D.Ed. (Teaching Studies) / The traditional method of lesson presentation has in recent years come under scrutiny from various education quarters concerned with approaches to teaching and learning. The reason for this being the changing swing of thoughts concerning knowledge and learning, the new integrated lifelong learning approach for general and further education (NQF:1995a) and the shift of emphasis in teaching strategies. The realization has dawned on educationalists that presentation lessons should perhaps not be "the one skill to which most attention is directed during [in-service] training" (Ashman & Conway, 1993:61), but one of many skills that should receive undue attention by all lesson presenters. The aim has not been to eradicate the process of lesson presentation in its present format but rather to oscillate the emphasis due to the growing interest in the manner in which learning matter is presented (Durniny & Sohnge, 1986:98). Learning activities should be "planned in such as way that most [all] of the learners are involved in [thinking] activities at all times of the lesson and not excluded as commonly appears to be the case" (Elston, 1992:71). Unfortunately initiative, creativity and other teacher input is not a prerequisite for lesson and content presentation as is proven when examining policies brought about by education departments regarding requirements for the planning and presentation of lessons. It must however be mentioned that these are changing drastically and we, as educators in so doing have to adapt (Osborne, 1993:2). Hardy (1992:56) believes that there should always be a prototype [lesson plan] according to which all instructional activities should take place. Obviously some structure or guidelines are essential, especially pertaining to new, inexperienced teachers, but has one not been "too reliant for too long on hierarchical and sanction ridden modes of 'instructional supervision'" (Smyth, 1991:81) which includes lesson presentation...

M.Ed. / This study was influenced deeply by among other issues the current sociopolitical reforms in South Africa, an overt paradigm shift in education and educational practices, growing concern for the environment and the need to empower teachers with environmental education knowledge, action competencies and skills through participation in curriculum development activities at both local and national level. The main aim was to uncover barriers towards the meaningful involvement and subsequent participation of teachers in environmental education curriculum development processes. This was done by determining teachers' perceptions about involvement in environmental education curriculum development processes. The literature review in this study revealed that teachers have been passive recipients and implementers of externally developed curricula both in South Africa and world-wide. No significant open-ended strategies have been formulated to involve teachers in curriculum development. The use of both the questionnaire and group interviews for this study proved to be very useful for providing insights into teachers' perceptions about the issue of curriculum development and their involvement in such processes. Several obstacles towards successful environmental education curriculum development and the subsequent involvement of teachers have been highlighted. The findings and recommendations of this research are expected to help elevate teachers' interest and awareness on issues of curriculum development for environmental education and to enable them to realise the need to engage in collaborative participatory curriculum initiatives. Based on the findings of this study, it can be argued that networking among environmental educators from various schools at local, provincial and national level, as well as with other informal environmental education providers should be encouraged by establishing appropriate policy and structural support systems in the Department of Education and Training. An appropriate model which highlights this idea, has therefore been developed.

After independence in 1990, Namibian schools were required by the new government to shift from a hierarchical organisational structure with authoritarian leadership to a more democratic type of leadership that offers teachers the opportunity to participate in school leadership and in decision-making processes. This shift is suggested in a number of national policies in Namibia that highlight the sharing of leadership within the organization and, in particular, the sharing of leadership with teachers. As such, teacher leadership is a manifestation of distributed leadership which emphasizes that leadership can be located in the position of the principal but can spread over many people who work in a school at various levels. While teacher leadership is well researched in developed countries, it is under researched in Namibia. Against this backdrop, the purpose of my study was to explore the concept and practice of teacher leadership as an organizational phenomenon in a case study school in the Ncuncuni circuit of the Kavango region in Namibia. It also examined the factors that enabled and inhibited the practice of teacher leadership. My study was conducted within a qualitative interpretive paradigm and it adopted a case study approach in one school. The study used the following instruments to collect data: a closed questionnaire, document analysis, observations and individual interviews. The primary participants were the principal and three teachers, while the entire school teaching staff constituted my secondary participants. Quantitative data was analysed manually using descriptive statistics while qualitative data was analysed thematically using a model of teacher leadership (Grant, 2008). The findings of my study indicated that while the concept of teacher leadership was new to all participants, they had a common sense understanding of it. Although teachers in the study understood teacher leadership in a range of different ways, the overarching idea of the whole school was that teachers lead both in and outside the classroom. My study also found that teachers in the school practiced teacher leadership across the entire four zones. These included how teacher leadership was practiced inside the classroom and how teachers worked as leaders with colleagues and learners beyond their classroom in curricular and extra-curricular activities. It also included how teachers led outside their classroom in whole school development as well as how teachers led beyond their schools in the community. Teacher leadership was strong in the first three zones and weaker in the fourth zone, which constituted an example of 'successful teacher leadership' (Harris and Muijs, 2005). There were factors that promoted teacher leadership in the case study school such as a supportive culture and ongoing professional development. Factors that constrained the practice of teacher leadership were also evident like the SMT who used its power at times to control teachers' decisions and a lack of time also emerged as a barrier that impeded teachers from taking leadership roles because they already had full teaching programmes. Even though there were some barriers to teacher leadership, a dispersed distributed leadership context prevailed at the case study school.

