Facilitating early career leadership through pre‐service training

Current research indicates that new teachers want to be involved in school‐level decision‐making. Upon entering the profession, many novice teachers are surprised and disillusioned to find they have considerably less involvement and influence than expected. Based on strategies that have been developed, revised, and refined over a number of years in two teacher preparation programs in the eastern US, the current discussion proposes that teacher preparation programs incorporate training in school‐based management as a means to better prepare new teachers for the political realities of the profession. Intended for teacher educators, this paper describes how the research component common to most teacher education programs can be used as a venue to train teacher candidates in school‐based management.     

Student‐teachers' perspectives on positive and negative social processes in school

In recent years, the Standards for Qualified Teacher Status in England have placed new emphasis on student‐teachers' ability to become integrated into the ‘corporate life of the school’ and to work with other professionals. Little research, however, has been carried out into how student‐teachers perceive the social processes and interactions that are central to such integration during their initial teacher education school placements. This study aims to shed light on these perceptions. The data, gathered from 23 student‐teachers through interviews and reflective writing, illustrate the extent to which the participants perceived such social processes as supporting or obstructing their development as teachers. Signals of inclusion, the degree of match or mismatch in students' and school colleagues' role expectations, and the social awareness of both school and student‐teacher emerged as crucial factors in this respect. The student‐teachers' accounts show their social interactions with school staff to be meaningful in developing their ‘teacher self’ and to be profoundly emotionally charged. The implications for mentor and student‐teacher role preparation are discussed in this article.     

Teachers reflecting on their work: articulating what is said about what is done

Teachers' written reflections on their work, which report on a change in their practice, were the object of this research. Taking teachers' articulation of their plans and actions in teacher journals as our source, this study's aim is twofold: (1) to describe how teacher reflect in a self‐initiated and non‐framed way on their own practice, and (2) to review teacher self generated reflections in reference to models of reflection. In this way, we tried to disclose what precisely teachers write (said) when reflecting on their work (did) in order to appreciate their way of describing what matters in their work; and position this in reference to models that conceptualise (“talk”) on how to actualise (‘walk’) reflection. This ‘double’ articulation of reflection is gauged in two ways, i.e., on: a) completeness, that is, whether it includes relevant components of reflection (models) to be found in the literature, and on b) recursiveness, that is, whether the written account gives evidence of an integrated cyclical, i.e., recursive process of re‐view, which appraises and looks back on what has been accomplished.

The results show that teachers do not work along the lines identified in current reflection models (i.e. providing clear problem definition, searching for evidence, planning for change, and reviewing plans). Instead, many teachers use a narrative and valuing appraisal of their accomplishments; not so much cautiously reviewing their actions but prospectively commenting on plans and solutions for future action. The data lead us to be cautious about the prominence of reflection models as advocated in the literature to be applied to teachers' written accounts of their practice.     

Our teachers want to be the best: on the necessity of intra‐professional reflection about moral ideals of teaching

Teaching is a significant social good and therefore teachers as well as the state have to take responsibility for guarding the moral quality of the teaching practice. Based on this premise, the article describes and defends the view that these parties have their own particular role by means of literature review and theoretical and practical arguments.

The role of the state is necessarily limited to defining minimal moral rules and obligations, because in liberal Western democracies morality is codified in law to a minimal degree. The state also has practical reasons for such a confined position, among which are the complexities of professional practice and its implied tacit knowledge.

Teachers have to take responsibility for constructing the full width of professional morality, but particularly for defining its optimal or aspirational dimension. This dimension comprises the virtues deemed important for teachers as well as their professional ideals. Whereas the literature on professional ethics of teachers is relatively silent about professional ideals, several arguments are provided for the importance of ideals for teachers.

The final part of the article defends the claim that teachers have to articulate their professional ideals through intra‐professional dialogue. Again, theoretical and practical arguments are provided, for instance that such a debate provokes teachers to think about the best aims and means of their profession and that it contributes to the sense and meaning of their work. The article ends with some practical implications of the theoretical exposé.     

The split‐off narrator: coming to symptoms in stories of learning to teach

In this conceptual paper I draw on narratives from several contexts in my own educational history – a student‐teaching experience, a graduate course in educational theory, and my work as a preservice teacher educator – to consider, first, the Winnicottian notion of the split‐off intellect, in which individual subjectivity is skewed toward thinking and away from affect, and second, an inversion of that notion, in which affect splits off to form the central domain of experience, relationship, and defense against difficulty. Theorizing some of the ways in which thinking and affect can at times seem to get in each other’s way, and reflecting on what individuals might use that ‘getting in the way’ to do, I explore some ways in which educators in general, and teacher educators in particular, might facilitate the working‐through of intellect/affect splits with the aim of helping students integrate thinking and feeling as they begin or continue their work in the classroom.     

