The purpose of the study aimed at gaining a better understanding of how the intended Project Lead the Way (PLTW) curriculum differs from the enacted curricula and what factors impact this. This understanding is important to make the professional development program more meaningful to the immediate needs of the teacher in the classroom. Identifying the factors that contribute to any emerging differences between the curricula helped fill the gap in research on teacher knowledge and beliefs about the use of science and mathematics content in the PLTW classroom. PLTW is an innovative hands-on pre-engineering curriculum designed for K-12 students based on project-based and problem-based learning. It tries to combine math and science principles to present engineering concepts to students in a way that tries to keep up with the rapid changes associated with technology in their everyday world. Multiple case sampling was used to select four teachers based on their years of teaching experience as well as background in science and math. They were interviewed about their knowledge and beliefs about project and problem-based learning. In addition, non-participant observations and teacher beliefs questionnaires were used to triangulate the data for more credible results. A fidelity of implementation rubric was also used to determine how well the teachers were implementing the curriculum. Findings of the study show that there were differences in the way teachers chose to enact the curriculum that were heavily influenced by the curriculum materials, the professional development training and their own personal beliefs about how the curriculum should be enacted. A conceptual model is developed that aims at improving the professional development experiences for the teachers that considers their beliefs.

Primary teachers in the United States accept responsibility for teaching children how to read, and the instruction they provide results in reading proficiency for approximately 37% of students. Although researchers have established a relationship between teacher-related factors and students' performance in reading, they have not yet been able to identify the combination of teacher characteristics that best predicts teachers' intention to provide evidence-based reading instruction. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships among teacher knowledge, teacher beliefs, and intention to provide evidence-based reading instruction using a conceptual framework that integrated the theory of planned behavior with the implicit theory of intelligence. An online survey was used to gather data from a convenience sample of 37 primary teachers in the United States to examine characteristics effective reading teachers have in common. The results of multiple regression analysis indicated different patterns for different groups of readers. For beginning readers, teachers' behavioral beliefs was the only significant predictor of intention to provide evidence-based reading instruction. For struggling readers, teacher knowledge of reading disabilities was the only significant predictor of intention. This study provided additional evidence of deficits in teachers' knowledge of basic language concepts and reading disabilities. Identifying teacher characteristics that influence students' reading proficiency outcomes may inform efforts to improve professional development and teacher preparation programs to better support and prepare teachers to ensure successful reading outcomes for all children.

This thesis explores the knowledge needed for teaching statistics through investigations at the primary (elementary) school level. Statistics has a relatively short history in the primary school curriculum, compared with mathematics. Recent research in statistics education has prompted a worldwide move away from the teaching of statistical skills, towards a broader underpinning of statistical thinking and reasoning. New Zealand’s nationally mandated curriculum reflects this move. Consequently, little is known about the types of knowledge needed to teach statistics effectively. Ideas from two contemporary areas of research, namely teacher content knowledge in relation to mathematics, and statistical thinking, are incorporated into a new framework, for exploring knowledge for teaching statistics. The study’s methodological approach is based on Popper’s philosophy of realism, and the associated logic of learning approach for classroom research. Four primary teachers (in their second year of teaching) planned and taught a sequence of four or five lessons, which were videotaped. Following each lesson, a stimulated recall interview, using an edited video of the lesson, was conducted with the teacher. The video and interview recordings were analysed in relation to the teacher knowledge and statistical thinking framework. The results provide detailed descriptions of the components of teacher knowledge in relation to statistical thinking that are needed and used in the classroom. Included in the results are profiles of each teacher’s knowledge. These profiles describe ‘missed opportunities’, which were defined as classroom incidents in which teacher knowledge was needed but not used, and consequently resulted in the teachers not taking advantage of chances to enhance students’ learning. A number of significant themes were revealed, linked to knowledge for teaching statistics. The themes include: problems associated with teacher listening; the need for the teacher to be familiar with the data; students’ difficulties with various components of the statistical investigation cycle; and understanding variation and the development of inference. The study concludes that for effective teaching of statistics through investigations, it is necessary for teachers to have knowledge in each of four categories as related to each component of statistical thinking. If any aspect of knowledge is not available or not used, teachers will not enhance, and could disadvantage, students’ learning. Implications from the findings are considered for initial and on-going teacher education.

Although an increasing number of research studies in mathematics education have begun focusing their efforts on mathematical modeling as a need for change to convey mathematical ideas beyond schools, there is not enough information about the nature of the teacher knowledge for effective use of modeling in mathematics teaching and how this knowledge evolves. The goal of this study is to investigate teachers&rsquo / evolving knowledge when they engage in professional development activities based on lesson study cycle from modeling perspective. Professional development program of this study included a cyclical process. Lasting a month, each cycle consisted of meeting before the implementation of the model eliciting activity, implementation of the activity and meeting after the implementation. The study took five months and was conducted in two public schools. The participants were four in-service mathematics teachers where two teachers were selected from each school by purposive sampling. The study was designed as case study. Data analyses were conducted during and after data collection and with two approaches as with-in case and cross-case analysis. As the professional development activities created learning environments for the teachers to develop their models for teaching mathematics from a modeling perspective, the results of this study showed that the professional development program used in the study had a positive effect on teachers&rsquo / evolving pedagogical content knowledge and pedagogical knowledge based on the theoretical and empirical backgrounds in the literature. Besides, implications, suggestions for professional development, for teachers and for further research are provided.

