Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Beginning Teachers’ Perceptions of their Pedagogical Knowledge and Skills in Teaching: A Three Year Study

Doris Choy et al. — Fri, 17 May 2013 06:21:16 PDT

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the beginning teachers’ perceptions of pedagogical knowledge and skills in teaching in Singapore. Data was collected from the beginning teachers at three time points: the exit point of the teacher education programme, the end of their first year and third year of teaching. In this three year study, the focus is to examine the beginning teachers’ perceptions of their development in the following teaching related factors: lesson planning, classroom management and instructional strategies. The results showed that beginning teachers’ pedagogical knowledge and skills increased significantly, but at different rates, in all three factors at the end of their third year of teaching. It suggested that learning to teach is an on-going process that begins from the pre-service teacher education programme and continues into the initial three years of teaching.

Teachers’ Knowledge of Anxiety and Identification of Excessive Anxiety in Children

Clea Headley et al. — Mon, 13 May 2013 19:07:10 PDT

This study examined primary school teachers’ knowledge of anxiety and excessive anxiety symptoms in children. Three hundred and fifteen primary school teachers completed a questionnaire exploring their definitions of anxiety and the indications they associated with excessive anxiety in primary school children. Results showed that teachers had an understanding of what anxiety was in general but did not consistently distinguish normal anxiety from excessive anxiety, often defining all anxiety as a negative experience. Teachers were able to identify symptoms of excessive anxiety in children by recognizing anxiety-specific and general problem indications. The results provided preliminary evidence that teachers’ knowledge of anxiety and anxiety disorders does not appear to be a barrier in preventing children’s referrals for mental health treatment. Implications for practice and directions for future research are discussed.

Education for Sustainability: A Case Study of Pre-service Primary Teachers' Knowledge and Efficacy

Gerard Effeney et al. — Fri, 10 May 2013 06:23:55 PDT

This study investigated the relationships between knowledge and efficacy for teaching sustainability in a sample of 266 pre-service primary teachers at a large, metropolitan university in Australia. A survey gathered information about the participant’s attitudes and self-efficacy for education for sustainability, along with their perceived and actual knowledge of environmental sustainability issues. The participants typically believed they were confident in their abilities to engage with education for sustainability with self-efficacy increasing with increased levels of perceived knowledge. However no relationship was found between perceived knowledge and actual knowledge which suggests that the participants either do not feel constrained by their lack of knowledge, or are perhaps unaware of their actual knowledge of sustainability issues. This lack of relationship may have implications for the development of pedagogical content knowledge with pre-service teachers potentially developing shallow, tokenistic approaches to Education for Sustainability.

Conceptualising Changes to Pre-Service Teachers’ Knowledge of how to Best Facilitate Learning in Mathematics: A TPACK Inspired Initiative

Frank G. Bate et al. — Wed, 08 May 2013 18:00:36 PDT

In 2010, the Australian Commonwealth government initiated an $8m project called Teaching Teachers for the Future. The aim of the project was to engage teacher educators in a professional learning network which focused on optimising exemplary use of information and communications technologies in teacher education. By taking part in this network, participants were afforded opportunities to transform their practice through a range of localised initiatives that applied information and communications technologies to the art and science of teaching and learning. One of these initiatives involved re-engineering a university mathematics unit targeted at pre-service teachers. Information and communications technologies were purposefully embedded using Mishra and Koehler’s (2006) Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge model as a conceptual framework. This paper discusses the outcomes of the initiative. Pre-service teachers and staff involved in the unit shared their stories about the changes they had noticed in both their thinking and practice. The results of the initiative were heartening, and it is hoped that the constructs used will translate into other learning areas.

“Miss, I Am Not Being Fully Prepared”: Student - Teachers’ Concerns About Their Preparation at a Teacher Training Institution in Jamaica

Carmel G. Roofe et al. — Tue, 07 May 2013 22:41:02 PDT

The issue of teacher preparation continues to occupy academic discourse relating to student outcomes and student achievement (Stronge, Ward & Grant, 2011). Research has supported the view that there is an inextricable connection between student outcomes, quality of teaching and teachers, and teacher preparation (Darling-Hammond 2005; Grover 2002). Similarly, theories about students’ self efficacy beliefs (e.g. Bandura, 1977; Dweck, 2000) and Institutional Habitus (Bourdieu, 1977) have been advanced in relation to students’ study experience, motivation and coping mechanisms. Using data from a focus group comprising 30 third year students enrolled in a four year teacher training pogramme in Jamaica, this paper discusses student-teachers’ concerns about their training. The main findings from this small scale exploratory study indicated that student teachers’ concerns were about the quality of teaching and teachers, curriculum organisation, content and delivery, and resources.

