Practices Of School Teachers Research Articles

Policy Delivery Strategies for Education Reform: A Formative Research and Development

Thailand education reform in the first decade (1999-2009) seemed to be unsuccessful, partly because of the predominant use of top-down policy delivery strategies. This report aims to develop new delivery strategies for education reform policy for practitioners, especially teachers. Using concepts of assessment-based education reform and university-and-school collaboration, the present study employed a formative research and development methodology to develop and examine policy delivery strategies during 2011-2013. All strategies proposed here were the synthesized results from subprojects of the study. Findings of the study lead to several policy recommendations. It is highly recommended for Thailand education reform to establish policy delivery units. Results also suggest concepts and activities for empowering teachers. After using such strategies in the participated schools, positive changes in practice of school teachers and students were noticeable.

POLÍTICA EDUCACIONAL INDIGENISTA: IMPLICAÇÕES NO XINGU

800x600 This work aims to approach elements of education policy for indigenous education and analyze how they express themselves in the present moment for Indian schools, ethnicity such as Xipaya, Juruna, Altamira Para. Methodology consists of documentary and field research, including history as a process, in order to pursue organic and cyclical movements. Results constitute the research the initial field sample, held in December 2011, July and September 2012, through the Research Project. The procedures were document analysis, interviews and analysis of these, from the understanding of teachers, managers, indigenous leaders and technicians from FUNAI. The perspective is to contribute to the History of Educational Policy for indigenous schools, as well as the discussion and social educational thought. Results point out to the centrality of State to occupy space in the conduct of indigenous educational policy, with openness to participation by indigenous leaders from the 1988 Constitution, with respect to ensuring rights for ethnic groups, in order to have a different, bilingual and intercultural school. Achievements are guaranteed by law, as in the LDB, Judgment 14/99 and Resolution 3/99, laws that are favorable to the creation of the category, indigenous schools and training teachers. The Referencial Curricular para Escolas Indigenas - RCNEI was built by MEC to subsidize the development and implementation of new policies and pedagogical practices in schools in indigenous areas. The Program Parameters in Action of Indigenous Education aims to follow the RCNEI in order to continue the training of indigenous teachers, which is similar to the Parâmetros Curriculares Nacionais – PCNs, however has a limit, since the latter is structured to be the benchmark for the Brazilian basic education schools, while RCNEI reference for curriculum organization is unique to Indian schools, thus this needs to consider cultural diversity and will not be detailed by the hegemonic capitalist rationality to provide a model Indian school. It is highlighted in this context, the need for vigilance and struggle of indigenous peoples to implement the rights won from the Law largest of country. The performance of critical teacher profession is critical, based on the centrality of work to contribute to overcoming the logic of centrality in the political sphere of the state, which produces actions and policies to ideological control of indigenous movements, is a current requirement. This also to overcome cronyism imposed to indigenous leaders, as is the case of Hydropower Projects - Belo Monte at Xingu, which have extension to reach achievements for indigenous education. To assert indigenous education with quality in Brazilian capitalist society, the indigenous and non-indigenous teachers are the agents that promote research with the leaders and indigenous elders in order to seek Indigenous History and contribute in overcoming the homogeneous curriculum organization, centered still in Eurocentric and American school culture, as well as minimizing and efficiency and productivity of the logic of current policies - quantitative education systems. The approach from teachers has scored discontinuities of educational policies that impact the teaching and learning processes. As an example: The training of indigenous teachers in Altamira began in October 2009 and in July 2013 there will still be training. Besides successive issues stemming from these policies, the 1990s, which they refer and are repeated in the first decades of 21th century, in order to meet the specific demands of the ethnic groups, such as ensuring cultural diversity in elementary and secondary education, resulting in deepening of difficulties in implementing a bilingual education. Normal 0 21 false false false PT-BR X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:Tabela normal; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:Times New Roman,serif;}

Knowledge and practice of schoolteachers towards students with epilepsy in Khamis Mushate, Southern Saudi Arabia.

Objectives:Epilepsy is a very common chronic neurological disorder in children throughout the world. This study was conducted to assess Saudi male schoolteachers’ knowledge of epilepsy and practice in Southern Saudi Arabia.Subjects and Methods:A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted among male teachers; 315 teachers filled a well-designed and pretested self administered questionnaire.Results:Approximately three-quarters (72.7%) of the schoolteachers had witnessed epileptic fits. Forty-six percent believed that epilepsy was caused by electrical discharges. Most of the school teachers (79.7%) disagreed with the idea of teaching children with epilepsy separately, or preventing them from sporting activity (50.5%). In addition, 94.9% disagreed with the idea that epilepsy was shameful. Unfortunately, 64.1% of the teachers who were exposed to cases of seizures were not able to provide first aid to students having epileptic fits (P = 0.03).Conclusions:The schoolteachers were generally knowledgeable about epilepsy. This fact can be used to design a national program through which teachers can help to bring about a well-informed and tolerant community toward epileptics.

