Learning Opportunities For Teachers Research Articles

Toward the automated analysis of teacher talk in secondary ELA classrooms

Qualities of teacher talk strongly affect student learning, yet opportunities for teachers to receive feedback on their talk face time and cost limitations. To address this, we developed a semi-automated method of analyzing teacher talk using Automated Speech Recognition technology, compared it to traditional methods, and used it to analyze teacher talk features in 127 secondary English Language Arts lessons. We found the new method aligned with traditional methods, allowing us to reliably identify interrelated but distinct talk features. These features often reflected dialogic instruction. Our findings contribute to future studies of instructional discourse and technology-driven teacher learning opportunities.

Leveraging prospective teachers’ knowledge through their participation in lesson study

This study focuses on a lesson study adaptation for bridging prospective teachers’ experiences in a methods course and their field experiences in a teacher education program in Puerto Rico. We ask, what opportunities for teacher learning emerge during discussions in lesson study? Two lesson study teams of secondary mathematics prospective teachers, each led by an experienced mentor, planned technology-based lessons. Using the theoretical framework for lesson study by Lewis and colleagues, we analyzed video recordings of the teams’ discussions. The results show learning opportunities in the three dimensions of the framework: teachers’ knowledge and beliefs, the creation of a professional community, and the development of teaching–learning artifacts. The mentors leveraged prospective teachers’ knowledge, built on topics discussed in the methods course, and created a professional learning community. Three resources introduced in the methods course supported the creation of a hybrid space connecting academic and practitioner knowledge: shared language about teaching moves for using technology in math instruction, the mathematical proficiency framework, and a lesson plan template. The mentors drew upon their subject matter and pedagogical knowledge during their facilitation of lesson study. The intervention exemplifies a lesson study adaptation that is feasible in the context of a teacher education program.

Becoming Globally Competent Through Inter-School Reciprocal Learning Partnerships: An Inquiry Into Canadian and Chinese Teachers’ Narratives

This study explores how a Canada–China Sister School Network provides school-based professional learning opportunities for in-service teachers to grow their knowledge and capacity to educate for global competence and citizenship (GCC). In particular, it presents the story of a Canadian teacher and a Chinese teacher who had found ways of educating for GCC through carrying out intercultural and international reciprocal learning in a researcher-supported inter-school reciprocal learning partnership. By inquiring into the Canadian and Chinese teachers’ growth narratives, this study highlights four lessons teachers, educators/researchers, and policy makers may learn from the two teachers. It concludes by highlighting the potential of a relationship-oriented, open-ended, and non-hierarchical international school network in supporting teachers to become more globally competent, foregrounding reciprocal learning and collaboration among school practitioners and researchers.

Designing Online Professional Learning to Support In-Service and Preservice Teachers Adapting to Emergency Remote Teaching

Service-learning partners, including a faculty of education and local school district, engaged in collaborative inquiry to support in-service and preservice teachers who were engaged in emergency remote teaching during a time of crisis and school disruption. This article illustrates how service-learning partners designed a professional learning series in an online learning environment to support in-service and preservice teachers adapting to teaching online. This article shares the instructional design process used to develop the series, insights about how the participants responded during the sessions, and a set of recommendations to inform design teams involved in developing professional learning or other types of non-formal learning opportunities for teachers.

Identifying and Informing Novice Iranian English Language Teachers’ Classroom Decision Making and Pedagogical Reasoning Regarding Managerial Mode

Decision making and pedagogical reasoning are regarded as two of the important concepts underlying teaching skills. This study aimed to first identify the novice Iranian English as a foreign language (EFL) teachers’ initial decision making and pedagogical reasoning in terms of managerial mode. More importantly, it sought to inform the teachers’ decisions and reasoning through some one-to-one feedback sessions, which were interactively held between every novice teacher and an experienced teacher. The participants of the study were one experienced (male) and five novice (four female and one male) teachers. To collect the data, a number of teaching scenarios, classroom observation, stimulated recalls, and the Self-Evaluation of Teacher Talk (SETT) framework were used. The analysis of the data using conversation analysis showed that the novice teachers benefited from their negotiated interactions with the experienced teacher and applied the points regarding all five pedagogic goals of managerial mode in the framework. After the feedback sessions, the teachers could confidently defend their decisions pedagogically when enquired for reasons. The results showed that modifying the teachers’ decision would not be successfully ensured until they reached the “aha” of the moment or a new understanding, which is the last stage in reforming one’s pedagogical reasoning. One way to achieve this moment is through raising the teachers’ awareness of the essential metalanguage. It is thus suggested that officials in charge and institute managers provide such learning opportunities for teachers so that they take more serious steps toward their own professional development through such frameworks as SETT.

