Limited evidence is available from the existing literature that relates teachers' career motivation to their attitudes towards special and inclusive education and their motivation for professional development in China. A mixed-method approach was used to investigate teachers' perspectives on their professional life in this respect. A sample of teachers at seven mainstream schools (N=326), two special schools (N=37) and student teachers from one university (N=565) in a city in China was identified. Triangulation of data collected from questionnaire surveys, interviews and observations facilitated the identification of cases for narrative enquiry. Self-Determination Theory (SDT) was applied in data analysis and discussion. The key findings are as follows: First, teachers researched were mostly extrinsically motivated. Some were amotivated (unwilling) and were regretful of their career choice. The majority of them would have chosen other professions if possible. Second, special school teachers' extrinsic motivation for working in special schools became less controlled and more autonomous with the accumulation of knowledge and skills in teaching practice. Similarly, their initial unwillingness had altered to controlled extrinsic motivation or even autonomous motivation. Third, initial teacher education had prepared teachers with limited knowledge and understanding about special and inclusive education. This contributed to the less positive attitudes towards inclusive education. Despite a high awareness of, and motivation for professional development, most teachers were not taking an active initiative in engaging themselves in professional development. The thesis highlights the impact of teacher recruitment policies on career motivation, models of initial and continuing teacher training on teacher attitudes values and incentives for professional development. This study implies a correlation between the key themes and extends the discussion of the SDT model in terms of the continuum of extrinsic motivation.

Prior to 1997, an integrated legislative and policy approach to meeting the educational and care needs of children and young people, in the English context, had been absent. Separatist rather than integrated models of service delivery prevailed. In the early years specifically, research findings have supported the growing recognition internationally about the importance of good quality Early Childhood Education and Care, both economically and for later life achievements. In England, the former Labour Government (1997-2010) began to address the issues through a raft of policy initiatives, including the Childcare Act 2006 which removed the distinction between education and care in the early years. This Act introduced the Early Years Foundation Stage and the Early Years Professional, a new inter-disciplinary professional status and role imposed at graduate level, rather than grown organically. This unprecedented step also took government involvement in the professions to a new dimension as it involved itself explicitly in orchestrating a new graduate level profession. The range of training routes to achieve Early Years Professional Status and the backgrounds of those being researched are complex and evolving. Therefore, the overarching aim of this research was to explore the development of professional identity through a critique of the concept, implementation and impact of Early Years Professional Status as a new professional role and status. Mixed methods were used to support a pragmatic, flexible approach to gathering the collective and individual perceptions of those who undertook the pilot in 2006 and those who commenced one of the four pathways to Early Years Professional Status in 2007. Questionnaires, interviews and a focus group were undertaken to gather insights at the start of the process, after the award of the status and a year later. The same methods were employed in two phases with stakeholders to add a further dimension to the research. The mixed methods research design was underpinned by Bronfenbrenner’s Bioecological Theory of Human Development, the model being envisaged with the Early Years Professional in the centre, rather than a child. This framework provided positive model for exploring a complex process. The development on Early Years Professional Status has not been linear and there have been several challenges. These include the starting point of a mixed economy of early years provision marked by variation in quality, poor qualification levels, low pay and low status, the initial confusing statement of broad based equivalency to teaching, political change and world recession. These last factors have supported greater understanding of the under theorised Chaotic System that Bronfenbrenner discussed in his final work. The research findings suggest that the development has been overwhelmingly welcomed, despite the lack of a clearly defined professional remit or being afforded the privileges ascribed to other professions. A new flexible professional space in the early years sector and children’s services is emerging at the intersection of health, social care and education. It is occupied by those who are developing a new holistic professional identity and others, who already had an established professional identity as a teacher, for whom completing Early Years Professional Status has been additional training, moving them towards being experts in their field. The training process and standards were affirmed and a community of practice is emerging, who would like to see a Continual Professional Development framework, a code of practice and an induction year for newly qualified Early Years Professionals. The roles of the Early Years Professional and the Early Years Teacher emerged as being complementary but essentially different. Evidenced also suggests that the Early Years Professional is a reflective professional, an advocate for all children and is leading and supporting quality outcomes. They are becoming a catalyst for change. However, the government has failed to recognise let alone celebrate the positive developments resulting from the workforce reform agenda and parents/carers and other professionals lack knowledge about the role, though those with Early Years Professional Status have not recognised their own role as wider change agents. The title Early Years Professional has not been widely welcomed, it is not being actively used and when it is, the acronym EYP prevails. Given this situation it could be opportune to rename the Early Years Professionals as Early Years Pedagogues, to reflect and celebrate a new flexible professional space at the intersection of health, education and social care that is occupied by an holistic leadership professional and an advocate for young children.

