Daily Teaching Practice Research Articles

Concepções de professoras dos anos iniciais do ensino fundamental sobre prevenção do uso indevido de drogas

RESUMO Partiu-se da concepção de escola como lugar de formação de aprendizes na relação com educadores, privilegiado para trabalhar questões relevantes à vivência social, como o uso de drogas, desde o início da escolarização. Objetivou-se levantar concepções de professoras dos anos iniciais do ensino fundamental que participaram da quinta edição do curso de prevenção ao uso de drogas para educadores de escolas públicas sobre os conteúdos abordados e sua prática cotidiana. Buscou-se refletir sobre a importância de criar formas pedagógicas pautadas no acolhimento às vivências das crianças. Realizou-se entrevistas com vinte e uma professoras ex-cursistas do Distrito Federal. A análise das categorias construídas permitiu refletir sobre a prática educativa cotidiana e a necessidade da escuta dos discursos das crianças sobre as drogas. As professoras puderam perceber que há abertura para abordar essas questões e demandaram formação teórico-prática como instrumento que auxilie o trabalho pedagógico.

Relações educativas de professoras com crianças de zona rural: uma leitura das práticas pedagógicas em um contexto de escola urbana

The article stems from a completed research and focuses on practices of two teachers in dealing with a group of children living in rural areas and attending an urban public school. Aimed to understand how occur the educational relationships between teachers and children in daily teaching practices. The group was composed of eleven children in the third grade of elementary school and two teachers. Of the qualitative perspective, participant observation was performed in two school spaces where children lived with teachers. With record in field diaries, all material collected was categorized by content analysis and discussed in the light of the chosen literature. Noteworthy are positive relationships between teachers and children, expressed by the actions of children to go to school and the enables the exchange of knowledge among peers and learn school knowledge. The results also revealed difficulties in pedagogical practices with the rural population inserted in the urban school, especially in differences in living contexts that pervade the countryside where children live. There is an implication in the experiential knowledge built in school, which lead to the reflection on the training of teachers to work with countryside children.

Interdisciplinarity in Education: Overcoming Fragmentation in the Teaching-Learning Process

The importance of interdisciplinarity in the teaching-learning process has been much debated. This topic has challenged schoolteachers, who do not always manage to integrate interdisciplinarity into the school routine. This paper emerged from the discipline Research Methodology taught at the postgraduate course in education of Universidade Federal do Triângulo Mineiro. During this course, we sought to gain knowledge about the academic production related to interdisciplinarity in the teaching-learning process, mainly in terms of teacher training and teaching practice, published in dissertations and theses. We explored contents published from 2011 to 2016 in Brazil. The covered period was based on a search for recent productions on the proposed theme, conducted by using the database of the Brazilian Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations. Analyses of the documents pointed to the need to work interdisciplinarity during teacher training courses and to adopt an interdisciplinary posture in daily teaching practice in schools. These practices should help to overcome compartmentalization of the teaching-learning process and to provide students with a global view of the world.

How can the skills of Early Years leaders support other leaders in a primary school setting?

This study investigated the leadership skills Early Years leaders demonstrated through their daily practice of teaching, assessing and teamwork within their setting. It explored how revealing the potential of Early Years leaders could have a positive impact on the leadership practice of other leaders in the same setting to improve pupil outcomes. A qualitative approach using interviews with Early Years leaders in 20 primary settings from the East Midlands and Bedfordshire areas was undertaken by two academics from two different UK based universities. Ethical guidelines ensuring anonymity and trustworthiness were followed. Using verbatim comments, data were analysed in themes against contemporary Early Years literature. Findings showed the skills of Early Years leaders could support pedagogy and practice but some of these skills were not utilized beyond this age phase. Our conclusion suggested that Early Years leaders had a range of leadership skills which were deemed specialist as they were unique to the success of the age phase, but needed to be exposed beyond Early Years for wider success and impact.

