Search results

This paper aims to describe a professional development workshop designed to enhance teachers' pedagogical content knowledge.

The program draws on a carefully articulated definition of pedagogical knowledge as elaborated by Shulman, and features the work of scholars focused on pushing new interpretations of the meaning of Gettysburg, especially in polarized political times.

Teacher participants have been found to draw new meaning from their visit that, for many, has had a profound impact on the way they make sense of Gettysburg as a historic site of political importance.

The program offers a model for professional development providers interested in enhancing the pedagogical content knowledge of teachers and engaging them in examination of the past for the purpose of re-examining contemporary political concerns.

Decolonizing the curriculum is an important topic in education but what does it really mean to decolonize the curriculum? In this self-study, I reflected, with the help of a critical friend, on what decolonizing the curriculum could mean in the context of my biology education classroom using the Pedagogical Content Knowledge model by Davidowitz and Rollnick (2011) as the guiding framework. From these reflections, I came to the conclusion that decolonizing the curriculum is not about erasing the known facts and principles of science but rather, it is about contextualizing it by replacing the Eurocentric stories, texts, and examples among other things, with our own Afrocentric ones. Contextualizing our curriculum is, however, fraught with challenges which include underdeveloped indigenous languages available to be used as languages of instruction, lack of locally produced teaching and learning resources including textbooks, and lack of documented indigenous knowledge that curriculum implementers can use in their teaching in order to make it contextually relevant. In this chapter, I share insights from my reflections.

This paper aims to analyze the extent to which education for sustainable development (ESD) training enhances university teachers’ professional competence and whether it has the same effect in the digital as in the face-to-face format.

A training concept was developed based on the professional action competence model. Between 2018 and 2021, 19 training sessions were conducted with 183 university teachers: ten in face-to-face sessions and nine in the digital format. Questionnaires were administered before and after the training to determine its impact.

Overall, the training proved to be effective. There was a significant increase in professional knowledge and self-efficacy after the training, but there was no change in motivation. The face-to-face and digital formats proved to be equally effective.

The long-term effect of the training could not be determined.

There should be regular ESD training and coaching for university teachers.

There has been little research on the effectiveness of ESD teacher training, and no comparison between the face-to-face and digital approaches exists. It has been possible to train a relatively large number of university teachers from a wide range of subject areas, about two-thirds of whom have had no previous ESD experience.

The purpose of this study is to explore decision-making of elementary teachers (n = 5) specific to US/American history content and curricular resources. More specifically for this study, the author asks the following broad research question: When presented with a collection of social studies instructional resources, how do elementary teachers describe the choices they do make/may make?

In this comparative case study, fifth-grade teachers were interviewed using verbal protocol methodology, they discussed their curriculum, teaching and instructional decisions as each was presented with history/social studies resources associated with newly adopted state standards.

Findings indicate these elementary teachers have professional freedom to make instructional decisions in the ways they interpreted the standards, design instruction and select materials for social studies.

This study contributes to and extends the research in elementary social studies. Teachers' voices and decisions are presented as intellectual and pedagogical actions associated with teaching elementary school social studies.

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, teacher education in Qatar, similar to many countries around the world, witnessed a succession of disruptions to the way it operated. The disruption continued throughout much of 2020, and the need to adapt to arising changes and concerns permeated all aspects of teacher education, particularly the practicum experience. The chapter presents our attempt to investigate the influence of an adapted practicum experience which was based on the synthesis of qualitative evidence (SQD) model on the development of six student teachers’ technology knowledge and skills. Using a qualitative case study research design, we collected data from multiple data sources, including pre–post-interviews and weekly reflection logs. Quantitative data collected from a pre–post-administration of the SQD survey and TPACK (Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge)-practical survey were used to triangulate the qualitative data. Findings from the thematic analysis and descriptive statistical analysis revealed evidence for participants’ increased TPACK-practical knowledge and skills, specifically in the domains of practical teaching and curriculum design. However, an emerging theme revealed that participants considered technology before pedagogy during instructional design. Findings also revealed two challenges to participants’ further development, namely working within a restricted learning environment and experiencing limited mentoring opportunities. We illustrated several implications for the design of the practicum experience and the required institutional support within the context of continued disruption to education and thereafter.

The study aims to assess the effectiveness of engaging tutors in designing and using ICT integrated lesson activities in strengthening their pedagogical use of ICT competences.