A Chinese family: teaching and learning in a clinical case conference

The authors show the interrelated processes of teaching and learning both for the Chinese student and the Western teacher. This article focuses on a clinical case conference as a co-constructed teaching and learning opportunity for Chinese therapists and Western teachers of family therapy. We present an account of a clinical case conference for family therapy students which occurred as part of a week-long training event, during the two-year continuous training programme in psychoanalytic couple and family therapy organised by Professor Fang Xin in Beijing. The first author, a Chinese family therapy student, made the family case presentation to her classmates and to the second author, a Western psychoanalyst as the discussant. The student introduced the referral to her of an index patient, a teenage boy who was refusing school, staying home to play videogames, and threatening suicide. She reported vividly on her consultation with the concerned mother, stern father, and rebellious adolescent son in a family group setting. Without process notes, the Western discussant could not comment on the presenter's analytic family therapy technique or move more deeply into the family unconscious. Yet, the material presented enabled the class to see how the boy had become the symptom bearer for his family, and at the same to learn about the strain of absence and the threat of death on a Chinese family. The article closes with a template for how to get the most out of a clinical case conference.

Teacher leaders’ brokerage practice in China: Impact on teacher learning in a school–university partnership

School–university partnerships bring meaningful learning opportunities for teachers, and empowering teachers with leadership roles has become an important approach for teacher learning. This study shows how teacher leaders exercised brokerage practice to support teacher learning in one small-scale school–university partnership in China based on interview data from a university expert, three school management team members, eight master teachers and backbone teachers as teacher leaders, and nine teachers. The study discusses the significance of expanding the forms of teacher leadership with brokerage practices, examines the combination of professional and managerial roles embedded within teacher leaders’ brokerage, and addresses the issue of unequal distribution of learning opportunities. Implications are also discussed.

Elementary prospective teachers’ visions of moving beyond mathematics anxiety

Previous studies of prospective elementary mathematics teachers’ mathematics anxiety have documented that many prospective teachers often worry about managing their repeated experiences of anxiety while developing their pedagogical and content knowledge to teach mathematics. The literature further indicates the importance of developing learning opportunities for prospective teachers to confront their past experiences while they (re)learn and learn to teach mathematics during methods courses. This study is situated within one such learning opportunity and seeks to analyze potential mathematics anxiety coping strategies generated by forty-eight prospective elementary teachers enrolled in a mathematical methods course. Written responses generated by the prospective teachers were subjected to qualitative thematic analysis to identify patterns of key ideas related to lesson planning for content they felt anxious and/or not confident about teaching and patterns focused on episodes of mathematics anxiety they might experience in the moment of teaching mathematics. Findings indicate that prospective teachers envision using between two and seven strategies grouped across eight coping strategy themes when given the opportunity to reflect on how they might deal with future instances of anxiety when they are tasked with teaching mathematics to their students. We highlight how some of the coping strategies that the prospective teachers envisioned as a means to cope with mathematics anxiety may have more potential to be helpful than others and present implications of our research for mathematics teacher educators.

Teaching with technology: a lesson from social participation in an online learning community

ABSTRACT Online learning communities (OLCs) offer opportunities to help teachers engage better with technology and develop new skills through a participatory social process. This study investigates the potential of an OLC for advancing teachers’ professional learning in integrating technology into their instructional practices. Drawing on two case studies of teachers, this study provides empirical evidence of how participation in an OLC affected the teachers in their professional learning journeys. Findings reveal that social interactions over the OLC provided learning opportunities for teachers who experimented with new technology tools and gradually gained confidence in sharing their practices. However, teachers rather felt ewuh pakewuh [uncomfortable] in openly expressing their views in the public OLCs. Instead, teachers preferred to have informal discussions in smaller closed OLCs. The study affirms that OLCs provide teachers with a social learning experience where they can collectively engage with each other to generate new teaching and learning ideas.

