Teacher perspectives on partnerships on families of children with autism

The success of students with disabilities in school and community largely relies on productive family professional partnerships (FPPs). The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, 2004) recognises the importance of family collaboration to student success by mandating that parents be involved in the Individualised Education Plan (IEP) process as full team members. While several previous studies examined the perspectives of parents of children with disabilities on partnerships with educators, less research exists on teacher perspectives on family professional collaborations. Additionally, there are even fewer studies that focus on teacher perspectives on partnerships with parents of children with autism, a disability category which continues to increase in prevalence. The present study contributes to the literature by examining teacher perspectives on factors that build and hinder positive partnerships with families of children with autism. Researchers surveyed 25 Special Education teachers and conducted additional individual interviews and open-ended questionnaires to examine teachers' first-hand experiences. Findings identified four common themes that educators felt helped and hindered collaborative relationships with families. Study results may lead to the development of specific family professional collaboration strategies that can be implemented and discussed in school districts, teacher trainings, pre-service teacher education programs and family workshops.     

Building the expert teacher prototype: A metasummary of teacher expertise studies in primary and secondary education

While expert teachers remain a frequent focus of research in education, to date there have been very few attempts to conduct systematic reviews of this literature. This paper presents the findings of the first systematic metasummary of research on teacher expertise in K12 education (primary/elementary and secondary levels), based on analysis of 106 empirical studies from 16 countries involving 1124 teachers identified as experts. The inductively-developed coding framework was applied independently by both authors to the dataset to generate agreement counts for specific coding themes, firstly for specific domains of teacher expertise, and then stratified to compare primary and secondary studies. We present 73 specific features organised into six domains in our expert teacher prototype. Salient findings indicate that, with regard to professional practice, expert teachers reflect extensively and often critically on their practice, help their colleagues frequently, and are continuous learners throughout their careers. Concerning knowledge, we find that expert teachers have well-developed pedagogical content knowledge and knowledge about their learners. In the domain of pedagogic practice, we observe that expert teachers display flexibility in the classroom, build strong interpersonal relationships with their learners, whom they engage through their choice of activities and content, and frequently make use of strategies typically emphasised in both constructivist and learner-centred education literatures. We offer our prototype as a useful initial sketch of family resemblance among expert teachers rather than a checklist of necessary or expected features of expertise, also cautioning that the prototype remains far from complete.     

The Domain-Specificity of Elementary School Teachers’ Judgment Accuracy

Teachers’ diagnostic competence for accurately judging students’ achievement is essential for instructional practice and professional decisions. To promote their judgment accuracy, it is important to know if this is a general or domain-specific skill. We investigated teachers’ judgment accuracy in German language (one subdomain: reading) and mathematics (two subdomains: geometry; stochastics) and examined differences across domains (i.e., German and mathematics) and across subdomains (reading; geometry; stochastics). We examined the judgment accuracy of 59 German elementary school teachers who teach both German and mathematics, judging the achievement of 1227 students in the three subdomains. We conducted multilevel analyses with a subsample of 39 teachers and 787 students and calculated different accuracy components (i.e., rank, level, and differentiation) to examine the comparability of our results. In line with prior research, findings revealed that teachers’ judgments were fairly accurate. However, there were significant differences between teachers’ average judgment accuracy in different subdomains (between-person comparisons) and no or only a weak relation between individual teachers’ judgment accuracy in different subdomains (within-person comparisons). Findings support the notion that teachers’ judgment accuracy of student achievement is domain-specific with respect to the investigated subdomains. Practical implications for the promotion of teacher judgment accuracy are discussed.     

教师发展对转变教师教学方式的影响

生物教师发展是指生物教师在知识、教学经验以及理念上不断成长的过程。文章分析了生物教师发展的内涵所包含的三个方面,以及生物教师在这三个方面的发展对转变生物教师的教学方式的重要影响,并提出了促进生物教师发展的方法。     

Achievement and engagement: How student characteristics influence teacher judgments

Teachers' judgments of student characteristics are affected not only by the characteristic in question, but also by other factors. This article presents three studies examining whether students' achievement influences teachers' judgments of their engagement (as a proxy for motivation) and vice versa. First, a field study was conducted with N = 52 teachers and N = 1135 students. Structural equation modeling revealed an effect of student achievement on teacher judgments of student engagement and an effect of student engagement on teacher judgments of student achievement—above and beyond the association of each student characteristic with teacher judgments of that characteristic. These results were then replicated in two experimental studies involving a computer simulation of an instructional situation, the Simulated Classroom, with N = 40 and N = 181 teacher candidates, respectively. The psychological determinants of the effects observed are discussed, as are their practical implications.     

Competing priorities: Singaporean teachers’ perspectives on critical literacy

This paper explores a group of Singaporean English language teachers’ knowledge and beliefs about critical literacy as well as their perspectives on how best to teach literacy and critical literacy in Singapore schools. A face-to-face survey was conducted among 58 English language teachers by using open-ended questions. The survey covered various topics related to literacy instruction including text decoding, meaning construction, and critical analysis of texts. The participating teachers believed strongly that reading and writing are transactional and interactional practices. However, they were less certain in their beliefs about teaching critical literacy including the critical, analytical and evaluative aspects of text reading. Some teachers saw a conflict between using time on teaching critical literacy and preparing students to pass their exams. As critical literacy is not a requirement at exams, they found it difficult to justify using time teaching it. The results suggest that the teachers’ belief systems are strongly influenced by the broad macro-structure of the educational system in Singapore and their own educational experiences.     

开诚宏道 立教育人——钱基博先生在国师的学与行

从原始的史料出发考察钱基博先生在国立师范学院的学与行,从襄助革创学院、合谋院务推进、忠于教学职守、慨兼学生导师以及瘁力学术研究等方面阐述其开诚宏道、立教育人的学行志旨.     

教师形象的悦目性对教育教学的影响

教师属于职业传播者,其外在形象是否具有悦目性将对其教育教学效果产生一定的影响。但在我国各级各类学校中几乎都存在轻视或忽视悦目性的现象。通过对悦目性的构成要素及其对教育教学效果影响的逐一分析,以求引起教育界的普遍关注,从而使教师外在形象的悦目性在教育教学中发挥最大的效能。     

Teacher e-mail message strategies and students' willingness to communicate online

In light of the prevalent use of e-mail between teachers and students, researchers have highlighted the need to assess its uses and effects. Relying on the research and thinking of teacher immediacy and extra-class communication, we developed a scale that measures those e-mail message strategies that influence students' willingness to communicate online with their teachers. Next, we isolated those reasons that students use e-mail to interact with their teachers: (1) to clarify course material and procedures, (2) as a means of efficient communication, and (3) for personal/social reasons. Finally, we examined student characteristics such as gender and ethnicity, and history of e-mail use that may (or may not) influence their attitudes toward e-mail exchanges with teachers.