Análisis del desarrollo de los nuevos títulos de Grado basados en competencias y adaptados al Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior (EEES)

<div data-canvas-width="216.70842163971002">Nos encontramos en una etapa en la que la implantación del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior debería constituir una realidad constatable, ya que en estos momentos las primeras promociones de los nuevos títulos de Grado están finalizando sus correspondientes carreras. Es en este contexto educativo en que nos encontramos, cuando más procedente resulta analizar si realmente los Programas Formativos se están implementando de manera adecuada en base a competencias y teniendo presentes los principios fundamentales de esta nueva orientación educativa, o bien, la novedad se ha limitado a cambios nominales sin modificaciones reales en la práctica educativa cotidiana del aula; manteniendo, por contra, una educación tradicional centrada en la transmisión unidireccional (docente→discente) de contenidos casi exclusivamente teóricos. En este artículo se pretende verificar, gracias a las aportaciones de los diferentes protagonistas del proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje (concretamente el profesorado y el alumnado), si los novedosos Planes de Estudios realmente se están desarrollando siguiendo los principios fundamentales de la educación/formación basada en competencias. Para ello se les ha pedido su opinión por medio de la aplicación de entrevistas a los docentes y grupos de discusión con los discentes, así como cuestionarios a ambos. Los resultados obtenidos han puesto de manifiesto que, a pesar del gran interés y dedicación puesto en juego por parte del profesorado, la formación universitaria actual aún dista sustancialmente de ser una correcta “educación basada en competencias” exigiendo todavía un notable esfuerzo al respecto.</div>

英語学習動機の変化に影響を及ぼす要因―動機高揚経験及び減衰経験の内容分析― Factors on Changes of English Learning Motivation: A Content Analysis of Motivating and Demotivating Experiences

本研究は、英語学習者である日本人大学生を対象に自由記述式のアンケートを実施し、大学入学前の中学校と高等学校の６年間に、どのような要因で英語学習の動機づけが高まったのか、また減衰したのかを探索することによって、英語学習に関する動機づけを行う方策についての示唆を得ることを目的とする。最初に、先行研究に基づいて動機を高める要因と減衰させる要因をまとめる。次に、これらの要因と動機の変容について探究しようとした先行研究を概観し、研究方法上の問題点を指摘する。先行研究の問題点を克服するために本研究は計画された。 In recent research on L2 learning motivation, there have been an increasing number of studies on motivators (e.g., Cheng & Dörnyei, 2007; Guilloteaux & Dörnyei, 2008; Sugita & Takeuchi, 2010) and demotivators (e.g., Kikuchi & Sakai, 2009; Sakai & Kikuchi, 2009) in the classroom. Although findings from these studies give general guidelines to language teachers, it has been argued that the motivators and demotivators vary in different contexts and that learner motivation fluctuates (Hayashi, 2005; Miura, 2010; Sawyer, 2007; Shoaib & Dörnyei, 2005). This study was aimed at understanding the changes in motivation among Japanese learners of English during their 6 years of high school. Based on a survey of 199 college students taking an English language teaching certificate class in the spring semesters of 2006, 2007, and 2008, the general pattern of changes as well as reasons for change were investigated. In a questionnaire adapted from Sawyer (2007), participants were asked to reflect on their level of motivation at the beginning and end of the school year during their 6 years of high school and rate the level on a 5-point Likert scale (0: completely demotivated, 1: fairly demotivated, 2: a bit motivated, 3: fairly motivated, 4: completely motivated). They were also asked to write why their motivation became higher or lower. The two research questions posed for this study were “When do Japanese learners of English experience motivators and demotivators in their six years of study in high schools?” and “What are motivators and demotivators experienced during those times?” Through an analysis of the changes in motivation, it was found that the level of participants’ motivation generally went down from the end of the 1st year of junior high school to the beginning of the 2nd year, from the end of the 3rd year of junior high to the 1st year of high school, and from the beginning of the 1st year of senior high school to the end of that school year. The level of motivation generally went up from the end of the 2nd year of senior high school to the beginning of the 3rd year and from the beginning of the 3rd year to the end of that school year. Statistical significance was found between each pair (Bonferroni-adjusted significance level α = .0045). These findings confirm those of previous studies (Hayashi, 2005; Miura, 2010; Sawyer, 2007) which reported the general pattern of the motivational fluctuation of Japanese English learners. Apparently, goals such as success in entrance examinations for senior high schools and universities may be reasonable motivators for many Japanese learners of English. After achieving entrance to junior high school or senior high school, participants may have difficulty adjusting to the class instruction and find it demotivating for a while. Furthermore, it was found that various factors such as experiences of failure, teacher behavior, or the content of classes can be motivators or demotivators. By using reflective surveys, we were able to glimpse the complexities of learners’ motivation. Based on the findings from this study, we discuss the importance of reflecting on our daily teaching practice and call for research considering learners’ contexts in depth.

