Collaborative elementary civics curriculum development to support teacher learning to enact culturally sustaining practices

Author(s):  
Esther A. Enright ◽  
William Toledo ◽  
Stacy Drum ◽  
Sarah Brown
2017 ◽  
Vol 68 (4) ◽  
pp. 411-425 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lynsey K. Gibbons ◽  
Paul Cobb

Instructional improvement initiatives in many districts include instructional coaching as a primary form of job-embedded support for teachers. However, the coaching literature provides little guidance about what activities coaches should engage in with teachers to improve instruction. When researchers do propose activities, they rarely justify why those activities might support teacher learning. Drawing on the preservice and inservice teacher education literatures, we present a conceptual analysis of learning activities that have the potential to support mathematics and science teachers to improve practice. We argue that our analysis can inform research on mathematics and science coaching, coaching policies, and the design of professional learning for coaches.


2017 ◽  
Vol 119 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-37
Author(s):  
Christine Andrews-Larson ◽  
Jonee Wilson ◽  
Adrian Larbi-Cherif

Background/Context School districts are increasingly expected to support students in meeting ambitious mathematical learning goals. Many schools and districts are investing significant resources in the provision of time for teacher collaboration in the hope that this will help teachers improve their instruction in ways that support students in meeting ambitious learning goals. While existing research points to the potential of this collaboration time to support teacher learning, findings from previous work suggest that use of this time varies in ways that are likely to be consequential for teachers’ learning. Research Question In this analysis, we investigate the question: In what ways do focus and facilitation shape teachers’ opportunities to learn during collaborative conversations? Research Design The data for this analysis comes from a 4-year study of 4 large urban school districts that examines what it takes to improve the quality of middle school math instruction at scale. Our analysis draws on the broader data set by first using teacher-level data (observed instructional quality) from 30 schools to identify schools that exhibited the most growth in instructional quality. We then analyze audio recordings of teacher collaborative meetings at those schools to better understand how the conversations that take place in these meetings might function to support teachers’ professional learning. In particular, we examine differences in facilitator questioning and subsequent facilitator press on teachers to elaborate their pedagogical reasoning. Findings/Results We observed two foci in identified sessions: writing learning targets and lesson co-planning. As enacted, the lesson co-planning sessions held greater potential for supporting teachers’ professional learning. Use of an activity-structuring tool was related to higher quality facilitator questions in these sessions but was not related to improved facilitator press on teachers to elaborate on their responses to these questions. These facilitator moves are marked by (1) solicitation of detailed representations of teachers’ classrooms and practice, (2) orientation toward students as sense-makers, and (3) press for teachers to articulate rationales for instructional decisions that are tied to goals for student learning. We provide examples of facilitator questioning and press that are generative for teacher learning. Conclusions/Recommendations This work contributes to the research on the ways collaborative time can support teacher learning. It identifies specific practices that facilitators can draw on to support teachers’ professional learning—which has the potential to inform both teacher learning and the training of facilitators. This work can additionally inform the design and use of tools (protocols) that can help productively structure teacher collaborative time and also reveal the limitations of such tools. Importantly, we offer a coding scheme for analyzing the quality of facilitation through questioning and press that can subsequently be challenged, problematized, and built upon in the field.


2011 ◽  
Vol 81 (4) ◽  
pp. 530-565 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca M. Schneider ◽  
Kellie Plasman

Learning progressions are the successively more sophisticated ways of thinking about an idea that follow one another over a broad span of time. This review examines the research on science teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) in order to refine ideas about science teacher learning progressions and how to support them. Research published between 1986 and 2010 relevant to science teacher learning and PCK was examined for what ways teachers’ knowledge becomes more developed and what appears to be the sequence. Analysis indicates that it is helpful for teachers to think about learners first, then to focus on teaching, and points out the essential role of reflection for teachers to rearrange their ideas in ways that develop their PCK. This review takes a unique approach to thinking about research on what science teachers learn and can support teacher educators in designing professional programs that support beginning and advanced learning for science teachers.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Meng Zhang ◽  
Allan David David Walker ◽  
Haiyan Qian

PurposeThis study aims to describe and analyze an innovative mechanism of teacher-led, system-wide professional learning that has been widely adopted since the beginning of the twenty-first century in China – the Master Teacher Studio (MTS).Design/methodology/approachThis paper drew from policy documents, published Chinese literature relating to MTSs and personal fieldwork experience in Shanghai, Guangdong and Zhejiang province.FindingsThe article first outlines the context framing the system change, including its policy background and evolution, and then the MTS's purpose, formative process and structure. It finally examines major teacher learning activities and the leadership roles of the MTS hosts (leaders).Research limitations/implicationsThis study contributed to the knowledge base of system teacher leaders and how they lead cross-school leading.Practical implicationsThe MTS initiative described in this article shows the power of central system leadership to spread and embed effective teacher learning practices at schools.Originality/valueThis article provides implications for understanding and practicing teacher system leadership to support teacher professional learning in different societies.


