The aim in this study is to examine preschool teachers’ perceptions of sustainable development and to put it in relation to the global definition of social sustainability and study how this work can be associated with the value-based work in the preschool curriculum. The study contextualizes sustainability using phenomenography as theoretical approach. Phenomenography approach is also used in method based on qualitative, semi-structured interviews to study the preschool teachers’ perceptions. The results of the study show that there are varied perceptions in the meaning of sustainable development. The results also indicate that there is a lack of discussion regarding sustainable development to achieve a consistent approach in value-based work.

This study intends to investigate Greek preschool teachers' perspectives about play in the schoolyard. Ten preschool teachers were interviewed using a semi-structured interview approach to gather data. Results were coded and analyzed using thematic analysis. The themes that were brought up revealed that Greek preschool teachers value play in the schoolyard. This study found that the teachers think there is a relation between play in the schoolyard and learning since they believe playing outside is a type of experiential learning. Moreover, they think that this relation can be more potent if teachers get involved more by organizing activities, and if the sense of place is increased to students. Furthermore, the Greek preschool teachers agree that play in the schoolyard has only positive effects on children's wellbeing. The barriers to facilitate outdoor play appear to be the schoolyard since they describe it as unsafe, empty, without any green elements, and missing pedagogical corners. Considering the Greek educational context that predominantly focus on the traditional inside the classroom teaching, the possitve attitudes that the preschool teachers showed for outdoor play are remarkable. These attitudes are a little step for further implementation of outdoor play in preschool education.

Diabetes mellitus (DM) is one of the most common chronic diseases affecting children under the age of 20, and it often leads to serious complications. In recent decades, there has been an increase in incidence of both types of DM among U.S. children. Having this chronic condition not only negatively impacts the health of these children but also their academic achievements. School health nurses struggle to manage these children appropriately and safely. The purpose of this project was to develop an evidence- based guideline for a standardized process in which school nurses coordinate the school and student health care teams to ensure a safe school environment for diabetic children. The Stevens star model of knowledge transformation was used to frame the development of this guideline. A team of experts, consisting of 10 ten school nurses, was assembled to provide formative and summative evaluations of the guidelines. Nine nurses completed and returned the questionnaires within the allotted time. The formative group feedback resulted in the revision of the guideline prior to distribution for the summative evaluation. The experts then participated in a summative evaluation using the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research & Evaluation (AGREE) II instrument. The revised guideline was approved and recommended for use by all of the experts without additional modification. Implementation of the guideline will result in social change by improving outcomes in students' health and academic achievement and in strengthening the role and autonomy of the school nurse. Dissemination will occur first in the school district through presentation and then to a larger audience through publication in journals focused on school nursing.

Tools for teaching and learning- A study of how some teachers of English and History perceive the role of different educational materials with regard to their own teaching and pupils’ learningThe main purpose of this qualitative study is to investigate and analyse how teachers of English and History at two compulsory schools in the south of Sweden perceive the role of different educational materials, with regard to their own teaching and pupils’ learning. To obtain a deeper understanding of the complex user-process that educational materials are a part of, frame factor theory serves as a tool that facilitates the interpretation and understanding of the collected data. The theory, which consists of different divisions, describes factors that control and interfere with education.Our results are based on a qualitative method where thirteen surveys initially were answered by teachers of English and History, eight teachers were then also interviewed about their perception of educational materials in relation to their own teaching and pupils’ learning.The main result of our study is that socio-cultural factors have the clearest effect on teachers’ selection of educational materials, such as pupils’ background and previous experiences.

This paper presents a qualitative study with semi-structured interviews investigating 1) How teachers in the course English 6 interpret the terms "relatively varied" and "well-grounded and balanced", and how their interpretations differed, 2) How do the teachers interpret the terms in relations to the National Agency for Education’s commentary material?, and 3) What kind of resources do the teachers use to understand those terms? The reason for conducting this research is to gain a greater understanding of how teachers in the course English 6 in upper secondary school interpret the terms in the requirements. The terms in our requirements leave a lot of room for interpretations, and I want to find out how teachers with experiences of teaching interpret the terms in order to better understand how they can be interpret. My finding revealed that three out of four of the interviewed teachers did not mention the terms in their description of them, they brought in other aspects from the requirements, and did not address neither of the terms clearly. This applied to all the teachers, except for T4. The teacher that did address the terms was the only one who read the National Agency’s commentary material, therefore T4’s interpretations of the term aligned closest to the description in the commentary material. From the answers the teachers provided me with, they seemed to interpret the requirements in their own way and this is a validity and reliability issue when assessing the students’ texts. The teachers answers are also discussed from a norm-referenced perspective.