Transactional Space: Feedback, Critical Thinking, and Learning Dance Technique

This article explores attitudes about feedback and critical thinking in dance technique classes. We discuss an expansion of our teaching practices to include feedback as bidirectional (transactional) and a part of developing critical thinking skills in student dancers. The article was written after we undertook research exploring attitudes and cultures surrounding feedback in dance technique classes within university settings in the United Kingdom and the United States. Using a hybrid ethnographic (practice as research) model we collected data through class observations, individual interviews with students and teachers, and journaling and reflecting on our own daily teaching practice. Pseudonyms have been used throughout and permission obtained from participants to include their voices in the article.1(1. This research was approved by University ethics board and institution review board, and followed rigorous ethical procedures, including consent forms and reviews during our process.) At the beginning of our inquiry we were interested in exploring how students received feedback. We thought this would involve discovering more about the forms and ways feedback can be communicated to students, particularly how a climate of negative feedback can be avoided in the classroom. However, as we carried out the research we realized that merely looking at how feedback is communicated constructs feedback as one-directional. We questioned whether we had been placing enough importance on the notion that feedback can be transactional. Following John Dewey, we take the term transactional to indicate dynamic, co-created relationships and environments (Dewey and Boydston 2008 Dewey, J., and J. A. Boydston. 2008. The later works of John Dewey, 1925–1953. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press.). We realized that how feedback is communicated is significant, of course, but the means by which it is recognized as feedback by students, and how it is responded to is of equal bearing. This led us to consider the importance of students’ (and teachers’) critical thinking in our classrooms, as we felt student responses to feedback are as important as the action of giving it. By critical thinking we are suggesting skills of evaluation that allow for synthesis of ideas and support the ability to have shifts in perception. We want our students to develop the analytical skills to let go of an essentialist approach to their perception of themselves as dancers, and instead critically challenge their habitual movements and notions of what dance can be. Thus we see critical thinking as supporting the co-construction and permeability of a transactional approach to feedback. Informed by Dewey’s somatic starting point we approached the inquiry from a theoretical framework that places bodily experience as central—which we are calling embodiment. (This methodology is examined further in Akinleye 2016 Akinleye, A. 2016. Her life in movement: Embodiment as a methodology. In Researching embodied sport: Exploring movement cultures, ed. I. Wellard, 178–96. London: Routledge.). In this article we discuss how we have come to see a relationship among feedback, communication, and critical thinking in dance technique classrooms.

TRAUMA-INFORMED FLEXIBLE LEARNING: CLASSROOMS THAT STRENGTHEN REGULATORY ABILITIES

<p style="margin: 0cm 0cm 24pt 36pt;"><span style="color: #131413; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: medium;">This study explores the implementation of the first of three domains, increasing regulatory abilities, within a trauma-informed positive education (TIPE) approach with flexible learning teachers as they incorporated trauma-informed principles into their daily teaching practice. Trauma-informed teaching approaches have particular relevance for flexible learning settings, and can help meet the complex needs of students who have experienced violence, abuse, or neglect. This paper proposes that redressing a trauma-affected student’s regulatory abilities should be the first aim in this developmentally-informed TIPE pedagogy. Drawing from research with nine teachers working in trauma-affected flexible learning settings in a large metropolitan region, this study employs a qualitative appreciative inquiry action research methodology to explore the use of TIPE perspectives with their students. Under the domain of increasing regulatory abilities, four arising subthemes hold particular application for teacher practice and planning: rhythm; self-regulation; mindfulness; and de-escalation. These four subthemes are positioned as promising pathways to increasing regulatory abilities in students as they strive toward successful learning outcomes.</span></p>