2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-381
Author(s):  
Danielle Lillge

Purpose Current top-down literacy reform mandates have reenergized attention to professional development (PD) outcomes. Still, questions remain about why English teachers struggle to apply their learning. Refocusing attention on understanding the complex yet critical relationship between professional development (PD) facilitators and teachers offers one explanation. Design/methodology/approach Using a telling case from an interactional ethnography, this paper illustrates how through their language-in-use teachers and facilitators can productively resolve conflicts that, if left unaddressed, can prevent teachers from acting on their professional learning. Findings A set of discursive moves – flagging, naming, soliciting and processing – provide a toolkit for surfacing and successfully resolving conflict in PD interactions. Research limitations/implications These moves offer a way of prioritizing the importance of teacher–facilitator relationships in future research aimed at addressing the longstanding conundrum of how best to support English teachers’ ongoing professional learning. Practical implications Teaching facilitators and teachers how to collaboratively address inevitable conflicts offers a needed intervention in supporting both teacher and facilitator learning. Originality/value Previous research has affirmed that facilitators, like teachers, need support for navigating the complexity of professional learning interactions. This paper offers a language for uncovering why teacher–facilitator interactions can be so challenging for teachers and facilitators as well as ways of responding productively in-the-moment. It contributes to a more capacious understanding of how these relationships shape diverse English teacher learning.


2012 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 41-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura R. Van Zoest ◽  
Shari L. Stockero

We draw on research into the durability of sociomathematical and professional norms to make a case for attending to productive norms in teacher education experiences. We illustrate that productive norms have the potential to support teacher learning by (a) improving teachers' own mathematical understanding, particularly of specialized content knowledge; (b) supporting teachers to productively view and analyze classroom practice; (c) providing teachers an experiential basis for thinking about fostering productive norms in their classrooms; and (d) helping teachers to develop professional dispositions that support continued learning from practice. This work points to the importance of intentionally considering the norms cultivated in teacher education experiences, assessing their productivity, and strategically focusing on those that provide the best support for teacher learning.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muawanah

Purposes of applying the regulation of the minister of education and culture number 103 in 2014 to manufacture the implementation plan for the implementation of learning is learning more focused and to the achievement of learning objectives. Lesson plan (RPP) is one manifestation of the curriculum development shall be prepared by the teacher and used as guidance in implementing the learning. Efforts towards the implementation of the regulation of the minister of education and culture number 103 in 2014 against the lesson plan teachers through on going guidance, training, and on the job training to teachers. Here we describe how the implementation of the regulation of the minister of education and culture number 103 in 2014 against the lesson plan teachers. The method used in this paper is descriptive qualitative research method literature study. For schools and school principals in order to spruce up the administration of teacher learning device. For teachers to be able to implement the regulation of the minister of education and culture number 103 in 2014 to plan the implementation of learning as feedback in order to understand the performance and the factors that influence so as to stimulate the teachers efforts to improve its capabilities.


2022 ◽  
pp. 313-334
Author(s):  
Luke J. Rapa ◽  
Jeff C. Marshall ◽  
Stephanie M. Madison ◽  
Christopher Flathmann ◽  
Bart P. Knijnenburg ◽  
...  

This chapter provides an overview of Clemson University's Teacher Learning Progression program, which offers participating middle school science, technology, engineering, and/or mathematics (STEM) teachers with personalized advanced credentials. In contrast to typical professional development (PD) approaches, this program identifies individualized pathways for PD based on teachers' unique interests and needs and offers PD options through the use of a “recommender system”—a system providing context-specific recommendations to guide teachers toward the identification of preferred PD pathways and content. In this chapter, the authors introduce the program and highlight (1) the data collection and instrumentation needed to make personalized PD recommendations, (2) the recommender system, and (3) the personalized advanced credential options. The authors also discuss lessons learned through initial stages of project implementation and consider future directions for the use of recommender systems to support teacher PD, considering both research and applied implications and settings.


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