South Africa’s future success depends on a number of national priorities, amongst them the transformation of its education system. Education is the best route to follow to alleviate poverty and many other social ills. One way to overcome some of the complex challenges and crises that we face in South African schools is to pay attention to issues of leading and leadership, including the leadership of teachers. This study is done with the hope that research into teacher leadership will be one of the answers to the crisis in education. It should become a beacon of hope for all educationists who passionately want progress in the youth of South Africa. What better way than to ‘Awaken the Sleeping Giant’ of teacher leadership, borrowing the term from Katzenmeyer and Moller (2009). This study was designed as a case study, the purpose of which was to find out about the enactment of teacher leadership in an Eastern Cape township high school as well as the enhancing and hindering factors to this enactment. This study was done as a replication study of a similar study done by a group of 11Master’s students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in 2010. Similar to the original study, this case study was located within the interpretive paradigm and drew on school profiling, survey questionnaires, a focus group interview, selfreflective journals and individual interviews for its methods of data collection. The study was framed by distributed leadership while Grant’s (2008; 2012) Model of teacher leadership was adopted as the analytical tool. It emerged from the data that the three teacher leaders, my primary participants, exhibited teacher leadership across all four zones of Grant’s (2008) Model. The first zone was leadership in the classroom where all three teacher leaders showed leadership to varying degrees. Zones Two to Four are about leadership beyond the classroom into the school and beyond. In Zone Two, the zone where teachers work with each other and the learners outside the classroom, substantial levels of leadership were enacted by the three teacher leaders. Zone Three, where leadership is exhibited in whole-school development, the three primary participants showed distinct leadership qualities as well. The fourth zone, which is about interaction with neighbouring schools, also revealed that all three teacher leaders demonstrated active leadership on a regular basis. Findings further revealed that there were only a few inhibiting factors to the leadership of teachers at the case study school, including limited resources and infrastructure as well as insufficient support and acknowledgement from the relevant stakeholders when leadership initiatives were made, either successfully or otherwise. However, the enhancing factors superseded the inhibiting factors. A functional committee culture guided by a shared vision existed in the case study school together with an ethos of trust which enabled the staff to work collaboratively. Though there was certainly room for improvement in leadership practices at this case study school, the enactment of teacher leadership in this school illustrated a strong case of ‘developed’ teacher leadership (Muijs& Harris, 2007) within a dispersed leadership framing (Gunter, 2005)

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The purpose of this study was to determine whether elementary teacher morale is related to teacher freedom to make decisions and give input into their work and work environment. Additionally, the study attempted to determine whether teacher decision making freedom varies with age, gender, number of degrees, years of experience, or special teaching assignment.