A study on the use of a metadata schema for characterizing school education STEM lessons plans by STEM teachers

Online labs (OLs) constitute digital educational tools which can have a significant role in supporting science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) teachers in their daily teaching practice. Designing STEM lessons supported by specific OLs is a challenging task and thus, it is useful for STEM teachers to be able to share their lesson plans in a way that these can be effectively searched by others. The most common way to facilitate this process is (a) to characterize the lesson plans with appropriately selected educational metadata and (b) to build a web repository that collects the metadata records of the lesson plans (following a common metadata schema) and offers search and retrieval functionalities. In our previous work, a metadata schema that can be used for characterizing STEM lesson plans supported by OLs has been proposed. The scope of this paper is to complement the findings of our previous work and present the technical implementation of the proposed metadata schema via a web-based repository, namely the Go-Lab repository and a study on the real usage of the metadata schema’s elements through the analysis of the lesson plans’ metadata records that have been published to this repository by STEM teachers.

A phenomenographic study of lecturers’ conceptions of using learning technology in a Pakistani context

ABSTRACTWhile there are many studies exploring the phenomenon of lecturers’ use of learning technology within teaching practices in western higher education contexts, currently we know little about this phenomenon within less developed countries. In the paper, we discuss the findings from a phenomenographic study of lecturers’ conceptions of using learning technology in a Pakistani university context. We describe how lecturers’ use of learning technology is underpinned by their pedagogical understanding. Furthermore, we show that prevailing contextual socio-economic and technological limitations affect lecturers’ daily pedagogical practices and use of learning technology. The results of the study demonstrate the importance and influence of lecturers’ pedagogical understandings and of contextual limitations within daily teaching practices on their experiences of using learning technology. The findings have wider implications for our understanding of the variation in ways learning technology is understood and used within pedagogical practice in other developing and more developed contexts.

Dissonance for understanding: Exploring a new theoretical lens for understanding teacher identity formation in borderlands of practice

Borderlands of practice are spaces where teachers are engaged in negotiating multiple conceptions of “best practices” within their daily teaching practice. Teachers at work in borderlands must actively negotiate varied conceptions, expectations, and assumptions about what is “best” for their students. These conceptions often challenge teacher professional knowledge and can result in a sense of dissonance about how to best meet the needs of students. Using a case study of one veteran teacher’s sense-making processes in her first year of teaching pre-Kindergarten, this article explores how a theoretical lens of dissonance might help researchers and teacher educators to better understand and support teacher identity formation in borderlands of practice.

Knowledge and Attitudes Towards Biotechnology of Elementary Education Preservice Teachers: The first Spanish experience

Due to the important impact that biotechnology has on current Western societies, well-informed critical citizens are needed. People prepared to make conscious decisions about aspects of biotechnology that relate to their own lives. Teachers play a central role in all education systems. Thus, the biotechnological literacy of preservice teachers is an important consideration as they will become an influential collective as future teachers of the next generation of children. The attitudes toward science (and biotechnology) that teachers have affect their behavior and influence the way they implement their daily practice of science teaching in school. This study analyzes the attitudes and knowledge of Spanish preservice teachers toward biotechnology. We designed a new survey instrument that was completed by 407 university students who were taking official degree programs in preschool and primary education. Our results point out that although they are aware of biotechnology applications, topics concerning the structure of DNA, management of genetic information inside the cell, genetically modified organism technology and the use of microorganisms as biotechnological tools were not correctly answered. According to our attitude analysis, Spanish preservice teachers could be defined as opponents of genetically modified product acquisition, supporters of biotechnology for medical purposes and highly interested in increasing their knowledge about biotechnology and other scientific advances. Our results show a positive correlation between better knowledge and more positive attitudes toward biotechnology. A Spanish preservice teacher with positive attitudes toward biotechnology tends to be a student with a strong biology background who scored good marks in our knowledge test.