Survey data from an intervention group of 70 tutors from two teachers colleges (TCs) were used to compare their level of ICT competences and domains of professional practice before and after the intervention. Document analysis, lesson observations and feedback from the learning management system (LMS) were used to describe tutors’ experiences from the intervention.

There was a statistically significant increase in tutors’ level of pedagogical use of ICT competences and domains of professional practice associated with hands-on practice in designing and implementing the intervention.

The intervention focus on hands-on practice, actual teaching and learning needs, and the use of active learning strategies like flipped classroom and the LMS, were useful means for tutors to make sense of pedagogical use of ICT competences.

The results offer useful insights to teacher education institutions and policymakers on how to prepare professional learning and supportive policies to enhance teaching and learning with ICT for addressing the learning needs of the subject matter.

Creating 16 ICT integrated lesson activities helped tutors to learn pedagogical use of ICT competences by doing. Use of such intervention could be a useful strategy in teacher education institutions to reposition ICT competence development from reproducing technological competences toward developing knowledge creators who could innovate their pedagogical practice with support from mentors, digital learning resources and networks.

This study analyzes the digital competencies and the attitude toward the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) in secondary school teachers of the Javier Heraud Public Educational Institution, Lima, Peru, according to the technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge (TPACK) model, which focuses on knowledge about technology knowledge (TK), pedagogical content (PK) and content knowledge (CK). This implies that it is important to take these components into account in the development of teaching work, in order to contribute to the quality of student learning, within the framework of the restrictions established due to the global health emergency. The study is based on the quantitative approach, type of correlational research and cross-sectional design, the sample consisted of 106 secondary education teachers, questionnaire was applied which were validated by five experts and its reliability was analyzed by the values obtained for Cronbach's alpha, for the digital competencies variable α = 0.861 and for the variable attitude toward the use of ICT α = 0.854. It has been shown that there is a relationship between digital competencies and the attitude toward the use of information and communication technologies in teachers of a Peruvian Public Educational Institution.

This research aims to understand the learning with regard to didactic knowledge of an early childhood teacher who participated in a Lesson Study (LS) on the topic of patterns, as well as her perspective about LS as a teacher education process.

This is a qualitative case study of an early childhood teacher who participated in a LS alongside three other colleagues and a facilitator. Data collection was made by participant observation with elaboration of a research journal, audio recording of sessions and a collective interview. Data analysis was made by content analysis based on the conceptual framework.

This case study shows that early childhood teachers may become aware of the importance of working with their children mathematical ideas. It also shows that they may develop their didactic knowledge in several dimensions such as school mathematics, curriculum, children and their learning, and teaching practice and that they may appreciate LS as a means of professional development.

This study shows the potential of LS for the professional development of early childhood teachers, a scarcely researched area. It also shows that their learning may include dimensions related to specific curricular areas such as mathematics.

This research examined correlations between contextual factors: frequency of online teaching (OT) (number of hours per week), Transformational Leadership Style (TLS) and TPACK (TPACK) among Arab and Jewish teachers in Israel after more than a year of teaching online during the Covid-19 crisis.

Quantitative methodology elicited data from 437 questionnaires. An online questionnaire was first sent to Israeli Arab and Jewish teachers studying for M.A degrees in three randomly selected higher education institutes in Israel, and then the questionnaire was sent to other teachers, selected through the snowball method. After data collection common method variance was precluded.

The findings of this research indicated a positive correlation between frequency of OT, TLS and TPACK among Israeli teachers. Major differences were found between Arab and Jewish teachers: Arab teachers (AT) reported more improvement of TPACK, although they taught fewer hours than Jewish teachers (JT). In addition, TLS and sector (Arab/Jewish) moderated the positive correlation between the frequency of OT and TPACK among ATs.

The findings of this research validate the opportunity created by the Covid-19 crisis for cultivation of teachers’ TPACK through OT. This research contributes to extant relevant literature and practice concerning the influence of contextual factors on teachers' improvement of their TPACK while performing OT during the Covid-19 crisis and can inform the design of ecological and culturally appropriate education policies in the post-COVID-19 period. The research was built on the theories of TLS, which is a crucial component supporting the influence of technology integration. The findings strengthen existing knowledge on the unique capacity of TLS to buffer negative external influences imposed on teachers' TPACK and motivate them.