Physical activity plays a key role in the health of children. Childhood obesity is increasing in the United States, and children are spending less time being physically active. Active participation by a physical education (PE) teacher in physical activities has been suggested as a means of promoting student fitness. The purpose of this quasi-experimental quantitative study was to determine whether modeling of physical activity by a PE teacher would increase student participation and physical fitness. Bandura's social learning theory provided the theoretical framework for the study. Participants included 311 4th and 5th grade elementary students enrolled in physical education classes. One group of students experienced PE teacher modeling in physical education class activities and the other group experienced no PE teacher modeling. Participation grades in physical education were used for participation scores, while the FITNESSGRAM was used to measure student physical fitness. Independent samples t tests were used to compare students' fitness and participation levels between the two groups. Results indicated no significant differences in fitness or participation between the groups based on teacher modeling. This study promoted positive social change by providing initial research findings to the local site on encouraging physical activity through teacher participation, which may be used to further examine student participation in physical activity.

The purpose of this study was to examine teachers' perceptions of the effects of their collaborative involvement in the school planning process. It is a descriptive case study of three elementary schools from a large east coast suburban public school district that had participated in the district's "Effective Schools Project." These schools evolved from beginning the collaborative planning process to full staff involvement and in some cases, community collaboration on the school operating plan. This descriptive case study consisted of basically qualitative research, however it also contained a quantitative dimension. The first part was a questionnaire administered to 104 teachers in three schools. The questionnaire survey measured teachers' perceptions of student achievement, the staff's level of collaborative involvement over the last several years, teachers' attitudes regarding collaborative involvement, and what factors motivated teachers to want to become involved in the process. Descriptive statistics and multivariate regression were used to analyze these data. Following the survey, focus group interviews with three teachers from each of the three schools who had been at those schools the entire time of transition were conducted. Participants for the focus groups were selected from different grade levels and years of teaching experience. The interviews were tape recorded, transcribed, coded, and a content analysis was conducted. Next, three principals from each of the three schools were interviewed separately and their words were also taped, transcribed, and coded. The last part of the study was a review of records consisting of biennial plans and their reports, standardized test scores and other demographic data on each of the three schools. A content analysis of these records was also conducted. It appears that those items on the questionnaire that were common to teachers' motivation factors had the highest frequencies and percentages for agreement as did those items dealing with perceived student achievement. Eight themes or constructs emerged during the interviews with teachers and principals--evolution and changing paradigms, implementation of the school plan both before and after collaboration, training, time, ownership, appreciation and recognition, empowerment of teachers, and the whole school as a community. Many of the salient quotes drawn from the interviews have been presented to share the voices of teachers and principals who have been involved directly in the collaborative planning process. The data collected from the regression analysis of the survey neither confirmed nor failed to confirm the qualitative data, due to a lack of reliability of two of the scales. However, when looked at simply as descriptive data the survey responses corroborated with the interview data. Teachers' focus group interviews were supported and validated by principals’ interviews and by a review of records from the three schools. These records included school operating plans and their final reports as well as standardized test scores. Teachers and principals in these three schools perceive that student achievement has improved since teachers have been involved in the collaborative planning process as indicated by standardized test scores and by other indicators of achievement noted in the evaluation component of the plan. They also perceive the overall school climate as improved since teachers have become collaboratively involved in the school operating plan. / Ed. D.

In a democratic South Africa, a variety of factors are necessary to ensure effective school governance and management. One of these factors is shared decision-making (SDM). SDM is a process of making decisions in a collaborative manner at the school level. Those responsible for implementing a decision must be actively and legitimately involved in making the decision. In South African schools today, SDM is no longer an option. The new framework of SDM is embedded in the South African Schools Act (Act 84 of 1996). According to the Act, parents, learners and teachers should be given the opportunity of participating in decisions on educational matters. In this study, the researcher set out to investigate and explore effective decision-making of secondary school principals in the Thabo Mofutsanayana Education District (THMOED) of the Free State Province. In an endeavour to realize that end, an open-ended questionnaire, individual and focus group interviews were used to collect data. The main aim was to find out how teachers, learners, parents and principals experienced decision-making in their schools. The main findings of this research were that, decisions-making practices in the secondary schools in the THMOED still adhered to pre-democratic formal lines of authority. In other words, the locus of control and decision-making powers resided mainly with the principals, with minimum participation of other stakeholders. Consequently, there were dissatisfactions and concerns raised by the participants. The concerns were directed at the management and included lack of communication, lack of transparency, unacceptable disciplinary procedures, autocratic leadership styles and centralized decision-making. According to the findings, it would appear that democratic models of governance were insufficiently used or overlooked by the principals. Concerns raised by the respondents were a clear indication that much needed to be done to change the mind-set of the principals. / Educational Studies / D.Ed (Education Management)