Knowledge of curriculum is a significant component of mathematical knowledge for teaching. However, clearly understanding knowledge of curriculum requires further refinement and substantial research. This study consists of three papers that aim to explore prospective and practicing middle school teachers’ Knowledge of Curriculum for Teaching Simple Algebraic Equations (KCTE). The first paper reviews trends in and the evolution of standards and policies and synthesizes significant findings of research on mathematics curriculum and Knowledge of Curriculum for Mathematics Teaching (KCMT). Through this synthesis, the paper examines policy changes and research relevant to mathematics curriculum and KCMT and anticipates future research approaches and topics that show promise. Building on the context provided by the first paper, the following two papers investigate KCTE from the perspectives of prospective and practicing middle school mathematics teachers. For the second paper, data was collected from a convenience sample of 58 prospective middle school mathematics teachers and a subsample of six participants. The findings of this study identify patterns of key mathematical topics in the teaching sequence of simple algebraic equations, compare the participants’ sequences with experts’, reveal participants’ orientations toward KCTE, draw connections between participants’ KCTE and their knowledge of content and teaching, and establish relationships between participants’ KCTE and their knowledge of content and students. Four middle school mathematics teachers participated in the third study. The results indicate that state-level intended curriculum is the most prevailing component of participants’ KCTE. Furthermore, from a vertical view of curriculum, participants’ awareness of their students’ lack of basic mathematical knowledge impacted their KCTE. The paper also identifies the role of the state-level intended curriculum in participants’ KCTE, alternative approaches to curriculum implementation that participants used to respond to the multiple intelligences of their students, and the participants’ lack of lateral curriculum knowledge in KCTE. Together, these three papers offer a closer look at KCMT with a focus on simple algebraic equations. This research broadens our understanding of prospective and practicing middle school teachers’ KCMT and discusses implications for professional development.

My dissertation study is two-year interdisciplinary project that combined case study and oral history methods to craft the life history of West Middle School. The goal of this project is to gain knowledge of how a school's identity, image and culture are shaped by outside forces such as education policy and demographic shifts over time. To this end, I ask teacher participants to narrate the life history of West Middle School, while paying particular attention to shifts in educational policy, to a changing student population and to citizenship education. The aim of exploring these issues is to present a holistic view of schooling. My theoretical framework draws upon the theories of figured worlds, hidden curriculum and social reproduction as entry points for understanding the complex world of West Middle School. I use case study methods such as observation along with oral history interviews and archival data to construct West's life history. The data sources include teacher interviews, an extensive yearbook archive, district school board meeting minutes, and school district boundary maps. The findings of the study are presented in two chapters. Chapter five presents key themes from the teachers' interviews describing the cultural environment and public image of West Middle School. Teachers characterize the school's image and reputation in terms of exceptionalism and the school's identity in terms of family and guardianship. Chapter six discusses citizenship education at West. The main themes in this chapter draw attention to teachers' understanding of good citizenship in pointed terms of respect, responsibility and civic duty. Central conclusions include a nuanced understanding of contradictions within the West Middle School community, the ways in which diversity is simultaneously valued and assimilated, and the ways in which West's positive reputation acts as social and cultural capital. Implications for teacher education include creating spaces where pre-service teachers can engage in deeper learning about school communities and coming to see teaching as a political rather than passive act. Finally, implications for research call for expanding methodological frameworks to include bending and combining methods toward gaining a rich understanding of the complexities of schools. / text

The effects of coaching on teacher and student outcomes were compared to outcomes of classes randomized to professional development only and comparison conditions. Twenty-one teachers, trained to implement a Tier II reading intervention curriculum, were grouped by campus then randomized to one of three conditions: professional development plus coaching support (n=6), professional development only (n=7) and a comparison condition (n=8). Teachers in the coached and professional development only (un-coached) conditions were compared on measures of teacher knowledge and implementation fidelity as an indication of teacher practice. Student achievement scores on word attack, reading fluency and reading comprehension measures were compared for students in each of the three conditions. A multiple-gating procedure was used to help teachers identify the five lowest-performing readers in their first grade classrooms. Students completed a battery of seven reading ability assessments prior to and immediately following teacher-implementation of a seventeen-week reading intervention curriculum. Results of ANCOVA analyses indicated students in classes of teachers who received professional development and coaching support did not demonstrate significantly higher scores than teachers who only received professional development training on a battery of reading measures. Further analysis indicated students in the professional development plus coaching condition did have significantly higher scores than those in comparison conditions on five of the seven outcome measures. Teachers in coached and professional development only conditions completed a teacher knowledge survey to measure their knowledge of evidence-based reading practices. ANCOVA analysis revealed no significant differences between groups at posttest. Changes in teacher practice were measured as a function of intervention implementation fidelity. Intervention teachers were videotaped three times over the course of the intervention and taped classes were scored, rated and compared across conditions. Results of a Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance on fidelity scores revealed a statistically significant difference in favor of the teachers who received professional development plus coaching. / text

No description available.

