The Influence of an In-Service Improvement Program upon Teacher Test Behavior and Classroom Program

Abstract

One of the most challenging and persistent problems faced by educators is the development of means for the professional im provement of teachers within local school systems. Among these procedures which have been widely used are workshops, child study groups, cooperative curriculum study, and the use of uni versity consultants and resource people in various areas of the school program. This study is concerned with the evaluation of certain aspects of an in-service program which combined these procedures in working at the educational problems of a local school community. The project being investigated is the three-year cooperative staff study program in the La Grange, Illinois, Public Schools in collaboration with the University of Chicago. This program which came to be known as the La Grange Cooperative Study, was in itiated in the spring of 1946 and had run for approximately two years at the conclusion of this investigation. It was composed of a wide variety of experiences, among the most important of which were the activities of child-study groups and multiple activities centering about the social studies in the curriculum. It included university workshop experiences in the summer months, two fall planning conferences, work on textbook selection and an instruc tional materials survey, consultant service work in certain in structional areas, emphasis on unit-planning in the social stud ies, a survey of pupil-accounting procedures, a number of spec ial projects and reports, and various other cooperative activities involving the collaboration of the teaching staff, university con