Como as pessoas percebem as outras é relevante no processo de ensino aprendizagem e nas interações sociais como um todo. Essas percepções definem a maneira com que as pessoas reagem umas às outras. Em particular, a avaliação da percepção de professores colabora na compreensão das atitudes do professor diante dos comportamentos de seus alunos. O objetivo do presente estudo foi avaliar a percepção de professores sobre a influência genética e ambiental em comportamentos relevantes no processo educacional: personalidade, inteligência, dificuldades de aprendizagem, problemas de comportamento e doenças mentais. Para tanto, o questionário The NatureNurture Question:Teachers perceptions of how genes and the environment influence educationally relevant behavior foi adaptado à língua portuguesa do Brasil e aplicado para 501 professores de todos os níveis de ensino, do estado de São Paulo. Os resultados demonstraram que os professores atribuíram influências genéticas e ambientais em proporções aproximadamente iguais considerando todos os domínios, personalidade e dificuldades e aprendizagem. Atribuíram maior influência genética à inteligência e doenças mentais, bem como maior influência ambiental aos problemas de comportamento. Metade dos participantes afirmou ter estudado aspectos da genética em sua formação para professor. A maioria dos professores declarou que ter um aluno com dificuldade de aprendizagem geneticamente influenciada afetaria seu método de instruí-lo. Os professores percebem que genes e ambiente criação são imprescindíveis nos comportamentos de seus alunos, reconhecendo, inclusive, a interatividade dos dois fatores, informações importantes para o delineamento de ações na formação dos mesmos possíveis intervenções no âmbito educacional. / How people perceive others are important in the educational process and social interactions at all. These perceptions define the way people react to each other. In particular, the evaluation teachers perception collaborates in the comprehension of teacher\'s attitudes towards the behavior of their students. The aim of this study was to evaluate teachers perception on the genetic and environmental influence on relevant behaviors in the educational process: personality, intelligence, learning difficulties, behavioral problems and mental illness. For this purpose, the questionnaire \"The Nature-Nurture Question: Teachers\' perceptions of how genes and the environment influence educationally relevant behavior\" was adapted to the Portuguese language in Brazil and applied to 501 teachers at all levels of education, the state of São Paulo. The results showed that teachers attributed genetic and environmental influences in approximately equal proportions considering all domains, personality difficulties and learning. They attributed greater genetic influence on intelligence and mental illness as well a greater environmental influence to behavior problems. Half of the participants declared to have studied aspects of genetics in their schooling to teacher. Most teachers stated that having a student with genetically influenced learning difficulty would affect his method to instruct. Teachers perceive that genetic and environment are essential for behaviors of their students, recognizing even the interaction of two factors. This information is important for the design of action in teacher education and possible interventions in the education sector.

This research investigated teachers'perceptions, understandings and implementation of education standards in elementary and primary schools in Papua New Guinea. The main research question and two sub-questions were designed to explore teachers' perceptions and understanding of national standards. This exploration engaged teachers in identifying factors which they believed influenced their professional work. This study also explored stakeholders' perceptions of teachers' interpretations of national education standards. This study adopted social constructivist epistemology, symbolic interactionism, and ethnographic case study methodology. This provided the basis for its theoretical framework to purposefully understand human interactions within their culture and context. Social constructivism accommodates situated learning, a conceptual framework which was adapted to interrogate understanding and implementation of national education standards. A variety of research methods were used to elicit teachers' and stakeholders' perceptions and experiences of their professional world. These methods included in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, documentary analysis, field notes and observations. Most of the focus group discussions engaged participants to "tell their stories", thus storytelling became an avenue for eliciting teachers' and stakeholders'perceptions. Workshops conducted for teachers became another important strategy for data collection. Two schools, one rural and one urban, became case studies to understand national education standards as an external phenomenon. A total of 595 participants were involved in this study including teachers and pupils, parents and community members, school board members, members of curriculum committees, and policy makers. The study found numerous contextual factors influenced teachers' understandings, interpretation and implementation of standards at the school level. Foremost, teachers' own knowledge of formal education standards was deficient thus influencing their commitment to and enthusiasm in their professional work. Teachers' content knowledge and pedagogical skills influenced their ability to translate content standards into clear benchmarks for pupils' learning. The absence of effective monitoring systems of teachers' performance contributed to pupils' superficial assessment reports and of uncoordinated mastery of subject content and performance skills. The absence of effective school leadership affected teachers' commitment, attitudes and professionalism. This generated a culture of isolationism acute in both schools. Teachers were performing to hierarchically externally imposed requirements, and in the process, overlooked essential knowledge and skills that were needed to improve quality of students' learning. The national education standards are an inherited policy from the colonial administration. This study found that successful implementation of education standards is highly dependent on the social and cultural expectations of Papua New Guinea's rapidly changing society. At the local level, education standards are highly influenced by teachers' professionalism, provincial education boards and community expectations. This is compounded by the mismatch of priorities and policies between the national and provincial education divisions. Such a practice impacts negatively on the successful implementation of educational reform agendas. The study implies that a reconsideration of national education standards is necessary. This process will involve a rethinking of teacher education programmes, dismantling previous assumptions of national standards and local implementation, and accommodating challenges presented by economic, political, social and cultural change in Papua New Guinea.