Pre-service Secondary Teachers’ Attitudes Towards Inclusive Education

Shane Costello et al. — Sat, 04 May 2013 19:24:30 PDT

The attitudes held by pre-service teachers have been shown to affect their willingness and ability to implement an inclusive approach to education. A sample consisting of 193 pre-service secondary teachers enrolled in secondary education courses at an Australian university were surveyed to determine their attitudes towards inclusive education, with a particular focus on attitudinal changes across the years of study. Results indicated that pre-service secondary teachers held positive attitudes towards inclusive education; however there was a significant decline in positive attitudes through the years of study. Pre-service secondary teachers enrolled in postgraduate programs were more inclusive than those enrolled in undergraduate courses. Attitudes towards training and perceived competence were less positive than other attitude scales for all participants, suggesting a concern regarding training effectiveness. Replication of the study is recommended across additional Australian and international universities to determine differences in training content and experiences which may impact on attitudes towards training and perceived competence.

How School and University Supervising Staff Perceive the Pre-Service Teacher Education Practicum: A Comparative Study

Jeanne M. Allen et al. — Sat, 04 May 2013 19:24:28 PDT

Abstract: This paper reports on research conducted in two Australian universities to evaluate factors that are perceived to significantly impact on the professional experiences of pre-service teachers during practicum. Contextualised within teacher education programs in an urban university in Tasmania and a regional university in Queensland, the particular focus of this paper is the beliefs and experiences of school and university supervising staff members regarding the efficacy of the practicum in enabling students to integrate into practice the knowledge and skills they have acquired in their university coursework. Findings generated from the comparative analysis of both mixed methods studies revealed some differences but predominantly a number of similarities between the perceptions of the two samples of school practitioners and university staff members towards practicum. Three key findings are presented and discussed in this paper.

Teacher Identity in the Early Career Phase: Trajectories that Explain and Influence Development

Chad M. Morrison — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 17:40:02 PDT

Early career teaching is a difficult phase to navigate with many newly qualified teachers choosing to leave the profession within the first few years. The professional identities of these and other teachers are shaped by challenging and unanticipated experiences. The schools where this teaching takes place also have profound influence on these teachers’ individual responses to their new roles. This paper reports on how the contexts and professional environments of fourteen early career teachers contributed to the establishment of three distinct trajectories of teacher identity: the emergent, tenuous and distressed. An examination of their developing identities revealed the influential experiences and individual responses that were connected to how the novice teachers understood and explained themselves with and through influential others. These descriptions and representations of themselves shaped their future actions and evolving beliefs. These were then implicated in their identity trajectories, which in turn contributed to their professional traction or early exit from the profession.

Pre-service Teachers’ Preferred Methods of Assessment: A Perspective from Saudi Arabia

Amani K. Hamdan Alghamdi — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 17:40:01 PDT

Teacher-candidate course assessment is one topic that has not been adequately explored in teacher education literature where pre-service teachers’ voices are rarely heard. Assessment methods in pre-service teacher programs across the world, including in Saudi Arabia, have received little exploration in the literature. This mixed-methods study explored a group of female pre-service teachers (n = 83) enrolled in a Diploma of Education program to identify their preferred method of assessment for their learning. The results showed that these individuals preferred a group assignment, consisting of a written report and an oral presentation, over an individual assignment, consisting of an individual essay, because the group assignment helped them to break through the boundary of facing an audience and encouraged them to exchange knowledge with their counterparts.

Workplace-Based Practicum: Enabling Expansive Practices

Bruce A. Pridham et al. — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 23:23:45 PDT

Effective pre-service teacher education integrates theoretical and practical knowledge. One means of integration is practicum in a school workplace. In a time of variable approaches to, and models of, practicum, we outline an innovative model of school immersion as part of a teacher preparation program. We apply Fuller and Unwin’s (2004) expansive and restrictive conceptual framework of workplace learning to a case study of an immersive practicum experience to discuss themes of participation, personal development and institutional arrangements in relation to school-based practicum. Enablers and constraints are identified for our immersion model of workplace-based practicum. Based on the data analysis a number of implications for structuring an expansive practicum learning experience are outlined.

