This research investigated the perceptions of student-teachers and lecturers regarding Initial Teacher Education (ITE) for secondary teachers in Zimbabwe. The ways in which factors in and between the university and school settings for ITE shaped learning to teach were investigated. Student-teachers’ and lecturers’ perceptions of the development of ideas as student-teachers moved through the different stages of training were also investigated. The study employed a qualitative case study methodology and methods - interviews, biographical questionnaires and document analysis. Data analysis began by defining a priori themes and identifying parts of the interview transcripts that were relevant to these a priori themes. The initial coding was then refined by adding additional codes which emerged from the data to create a final coding template to interpret findings. Activity Theory was used to provide a conceptual map to help describe and analyse the findings. Student-teachers had varied backgrounds and motives for joining the teacher education programme. These were often at variance with the goals of ITE. They had pre-conceived ideas about teaching from their years of schooling, prior training and work experience. Student-teachers were learning to teach in the university setting and attempting to prove their competence in school settings. In both settings students, teachers and lecturers constituted the learning communities. Relationships and availability of tools often determined the kind of support student-teachers were receiving. The factors encountered within and between the two different activity systems shaped learning to teach in various ways. ‘Taken-for-granted’ practices were not questioned and this limited the ways in which ideas presented in the university were used in the school setting. The student-teachers’ professional development, evident both to the students themselves as well as their lecturers, demonstrated not only growth in their pedagogical maturity, but also some deeper insights and the beginnings of their teacher identity. Much literature argues that learning to become an effective practitioner necessitates the use of reflective practice as a tool to resolve contradictions and for processing and internalising the complexities of boundary crossing between settings. The ‘theory-practice’ gap can be viewed as a ‘transformation space’ where teacher identity is often developed. A model to explain learning to teach made up of five elements is proposed: preconceived ideas of teaching, new ideas, contradictions, socialisation and reflective practice. The findings suggest that the university where the study was carried out should harmonise espoused practice and actual practice so that activities are consistent with the notion of concurrent learning. Concerted efforts are also needed to develop collaborative school-university partnerships, which foster reflective practice as a tool to promote professional development. Staff development programmes are needed to develop appropriate working practices. Working conditions for teachers need to be revised by the Zimbabwe government, both to encourage teaching as a desirable profession and to keep pace with changes occurring in pedagogic practice. Further research is needed to investigate how students can successfully negotiate and learn from university-school boundary crossing issues, and what sort of boundary brokers and tools are needed. Contextual factors in Zimbabwe are such that little funding is available to develop ITE. The challenge is to find innovative ways of using scarce resources to produce high quality teachers.

<p> Earlier studies concluded that technology&rsquo;s strength is in supporting student learning rather than as an instrument for content delivery (Angeli &amp; Valanides, 2014). Current research espouses the merits of the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework as a guide for educators&rsquo; reflections about technology integration within the context of content and instructional practice. Grounded by two theoretical frameworks, TPACK (Mishra &amp; Koehler, 2006; 2008) and Rogers&rsquo; (1983, 1995) theory of diffusion of innovation, the purpose of this mixed-methods research was two-fold: to explore the perceived competencies of tertiary science faculty at higher education institutions with respect to their integration of technology within the constructs of pedagogical practice and content learning and to analyze whether these perceived competencies may serve as predictive factors for technology adoption level. The literature review included past research that served as models for the Sci-TPACK instrument. Twenty-nine professors of tertiary science courses participated in an online Likert survey, and four professors provided in-depth interviews on their TPACK practices. Quantitative analysis of data consisted of descriptive and reliability statistics, calculations of means for each of the seven scales or domains of TPACK, and regression analysis. Open-ended questions on the Likert survey and individual interviews provided recurrent themes of the qualitative data. Final results revealed that the participants integrate technology into pedagogy and content through a myriad of TPACK practices. Regression analysis supported perceived TPACK competencies as predictive factors for technology adoption level. </p>