Taiwanese Preschool and Elementary Teachers Beliefs about Discipline, Students, and Teaching Practices

East Asian children are among the top academically performing students in the world (OECD, 2010), yet research examining teaching that leads to this success has just begun to identify beliefs. The present study investigated Taiwanese teachers’ beliefs about discipline, students, and teaching practices in preschool (N=98) and elementary school (N=251). Results indicated two-three dominant viewpoints on each topic within each sample and emphasized beliefs about the importance of controlling behaviors, caring about students, and role modeling. In most cases, teachers’ background and classroom characteristics did not relate to beliefs. We discuss findings within and between samples, as well as implications.

Multi-grade teaching practices in Austrian and Finnish primary schools

This article describes the teaching strategies used in multi-grade classes in five small rural primary schools in Austria and Finland on the basis of the content analysis of transcribed teacher interviews. Two main types of strategies were identified: practices that (1) aim to reduce or (2) capitalize on students’ heterogeneity. The results illustrate how differently multi-grade teaching can be realized and how it can effectively support individual student learning. The findings are discussed with regard to teacher education with the intention of increasing the awareness of the professional skills required in high-quality teaching practices in multi-grade teaching.

Perspectives of Strengthening Primary and High School Teaching Practices in South Africa

The profession of teaching is and should be considered as one of the most important in all countries. The reason is that any skill, be it technical or social, is acquired from teaching and learning process. Therefore, training teachers should be done with respect to profile of the person needed. In this article, we investigated some aspects of the South African education system with regard to faculties or colleges of education curriculum, teacher, micro-teaching lessons, and placement process. Based on the pillars underpinning the DR Congo education system, suggestions are made to strengthen the South African education system. DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2015.v5n1p145

Visual Image as a Trigger for Children's Narrative

The paper focuses on narration acquisition, which is a process believed to be at least partly related to school teaching practices. The problem of constructing a story with the help of a visual image is discussed through an analysis of children’s written responses to two photographs, different in some key respects of the way in which their characters and settings are presented. The range of visual elements which can effectively trigger production of different elements of a story is also established.

MEMORE – Um Ambiente para Apoio ao Acompanhamento da Utilização de Computadores na Educação

The use of computers as teaching and learning tools plays a particularly important role in modern society. Within this scenario, Brazil launched its own version of the 'One Laptop per Child' (OLPC) program, and this initiative, termed PROUCA, has already distributed hundreds of lowcost laptops for educational purposes in many Brazilian schools. However, in spite of its importance, PROUCA program does not have tools that help managers monitor, understand and evaluate which curricular and extracurricular activities have been developed with the laptops. Therefore, this article aims to present MEMORE, a computational environment that provides management information about the use of laptops in PROUCA´s context. Teachers and administrators can take such information into consideration in order to evaluate and improve educational policies and pedagogical practices in schools.

Remedial Teaching Practices in Secondary Schools of Northern Samar

The problem of poor quality in education has been traced to a number of causes, which include socio-economic factors, teacher-related factors, inadequate learning materials, and the short and congested school curriculum, among others. With this result, it is therefore imperative to organize remediation programs in low performing schools to address the needs of the learners to achieve desired learning outcomes and to enhance faculty’s teaching competence. The study determined the remedial teaching practices employed by secondary school teachers in both public and private schools in Northern Samar. It also found out the difference between the extent of remedial teaching practices as perceived by the teachers and students and if there was a significant difference between the extent of practices of public and private secondary schools in Northern Samar. The descriptive-comparative method was utilized in the study using a researcher-made survey questionnaire as the primary instrument. The study was conducted in twenty (20) public and private secondary schools in Northern Samar selected based on the results of the National Achievement Test (NAT) from 2010 to 2011. Frequency counts, percentages, and weighted mean computations were used to analyze the data obtained. The t-test was used to test the difference between the extent of remedial teaching practices as perceived by the secondary teachers and students and the difference in the extent of remedial teaching practices among public and private secondary schools in Northern Samar. The remedial teaching practices of the secondary school teachers were rated “extensive” by both teachers and students. There was a significant difference between the perceptions of the secondary school teachers and the students on the extent of remedial teaching practices but there was no significant difference between the extent of remedial teaching practices of the public and the private secondary schools in Northern Samar.