INTRODUCING THE COMMUNICATIVE APPROACH IN LIBYA: RESISTANCE AND CONFLICT

Although communicative language teaching (CLT) is well recognized as the leading theoretical and the most effective model in English language teaching (ELT), it is still uncertain how culturally suitable it is regarding Non-Western cultures of teaching and learning, including Libyan-Arabic culture. Any teaching methodology is only effective to the extent that teachers and students are willing and able to accept and apply it with trust and optimism, and whether it is accepted or not is largely determined by a set of circumstances and beliefs that these teachers and students have been surrounded by and socialised into. Many Libyan teachers and students of English do not seem to have gone through any fundamental changes in their perception of efficient language instruction and in their daily teaching and learning practices. Based on my experience as a language educator in several Libyan universities, and on my professional thinking, I argue that CLT has not received widespread enthusiasm, has failed to make the expected impact on ELT and the traditional approach is still prevalent in many Libyan foreign language classrooms. There is a host of constraints on the adoption of CLT in the Libyan context which includes, among others, beliefs about the roles of teachers and students, teachers’ lack of language proficiency and sociolinguistic competence, examination pressure, and cultural teaching and learning styles. This article examines how these beliefs, pedagogy, and structures which have developed in the Libyan English language classroom culture limit pedagogical change advocated by foreign and Libyan education policy makers. The issues raised serve to acquaint the reader with some of the complexities of pedagogical change in Libya. The issues could also be of significance and relevance to other countries with a similar educational system and linguistic situation. The paper concludes with highlighting the need for taking attentively eclectic approach and making well-informed pedagogical options that stem from a deep understanding of the cultural and educational values that influence language learning and teaching styles.

COURSERA ONLINE COURSE: A PLATFORM FOR ENGLISH TEACHERS’ MEANINGFUL AND VIBRANT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

This article reports on English teachers‘ attitudes towards a professional development program run by Coursera (coursera.org). Theseteachers were participants of Foundation of Teaching for Learning 1: Introduction online course. Using a survey case study, the findings reveal that most of the participants perceive the course as a well-organized and effective platform to engage in professional learning. Coursera is an online learning platform offering various courses for teacher educators which are meaningful (closely related to their daily teaching practice) and vibrant (involves active collaboration among peer participants to review and assess their projects). Albeit this nature, another finding shows that the participants lament that their institutions do not provide professional development (PD) support. In fact, PD programs are not constrained to face-to-face encounters, since it can be designed using online platforms such as Coursera, a massive open online course (MOOC). Accordingly, the contribution of the article is to show how online platforms make meaningful and vibrant teacher professional development (TPD) possible. The implication of the study is that school administrators and policy makers should provide support for their teachers to take online PD programs. This professional learning should contribute to the best teaching practice and student learning attainment.

Towards Competence-Based Learning Design Driven Remote and Virtual Labs Recommendations for Science Teachers

Remote and virtual labs (RVLs) are widely used by science education teachers in their daily teaching practice. This has led to a plethora of RVLs that are offered with or without cost. In order to organise them and facilitate their search and findability, several RVL web-based repositories have been operated. As a result, a key open challenge is to design and implement recommender systems that support science teachers in finding and selecting appropriate RVLs based on core pedagogical elements of their learning designs and their own information and communication technology (ICT)-supported teaching competence profiles. In response to this challenge, we propose a recommender system for supporting learning design driven RVLs recommendations taking into consideration teachers’ profiling elements related to the ICT-supported teaching competences for using RVLs. To achieve this, we propose an instantiation of the UNESCO ICT competency framework for teachers for the context of using RVL and capitalise on our previously proposed metadata schema for describing RVLs, which includes core elements of a learning design and teachers’ required ICT-supported teaching competences. Our evaluation results based on a user study, highlight the high level of ranking accuracy of our proposed recommender system and support its capacity to facilitate science teachers in selecting appropriate RVLs.

