This thesis is a study of Métis teacher practice. Teacher practice evolves from experiences that teachers had as students. In a hegemonic educational system, certain practices are more valued than others. Minority teachers have been schooled in this same hegemony. The struggle for many minority teachers is to fully integrate their cultural identity into their teaching practice. They need to resist the established dominant norms and the pressure to conform in their classrooms. There are very few supports for teachers who challenge the status-quo. Four Métis teachers were the participants in the study along with the researcher who became a co-participant. The study investigated how the participants viewed the role of Métis culture in their professional and personal lives. Using a voice as a Métis woman and teacher, the researcher used narrative to analyze and reflect on the data. It was found that the participants cultural identity influenced their teaching practice. The standards that guided their classroom choices and behaviours have been shaped by their own experiences. The participants realized that it was their task to teach for social change and support their minority students in learning how to function in an oppressive society. The participants taught for social justice through critical pedagogy and their choice of teaching methodologies. They taught their students how to question power, privilege, inequality, knowledge and ideas. Using the teaching methodologies of storytelling and dialogue allowed these teacher participants to honour themselves and the uniqueness of each student. They created an environment that respected diversity and affirmed their students identities. In this thesis the researcher provided a voice of Métis that is distinct, yet can be viewed alongside other Aboriginal cultures. It is believed that this study can assist other teachers in analyzing their own practice as well as demonstrate how teaching for social justice benefits all students.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Indiana University of Pennsylvania. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 118-122). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

This study sought to determine if a six session classroom intervention coupled with a teacher education program was sufficient to alter behaviors related to socially aggressive behaviors of fourth grade students. The treatment manual for this intervention was developed by Pamela McDonald Schaber and Daniel Hoard (Schaber and Hoard, 2006), following a review of the literature on ecological intervention for overt and social/relational aggression. The objectives of the intervention were to reduce aggressive behaviors through an ecological approach by: 1) educating students on types of bullying (physical and social), the role of the bystander in contributing to bullying, and the consequences for individuals and the classroom environment when bullying occurs; 2) challenging sympathetic attitudes about the appropriateness of bullying; 3) providing students with strategies for intervening when they observe bullying; 4) modeling bystander interventions; 5) giving students an opportunity to practice bystander interventions; and 6) empowering classrooms to develop a code of conduct for working together to reduce bullying. Participants were 71 fourth grade students from a Central Texas elementary school. Participants completed the Social Experiences Questionnaire -- peer-report which is a peer-rating measure of their classmates' frequency of social aggression and prosocial behavior. They also completed the Participant Roles Questionnaire -- self-report to determine how often they engaged in the different roles associated with bullying (i.e., bully, defender, assistant...). The main findings were that social aggression decreased for boys but not girls, and bully behavior decreased for both boys and girls. Unexpected findings were that prosocial behavior decreased from pre-test to post-test, and there were no changes evidenced in defender, assistant, and reinforcer behaviors. Implications and limitations for the findings are provided. / text

This study is a classroom observational study in primary schools in one Local Education Authority in England The study, which was begun in 1990, was concerned to identify the range and nature of academic classroom behaviours of academically able underachievers, and in comparison with children of average ability, to identify the effects and implications of those behaviours for teachers arid classroom management. The research sample consisted of a total of seven matched Year 3 pupils aged 7-8 years old drawn from five primary schools. The identification of the more able (the target group) and their 'normal' counterparts (the control group) was carried out using a small number of objective tests and triangulated by teacher and pupil perceptions of abilities and relative class positions. The data was collected by the observation of English and Mathematics lessons for one session per Week over a period of one month. A continuous observation schedule was used containing fOurteen different categories of cl~sroom behaviours. The research demonstrates that academically able underachievers are undetected in classrooms; consequently are not given work commensurate with their undetected abilities; are rarely required to participate in lessons; and who subsequently become bored' in a relatively unchallenging environment. Even though they were bored they did not disrupt lessons, but quiet1Yacquiesced to the mores of the peer group. The thesis discusses the implications of these findings for primary education for academically able children as well as reflecting upon the findings in the light of subsequent reading and updating of the bibliography.

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No description available.

This thesis reports on a qualitative study that documented one teacher’s research-based practice of teaching students to read in a Grade 9 ESL Academic mathematics course. Specifically, this thesis focuses on the description of the range of strategies and reading-based activities that the teacher used; the experiences and influences that led him to include reading strategies in his regular instructional practice; and, the challenges that he faced when integrating these strategies routinely as part of his daily mathematics program. The complexity of simultaneously teaching mathematics and reading strategies in the context of a Grade 9 ESL Academic course is also discussed. The study was conducted early in the second semester of the 2007-2008 school year. A variety of data collection methods were used: interview, classroom observation, and document collection. The findings of the study provide concrete examples of designing lessons that embed the use of reading strategies (e.g., vocabulary development, reading supplementary text, and reflection) to teach or inform mathematics concepts. The large number of ESL students in the observed class underscored the importance of incorporating reading strategies into the mathematics program in order to facilitate ESL students’ language learning processes. The teacher under study focused on using additional literature as an aid to develop students’ deeper understanding of mathematics concepts and introduced reading strategies as a means to improve students’ reading comprehension of supplementary text; however, he did not apply these strategies to lessons directed at the comprehension of specific mathematics text. The conclusions suggest that mathematics teachers require substantive classroom-based evidence and support from Ministry of Education personnel, subject specialists, school administrators, and peers in order to be convinced of the value of reading in mathematics class and to embark on their own program for implementing reading strategies and reading-based activities into regular mathematics learning activities. / Thesis (Master, Education) -- Queen's University, 2008-11-06 13:51:42.326

No description available.

This study is concerned with how teachers use and guide classroom talk to support students in developing an understanding of scientific conceptual knowledge. The focus is on teachers and teaching. The study involves developing theoretical tools for describing the ways in which teachers make scientific ways of talking and knowing available to their students in classroom settings. The study has both theoretical and empirical components. The theoretical component involves drawing on aspects of Vygotslcy's socio-cultural theory of learning and development and the work of other neo-Vygotskian scholars to develop theoretical tools, based on the concept of the teaching narrative, for analysing the teaching interactions of the classroom. The empirical part involves taking those theoretical tools and applying them to real classroom situations. It is anticipated that the process of applying the theoretical tools to particular classroom situations will enable elaboration and further development of those tools; in this respect there is close interlinking between theoretical and empirical components of the study. The empirical component is based on two case studies. These case studies detail short teaching sequences in which two teachers introduce their classes to particular scientific concepts. The first case involves teaching and learning about chemical change (focussing on the process of rusting) and the second about air pressure. In summary, the main aim of this thesis is to draw upon Vygotskian theory to develop ways of talking and thinking about language-based pedagogical strategies of science teaching. The intention is that such ways of talking and thinking, framed in terms of the teaching narrative, should contribute to the professional language of science teaching providing tools for reflecting on and developing teaching practice.