This study seeks to understand the transmogrification of four Mexican foreign language teachers as they participate in a teaching exchange in American schools throughout the United States. Previous research into development of competent membership in given communities of practice points to the need for mutual engagement with other community members, an understanding of the community activity, and a shared repertoire among community members. Framed within an activity theory perspective, the present study examined how the teachers's socio-historical background, cultural tools and artifacts, along with other pedagogical activities, community rules, and division of labor mediated the teachers' understanding of their professional identity within their exchange communities. Situated within a cohort of thirteen exchange teachers, these four teachers employed an electronic discussion board, Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), and instant messaging to narrate their experiences as well as create a global support community. Data collected from these electronic medium were employed as research texts to evidence shared construction of teacher identity within the teachers' local communities. The research texts, in turn, served as data for the development of narrative accounts of these teachers' activities and experiences as mediational factors in community participation. Findings from this study uncover the importance of pedagogical activity as a mediational factor in the transmogrification of teacher identity for these exchange teachers. In additon, it is suggested that culturally shared repertoire, family participation, and social interaction are essential factors in mediating competent community membership in local communities. Finally, this study points to the fluid nature of teacher identity; it proposes that this conceptualization of self-as-teacher is constantly transforming due to mediation by pedagogic activity and participation in local communities of prac tice.

This yearlong dissertation study focused on understanding the experiences of domestic graduate mathematics teaching assistants (GMTAs) and the context in which they shape and develop their teaching views and practices. The intent of the study was to detail the teaching development of several GMTAs, determine the impact that their preparation programs had on their teaching, and identify other sources that influenced their teaching practices. Utilizing qualitative research methodology, consisting of interviews substantiated by observations, eight GMTAs were purposively selected and studied. Analysis provided the following findings.GMTAs are not a homogenous group; they bring with them different experiences, knowledge, preparation, and attitudes, all of which influence the way that they teach. In addition, a number of factors, many of which are external, played strong roles in shaping GMTAs' teaching practices. This study both identifies such factors and describes how they impacted the GMTAs' teaching practices.Preparation (training) programs were among these factors. Preparation programs can impact the teaching practices of GMTAs. This impact, however, is affected by the influence of other factors (such as course structure, time management, and limited pedagogical knowledge), which can support, constrain, or even counter-act the impact of training programs; this provides insight into why research has found programs to have limited impact on GMTAs' teaching. Furthermore, GMTAs are not always aware of the ways in which these programs impact their teaching; positive testimonials and attitudes toward training do not guarantee influence or impact on teaching practices, nor do negative ones; this suggests caution in using interviews as the sole basis for the evaluation of training programs.This dissertation provides detailed data stories for three of the participants. A list of factors and discussion of how they impacted their teaching practices is given. Some connections are made to research on K-12 teacher preparation. It shows the need for extended GMTA preparation programs, programs which provide significant instructional knowledge and which include guided instructional practices. For researchers, it shows the need to include classroom observations when studying and evaluating preparation programs, discussing the limitations of solely interview based findings.

Although the reform movement in mathematics education has been very influential within colleges of education and among researchers, it has had less of an effect on mathematics education at the K-12 level (National Center for Educational Statistics, 1999). As a part of the reform movement, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (1991) recommends that teachers engage students in mathematical discourse. Given that situated learning theory suggests that reflection, particularly collective reflection, is necessary for professional development (Borko & Putnam, 1998; Lave & Wenger, 1991), this study examined the use of teacher video clubs as a space in which novice teachers can publicly and collectively reflect on ways to create productive mathematical discourse communities within their elementary classrooms. This study advances prior research by using teacher video clubs as a tool for enhancing mathematical discourse communities among novice teachers who facilitate video club sessions. This mixed-methods study examines (a) video club teacher-to-teacher discourse around teaching mathematics by using qualitative comparative analysis, (b) elementary students’ mathematical discourse in a case study of one video club member’s classroom by diagramming and coding classroom discourse, and (c) teachers’ (video-club group vs. traditional-coaching group) specialized content knowledge and reform beliefs measured by Teachers’ Knowledge for Teaching Mathematics Survey (Ball, Hill, Rowan, & Schilling, 2002) and Elementary Teacher’s Commitment to Mathematical Education Reform (Ross, McDougall, Hogaboam-Gray, & LeSage, 2003) respectively. The main findings are: (a) Teacher-to-teacher discourse focused of pedagogical issues across all video club session, but changes in later video club sessions to include questioning of goals and authority. Analysis of the discourse also reveal three possible affordances of video club participation: noticing, encouragement, and alternative ideas and strategies; (b) Classroom discourse became increasingly more horizontal and students increased initiation of discourse topics; and (c) As a group, video club members’ specialized content knowledge of students and content was found to be marginally significant over the traditional coaching group. No group difference was found in reform beliefs between the two groups. This study shows that video clubs have promising potential as an approach to professional development for the implementation of reform initiatives.