No description available.

The focus of this research study is upon the possible benefits research can offer special needs education (SNE) teachers. The project has been based upon a ‘study of a study’ with a piece of small-scale personal research - an observational study of the play of children with severe learning difficulties — being used as the starting point for examining the opportunities for learning about professional practice research can present teachers working in SNE. This project has linked two professional interests: a desire to systematically investigate a teaching and learning issue whilst reflecting upon the process of conducting that investigation. This reflection upon the process of conducting research was both personal and also involved asking other researchers — teacher researchers and professional researchers who support teacher researchers — about their experiences of conducting research. The project has involved using a reflective diary on personal research as well as semi-structured interviews with teacher researchers and professional researchers as a means of collecting data about the possible benefits of teacher research. The analysis of this data then led to the generation of a series of hypotheses and recommendations about possible future SNE teachers’ research. It is hoped this small-scale research project will be of interest to other teachers who are either engaged in or considering becoming involved in research, as well as the school managers, professional researchers and policy makers who support these teacher researchers in different aspects of their professional learning and development

This thesis reports on research into a Continuing Professional Development (CPD) programme in Senegal: Strengthening Mathematics, Science, and Technologies in Education Project (Projet de Renforcement de l'Enseignement des Mathématiques, des Sciences et de la Technologie, or PREMST). The literature review reveals very few examples of CPD changing teaching practices of teachers especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. However in this case, large-scale official project evaluations claim that some positive changes seem to have occurred, but give few details about the nature of the changes or how they have been brought about. This research seeks to understand the complexities of pedagogical change that teachers have gone through as a result of their participation in the CPD programmes through a more detailed investigation. The research examines the cases of five teachers in three schools that stakeholders claim to have gone through positive changes in the last three years. The research methods include focus-group discussions, lesson observation, and interviews before and after lessons. Lesson observation was aided by video and audio recording engaging with particular actions in the lesson observed. This process allowed me to understand how teachers reflected upon their own teaching and pupils' learning. The research finds that PREMST helped teachers envision how teaching should be conducted, by providing a structured approach to conduct a lesson. A visible change has been brought about in the classroom because the way training is conducted is well-integrated in the learning mechanism of teachers. However, the change in teaching practice has not necessarily brought a positive change in the learning of pupils. Apparent emphasis on group work has changed the modality of lessons, but it has not changed how teachers think about teaching. Given the difficulties involved in pedagogical change, emphasising specific skills may have been the necessary and practical first step, but changing these teaching practices is not enough. The research found that teachers still paid little attention to the learning of individual pupils. Teachers have changed their practices in terms of teaching methods used in the classroom, but the change in pedagogy has remained minimal because they have not understood the underlying premise of the new pedagogy. Unless they realise that their present manner of teaching does not enable the learning of pupils in a sufficient manner, their change is likely to remain at the level of teaching methods, not the pedagogy which incorporates the theories of learning and assumptions behind the practices. A key outcome of the research was to identify the next step for PREMST, namely to redirect the focus of teachers from the teaching procedures to the learning of pupils, by asking them to pay attention to what pupils say or write during the lesson. The thesis concludes by describing how this is being achieved through a shift in focus on classroom practice, through a training model based on lesson study.

This study aimed at investigating the effectiveness of induction program applied to candidate teachers. The effectiveness of the program was evaluated by focusing on the perceptions of the stakeholders of the induction program / the managers, the implementers of the program / candidate teachers to whom the program implemented / and the mentor teachers, implementers of the practical training. To this end, the CIPP evaluation model was utilized. Through in-depth interviews, the data were collected from 14 candidate teachers, 4 program managers and 4 mentor teachers from 6 public schools. The challenges and/or problems in implementation of the Teacher Induction Program perceived by the stakeholders of the Teacher Induction Program were revealed as the discrepancy between the needs of the program participants and aims of the program / lack of effective methods, materials and equipment / unnecessary courses in the program / unreliable and invalid exams and inefficient program instructors.

