire as a Monitoring Evaluation Tool in a Problem-based Medical Programme

This paper reports on the use of the Course Experience Questionnaire (CEQ) as an instrument to monitor the medical programme at the University of Sydney and in particular to measure improvements in teaching quality with the introduction of the new graduate-entry problem-based programme. In addition, it raises the more general issue of interpretation of CEQ results in courses designed around problembased learning (PBL). Students' perceptions of teaching quality were sought using a whole class questionnaire survey and small group interviews. Students in the new programme rated their course more highly than did students in the old programme with respect to good teaching, appropriate assessment, generic skills and overall satisfaction. These improvements did not hold with respect to the clarity of goals and standards, nor for perceptions of an appropriate workload. The results are interpreted in context and it is argued that particular items in the CEQ do not reflect the educational philosophy or the instructional processes of PBL programmes.     

Making connections: Using skill theory to recognize how students build and rebuild understanding

In this companion to Marc Schwartz and Kurt Fischer's article, Patricia King and JoNes VanHecke describe how student affairs educators can help students become sophisticated thinkers.     

Performance Assessment as a Diagnostic Tool for Science Teachers

Research in Science Education - Information on students’ development of science skills is essential for teachers to evaluate and improve their own education, as well as to provide adequate...     

Are We Having Fun Yet? How Teachers Use Manipulatives to Teach Mathematics

Teachers often comment that using manipulatives to teach mathematics is ‘fun!’ Embedded in the word ‘fun’ are important notions about how and why teachers use manipulatives in the teaching of mathematics. Over the course of one academic year, this study examined 10 middle grades teachers’ uses of manipulatives for teaching mathematics using interviews and observations to explore how and why the teachers used the manipulatives as they did. An examination of the participants’ statements and behaviors indicated that using manipulatives was little more than a diversion in classrooms where teachers were not able to represent mathematics concepts themselves. The teachers communicated that the manipulatives were fun, but not necessary, for teaching and learning mathematics. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Student Progress in Learning: Teacher Responsibility, Accountability, and Reality

Educator accountability for student progress in learning goes hand-in-hand with the social contract that assigns responsibility for education to schools. From this perspective accountability rests most heavily with teachers, since they are the most directly responsible for learning, but it extends to specialists, school administrators, and school board members as well. To accommodate the realities of classrooms, schools, families, and communities, however, the caveat is added that teacher accountability needs to be thought of as both conditional and collective. The implications of this view are discussed for teacher work, teaching as a profession, and the meaning of reasonable and defensible standards of performance when addressing the issue of educator accountability for student learning. Illustrative criteria of accountability are proposed, which the author believes to represent a realistic balance between the ethical obligations of a profession, the dependence of citizenry on these obligations being met, and the hard realities encountered in attempting to meet them.