Early career teachers’ sense of professional agency in the classroom: associations with turnover intentions and perceived inadequacy in teacher–student interaction

Teachers’ capacity to learn intentionally and responsively in the classroom is particularly vulnerable during the first years in the profession. This study investigated the interrelations between early career teachers’ turnover intentions, perceived inadequacy in teacher–student interaction, and sense of professional agency in the classroom. The survey data were collected from 284 in-service teachers with not more than 5 years of experience and analysed by structural equation modelling (SEM). The results showed that the negative relation between turnover intentions and early career teachers’ sense of professional agency was completely mediated by perceived inadequacy in teacher–student interaction. The results indicate that experiences of insufficient abilities to solve pedagogically and socially challenging student situations have a crucial effect on early career teacher’s capacity for adaptive reflection and active transformation of instruction.     

Relating early childhood teachers’ working conditions and well-being to their turnover intentions

High turnover rates of early care and education teachers reduce the quality of education; unsatisfied teachers, suffering from stress or emotional exhaustion, are less equipped to promote children’s development and more likely to leave the classroom. We used data from a national survey of US early childhood educators (n?=?1129) to examine associations between teachers’ working conditions, well-being, and motivation with professional commitment and turnover intentions to move, leave, or remain. Multiple regression analyses revealed that more intrinsically motivated teachers were more likely to report intentions to move over leave, emotionally exhausted teachers were more likely to report intentions to leave, and lower teacher-reported working conditions predicted intentions to move or leave the field over staying. The results suggest that teachers’ well-being and perceived working conditions relate with their intentions to remain at their job or within the field and to their commitment to the profession.     

Child developmental impact of Pittsburgh’s Early Childhood Initiative (ECI) in high-risk communities: first-phase authentic evaluation research

The national debate surrounding the issue of school failure has renewed interest in the quality, efficacy, and outcomes of early childhood intervention programs that can promote early school success for children at developmental risk. Moreover, researchers and policymakers report the need to document developmentally-appropriate models for assessing and evaluating early childhood outcomes. We report on the first-phase results of Pittsburgh’s early childhood initiative (ECI). ECI is a privately-funded effort by a consortium composed of the business, corporate, foundation, and community sectors to implement high-quality early care and education options for children in high-risk neighborhoods. The overarching objective of ECI is to ensure early school success for high-risk children. Our Scaling Progress in Early Childhood Settings (SPECS) Evaluation Team implemented an authentic assessment and program evaluation strategy and an enhanced “constructed comparison group” statistical model to conduct longitudinal research on the child developmental impact of the ECI model. First-phase results on 155 high-risk children indicate that those who participated in high-quality ECI programs for the longest periods of time demonstrated patterns of progress that exceeded maturational expectations. Weekly collaborative consultation to teachers and caregivers by consultants about program quality using the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) standards as “best practice” benchmarks seemed to be associated with initial enhanced child outcomes and the particular impact of the ECI model.     

巧用信息技术提高音乐教学效果探讨

实现信息技术在音乐教学中的合理应用,是实现音乐教学创新的重要途径。文章结合音乐教学案例,指出教师要借助多媒体实现音乐意境的构建,要在音乐鉴赏中增强学生的音乐体验,要借助信息技术打造能动的音乐氛围,从而提高学生的音乐素养和审美能力。     

Informed learning design: teaching and learning through engagement with information

ABSTRACT

While higher education teachers are able to use information in sophisticated ways to learn and communicate within their disciplines, they may not be accustomed to teaching their students to use information creatively and reflectively to support their work in a course. This article introduces informed learning design, a curriculum design model by which teachers specifically enable students to learn course content through intentional engagement with information. Drawing from informed learning pedagogy and the variation theory of learning, the design model outlines an instructional pattern for enabling student awareness of critical aspects and features of the object being studied related to both information use and course content.     

Revisioning professionalism from the periphery

Abstract

The issue of who should be included and recognised as professionals in the early childhood education and care (ECEC) service system is both contested and pressing in the current policy climate. At stake is a high-quality early childhood care and education service system that is both responsive and appropriate to the constituency it serves. A review of the history of ECEC professionalism reveals complex entanglements and debates regarding professional belonging. Services that deliver education and care to children and families living in high poverty contexts are often excluded from ECEC professionalism debates. Drawing on notions of rationality, emotionality and criticality presented in recent accounts of ECEC professionalism, we use data collected from interviews with service providers delivering services to children and families living in high poverty contexts in Australia to develop an account of criticality that is pertinent to current funding and policy contexts. We argue that these service providers’ perspectives about their own professionalism have much to offer broader debates.     

Beginning reading strategies in children experiencing contrasting teaching methods

Two groups of 4.5–5.5 year old children in their first year at school were examined; one taught by a whole word teaching method and one taught by a mixed whole word and phonological teaching method. The children were given a test to investigate their reading of normal words. The results of this test were subjected to a detailed error analysis and the two groups were examined in order to see if there were differences in the reading strategies they used. No evidence was found counter to the assumption that reading begins with a logographic stage. However, it was found that teaching method was having a significant impact on the reading strategies which the children adopted. In addition it was found that a number of children from the whole school appeared to exhibit letter by letter reading. This suggests that letter by letter dyslexia might in part be an extreme form of a strategy used by normal readers.     

核心素养理念下的化学实验教学策略探究

新课程标准已经明确指出,实验在初中化学教学中占有重要地位。教师在初中化学实验教学中,要努力创新实验教学方式,激发学生的化学探究兴趣,提高学生的实验探究能力和动手操作能力,培养学生的化学核心素养。文章对核心素养理念下的初中化学实验教学进行分析,并提出几种教学策略。     

Is students’ energy literacy related to their university’s position in a sustainability ranking?

Abstract

University rankings are increasingly important internationally, and in the UK include a sustainability ‘Green League’. However, there is little evidence about experiences of studying in ‘sustainable universities’. We report an empirical study at five universities in varied positions in the Green League, exploring students’ energy literacy, environmental attitudes and perceptions of their institution’s energy-saving efforts. Although the link to energy literacy is not clear, findings suggest that there are significant differences between students’ environmental attitudes at universities placed at different points in the league. In addition, students at higher ranked universities are more positive about their university’s energy-saving efforts, suggesting that these institutions may exhibit more overt manifestations of sustainability. This is important since students report being more likely to choose energy-conservation behaviours if there is visible representation of energy use. The study is the first to attempt a comparison between universities at different positions in a sustainability ranking.     

早世代稳定水稻杂交合子传粉授精细胞学研究

对水稻早世代稳定机理研究推测其杂种合子发生了纯合化事件，本实验对杂种合子进行细胞学研究，结果表明在胚胎发育过程中未出现染色体片段渗透，体细胞成数分裂等现象。