What About Me?

Children with differences do not need to be fixed or cured or pitied. Children are valuable simply for the person they are and will be. Schools and school districts have sought to remediate the weaknesses of children with disabilities without focusing on or utilizing the strengths and interests of children with disabilities as the basis for individual education programs (IEP). Beginning with a pre-referral process that focuses on parent or teacher concerns for children, driving an evaluation that focuses on a child's weaknesses, leading to an IEP built on remediating weaknesses that often ignore an individual's strengths and interests, the process and end product are focused on deficits in children. This chapter will present an alternative to this model, an alternative focused on identifying and utilizing a child's strengths and interests in the development of IEPs.

Teachers’ primary concerns in a case of educational innovation introduction in primary schools in Greece

By converting all-day primary schools of suburban and urban areas in Greece into schools that implement the Comprehensive Reformed Educational Programme (CREP), a set of innovations were implemented, significantly altering the Greek school. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of selected variables over concerns of teachers who work at such schools. Additionally, this research asked the teachers to identify the professional development support and interventions required to enable them to make better use of the Book-reading Advancement (Philanagnosia) Activities innovation. Teachers’ administrative and pedagogical guidance executives, based on the above, will design the necessary interventions to positively address teachers’ concerns and implement the specific innovation in the most effective manner. Overall, the study found that higher teacher concerns were task related, with a significant record of information and self-concerns, which may indicate that the introduction of the innovation was not properly designed to address teachers’ primary concerns.

Developing Effective Dispositions for Teaching Music

The impact of teacher dispositions on the professional development of preservice music teachers (PMTs) has been substantiated. This chapter describes an approach to dispositional development within the structure of an introduction to music education course. A teacher concerns model is used to organize this systematic approach through three developmental stages that include self-concerns, teaching task concerns, and student learning concerns. A series of 11 critical questions are presented for use in guiding PMTs’ dispositional development through these developmental stages. Activities to engage PMTs in the exploration of each of these questions are detailed for use by music teacher educators desiring to engage PMTs in dispositional development.

Perfil sociodemográfico e preocupações dos professores de educação física do município de Cianorte – Pr

Introdução: Durante a carreira docente, diversos fatores influenciam o percurso profissional docente, dentre eles as preocupações docentes. Elas são organizadas em três dimensões: Consigo, Tarefa e Impacto da Tarefa, que acometem os professores em sua atuação pedagógica. Objetivo: Nesse sentido, a presente pesquisa teve como objetivo identificar as preocupações de professores de Educação Física que atuam na rede municipal de Cianorte-PR considerando as variáveis sociodemográficas. Métodos: Caracteriza-se como uma pesquisa descritiva exploratória. Para a coleta dos dados, na primeira fase da investigação, participaram 14 professores de Educação Física do município de Cianorte – Paraná, que responderam um questionário sociodemográfico e a Escala de Preocupações dos Professores. Na segunda fase, foi realizada uma entrevista semiestruturada com oito professores, relacionando as variáveis sóciodemográficas com as preocupações no âmbito de sua atuação docente. Para análise dos dados quantitativos utilizou-se da análise estatística indutiva, empregando o teste de Shapiro-Wilk, e o Teste Prova U de Mann Whitney para comparar as médias das dimensões de preocupações conforme as variáveis sociodemográficas. Para os dados qualitativos, utilizou-se a análise de conteúdo. Resultados: Os professores investigados são em sua maioria jovens e com pouco tempo de carreira docente. No entanto, apresentam menor preocupação com a dimensão Consigo e o maior índice se expressa na dimensão Impacto da Tarefa. Em relação à idade, os professores que possuem até 29 anos têm maior preocupação com a dimensão Tarefa, enquanto que os professores que possuem 30 anos ou mais concentram suas preocupações na dimensão Impacto da Tarefa. Destaca-se que foram identificadas, com relevância, outras preocupações docentes, a Estrutura Familiar/Contexto Social e Formação Docente, que não estão presentes na teoria das preocupações. Conclusão: As dimensões apresentadas por Fuller e Bown, acometem os professores analisados. Além disso, outras preocupações foram evidenciadas como: Estrutura Familiar/Contexto Social e Formação Docente.ABSTRACT. Sociodemographic profile and concerns of physical education teachers of Cianorte – Paraná. Background: During the teaching career, several factors influence the professional career of teachers, among them the teachers’ concerns. They are organized in three dimensions: Dimension for Self, Dimension Task e Dimension Impact of Task. Objective: In this sense, the present research had as objective to identify the concerns of Physical Education teachers working in the municipal network of Cianorte-PR considering the sociodemographic variables. Methods: It is characterized as an exploratory descriptive research. In order to collect the data, in the first phase of the investigation, 14 Physical Education teachers from the city of Cianorte - Paraná (Brazil) participated, who answered a sociodemographic questionnaire and the Teacher Concerns Scale. In the second phase, a semistructured interview was conducted with 8 teachers, associating the sociodemographic variables with the concerns of the teaching performance. For the analysis of the quantitative data, it was used the inductive statistical analysis using the Shapiro-Wilk test and the Mann Whitney Test U test to compare the averages of the dimensions of concerns according to sociodemographic variables. For the qualitative data, the content analysis was used. Results: The teachers investigated are mostly young and with little teaching career time. However, they are less concerned with the Dimension for Self and the higher level of concern expressed in the Dimension Impact of Task. Teachers who are up to age 29 are more concerned with task dimension, while teachers who are age 30 or older focus their concerns on the Impact of Task dimension. Other teacher concerns were identified with relevance, Family Structure/Social Context and Teacher Training, which are not present in the theory of concerns. Conclusion: The dimensions presented by Fuller and Bown affect the teachers analyzed. In addition, other concerns were highlighted as: Family Structure/Social Context and Teacher Training.

A Phenomenological Study on Teacher’s View and Perspectives on Using Technology in Teaching & Learning

Technology has changed the conventional way of teaching and learning. Teaching with technology can deepen student learning by supporting instructional objectives. However, technology could be a distraction for students if they do not use it wisely. In addition, the emergence of new educational technologies has led to a need change teachers roles. This qualitative research study employed a phenomenological approach to focus on teachers’ views and perspectives on using technology in their teaching and learning. Eight full time elementary and secondary teachers in an international school attend in in-depth, semi-structural interviews. The data were analyzed using phenomenological analysis. Findings were coded into four categories: teacher concerns, teacher’s roles, teachers’ perspective, and implementation. Instructional maintenance, inequalities, filtration of information, teachers’ readiness and need for training have been identified as teacher concerns. Guider, facilitator, assessor and moderator were teachers’ roles in international school. Finally, the reason for implementing technology in schools was beneficial and effectiveness of integrating technology in classroom teaching. The research showed that teachers who are slightly younger often use the technology in teaching and learning more than the older teachers do.