<p> This study compared data related to National Board Certification (NBC) of mathematics teachers in a South Florida school district. Data included 1,162 student scores on the 2014 AP Calculus AB exam, student gender, student grade level, and eligibility for free or reduced price lunch (FRL) status. Teachers completed the Standards&rsquo; Beliefs Instrument (SBI) (Zollman &amp; Mason, 1992) to determine alignment of their beliefs with the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) standards. Interviews were conducted with five NBC mathematics teachers to understand how they incorporate best mathematics teaching practices in their daily instruction.</p><p> A t-test analysis revealed that students taught by NBC teachers scored significantly higher (M = 3.70) on the AP Calculus AB Exam than those taught by non-NBCTs (M = 2.74); Cohen&rsquo;s <i>d</i> (.6429) indicated a moderately large effect size. No causation is to be implied; various confounding factors may also contribute to the variance in student scores.</p><p> Three factorial ANOVA tests were performed to test interaction effects. Two significant interaction effects were detected: (1) NBCT status and student grade level; and (2) NBCT status and student FRL (free and reduced price lunch) status. No significant interaction was found between NBCT status and student gender. </p><p> With a reliability estimate using Cronbach&rsquo;s alpha, a second t-test was conducted. A statistically significant difference was found regarding the mean scores of NBCTs and non-NBCTs regarding their beliefs according to the vision of the NCTM. NBCTs generally have practices that align more with the NCTM mathematics teaching standards. Interviews with five NBC teachers of AP Calculus provided rich qualitative descriptions of their teaching philosophies, approaches, and best practices contributing to student success. </p><p> The results of this study reinforce evidence from previous research that the process of obtaining the NBC contributes to a teacher&rsquo;s professional expertise and is related to student success; however, since there may be other confounding factors related to teachers, students, and their schools, the NBC cannot be considered the sole factor contributing to student success in AP coursework and exams.</p>

<p> Because African American males are being educated in suburban environments where they are not performing as well as their White peers, this study sought to understand how these males make meaning of being educated with primarily White teachers in suburbia and to understand how they perceive their teachers' efficacy and expectations. (Abstract shortened by ProQuest.)</p>

<p> The quality of early caregiving and educational environments has a significant effect on children&rsquo;s later cognitive outcomes. Early childhood teachers are an important determining factor in the quality of these environments. Due to inconsistencies in practice across the early childhood field, there is a call for better prepared teachers. Teacher preparation itself is criticized for its lack of innovative and effective practices. While research finds that more effective teacher preparation programs are those that are steeped in clinical practice, these types of experiences are inconsistent and fragmented in the early childhood field. Part of the issue is the lack of knowledge on how to integrate highquality clinical experiences carefully into early childhood teacher preparation in order to prepare all preservice teachers successfully for the classroom. </p><p> The purpose of this qualitative study was to propose a middle-range, systematic theory for the types of practices and ideologies that the most successful early childhood teacher education programs use to prepare their preservice teachers for the education profession. A more focused purpose of this grounded theory study was to describe the ways in which early childhood preservice teachers learn about children&rsquo;s cognitive development as well as how they describe their application of this knowledge to developmentally appropriate pedagogical practices. A secondary purpose of this study was to examine these various clinical models as described by experts in the field. Analysis was completed on semi-structured interviews with preservice teachers and faculty members, open-ended surveys completed by preservice teachers, and university documents. As a result of rigorous data analysis, a theory emerged to explain clinical practice at three model early childhood teacher preparation programs. Findings suggest that there are seven layers of strength that contribute to the model programs&rsquo; expertise in preparing their preservice teachers. This study is significant in that it reports researchbased elements that may contribute to policy regarding models for teacher preparation and meaningful clinical experiences.</p>

Inquiry is a learning stance that affords students with a variety of engagements to learn about a concept. It is a collaborative process where students think together, work together and talk together to develop their understanding of the issue they face. Inquiry supports teachers in creating highly recommended learning environments for students. Educators know the importance of the relationship between teachers and students and the influence on students' learning development and achievement in school. These goals can be reached through understanding classroom environments and informing teachers about an inquiry approach in teaching. This understanding will also improve teacher’s knowledge and help him/her professionally interact with students. This research explored the experiences and perspectives of eleven Saudi female educators on their learning experiences as students and as teachers in two different settings, Saudi Arabia and the U.S., and two different teaching strategies, a traditional teaching approach and a learning centered approach. I used a qualitative approach to design this study to ask my participants about their learning and teaching experiences before and after studying abroad. In-depth interviews allowed me to access their perspectives and how they created meaning out of experience. I used in-depth interviews, using focus group interviews for the third question only with the participants in Tucson because I wanted to explore an inquiry related to a group of people linked by their background culture. Throughout this study, the data was gathered and analyzed to answer three general questions: 1. What are the teaching and learning experiences of Saudi teachers? 2. How do the experiences of Saudi teachers impact their thinking about teaching practices and the curriculum in their classrooms? 3. What are the perspectives of Saudi women who either are teaching or have teaching experience on the type of learning experiences needed for Saudi Arabian pre-service and in-service teachers? The findings revealed that the participants in this study supported developing and working toward achieving reforms in education in Saudi Arabia. The participants' previous experience impacted them in thinking about their own teaching in their classrooms. All of the participants supported development of the education of teachers in Saudi Arabia. The participants' responses to this question revealed the need for ongoing professional development and redesigning teacher preparation programs around key principles of engagement and inquiry.