The Lived and Living Bodies of Two Health and Physical Education Tertiary Educators: How Embodied Consciousness Highlighted the Importance of their Bodies in their Teaching Practice in HPE

Jennifer A. McMahon et al. — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 04:56:05 PDT

This paper reports on narrative research that focuses on two tertiary Health and Physical Education (HPE) educators’ bodies. In particular, it explores how their lived encounters impacted upon their everyday teaching practice. Narrative accounts are used to present their lived and living bodies in this research. Findings suggest that they were enacting body pedagogies and embodied experiences in various ways influencing pedagogical practice and at times colliding with pre-service teachers’ bodies. ‘Embodied consciousness’ highlights an importance for all educators to better understand how their bodies are positioned and thus influence their practice. This research acknowledges the body as a site through which lived experience can be perpetuated and/or enacted in and through the living body.

Literacy Coaching Roles in Diverse Contexts of Teaching and Learning: New Ways of Working

Lisa J. van Leent et al. — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 01:07:37 PDT

As the demands placed on the literacy coach have evolved, so too have the roles of these educational providers who are often responsible for working with school teams to turn around student performance on standardized literacy tests. One literacy coach based in a Queensland primary school recounts her experiences via open-ended interview over a two year period. We offer a theorisation of the newways of working as a literacy coach in a context of teaching and learning marked by diversity.

Building Early Career Teacher Resilience: The Role of Relationships

Rosie Le Cornu — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 04:54:20 PDT

There are serious concerns around the sustainability of teaching given the attrition rate of early career teachers. In Western countries we know that between 25% and 40% of beginning teachers are likely to leave the teaching profession in the first 5 years (Ewing & Smith, 2003; Day & Gu, 2010). Clearly, there is a need to better understand the experiences of early career teachers and to investigate, in new ways, how the problem of teacher attrition can be addressed. This paper is based on a collaborative qualitative research project funded by the Australian Research Council that aimed to investigate the dynamic and complex interplay among individual, relational and contextual conditions that operate over time to promote early career teacher resilience.

The methodology for the study was a critical enquiry. The data for the study came from interviews with 60 beginning teachers and their principals. Five main ‘Conditions for Resilience’ emerged from the analysis: relationships; school culture; teacher identity; teachers’ work; and policies and practices (Johnson, Down, Le Cornu, Peters, Sullivan, Pearce & Hunter, 2010). This article focuses on the first theme – relationships. It illuminates the role that sustainable and mutually sustaining relationships play in the development of early career teachers. Jordan’s (2006) model of relational resilience – with its characteristics of mutuality, empowerment and the development of courage - is used as a conceptual framework for discussing the insights from the study.

Teacher Retention and Attrition: Views of Early Career Teachers

John Buchanan et al. — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 04:15:33 PDT

The provision and maintenance of quality teachers is a matter of priority for the profession. Moreover, teacher attrition is costly to the profession, to the community and to those teachers who leave feeling disillusioned. There is a need to investigate the experiences of early career teachers to consider how these issues contribute to decisions about staying in or leaving the profession. This paper reports on an aspect of a larger study on teacher retention. It describes and analyses the experiences of teachers participating in the study and highlights implications for teacher retention. The study proposes the notion of ‘resilient stayers’, and how beginning teachers’ resilience might be strengthened and supported. It asks what combination of circumstances in the school and the system, and individual resources of resilience on the part of early career teachers, might maximise the chances of teachers choosing to remain in the profession.

Learning about the Effects of Context on Teaching and Learning in Pre-Service Teacher Education

Lisl Fenwick et al. — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 00:36:08 PDT

Preparing teachers to work effectively within increasingly diverse contexts is a key goal of teacher education programs. This study analyses the extent to which a semester unit within a teacher education course provided pre-service teachers with the understanding and practices required to teach in low socio-economic status (SES) contexts. The results suggest that a unit, which emphasises links between theory, historical perspectives and practice, can effectively provide pre-service teachers with the key understandings and skills associated with improving equity outcomes in education. However, when the ideas being presented conflict with pre-existing, strongly held ideas about the role of schooling, practices associated with equity will not be sustained.

Learning to Teach English Language in the Practicum: What Challenges do Non-Native ESL Student Teachers Face?