Instructional scaffolding is a powerful tool that many teachers utilize to meet the challenge of individualizing instruction for diverse learners. The concept of instructional scaffolding is complex (Meyer, 1993), in that teachers have to determine what, how much, and what kind of help to give to students in a moment’s notice (Rodgers, 2004/05). Gaining expertise with scaffolding can take years, which leads us to worry about the effectiveness of novice teachers. A scarcity of research examining how to support a teacher’s development of instructional decisions such as scaffolding is reported (Anders, Hoffman, & Duffy, 2000). The ability to make scaffolding decisions requires teachers to be cognitively flexible, drawing from multiple domains of understanding to meet the individual needs of a group of students. However, little is known about which domains and understandings teachers draw on during scaffolding events or the rationales underlying this decision-making process. This naturalistic study examined the decision-making processes of a novice elementary ESOL teacher as she scaffolded instruction for her third-grade students. As she videotaped what she considered to be a successful scaffolding event each week, we unpacked the event together using the lens of Cognitive Flexibility Theory (CFT). The guiding questions were: (1) How can the decision-making processes underlying a novice ESOL teacher’s instructional scaffolding be described? (2) How can the lens of Cognitive Flexibility Theory inform a novice ESOL teacher’s scaffolding decisions? Data sources included interviews, field notes, and reflections of the sessions. Constant comparative analysis (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Miles & Huberman, 1994) was used to analyze data. Rigor was demonstrated by establishing credibility, transferability, dependability, and confirmability (Lincoln and Guba). A grounded theory model of a kaleidoscope was created to describe the novice ESOL teacher’s decision-making processes during scaffolding events. The participant’s decisions were influenced by a variety of pedagogical and contextual domains while also being impacted by her views on scaffolding, on assessment, and on the connection between theory and practice. The participant’s conceptions of scaffolding became more complex and her confidence and sense of agency became stronger as a result of mentoring underpinned by CFT.

In this workshop, participants engaged with and reflected on authentic artifacts from data modeling projects related to the solar system and to deforestation that were completed by elementary students in grade 5 (average age 11). These authentic examples were used to ground a discussion of using a data modeling approach to help elementary students make sense of and meaningful integrated use of mathematics and science concepts and tools. School-based ways of helping teachers understand this approach in order to be able to use it in their classrooms were also discussed.

This thesis reports a research project studying how people become tertiary teachers in New Zealand. While studies of many aspects of tertiary teaching, teacher professional development and workplace learning have been published, no comparative study of tertiary teacher development across different types of institutions had been carried out. Few previous studies had linked the concept of learning in a community of practice with teachers' workplace learning. A qualitative, interpretive research framework was adopted, using three case studies. Data were gathered from institutional documents, educational developers and experienced teaching staff of three representative institutions, a polytechnic, a wananga and a university, from mid-2000 to mid-2001. Data gathering strategies included semi-structured interviews with teachers and educational developers, examination of documents, a teacher questionnaire and some class observations. Interview transcripts and other data were analysed to identify common themes, and findings were reported as three individual cases before integration. It was found that most tertiary teachers' learning about teaching and how to teach was in-service, mainly informal and experiential, and the knowledge gained was mainly tacit and process-oriented. Although that was complemented by varying amounts of formal learning, gained through courses or professional development activities, few tertiary teachers have sought or gained teaching qualifications. While institutions have central policies and procedures to support in-service teacher development, their implementation is often uneven, with little integration or balancing of the parts. Differences of practice were observed both between institutions, and between departments within institutions, indicating the importance of context for tertiary teachers' development. It was concluded that non-formal workplace learning is likely to continue to be the mainstay of tertiary teacher development, and that it needs to be refocussed and approached from a fresh angle. The perspective of learning in a community of teaching practice provides a conceptual framework for integrating different levels and forms of support for tertiary teachers. Recommendations for strengthening tertiary teacher development are addressed at three levels: institutions (as social learning systems); communities of practice within those institutions (such as departments, discipline groups, programme teams, or campus whanau); and individual teachers (whose teaching identities develop within those communities).