This is a study to determine a sound method of pre-service education for teachers of life adjustment schools. For many years some of the leading educations have seen the need to revise the public schools to improve the quality of living in a democratic society. With the assumption that this change is necessary in order to quip the individuals with the tools for making adjustments to existing and impending life situations, a new type of teacher may be required. For the improvement of teachers and leaders, the schools, colleges, and departments of education must assume major responsibilities, for through them will come practically all of the teachers and administrators who will have a part in determining the course of education.

This qualitative study focuses on the faculty engaged in the preparation of secondary teachers at North East University (NEU). It seeks to discover how they see themselves as professionals and assess their work preparing future teachers in "Best Practices" of teaching so that they can effectively teach all students, particularly low achievers. To achieve the goal of this study, I conducted semi-structured individual interviews with those faculty who are engaged in preparing teachers at the secondary program. Eight participants were interviewed for this study, among them six participants were fully engaged in the teacher preparation. Once I collected the data from the interviews, then I transcribed, coded, analyzed the data, and identified similarities, differences, patterns, and themes from the interviews. The findings of this study indicate that these faculty have a strong commitment to preparing outstanding teachers that is rooted in their belief in social justice and equality. They expressed they have dreams about their teaching, about their student-teachers and about their program. The faculty are highly confident of their ability to educate secondary teachers and believe that they make a difference in the academic performance of those children their graduates serve in the schools. This study also concluded that the teacher educators at NEU's secondary program think they are successful in introducing "Best Practices" of teaching, especially helping their student-teachers in differentiating instructions, dealing with disabilities, teaching ELL students, employing technology in teaching, understanding diversity, culture and traditions, and preparing their student-teachers in examining issues relating to prejudice, discrimination, stereotyping, race, poverty, gender, social class and ethnicity.

Doctor of Philosophy / Curriculum and Instruction Programs / Michael C. Holen / There is a call for education, including teacher education, to transform from solely transmitting knowledge to creating dynamic learning opportunities for students to experience real-world situations so they can develop the skills and competencies necessary to navigate a changing and unpredictable world. Service-learning is proposed as one strategy to facilitate this transformation. Therefore, the purpose of this qualitative case study was to describe how individual or group service-learning experiences might impact the attitudes and beliefs of pre-service teachers in a teacher education course. This study was guided by two research questions: How do pre-service teacher participants describe their individual or group service-learning experiences within the context of a required teacher education course? In what ways do participants' attitudes and beliefs towards service-learning vary, based on individual or group service-learning experiences? The service-learning experiences for this study were designed using experiential educational theory and a blended framework from service-learning common goals (academic enhancement, personal/professional growth, and civic learning) and common components (academic material, critical reflection and relevant service) (Ash, Clayton, & Moses, 2009). Fourteen pre-service students agreed to participate in the study. Two sources of data were identified, (a) individual semi-structured, face-to-face interviews and (b) critical reflective journals written by participants. Findings suggest that service-learning experiences reinforce academic content including experiential education. Personal and professional growth and an understanding of diversity can result from service-learning experiences. Teacher involvement in the local community was viewed by participants as important for student-teacher relationships and to improve connections between the school and the community. Participants of the study viewed critical reflection as a fundamental component in service-learning. Self-identified personality type can impact how each participant described their individual or group service-learning experiences, including benefits of social interaction and collaboration. Individual and group service-learning present different challenges in implementing effective experiences. Participants’ beliefs and attitudes did not vary based upon individual or group service-learning experiences. In conclusion, incorporating the experiential pedagogy of service-learning in teacher education programs can better prepare pre-service teachers for the very unpredictable nature of teaching.

<p> Examining teacher participation in collaborative microblogging activities may offer insight into creating alternative options for effective professional development. In this sequential explanatory mixed methods study, educators&rsquo; opinions of their use of a microblogging tool, Twitter, will be examined to determine what factors affect their participation in professional development activities using the microblogging tool, Twitter. The overall guiding question for this study will be, Why do educators participate in voluntary professional development opportunities, specifically in Twitter-supported professional learning networks? </p><p> This study will contribute to the existing body of research in the areas of professional development, professional learning networks, educator&rsquo;s motivation to learn, informal learning, online learning, and social media. Social media, specifically the microblogging tool Twitter, will be examined for its potential to act as an alternative mode of dissemination for educator professional development, as well as its potential for creating informal professional learning networks. Data sources for this study will include: surveys and interview questions. This information may be useful for future creation of more effective professional development opportunities. Findings from this study may be useful for researchers, educators, administrators, and developers of professional development opportunities.</p>