Como as pessoas percebem as outras é relevante no processo de ensino aprendizagem e nas interações sociais como um todo. Essas percepções definem a maneira com que as pessoas reagem umas às outras. Em particular, a avaliação da percepção de professores colabora na compreensão das atitudes do professor diante dos comportamentos de seus alunos. O objetivo do presente estudo foi avaliar a percepção de professores sobre a influência genética e ambiental em comportamentos relevantes no processo educacional: personalidade, inteligência, dificuldades de aprendizagem, problemas de comportamento e doenças mentais. Para tanto, o questionário The NatureNurture Question:Teachers perceptions of how genes and the environment influence educationally relevant behavior foi adaptado à língua portuguesa do Brasil e aplicado para 501 professores de todos os níveis de ensino, do estado de São Paulo. Os resultados demonstraram que os professores atribuíram influências genéticas e ambientais em proporções aproximadamente iguais considerando todos os domínios, personalidade e dificuldades e aprendizagem. Atribuíram maior influência genética à inteligência e doenças mentais, bem como maior influência ambiental aos problemas de comportamento. Metade dos participantes afirmou ter estudado aspectos da genética em sua formação para professor. A maioria dos professores declarou que ter um aluno com dificuldade de aprendizagem geneticamente influenciada afetaria seu método de instruí-lo. Os professores percebem que genes e ambiente criação são imprescindíveis nos comportamentos de seus alunos, reconhecendo, inclusive, a interatividade dos dois fatores, informações importantes para o delineamento de ações na formação dos mesmos possíveis intervenções no âmbito educacional. / How people perceive others are important in the educational process and social interactions at all. These perceptions define the way people react to each other. In particular, the evaluation teachers perception collaborates in the comprehension of teacher\'s attitudes towards the behavior of their students. The aim of this study was to evaluate teachers perception on the genetic and environmental influence on relevant behaviors in the educational process: personality, intelligence, learning difficulties, behavioral problems and mental illness. For this purpose, the questionnaire \"The Nature-Nurture Question: Teachers\' perceptions of how genes and the environment influence educationally relevant behavior\" was adapted to the Portuguese language in Brazil and applied to 501 teachers at all levels of education, the state of São Paulo. The results showed that teachers attributed genetic and environmental influences in approximately equal proportions considering all domains, personality difficulties and learning. They attributed greater genetic influence on intelligence and mental illness as well a greater environmental influence to behavior problems. Half of the participants declared to have studied aspects of genetics in their schooling to teacher. Most teachers stated that having a student with genetically influenced learning difficulty would affect his method to instruct. Teachers perceive that genetic and environment are essential for behaviors of their students, recognizing even the interaction of two factors. This information is important for the design of action in teacher education and possible interventions in the education sector.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-01-26T18:49:33Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2010_DISSERTACAO_MARIA IGNEZ1.pdf: 250922 bytes, checksum: b2ee9bb8773ca06224616fa76ed35377 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2006-11-22 / The present essay focuses the learning evaluation process as it is seen by teachers and students of a public school from the state of São Paulo, Piraju city. The choice for a qualitative case study has made possible the analysis of the answers to the questionnaires solved by teachers and students. Interviews made with the school headmaster have made possible the characterizing of the surveyed subjects profiles. Results have shown that both students and teachers conceptions lead to the representation of the evaluation as a way of checking the program content associated to the measure of the learning and present classyfing evaluation characteristics, privileging the quantifying of students learning. They also show the tendency the teachers have to using in their speech, nomenclatures that come close to progressist concepts concerning evaluation. However, students answers confirm the practice of reproducing the content that has been taught. The data leads to a portrait of the evaluation concept in a public school that may work as a reference to the study of similar realities. It is emphasizes that is necessary and important the accomplishement of a permanent