Coaching in the time of coronavirus 2019: how simulations spark reflection

PurposeThis study investigates how debrief conversations unfold during virtual coaching sessions that provide embedded opportunities to practice teaching within a mixed reality simulation (MRS). We examine how teacher and coach topical episodes function (agreeing, explaining, clarifying, probing, recapping, reflecting and suggesting) to activate reflection as part of virtual coaching.Design/methodology/approachGrounded in Vygotsky's sociocultural theory and the belief that learning is collaborative and impacts how pre- and in-service teachers construct knowledge, this exploratory case study draws on insights from 15 graduate students (5 pre-service teachers (PSTs) and 10 in-service teachers (ISTs)) who participated in virtual coaching with embedded practice opportunities. Data sources were video recordings and transcripts of 15 virtual coaching sessions, and one-on-one postcoaching interviews. Coding categories were determined through the constant comparative analysis method.FindingsFindings indicate that an MRS provides an immediate context for reflection, which guided the debrief conversations. Additionally, functions occurred with varying frequency among PSTs and ISTs, and across both groups, probing questions often led directly to reflecting and recapping the shared simulation context.Research limitations/implicationsThis study had a small sample (n = 15) and the use of an MRS, while widely used, is not necessarily a scalable practice.Originality/valueIn times of remote teaching, like during corona virus 2019 (COVID-19), opportunities to simulate clinical experiences become vital. With a limited research base, learning how teachers engage with and learn from simulated experiences is a key to creating rich learning opportunities for teachers.

Lesson study as a lever for improving university teaching in Spain: listening to students’ voices

ABSTRACT This paper presents an experience in which Lesson Studies (LS) are viewed as a lever for improving university teaching in Spain. The expansion of the LS model in the West is an indication of its value for improving teaching and provides us with different interpretations and variations of it. We will describe a process of Participatory Lesson Study (PLS) within the field of Initial Teacher Education (ITE) which incorporates university students in LS cycles. This work is recognised within the qualitative research paradigm. The results illustrate that when we incorporate students in research processes teaching becomes more democratic and collaborative and new learning opportunities for university teachers in their teaching practice arise. At the same time, LS is a tool that facilitates joint reflection by teachers on their own practice and the development of practical knowledge. The incorporation of students in the reflection processes on our practices can be viewed as an original and genuine strategy that facilitates access to areas that are not usually explored in decision making in our research lessons.

Pop-up loose parts playgrounds: learning opportunities for early childhood preservice teachers

ABSTRACT Play is a cornerstone of early childhood education. However, recent trends of schoolification and school readiness have meant that academic learning and adult-guided play are often privileged over free play. The aim of this study was to explore how a service-learning experience, in the form of organising and running a pop-up playground for young children and their families, would promote learning about and advocacy for play among early childhood preservice teachers (PSTs). Thirty-six PSTs enrolled in a second-year early childhood education unit in an Australian University were required to advertise, organise and facilitate a loose parts playground at a local park as part of their coursework. PSTs were asked to reflect on their learning from the event. Findings suggest that a service-learning pop-up playground was highly successful in promoting PST learning about children’s play, loose parts and the adulteration of play. Learning about advocacy for play was less evident.

Cross-cultural considerations: mentoring teachers in Jewish day schools

ABSTRACT This study focuses on the impact of mentoring in Jewish day schools through the lens of cross-cultural considerations. The researchers examined the influence of differences in culture and religion on mentoring relationships and professional growth experiences. Findings indicate that building bridges of understanding and trust in a cross-cultural mentoring environment, requires the viewing of teacher mentoring as context-specific. Mentoring is strengthened when mentors become familiar with the school community and exhibit a respectful, and non-judgmental attitude toward the unique religious and cultural elements of the school community. Findings from the study provide an important contribution to discourse about teacher mentoring through a new and unique lens that focuses on cross-cultural relationships and their potential to enhance professional development and learning opportunities for teachers and mentors.