Ancoragem da representação social da educação física escolar nas abordagens teóricas da educação física

This study aimed to investigate the practice of physical education in schools from the perspective of social representations theory in order to identify anchoring of social representations inTheoretical Models of this discipline. Based on previous study where the social representation is based on the factors identified: playful and DEVELOPMENT central elements, the results obtained in this study indicate that the Social Representation identified is anchored in the approaches: Developmental and Psychomotor. We suggest that the practice of physical education at the service of DEVELOPMENT and this development is promoted primarily through strategies SPORT and LEISURE.

Analysis of School Teachers’ Practices for Quality Education in View of Their Head Teachers at Secondary Level

The study examined secondary school teachers’ practices in view of their head teachers for quality enhancement at secondary level. Forty eight secondary schools from three districts Bahawalpur, Okara and Faisalabad of the Punjab province of Pakistan, were randomly selected for data collection but forty two head teachers participated in the study. The questionnaire was developed and after making it valid and reliable, the data was collected and analyzed by using simple mean score. Practices of school teachers were divided into two main categories: practices in classroom and practices out of classroom but in the institution. Findings showed that teachers’ practices in view of their head teachers for quality enhancement out of the classroom are better than practices in classroom. There is found minor difference between the categorical variables of male and female teachers’ practices for quality enhancement in view of their head teachers but the difference found considerable in the variables of urban and rural teachers. Rural teachers’ practices are better than urban teachers in this concern. The comparison of the three districts is also made and it is found that the teachers from Bahawalpur district are having significantly better practices than the teachers of other districts included in the study. The study therefore, recommended that teachers should be made aware not only of the modern concepts of quality education but also of the quality enhancing practices through activity based refresher courses, seminars and conferences. Training sessions should be conducted to update teachers’ knowledge and to make their vision bright about quality enhancing practices at secondary level. After discussion and analysis, further interesting results are presented. Based on the findings, appropriate recommendations are suggested for improving the quality of education at secondary level in Pakistan.

Religious studies, religious education and the aims of education

This article interacts with a recent article by Denise Cush and Catherine Robinson in which they call for a new dialogue between religious studies in universities and religious education, and identify a number of developments in religious studies that have implications for the practice of religious education in schools. Cush and Robinson are representative of an influential body of opinion among religious educators that looks to religious studies for inspiration. It is argued that they, along with others, fail to appreciate the difference between the aims of religious studies and those of religious education and that this unrecognised difference leads them both to engage uncritically and superficially with the history of post-confessional religious education and to fail to recognise that the roots of some of the weaknesses in contemporary religious education can be traced to the influence of religious studies over it. Showing that religious education has (and is required to have) a different set of aims from religious studies (though some aims may be held in common) alerts us to its distinctive nature, and this in turn facilitates a clearer understanding of its role in schools, which can serve both to direct and to evaluate educational outcomes.

Students’ Perception of Effective Teaching Practices in a Medical School

Introduction: It is often portrayed in literature and academic settings that effective teaching is the cornerstone of student learning environment in large classes; but the characteristics of effective teaching is rather mysterious. Objective: To delve more into this aspect, the student perceptions of effective teaching practices were analysed to derive certain principles which could contribute to teaching effectively. Method: Medical students in first year, second year and clinical batches (n= 451) were enrolled. The study was done in three phases. In the first phase of the study, data was gathered from 128 students of a batch, individually, about the core qualities of effective teaching during a lecture. In the second phase, the class of 198 students was divided into small groups of 5 students each, worked together, discussed about effective teaching practices and then listed five qualities that are required to qualify for effective teaching. In the third phase, based on the responses of phase 1 and 2, a questionnaire was prepared. The questionnaire was peer validated and administered to 125 students. Result: The student responses of the phase 1 and phase 2 of the study clearly fell under the following five themes which include a. Clarity and easy understanding of the subject b. Interactivity in the classroom c. Motivation factor d. Making topics fun to learn e. Dedication and patience exhibited by the teacher. Conclusion: Majority of the students perceived that a teacher who gave clear explanation, simplified the subject for easy understanding; and made the topic fun to learn, very effective.

Team Teaching in Elementary and Secondary Schools in Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan

In many countries, to improve teachers’ and students’ communicative competence in English, team teaching between native English teacher and local English teacher is commonly practiced in schools. In this article, I reviewed team teaching practices in elementary and secondary schools in the four East Asian countries ? Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. In particular, through the review of research articles on team teaching, I examined current team teaching practice, its contributions, problems, and suggestions put forth in these articles. The study indicated team teaching was practiced more vigorously in elementary schools than in secondary counterparts. While team teaching contributed to improving teachers’ and students’ communicative competence to some extents, it had a number of problems such as exam-oriented curricular constraints, role conflicts between team teachers, and communication problems. Suggestions included building harmonious interpersonal relationship and provision of on-going, systematic professional development opportunities.