二维视阈下的歌唱艺术--对歌唱艺术本体论的再认识

在中国当下的音乐生产和音乐消费中,大众广泛接受的音乐式样是音乐的表演.更近一步说,歌唱艺术已经不再是单纯的声乐演唱,而是要达到形神兼备的表演,是“演”与“唱”的有机结合体,只有这样才能使歌唱完美.因此,我们的音乐领域或说我们的歌唱艺术出现了新的诉求,这种对音乐消费品的更高层次的要求既源自音乐受众,也源自当下视听技术的推动.这种诉求也要求我们从理论和实践上对原有的歌唱艺术进行重新地考察.从“演”与“唱”两个维度出发展开讨论,对歌唱艺术本体论进行了重新审视,进而考察了如何通过“演”与“唱”达到歌唱艺术的臻美.     

A retrospective look at replacing face‐to‐face embryology instruction with online lectures in a human anatomy course

Embryology is integrated into the Clinically Oriented Anatomy course at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center School of Medicine. Before 2008, the same instructor presented embryology in 13 face‐to‐face lectures distributed by organ systems throughout the course. For the 2008 and 2009 offerings of the course, a hybrid embryology instruction model with four face‐to‐face classes that supplemented online recorded lectures was used. One instructor delivered the lectures face‐to‐face in 2007 and by online videos in 2008–2009, while a second instructor provided the supplemental face‐to‐face classes in 2008–2009. The same embryology learning objectives and selected examination questions were used for each of the three years. This allowed direct comparison of learning outcomes, as measured by examination performance, for students receiving only face‐to‐face embryology instruction versus the hybrid approach. Comparison of the face‐to‐face lectures to the hybrid approach showed no difference in overall class performance on embryology questions that were used all three years. Moreover, there was no differential effect of the delivery method on the examination scores for bottom quartile students. Students completed an end‐of‐course survey to assess their opinions. They rated the two forms of delivery similarly on a six‐point Likert scale and reported that face‐to‐face lectures have the advantage of allowing them to interact with the instructor, whereas online lectures could be paused, replayed, and viewed at any time. These experiences suggest the need for well‐designed prospective studies to determine whether online lectures can be used to enhance the efficacy of embryology instruction. Anat Sci Educ 7: 234–241. © 2013 American Association of Anatomists.     

Migrating product structure bill of materials Excel files to STEP PDM implementation

It is important for manufacturing companies to provide a standard for product data exchange between diverse computer systems. Past attempts to develop neutral format standards for data exchange have had limited success, and have led to the development of STEP (Standard for the Exchange of Product) as a data exchange standard. The STEP standard makes it easier to integrate systems that process various product life-cycle functions, such as design, engineering, manufacturing, logistics support, and will help to facilitate concurrent engineering. The goal of this paper is to facilitate the computer-readable exchange of the product bill of materials (BOM) information for product data management (PDM). In this paper, the STEP ISO 10303-21 is implemented to share the product data information in a manufacturing environment. A structural product bill of materials is first transformed into an Excel file format, then a PDM Schema Exporter is utilized to export a BOM Excel file to a STEP Part 21 file. A C# program decodes the STEP file into BOM information to update the PDM databases in SQL server for product data management. Also, SAS code is written to generate the indented bill of materials from the BOM information, to draw a tree diagram to present an accurate structural view of a product, and to export to PDM databases for product data structural view.     

Malawi's special needs education (SNE): perspectives and comparisons of practice and progress

The sub‐Saharan country of Malawi is steeped in a robust educational reform movement to ensure ‘Education for All’. Based upon country immersion experience and a review of the literature, this report highlights Malawi's nationwide support for its special needs education (SNE) campaign. First discussed is a brief overview of Malawi, its people and its educational philosophy regarding SNE. Comparisons of sub‐Saharan countries’ educational provisions for students with special learning needs follow, as do explanations of the country's classroom practices and its national SNE Policy (revised in 2007). Described along with ‘best practices’ and the country's history of SNE teacher preparation initiatives is the structure of Malawi's SNE implementation, its design in the classroom, teacher preparation particulars and SNE programme milestones. Partners (organisations), integral to the success of Malawi's SNE efforts, are emphasised; and related policies and provisions are presented, along with closing discussion of assessment, diagnosis, programming, and future implications and conclusions.