Changes In Instructional Practices Research Articles

Examining the link between program implementation and behavior outcomes in the lifestyle education for activity program (LEAP)

Lifestyle Education for Activity Program (LEAP) was a comprehensive, school-based intervention designed to promote physical activity in high school girls. The intervention focused on changes in instructional practices and the school environment to affect personal, social, and environmental factors related to physical activity. Multiple process evaluation tools and an organizational assessment tool were developed to monitor program implementation from a framework called the LEAP essential elements, which characterized complete and acceptable intervention delivery; secular trends were also monitored. Using process data, LEAP intervention schools were categorized into low- and high-implementing groups and compared with control schools on nine essential elements assessed at the organizational level. The Wilcoxon scores test revealed that low- and high-implementing intervention, and control schools differed significantly on two of nine administrator-reported organizational-level components: having a physical activity team and having a faculty-staff health promotion program. A mixed-model analysis of covariance indicated that, compared to control schools, a greater percentage of girls in high-implementing schools reported engaging in vigorous physical activity. Process evaluation can be used to understand the relationship between level of implementation and successful program outcome.

A Comparison of Three Retrospective Self-reporting Methods of Measuring Change in Instructional Practice

In the post + retrospective pretest method of measuring change, evaluators ask the respondents to recall pre-intervention status at posttest time. Research has produced strong evidence in support of this approach over the pretest-posttest approach to measuring change. However, no research has yet to examine and compare different forms of retrospective methods. We compared three retrospective methods of measuring elementary grade teachers’ self-reported change in mathematics instructional practices: the post + retrospective pretest method (reporting current practices and earlier practices), the post + perceived change method (reporting current practice and the amount and direction of change), and the perceived change method (reporting only the amount and direction of change). Teachers in the post + retrospective pretest condition reported least change, followed by teachers in the post + perceived change condition; teachers in the perceived change condition reported the greatest change. We can explain our findings in terms of differential satisficing (the tendency to exert minimal effort in responding) caused by differences in cognitive demands among the three methods. Greater task difficulty leads to greater satisficing, which causes respondents to resort more to socially desirable responses. A greater tendency to provide socially desirable responses leads to relying on expected implicit theory of change and subsequently reporting greater change in instructional practices.

A Comparison of Three Retrospective Self-reporting Methods of Measuring Change in Instructional Practice

In the post+retrospective pretest method of measuring change, evaluators ask the respondents to recall pre-intervention status at posttest time. Research has produced strong evidence in support of this approach over the pretest–posttest approach to measuring change. However, no research has yet to examine and compare different forms of retrospective methods. We compared three retrospective methods of measuring elementary grade teachers’ self-reported change in mathematics instructional practices: the post+retrospective pretest method (reporting current practices and earlier practices), the post+perceived change method (reporting current practice and the amount and direction of change), and the perceived change method (reporting only the amount and direction of change). Teachers in the post+retrospective pretest condition reported least change, followed by teachers in the post+perceived change condition; teachers in the perceived change condition reported the greatest change. We can explain our findings in terms of differential satisficing (the tendency to exert minimal effort in responding) caused by differences in cognitive demands among the three methods. Greater task difficulty leads to greater satisficing, which causes respondents to resort more to socially desirable responses. A greater tendency to provide socially desirable responses leads to relying on expected implicit theory of change and subsequently reporting greater change in instructional practices.

State Standards & Opportunity to Learn in New Jersey

A survey of 245 New Jersey teachers provides a baseline for examining how the introduction of state standards and assessments affects the teaching of math and science in the 4th grade. These policies are promoting teaching of additional topics in both areas. The changes in the delivery of professional development have not yet been sufficient to lead to substantial changes in instructional practice. While inequities in access to material that characterized the state in the early 1990s have diminished, we find a pattern of inquiry-oriented science teaching more prevalent in wealthy districts and teaching to the test more prevalent in poorer ones. We also note some areas where middle-income districts appear disadvantaged.

Group Response Technology in Lecture-Based Instruction: Exploring Student Engagement and Instructor Perceptions

Technology has been touted as an effective method to improve teaching and learning; yet, few researchers have examined the use of technology in traditional lecture-based instruction to improve student engagement or provide feedback about student learning to the instructor. The exploratory study described in this article examined the use of group response technology (GRT) to gather student responses during instruction in a preservice special education course. Classroom observation data indicated no differences in engagement between preservice teachers who used GRT and those who used hand-written journals; however, the use of GRT provided the instructor with real-time data about student learning. These data challenged the instructor's conceptions of lecture-based instruction, causing increased attention to and heightened knowledge of student learning, which, in turn, resulted in changes in instructional practices. The potential of GRT use for increasing the effectiveness of instruction in higher education and modeling effective instructional practices for teacher preparation are discussed.