Submitted by WILLIAM CORDEIRO LEITE (williamcleite@gmail.com) on 2016-02-15T20:17:40Z No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTAÇÃO versão final.pdf: 1787521 bytes, checksum: 744bbf094b4dd838ab026ab3ad448316 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by BRUNA BARROS (bruna.barros@fgv.br) on 2016-02-25T19:05:51Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTAÇÃO versão final.pdf: 1787521 bytes, checksum: 744bbf094b4dd838ab026ab3ad448316 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Maria Almeida (maria.socorro@fgv.br) on 2016-02-26T19:27:25Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTAÇÃO versão final.pdf: 1787521 bytes, checksum: 744bbf094b4dd838ab026ab3ad448316 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-02-26T19:27:38Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 DISSERTAÇÃO versão final.pdf: 1787521 bytes, checksum: 744bbf094b4dd838ab026ab3ad448316 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-11-17 / The objective of this research was to identify the aspects of a professional police force found in the specialized literature on the subject and to compare them to the Brazilian Federal Police, using bibliographical, documentary and field research. To this end, we researched the concepts of police professionalization in the literature and determined that its definition is controversial and complex and that the reforms that took place in western police forces, primarily in the USA and England, from the end of the 19th century to the middle of the 20th century, created a bureaucratic police model, with a militarized structure and emphasis on enforcing the law. This model influenced the professional model of Brazilian police forces, and more specifically, the Brazilian Federal Police. Ten primary aspects of a professional police force were identified. These were divided into 18 items, and documentary research was performed to determine how these aspects were present in the Brazilian Federal Police. Some hypotheses/assumptions were formulated concerning the problems that were discovered. Subsequently, quantitative research was performed, through a structured questionnaire, with 25 questions, to a sample of federal police officers with the positions of Agent, Clerk and Forensic Print Analyst of the Federal Police crowded into the Federal Police Station in Foz do Iguaçu, in the state of Paraná, about the aspects found in the documentary research. In the research, we were able to verify that the items with the greatest problems were those related to the police career (class promotion, job duties and performance evaluations), internal control (internal inspection structure and enforcement of the penalty), compensation, courses for class advancement in the career and the democratic relationship among police public servants. Concerning the items with the best assessments, those which stand out were those related to the professional training of the police officer, police ethics and the democratic relationship between the federal police officer and the citizen / Esta pesquisa teve por objetivo identificar os aspectos de uma polícia profissional presentes na literatura especializada sobre o assunto e compará-los com a Polícia Federal Brasileira, utilizando-se de pesquisa bibliográfica, documental e de campo. Para isso, pesquisou-se os conceitos de profissionalização policial na literatura e verificou-se que sua definição é controversa e complexa e que as reformas ocorridas nas policias ocidentais, principalmente nos EUA e Inglaterra, no final do século XIX até metade do século XX, criaram um modelo burocrático de polícia, com uma estrutura militarizada e com ênfase na aplicação da lei. Esse modelo influenciou o modelo profissional das polícias brasileiras, e em destaque, a Polícia Federal brasileira. Identificou-se dez principais aspectos de uma polícia profissional. Estes foram divididos em 18 itens, e realizou-se uma pesquisa documental para verificar como esses aspectos estavam presentes na Polícia Federal brasileira e levantou-se algumas hipóteses/suposições sobre os problemas encontrados. Após, realizou-se pesquisa quantitativa, através de um questionário estruturado, com 25 perguntas, para a população de policiais federais dos cargos de Agente, Escrivão e Papiloscopistas de Polícia Federal lotados na Delegacia de Polícia Federal em Foz do Iguaçu-PR, sobre os aspectos verificados na pesquisa documental Com a pesquisa, verificou-se que, na opinião dos respondentes, os itens com maiores problemas eram os relacionados à carreira policial (promoção de classes, funções do cargo e avaliação de desempenho), controle interno (estrutura de corregedorias e aplicação de penalidade), remuneração, cursos de progressão de classes na carreira e a relação democrática entre os servidores policiais. Em relação aos itens mais bem avaliados, destacam-se os relacionados à formação profissional do policial, a deontologia policial e o relacionamento democrático do policial federal com o cidadão.