This research proposes that the explicit incorporation of spatial thinking into teacher preparation programs is an effective and efficient way to foster and develop a spatially literate populace. The major objective of this study was to examine the effect of explicit instruction in spatial thinking on the development of preservice teachers' knowledge, skills, and dispositions toward teaching it. A one-day workshop - Teaching Spatial Thinking with Geography - for preservice geography teachers was developed as the intervention of this study. The primary focus of the workshop was to provide an explicit opportunity to learn about spatial thinking and to practice skills required to incorporate spatial thinking into participants' classrooms. Three assessments were used to examine changes in participants' knowledge, skills, and dispositions, before and after the workshop: the spatial concepts test, the teaching spatial thinking disposition survey, and participant-produced lesson plans. Individual interviews were conducted to obtain a deeper understanding of participants' learning experiences during the workshop. A mixed-method research design was adopted in which both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to offset the weaknesses inherent within one method with the strengths of the other. The major findings of this study include: 1) explicit instruction about spatial concepts is necessary to the development of preservice teachers' knowledge required for teaching spatial thinking through geography; 2) the skills development required to teach spatial thinking should be approached as the development of pedagogical content knowledge; 3) dispositions toward teaching spatial thinking should be differentiated from dispositions toward teaching general thinking skills; 4) although explicit instruction about teaching spatial thinking contributed substantially to the preservice teachers' acquisition of knowledge and skills and the development of positive dispositions toward teaching spatial, each of these components develops at a different rate but affect each other; and 5) a promising approach to the development of preservice teachers' pedagogical content knowledge would be to offer geography education courses, not general geography or methods courses, in which the focus is explicitly on teaching geography with an emphasis on spatial thinking.

It is no unknown fact that South African learners underachieve in mathematics. Due to the fact that the quality of mathematics teaching is one possible factor that has an influence on learners' mathematics achievement, there are valid reasons questioning the conceptual mathematical knowledge of mathematics teachers. In order to facilitate conceptual understanding teachers themselves must possess profound mathematical knowledge. Apart from the influence of a teacher's knowledge for teaching, teachers' attitudes and beliefs play a meaningful role in the way they teach mathematics. The deficient nature of prospective and practising teachers' knowledge of school mathematics, as well as their attitudes and beliefs towards mathematics has serious implications for the training of prospective mathematics teachers. Literature reveals that a technologically enhanced environment can improve the conceptual learning of prospective mathematics teachers. The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of a dynamic technologically enhanced environment on the attitudes and beliefs, as well as the conceptualisation of prospective mathematics teachers regarding the function concept. In this study, prospective teachers were exposed to Geometer's Sketchpad®, a dynamic software programme providing a powerful learning context that promotes the investigation of algebraic relationships. In order to answer the research question, an explanatory mixed method design was used. In the quantitative part of the study, the Study Orientation Questionnaire in Mathematics and a function test were administered to prospective teachers. In the latter, conceptualisation of the function concept was measured in terms of four competence components, namely interpretation, modelling, translation and reification. In the qualitative part of the investigation semi-structured and task-based interviews were held with a group of prospective teachers. Analysis of the results revealed that the dynamic technologically enhanced environment did not contribute to an improvement of the prospective teachers' attitudes and beliefs. In fact, these decreased visibly. Regarding their conceptualisation, only the reification component showed a practically significant improvement. It therefore appears as if prospective teachers are not being prepared to benefit from the dynamic technologically enhanced environment. A model is proposed for the effective use of such a learning environment. The model involves that diagnostic assessment be made of prospective teachers' basic knowledge of the function concept, their study habits, their attitudes and beliefs with respect to mathematics, as well as their mathematics anxiety. The second component comprises recommendations made to prospective teachers as a result of the diagnostic assessment, as well as continuous support being offered as an integrated part of the mathematics module. Support is offered with respect to cognitive and meta-cognitive skills, affective factors and the creation of an advantageous technologically enhanced learning environment. Despite the restricted value of generalisation of the findings from this study, I still recommend the expansion, refining and implementation of the model so that prospective mathematics teachers can effectively benefit from a technologically enhanced environment. Key words for indexing: mathematics education, mathematics teacher education, teacher knowledge, prospective mathematics teachers, function concept, conceptual learning, tertiary education. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Education))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2009.