Can National History Be De-Provincialized? U.S. History Textbook Controversies in the 1940s and 1990s

Thomas Bender’s 2009 essay “Can National History Be De-Provincialized? U.S. History Textbook Controversies in the 1940s and 1990s,” originally published in Contexts: The Journal of Educational Media, Memory, and Society, asks the important question of how a nation-specific curriculum in history—that is, how “American” history itself—can be taught with the least influence of political factions and the least interference of commercial factors, in light of the fact that both elements, the political and the commercial, have played a role in the construction of the US history textbook. Bender’s essay demonstrates the complexity of the problem as multiple stakeholders seek to control, limit, or promote particular elements of the narratives of US history. Professional historians, Bender argues, like history itself, have “no responsibility to supply comfort”—that is, no role in promoting nationalism or American exceptionalism—yet he also warns that, due to changes in the textbook industry, they also may have little role in determining what is finally published. Bender’s essay, which specifically discusses the impact of political conditions—World War II, for example—on the daily practice of teaching and writing about history, serves as an insightful reminder of the complexity and vulnerability of a nation’s memory.

O dilema extensão universitária

Objetivou-se analisar como um grupo de professores universitários conceitua a Extensão Universitária, ou melhor, como avalia tal função no cotidiano das ações docentes. Discutiu-se o material empírico (entrevistas) com base na teoria de Norbert Elias, interpretando-se as forças específicas compulsivas no jogo universitário. Constatou-se que os professores entrevistados se baseiam em grupos de intelectuais que jogam e se perdem entre as funções do ensino, da pesquisa e da extensão, e assim medem as suas forças. Ora buscam na força da pesquisa o reconhecimento acadêmico ou, então, criticam a Extensão sem envolvimento com pesquisa ou, ainda, são favoráveis à Extensão e propõem a modificação do mundo circundante por intermédio da Extensão, defendendo-a por garantir melhor formação profissional. Concluiu-se que a Extensão Universitária é um dilema acadêmico, ou melhor, evidenciam-se tentativas de resoluções, mas ainda nenhuma delas plenamente aceitável pela totalidade da comunidade acadêmica.

The Cultivation of Multiliteracies in the Context of Multimedia Instruction

As the digital, network and multimedia technology has been penetrating gradually and applied widely into the education, increasing number of courses have introduced computer-based multimedia equipment to supplement the teaching process, which poses a huge challenge for the students as they need to be able to obtain, interpret, sift and recreate multimodal information in hypertexts. That means the cultivation of multiliteracies is in urgent need. Therefore, the multimodal teaching mode is proposed in this paper, together with the feasible ways to apply it in daily teaching practice by analyzing and discussing the concept and pedagogy of multilieracies.

Traditional Classrooms Transformed into Modern School Environments through Collaborative Action Research

Collaborative teaching approach has confused teachers in Greece, who although generally argue in favour of this, however, state that they are unable to incorporate it into their daily teaching practice. Thus, collaborative action research, as a form of training, has been implemented to a group of teachers in order improvement to be achieved. The opinions and feelings of the participants are presented in the following article. Analyzing the facilitator’s observation notes and the participants’ interviews seems that action research has triggered a change in pupils’ learning process. Additionally, teachers exchanged ideas, expressed themselves without hesitation and adopted innovations. According to the researcher, teachers’ hard and lonely work is supported through the collaborative action research. This kind of training focuses on their needs, takes place at their own school, while the member of the University and the researcher undertake the support work. With this effort, the classroom can be transformed into a modern school environment, more active, experiential and collaborative one.

Effects of Storybook Reading Style on Comprehension: The Role of Word Elaboration and Coherence Questions

Research Findings: Two studies examined the effects of specific reading styles on the comprehension of stories of at-risk preschool Chilean children. Study 1 examined the effect of word elaboration on story comprehension with 72 children. Children who were exposed to elaborations of unknown words during storybook reading achieved better comprehension than those who were not after vocabulary and narrative comprehension skills were controlled. This effect was mediated by children's learning of the elaborated words and thus provides evidence for the causal role of word knowledge in story comprehension. Study 2 examined the effect of asking questions about coherence relations versus other kinds of open-ended questions such as requests for predictions, descriptions, and real-life connections. Children exposed to coherence questions achieved better story comprehension than those exposed to other open-ended questions after initial vocabulary, narrative comprehension skills, and attentiveness were controlled. Practice or Policy: These findings suggest the use of specific reading strategies for improving comprehension. Teaching rare words and asking coherence-related questions during reading leads to better understanding of the story. These are 2 easy methods that could be integrated into daily teaching practices to help improve children's narrative comprehension.