A smart learning assistance tool for inclusive education

The government has established special schools to cater to the needs of children with disabilities but they are often segregated rather than receiving equitable opportunities. Artificial Intelligence has opened new ways to promote special education with advanced learning tools. These tools enable to adapt to a typical classroom set up for all the students with or without disabilities. To ensure social equity and the same classroom experience, a coherent solution is envisioned for inclusive education. This paper aims to propose a cost-effective and integrated Smart Learning Assistance (SLA) tool for Inclusive Education using Deep Learning and Computer Vision techniques. It comprises speech to text and sign language conversion for hearing impaired students, sign language to text conversion for speech impaired students, and Braille to text for communicating with visually impaired students. The tool assists differently-abled students to make use of various teaching-learning opportunities conferred to them and ensures convenient two-way communication with the instructor and peers in the classroom thus makes learning easier.

Modelo teórico para organizar e compreender as oportunidades de aprendizagem de professores para ensinar matemática

Compreender como se constitui a aprendizagem de professores é uma importante área de pesquisa na formação de professores, com muitas questões em aberto a serem ainda investigadas. Assim, neste artigo, apresentamos um modelo teórico cujo principal objetivo é permitir o desenho de programas de formação de professores, bem como orientar a compreensão das oportunidades de aprendizagem profissional para os professores. Com base em nossos resultados de pesquisa em ensino e aprendizagem de álgebra e em uma revisão de literatura, descrevemos como o modelo foi elaborado e trazemos algumas situações ilustrativas para indicar o modelo “em ação” durante todo o processo de formação de professores. A arquitetura do programa permitiu que os professores experimentassem oportunidades de aprendizagem profissional vinculadas a conhecimentos matemáticos e didáticos sobre padrões e regularidades, bem como a oportunidade de aprender uns com os outros, superando o isolamento causado pelo trabalho diário em suas escolas e levando-os a explorar práticas próximas à própria realidade escolar.

Striving towards an ideal: coevaluation of student coteaching experiences

ABSTRACT The goal of clinical practice is to enrich teacher candidate learning through enhanced field experiences. Evaluation is a key element of coteaching during which coteachers review their teaching and its impact on pupil learning. However, coteachers are challenged in enacting coevaluation, that is, a critique of the teacher candidate’s and clinical educator’s teaching. In this paper, dyad and triad evaluation of teaching practices in coteaching field experiences are discussed to illuminate barriers to enacting coevaluation that aligns with coteaching principles. Most preservice evaluation tools, systems, and structures are designed for compliance with consensus standards (Zeichner 2006); some of these structures focus upon teacher candidates’ competencies with limited emphasis on pupil learning. Using data from examinations of field instructor meetings with coteachers and interviews with clinical educators, we find that coevaluation meetings address pupil learning and improvement of practice along with accreditation and licensure. However, when evaluative instruments with a teacher competency emphasis are introduced, triad discourse about teacher development narrows. If we are to expand the field of teacher education to provide clinical field experiences that emphasise new ways of thinking and learning for all participants, then it is critical to understand how existing evaluative structures circumscribe teacher learning opportunities.

Teachers’ Opportunities to Learn through Collaboration over Time: A Case Study of Math Teacher Teams in Schools under Pressure to Improve

Background/Context While current research provides key insights about successful collaboration in which teachers experience deep learning and practice change, few studies analyze the content of teachers’ collaborative conversations about instruction. Even fewer explore how the content of collaborative conversations evolves over time, making it difficult to understand the impact of shifting policies, priorities, and personnel on teachers’ collective work. Purpose and Research Questions To explore teachers’ opportunities to learn through collaboration, I draw on the following research questions: How does the depth of teachers’ opportunities to learn from collaborative conversations evolve over time? In what ways do contextual factors (e.g., personnel, tools, leadership expectations, coaching) influence these opportunities to learn through collaboration? Participants This study is situated in two urban middle schools under significant pressure to improve student achievement. I selected one grade-level math team from each school, analyzing their conversations taking place during collaboration meetings. Research Design To better understand teachers’ collaborative learning, I rely on qualitative case study methods. Data collected include interviews and observations of two teacher collaboration groups over four years. I use Horn and colleagues’ (2017) taxonomy of teachers’ opportunities to learn in conjunction with cultural historical activity theory (Cole & Engeström, 2007) to examine teachers’ collective learning over time as this process unfolds in context. Findings/Results Across both groups, expectations from leadership to improve school performance shaped teachers’ opportunities to learn, as did the presence of teachers whose beliefs about math instruction foregrounded student thinking and exploration. Findings demonstrated that for one team, fluctuations in depth of learning also depended on the agendas and protocols used to frame collective work. For the second team, depth of learning opportunities was connected to shifts in personnel and group norms over time. For both teams, high-depth conversations represented no more than a third of the meetings observed in each year, reflecting the complexity of developing effective collaborative cultures supporting deep learning. Conclusions/Recommendations While high-depth opportunities to learn (OTLs) were infrequent for both teams, the reasons for this scarcity were shaped by each team's context. Leaders hoping to develop collaborative cultures with richer teacher learning opportunities should consider multiple factors shaping OTLs, including collaborative team norms, teachers’ beliefs about math instruction, protocols guiding discussions, and the role of accountability pressures in shaping expectations for collective work.