Recommendations have been given in the areas of teachers, the subject and the school according to the data collected in the study. Teachers need to change their attitude towards the use of course books, otherwise, a comprehensive degree (i.e., breadth and depth) of curriculum decision making is hard to be developed. The subject team should utilize the common planning period more effectively by designating targets and developing a work routine. It is also crucial to establish a harmonious working relationship within the team while the panel chairperson is required to lead a professional role. Teachers' professional developments should go hand-in-hand with curriculum development and more efforts should be focused on integrating scattered strengths into the team. At school level, more support should be given to curriculum decision making policy and its culture. Moreover, more professional development opportunities should be provided. (Abstract shortened by UMI.) / The New Edition of the Chinese Language Curriculum was introduced in all secondary schools in September 2002. Major features of the reform cultivate the migration from a single model passage to a more holistic teaching unit, teaching focus has switched from just reading and writing to comprehensive aspects of speaking, reading, listening and writing. While the role of a teacher has shifted from dominating to facilitating, the role of the students has shifted from a passive receptor to an active learner. The aim of language teaching has changed from imparting language knowledge to cultivating generic skills. As a whole, the New Edition of the Chinese Language Curriculum has extended the work scope of the teachers in their curriculum and teaching decision making. For instance, they are able to adjust the course books according to the circumstances of the school. Adjusting the course books or developing school specific teaching resources is a complicated task which requires co-operation and creative input of the teachers. With this in mind, some schools have started the reform of the Chinese Language subject by allocating a common planning period, making room for the teachers to increase their opportunities in curriculum input and decision making. / The present research started in the second year after the introduction of the New Edition of the Chinese Language Curriculum. By applying qualitative research methods, five schools were chosen as case studies, with the teachers of Secondary One as research target, to explore the state of teachers' participation in the curriculum decision making, to understand how the curriculum decisions were made within a subject team, and to investigate the factors influencing the decision making. The data was collected via interviews, participatory observations and document analysis. / The study has concluded six points. (1) Sparing a common planning period by schools cannot guarantee the quality of curriculum decision making. (2) Teachers' degree of understanding towards the curriculum affects their decision making on curriculum content. (3) Teachers' viewpoints on course books will affect their decision making on curriculum content too. (4) The sense of co-operation determines the degree of contribution and involvement by the teacher in the curriculum decision making. (5) The leadership and co-ordination of a panel chairperson is crucial to cultivate a harmonious working relationship between team members. (6) The factors affecting a school are inter-related. / The study reveals that at present, schools have not carried out any restructuring because of individual subject reforms. The common planning period in certain schools is merely the subject policy, not a unified policy in the school. While it has contributed to the significant opportunity for teachers to participate in curriculum decision making, the policy cannot guarantee the quality of the decisions. There are a few fundamental issues which determine whether a curriculum decision making can be developed to a profound and extensive degree. The teachers must be well prepared for the new curriculum by having participated in the pilot program organized by the Education and Manpower Bureau at the time; the subject team must use the common planning period effectively by developing a work routine, and by distributing responsibilities among teachers in the team to make sure that they are engaged and able to contribute; the subject teaching attribution should focus on and reflect the needs of the students as well as the implementation of changes in the curriculum to improve teaching; and lastly, in addition to providing teachers with a common planning period, the school also needs to allocate more resources in the theme of policy making, such as flexible timetables and on-going professional development opportunities. If these factors are missing in the academic subject, teachers will rely heavily on course books and when dealing with curriculum content decision making, they will seldom consider other elements, such as teaching methodology and teaching activities, in a curriculum. / 高慕蓮. / Adviser: Lee Chi Kin. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-03, Section: A, page: 0787. / Thesis (doctoral)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 489-508). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstracts in Chinese and English. / School code: 1307. / Gao Mulian.