Zhengdong Gan — Sun, 14 Apr 2013 21:00:15 PDT

This study investigates the challenges sixteen non-native preservice ESL teachers in a Bachelor of Education (English Language) (BEdEL) programme from Hong Kong experienced in an eight-week teaching practicum. Qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and reflective journals were collected from all 16 participants to obtain a detailed description of the participants’ perceptions of their field-based practicum experiences. Results indicate that the preserviece teachers’ practicum was characterized by a reality shock due to difficulties in experimenting with pedagogical practices they were taught in the BEdEL programme, and a lack of sense of control in class. This reality shock could destabilize the already anxious student teachers and have adverse effects well beyond the eight-week teaching practicum. Inadequacy in English language competence also appeared to affect not only these student teachers’ teaching performance but also how they established and maintained their teacher role and relationship with their students. Implications of the results for strengthening current ESL teacher preparation programmes in non-native English speaking contexts are discussed.

Self- Efficacy and Participation in Choosing the Teaching Profession as Predictors of Academic Motivation among Arab Student's Girls

Qutaiba Ali Agbaria — Sun, 14 Apr 2013 00:17:17 PDT

The purpose of this study is to examine the link between learning motivation among teaching trainees and self- efficacy and the rate of participation in choosing the profession of teaching. The main assumptions: There will be a clear positive link between the rate of self-efficacy of students and academic motivation, with its various elements. There will be a clear positive link between the rate of participation in choosing the profession (teaching) and academic motivation.

The sample included 181 female students. The sample was random relative to students of each academic year and specialization.

The findings of the study corroborated most of the assumptions, and we found clear links between motivation and its variety of elements and participation in the process of choosing the academic institution.

The Effects of Problem-Based Learning on Metacognitive Awareness and Attitudes toward Chemistry of Prospective Teachers with Different Academic Backgrounds

Cemal Tosun et al. — Sat, 13 Apr 2013 04:29:58 PDT

The aim of this study was to reveal the effects of Problem-based Learning (PBL) on the metacognitive awareness and attitudes toward chemistry of teacher candidates with different academic backgrounds. The study was carried out on one group using both pre- and post-test experimental studies. The findings of the study were obtained through quantitative approaches. The sample of the study was 70 first-year undergraduate students at a state university in Turkey taking General Chemistry/General Chemistry-II classes. The study was implemented during the spring semester of the 2011-2012 academic years and for a period of 20 hours. Quantitative data was obtained using the Metacognitive Awareness Inventory and the Chemistry Attitude Scale. Two dependent sample t-tests were used for the pre-and post-test comparisons. The findings showed that PBL was more effective in developing metacognitive awareness levels of students with weak science background knowledge compared to those with strong science backgrounds. In addition, the findings showed that PBL was effective in increasing the attitudes positively toward chemistry of students with weak scientific backgrounds.

Teachers’ Perceptions on the Changes in the Curriculum and Exit Examinations for Biology and Human Biology

Mirko Krüger et al. — Sat, 13 Apr 2013 04:29:56 PDT

In the age of educational accountability, national and state-wide measures are assumed to secure and improve the educational quality. However, educators often wonder how much a new accountability measure may improve the actual teaching and learning practices when the agents of change (teachers) are not active participants of such educational reform. Nevertheless, in Australia, the National Curriculum is rolling in for the first time for K-10 school education in 2012-13. In Western Australia, the new Western Australian Certificate of Education (WACE) system with new compulsory exit examination requirements has been implemented recently for Years 11-12. In this study, using the contextual curriculum theory (Cornbleth, 1990) and the levels of curriculum (van den Akker, 1998, 2003) as our theoretical framework, we investigated how experienced Biology teachers are making sense of the recent changes in the curriculum and the exit examination requirements: what they perceive as the major changes in the new WACE system; and how they implement the changes in their teaching practice. We discuss how the teachers’ teaching philosophy, their school environments, and the new curriculum interact to create a spectrum of the implemented curriculum.

Ensuring student success: Establishing a community of practice for culturally and linguistically diverse preservice teachers

Radha Iyer et al. — Sat, 13 Apr 2013 04:08:34 PDT

This paper discusses the primacy of communities of practice within learning contexts at university and during practicum for culturally and linguistically diverse preservice teachers. The study illustrates that learning occurs when there are adequate opportunities for participation and practice. Data from interviews with 28 culturally and linguistically diverse preservice teachers illustrate that tensions created by social, cultural differences impact upon modes of identification and dimensions of practice (Lave & Wenger, 1991; Wenger, 1998). The study concludes by reiterating the importance of establishing proactive communities of practice to ensure success in learning and practice for this group of preservice teachers.