The Challenges of Models-Based Practice in Physical Education Teacher Education: A Collaborative Self-Study

There are two purposes of this study. The first is to examine our experiences as beginning teacher educators who taught using models-based practice (using the example of Cooperative Learning). The second is to consider the benefits of using collaborative self-study to foster deep understandings of teacher education practice. The findings highlight the challenges in adapting school teaching practices to the university setting, and the different types of knowledge required to teach about the “hows” and “whys” of a models-based approach. We conclude by acknowledging the benefits of systematic study of practice in helping to unpack the complexities and challenges of teaching about teaching. Our collaborative self-study enabled us to develop insights into the intertwined nature of self and practice, and the personal and professional value of our research leads us to encourage teacher educators to examine and share their challenges and understandings of teaching practice.

Changing education through learning spaces: impacts of the Portuguese school buildings’ renovation programme

In this article we present findings from the evaluation study of a nation-wide school renovation programme in Portugal. The aim is to analyse policy implementation, taking into account school community participation, discussing how the programme requirement to involve users in the renovation was met, examining perceptions of the programme’s pedagogical principles and the impact on teaching and learning models. The analysis shows that the upgrading of schools increased pride in and responsibility for the school. But teaching practices in schools remain set in a traditional mould. Tensions remain between the objectives defined at the political level and effective conditions for learning.

Systemic teacher continuous professional development as support of teaching practice

The gap between the teachers’ education and the teaching practice in school is a significant problem. This problem has many causes. Our experience and research have brought us to the conclusion that it is necessary to create systemic teacher continuous professional development (CPD). Teacher pre-service and in-service education with practical experience should be systematically linked. Teachers’ professional competences are finally formed through the combination of these three core parts of CPD. The outputs of our design-based research confirm this fact. We propose using the natural binding of three core parts of CPD and linking them systematically. We have found a set of current specific teachers’ competences that need to be addressed in science and mathematics education. These include in particular: education of gifted students, implementation of connectivism and IBSME etc. These competencies can be sufficiently established only within systemic CPD. In our study we present some specific examples of these competences.

Performativity pressures at urban high schools in Sweden and the USA

This article reveals how test-based performativity pressures interfere with the pedagogical approaches preferred by teachers of second-language learners. Our findings derive from ethnographic research conducted in two non-mainstream high schools: one in a US city and other one in a Swedish city. Both schools serve immigrant students who speak English/Swedish as a second language, the majority of whom are from low-income, non-mainstream backgrounds. Unlike many schools that serve low-income immigrants, both are fairly well-resourced schools; teachers at each school foster productive learning environments and pedagogical practices conducive to academic success. Yet these practices are eroded by a mode of regulation that is hyper-fixed on ‘performativity’ as discussed by Stephen J. Ball. Swedish teachers report less pressure than American teachers but teachers at both schools provide clear examples of the instances when performativity pressures intrude upon preferred pedagogical approaches.

Dynamic Thinking and Static Thinking in Problem Solving: Do they Explain Different Patterns of Students’ Answers?

We look at dynamic thinking and static thinking in relation to mathematical problem solving. We examine the distribution of answers chosen by large samples of students to multiple-choice problems. Our empirical data suggest that static thinking activated by students in problem solving is likely to be responsible for a certain pattern of students’ responses, which is characterized by a uniform distribution among the choices. This finding has implications for curriculum development, as well as for the teaching practice in school.

Teaching practices and cognitive skills

National Teaching Standards by various educational organizations in the United States call for a decrease in the use of traditional teaching practices (such as learning by rote) and an increase in the use of modern teaching practices (such as working in small groups) in schools. Yet a small literature in economics has consistently found that traditional teaching raises test scores, while the effect of modern teaching appears to be small and sometimes even negative. This paper uses data from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) to show that traditional and modern teaching practices promote different cognitive skills in students. In particular, traditional teaching practices increase students' factual knowledge and their competency in solving routine problems, but have no significant effect on their reasoning skills. The effects of modern teaching practices are exactly the opposite, with modern teaching fostering reasoning skills. I provide evidence that standardized tests do not measure reasoning skills well, which explains the finding of only small or negative effects of modern teaching on test scores in the literature. I discuss the implications of these results for the recommendations made by National Teaching Standards.