The present study is part of the line of research Gestão das Tecnologias Educacionais em Rede in the Master's Program Tecnologias Educacionais em Rede intended to propose guidelines for the construction of a follow-up of graduates of the course on Special Education Services (Atendimento Educacional Especializado - AEE), offered the distance by this University, gathering information about the destination, employability and professional trajectory. In order to carry out this study, some theorists were used as theoretical background for the guiding principles such as inclusion policies, online teacher development courses, teacher development/training courses for teachers to work with Special Education Services, distance education management, and the process of keeping track of former students. The methodology used was an exploratory and descriptive research, that is, a case study in which the subjects were teachers who are former students of the 10th teacher development/training course for teachers to work with Special Education Services. A semistructured questionnaire with close-ended and open-ended questions was used as the research tool and the data analysis through on the analysis of the content, which brought up three categories that are former student’s profile, professional status, and practice in the course. In conclusion, a process that keeps track of former students helps gather information which will contribute to quality management of online courses as well as obtain feedback about the professionals who are graduatingThus, the proposed objectives have been achieved. / O presente estudo, vinculado à linha de pesquisa “Gestão das Tecnologias Educacionais em Rede” do Mestrado em Tecnologias Educacionais em Rede, tem por objetivo propor diretrizes para a construção de um processo de acompanhamento de egressos do Curso de Atendimento Educacional Especializado (AEE), ofertado a distância por esta universidade, reunindo informações sobre o destino, empregabilidade e trajetória profissional. Para a realização deste estudo, utilizou-se de teóricos que serviram como base para os eixos norteadores, quais sejam: políticas de inclusão; cursos de formação em EAD; formação de professores para AEE; gestão da educação a distância e processo de acompanhamento de egressos. A metodologia utilizada consistiu em uma pesquisa descritiva exploratória, do tipo estudo de caso, em que os sujeitos de pesquisa são os professores egressos da décima edição do curso de formação de professores para o AEE. O instrumento de pesquisa foi um questionário semiestruturado com perguntas abertas e fechadas e a análise dos resultados é baseada na análise de conteúdo por meio da qual foram elencadas três categorias de estudo: perfil do egresso; situação profissional e prática no AEE. Dessa forma, conclui-se que um processo de acompanhamento de egressos favorece a obtenção de informações que contribuem para uma gestão de cursos EAD de qualidade ofertados a distância, bem como obter um retorno com relação ao profissional que se está formando. Desse modo, os objetivos propostos foram alcançados.

Submitted by Ana Paim (verenaebranca@gmail.com) on 2014-01-06T18:59:05Z No. of bitstreams: 1 TESE 2013 DEFINITIVA.pdf: 1652998 bytes, checksum: e1685ee73a9e1bd893019c494f4c0deb (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Maria Auxiliadora da Silva Lopes (silopes@ufba.br) on 2014-01-22T19:02:19Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 TESE 2013 DEFINITIVA.pdf: 1652998 bytes, checksum: e1685ee73a9e1bd893019c494f4c0deb (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2014-01-22T19:02:19Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 TESE 2013 DEFINITIVA.pdf: 1652998 bytes, checksum: e1685ee73a9e1bd893019c494f4c0deb (MD5) / Este é um trabalho de tese que teve como objeto de pesquisa as re-existências dos professores-estudantes como atos de currículo do Curso de Licenciatura em Física do Programa de Formação para Professores (5ª à 8ª séries/Ensino Médio) – Modalidade Presencial, desenvolvido na Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana. Investigar como as re-existências epistemológicas e formativas, enquanto atos de currículo se manifestaram neste Curso constituiu-se, portanto, no problema de pesquisa que norteou esta investigação. A pesquisa teve como objetivo maior compreender as re-existências epistemológicas e formativas desses professores-estudantes aos atos de currículo constitutivos do Curso de Licenciatura em Física do Programa de Formação para Professores. Para tanto, optei pela abordagem de pesquisa qualitativa a partir do viés teórico-metodológico da etnopesquisa crítica e multirreferencial de inspiração fenomenológica, pelos princípios que apresenta, pela pertinência ao tipo de estudo realizado e aos seus propósitos. Dado o caráter idiográfico do contexto e dos sujeitos pesquisados escolhi desenvolver um estudo de caso de tipo etnográfico. No trabalho de campo fiz uso de dispositivos de recolha de informações que permitiram a “escuta sensível” (BARBIER,1990) dos sujeitos e a revelação do fenômeno através de suas narrativas, a saber: a “entre-vista” aberta, o questionário com perguntas semi-abertas, o grupo focal, cartas formativas, análise documental e “narrativas catárticas” (PAIM,2013). O estudo do fenômeno da re-existência como atos de currículo no âmbito da formação revelou o poder dos sujeitos em seus processos formativos de autorizar-se e instituírem-se como atores sociopedagógicos, assim como me remeteu a um exercício reflexivo sobre os atos de currículo e suas implicações na formação. As re-existências dos professores-estudantes aos atos de currículo confirmaram, portanto, a inseparabilidade do Ser e sua existência no processo formativo, bem como a responsabilidade dos atos de currículo na formação, algo que pouco tem sido pensado quando se discute esse fenômeno, daí a relevância desse estudo. Palavras-chave: Atos de currículo. Re-existência. Formação de professores. / ABSTRACT This is a thesis paper which had as its research objective the re-existence of learner teachers as curriculum acts in the Physics Graduation Course from the Teacher Development Program (5th to 8th grades/High School) - Classroom Learning Modality, created at the State University in Feira de Santana. Investigating how the epistemological and formative re-existences, while curriculum acts arose in this Course resulted, thus, in a research object which led to this investigation. The research major objective was to understand the epistemological and formative re-existences of such learner teachers to the Curriculum Acts of the Physics Graduation Course as part of the Teacher Development Program. So, I chose the qualitative research approach from a theoretical methodological bias of multi-referential and critical ethnology research of phenomenological inspiration, for the principles it represents, for the importance of the study and its purposes. Given its context idiographic characteristic and the subjects under investigation, I decided to carry out a ethnographical case study. In the field study, devices for collecting information were adopted which made the “sensitive hearing” (BARBIER, 1990) on the subjects possible as well as the revealing of the phenomenon through their narratives, which are: the open interview, questionnaire with semi-open questions, the focus group, formative letters, document analysis and “cathartic narratives” (PAIM, 2013). The study of the re-existence phenomenon as curriculum acts about professional development revealed the power of the subjects in their formative process to regard and to refer to themselves as social pedagogical actors. It also reminded me of a reflection exercise about curriculum acts and their implications on development. The re-existence of learner teachers to the curriculum acts confirmed, therefore, the inseparability of the Person and his existence in the formative process, as well as the responsibility of curriculum acts for the development, which has not been widely considered when this phenomenon is discussed, that explains the importance of this study. Key-words: curriculum acts; re-existence; teacher development.