Commentary: Align Professional Development, Classroom Practice, and Student Progress in the Curriculum and You'll Improve General Education for all Students

I enjoyed reading the articles contained in this special issue not only because they report research findings on general education teachers' implementation of new classroom practices, but because they reflect progress on the fundamental problem in education-the misalignment of specific professional development experiences with changes in instructional practice within the general education classroom with improvement in student outcomes. For too long, strong links between these critical elements of professional development, teaching, and learning have not been forged (Carnine, 1995). Because each of the authors in this issue addressed elements of the solution to this problem in their research, we now know more about solving it. For example, realizing that teachers are not traditionally consumers of educational research (e.g., Kaestle, 1993) and that traditional inservice training is insufficient to result in high-quality classroom implementation, Vaughn et al. selected four research-based practices and taught them to volunteer teachers in an intensive, year-long program of professional development that combined inservice, meetings, and weekly coaching. Recognizing that much of educational research has few implications for teachers in real classrooms (Viadero, 1994), Marks and Gersten sought to engage classroom teachers in interactions organized around their interests and needs as a basis for introducing and sustaining their use of researchbased practices. Further realizing that traditional general education instruction does not adapt easily to the needs of individuals with learning disabilities (LD) (Fuchs, Fuchs, & Bishop, 1992a, 1992b), Fuchs and Fuchs developed and evaluated the effectiveness of combining computerbased assessments and peer-mediated instructional strategies on the rate of individualizing instruction and the resulting improvements in students' rate of academic progress in the curriculum. Also concerned about general educators' adaptation of instruction to fit the needs of diverse learners, Simmons et al. sought to understand teachers' beliefs about influences on stu-

State Assessment and Instructional Change: A Path Model Analysis

This study demonstrates a method to investigate consequential evidence of validity for a state assessment developed to change teacher instructional practices. Survey responses from over 1,000 Kansas teachers were used to construct a path model that described the relation of district, building, and teacher factors to changes in teacher instructional practices. The model allowed the effects of the state assessment to be studied at the building and teacher level, along with effects of the content standards at the district level. In the model developed, teacher professional activities in response to the assessment and teacher attitudes toward the assessment were both directly related to changes in instructional practices. The largest direct effect on instructional changes was from teacher attitude toward the scoring rubrics. Although generalizability of the specific results of the model developed was limited by several factors, this study shows that a path model approach is important and useful. The path model not only provided a systems approach to consequential evidence of validity but also indicated ways to increase teacher changes in response to the state assessment.

Knowledge-based cognition and performance assessment in the science classroom

Changes in knowledge underlie the cognitive capabilities that are displayed in competent performance and the acquisition of improved performance. It is important to bring these knowledge-generated processes to attention because they represent possibilities for instructional design that might improve learning. In this article, the role of performance assessments in making relevant cognitive activity apparent to teachers and students is discussed. Descriptions of the cognitive activity of fifth-grade students carrying out a science performance assessment reveal critical differences between those who think and reason well with their knowledge of circuits and those who do not. Differences in quality of explanations, adequacy of problem representation, appropriateness of solution strategies, and frequency and flexibility of self-monitoring indicate more or less effective learning of the subject matter. Awareness of and attention to these cognitive characteristics of competent performance in an assessment situation provides teachers the necessary feedback to construct classroom environments that encourage reasoning and knowledge integration. In this way, performance assessments not only evaluate student performance but suggest changes in instructional practice to support effective learning in the elementary science classroom.

Conjectures concerning the Origins of Misconceptions in Logo

Adult students learning LOGO for the first time developed a series of misconceptions concerning the flow of control in their programs. Most errors consisted of violations of programming discourse or style conventions. Students with prior programming experience in BASIC developed a novel implementation of recursion in LOGO that reflected the iterative FOR … NEXT construct of BASIC. The origins of these violations of programming conventions were traced to general properties of cognition and also to specific instructional practices. Changes in instructional practices, implemented in a second study, reduced the general incidence of some types of errors. However, instances of negative transfer due to prior programming experience continued to occur.