critical study in order to consolidate basic concepts regarding the evaluation of school learning and a critical reflexion of students, parents, teachers, employers and directors concerning pedagogic issues that surround the construction of knowledge. / O presente trabalho tem como foco o processo de avaliação da aprendizagem tal como é percebido por alunos e professores de uma escola pública do Estado de São Paulo. A opção pelo estudo de caso qualitativo possibilitou analisar as respostas dos questionários aplicados a professores e alunos. As entrevistas realizadas com os gestores da escola possibilitaram a caracterização dos perfis dos sujeitos pesquisados. Os resultados demonstram que as concepções dos professores e alunos convergem para a representação da avaliação como verificação do conteúdo programático associado à mensuração da aprendizagem e apresentam características de avaliação classificatória, privilegiando a quantificação da aprendizagem do aluno. Demonstram também a tendência dos professores de utilizarem, em seus discursos, nomenclaturas que se aproximam de conceitos progressistas a respeito da avaliação, porém as respostas dos alunos confirmam uma prática reprodutiva dos conteúdos ensinados. Os dados remetem a um retrato da concepção da avaliação da aprendizagem em uma escola pública que pode servir de ponto de referência para estudo de outras realidades próximas. Enfatiza-se a necessidade e importância de um trabalho crítico permanente a fim de consolidar conceitos básicos a respeito da avaliação da aprendizagem escolar e de uma reflexão crítica de alunos, pais, professores, funcionários e gestores a respeito de questões pedagógicas que envolvam a construção do conhecimento.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-07-18T17:54:08Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2010_DISSERTACAO_MARIA IGNEZ1.pdf: 250922 bytes, checksum: b2ee9bb8773ca06224616fa76ed35377 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2006-11-22 / The present essay focuses the learning evaluation process as it is seen by teachers and students of a public school from the state of São Paulo, Piraju city. The choice for a qualitative case study has made possible the analysis of the answers to the questionnaires solved by teachers and students. Interviews made with the school headmaster have made possible the characterizing of the surveyed subjects profiles. Results have shown that both students and teachers conceptions lead to the representation of the evaluation as a way of checking the program content associated to the measure of the learning and present classyfing evaluation characteristics, privileging the quantifying of students learning. They also show the tendency the teachers have to using in their speech, nomenclatures that come close to progressist concepts concerning evaluation. However, students answers confirm the practice of reproducing the content that has been taught. The data leads to a portrait of the evaluation concept in a public school that may work as a reference to the study of similar realities. It is emphasizes that is necessary and important the accomplishement of a permanent critical study in order to consolidate basic concepts regarding the evaluation of school learning and a critical reflexion of students, parents, teachers, employers and directors concerning pedagogic issues that surround the construction of knowledge. / O presente trabalho tem como foco o processo de avaliação da aprendizagem tal como é percebido por alunos e professores de uma escola pública do Estado de São Paulo. A opção pelo estudo de caso qualitativo possibilitou analisar as respostas dos questionários aplicados a professores e alunos. As entrevistas realizadas com os gestores da escola possibilitaram a caracterização dos perfis dos sujeitos pesquisados. Os resultados demonstram que as concepções dos professores e alunos convergem para a representação da avaliação como verificação do conteúdo programático associado à mensuração da aprendizagem e apresentam características de avaliação classificatória, privilegiando a quantificação da aprendizagem do aluno. Demonstram também a tendência dos professores de utilizarem, em seus discursos, nomenclaturas que se aproximam de conceitos progressistas a respeito da avaliação, porém as respostas dos alunos confirmam uma prática reprodutiva dos conteúdos ensinados. Os dados remetem a um retrato da concepção da avaliação da aprendizagem em uma escola pública que pode servir de ponto de referência para estudo de outras realidades próximas. Enfatiza-se a necessidade e importância de um trabalho crítico permanente a fim de consolidar conceitos básicos a respeito da avaliação da aprendizagem escolar e de uma reflexão crítica de alunos, pais, professores, funcionários e gestores a respeito de questões pedagógicas que envolvam a construção do conhecimento.