The article reviews the approaches to innovation in university teaching, recounts the Teachers’ Academic Management’s experience with the First University Teaching Innovation Fund (Primer Fondo de Innovacion para la docencia universitaria) and shows the preliminary results, gathered from interviews with the participating teachers. / El artículo presenta una revisión sobre los enfoquesde innovación en  la  docencia universitaria, describe la experiencia de la convocatoria lanzada desde la Dirección Académica del Profesorado al Primer Fondo de Innovación para la docencia universitaria, y concluye con los resultados preliminares, basados en entrevistasa los profesores participantes.

Orientador: Roberto Nardi / Banca: Maria José Pereira Monteiro de Almeida / Banca: Rejane Aurora Mion / Banca: Maria Lúcia Vital dos Santos Abib / Banca: Renato Carlos Tonin Ghiotto / Resumo: Este estudo trata da formação inicial de professores de Física, tendo como pano de fundo o processo de reestruturação de um projeto político-pedagógico de um curso de licenciatura em Física de uma universidade pública. Discursos de licenciandos, docentes universitários e professores em exercício ouvidos durante o processo foram analisados, procurando-se entender como as demandas dos diversos grupos influenciaram na estrutura curricular resultante deste processo. Para a leitura e interpretação dos efeitos de sentidos presentes em documentos e discursos dos sujeitos envolvidos nesse processo foram adotados referenciais teórico-metodológicos embasados em teorias críticas sobre o desenvolvimento curricular e na Análise de Discurso de linha francesa, proposta por Michel Pêcheux (2002), bem como em noções derivadas dos estudos deste autor desenvolvidas no Brasil por Orlandi (2001; 2003). Discute-se a natureza da proposta pedagógica final, que se situou entre as exigências legais e a realidade acadêmica. A legislação consultada, os professores em exercício, os licenciandos e os formadores na Universidade, cada qual falando a partir de posições definidas, forneceram subsídios ou sinalizaram o que e como a estrutura curricular e o projeto pedagógico deste Curso de Licenciatura em Física poderia ter ou ser alterado. / Abstract: This research deals with physics teachers pre-service education, having as background a physics education undergraduate program' curriculum reestructuration process, carried out in a public university. Pre-service, in-service physics teachers and university professors' discourses were analyzed during the process, in order to search for understanding how the claims from the different groups influenced in the resultant curricular structure. To read and interpret the sense effects present in documents and subjects evolved in this process discourses heoretic-methodological referential based on curricular development critical theories and the Michel Pechêux (2002) French approach discourse analysis were adopted, as well as those derived from this author's developed in Brazil by Orlandi (2001, 2003). The restructured pedagogical proposal form, which was placed between the legal demand and the academic reality, is discussed. The legislation consulted, the in-service teachers, the future teachers and the university professors, which one speaking from defined position, whether provided subsides or signalized what and how the curricular structure and the pedagogical project should have or be changed. / Doutor