Learning through communication: exploring learning potential in teacher teams lesson study talk

PurposeThis paper discusses findings from a four-year research and development project using lesson study in a Norwegian elementary school. There are only a limited number of studies which have investigated how talk mediates teacher learning in lesson study, whereas research has shown that the form communication takes is the key to whether or not collaboration leads to learning. Focus in this paper is therefore on the talk which takes place in teacher teams when they meet to plan the research lesson in lesson study. The article explores sequences of talk that afford opportunities for teacher learning in order to understand what triggers and characterizes these opportunities.Design/methodology/approachData consisted of audio recordings of four teacher teams made during planning meetings. Based on theoretical criteria, sequences of teacher talk which indicated potential for learning were selected for further analyses. These sequences were then coded with respect to what themes triggered this talk and what conversional routines were found.FindingsThe most frequent trigger of talk affording opportunities for learning was in relation to students and more specifically different needs of individual or subgroups of students. Didactic and purely curriculum-focussed issues triggered this kind of talk to a small degree. Conversional routines in the selected sequences concerned (1) taking a student perspective, (2) discussing impact on student learning behaviour and (3) generalizing (moving from specific accounts of classroom practice to general reflection on one's own practice).Originality/valueThis study aims to investigate what triggers and characterizes talk with learning potential in the lesson study work of teacher teams.

Complicating the Conversation on Teacher Quality: A Comparative Examination of Contextual Supports for Effective Teaching

Drawing on qualitative case study research in four small schools, this paper explores the relationship between the professional contexts of schools—specifically supports for 1) collaboration focused on improving instruction, 2) professional development and teacher learning opportunities, and 3) the degree to which teachers have authority and leadership in shaping curriculum and school practice—and teachers’ delivery of high-quality instruction. Looking across multiple sources of data from four schools, we found clear differences in terms of the extent to which we saw teacher collaboration with a culture of reflection and inquiry, professional development aligned with teachers’ emergent needs, and shared leadership that encourages teacher authority.

Teachers' networked professional learning with MOOCs.

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are used to support professional learning at scale in many countries. The present study examined a MOOC named Flipped Classrooms that was specially designed for in-service teachers in China. This MOOC was offered for seven consecutive iterations across three years and allowed teachers to re-take this course in connection with their teaching practice. Overall, 16% of all 105,370 learners enrolled in at least two iterations of the MOOC. To understand their learning motivations, their learning engagement within the MOOC, and the connections they forged between the MOOC and their teaching, we conducted a mixed-methods study using multiple data sources including course registration records, course entry surveys, learning performance data, click logs, and semi-structured interviews. Results indicated that teacher-learners re-took the MOOC for various reasons such as refreshing domain understanding, improving grades, and addressing practical problems. Click log analysis found MOOC re-takers with different performance trajectories demonstrated distinct learning patterns across iterations. Qualitative analysis of the interview data revealed additional insights into learning within the MOOC and connections forged by the re-takers between the MOOC and their teaching practice. This study contributes fresh insights into the MOOC literature by investigating MOOC re-takers and sheds light on the promise of using MOOC to support networked professional learning. Implications for future MOOCs and teacher learning opportunities are discussed.