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Classroom management is a prerequisite for effective instruction, yet research indicates that not all teachers implement evidence-based classroom management skills (CMS) in their classroom. Therefore, efficient professional development models are necessary to increase teachers’ use of CMS, but those models are predicated on valid and reliable screening tools to identify teachers CMS performance. This study is a psychometric evaluation of a direct observation CMS screening tool for elementary school teachers that can be used as part of a targeted CMS professional development model. Based on a three-facet generalizability study, the primary source of variance across observations was differences among teachers and differences across observations. A decision study was conducted and indicates that a generalizable estimate from the CMS screening tool requires four 30-min observations. These results are compared with prior research and recommendations for future research are discussed.

In this chapter, I focus on two methodological issues involved with conducting ethnographies of very young children; establishing a researcher role in preschool classrooms while simultaneously gaining access into children’s culture and the trust of adult gatekeepers involved (i.e., teachers). Drawing on my participant observation experiences in 10 preschool classrooms (over 470 hours and 19 months of observations), I challenge the use of the friend role (Fine & Sandstrom, 1988) and least-adult role (Mandell, 1988) in research with young children. I examine how teachers mediate the researcher’s role in participant observation of children in preschool classrooms demonstrating the importance of establishing a middle manager role between teachers and children when conducting participant observations. I also discuss strategies used to overcome adult’s mediation of the researcher’s role, and strategies for simultaneously gaining teachers and children’s rapport in participant observation research in ways that formulate positive relationships with adults and children. I demonstrate the importance of researcher reflexivity of children’s and adults’ assessments of researchers’ roles in the field, highlighting how researchers’ impacts on children are not dependent on the times they are present in the field. Instead, I show that children continue to critically assess researchers’ positionality and roles in the field, often times seeking the help of adults (i.e., parents and teachers), further stressing the need for researchers to negotiate an understanding of their roles with both adults and children prior to and while in the field.

Despite many well-intentioned efforts to improve student achievement in chronically low-performing schools, there is little evidence of significant progress. A new and different kind of data; however, is providing a fresh perspective on the problem: According to recent studies, research-based instructional strategies – those strategies that have been proven to increase the likelihood that students will be able to retain, recall, and apply what they have been taught – are not consistently used in classrooms. Irrespective of the many changes that occur in schools, student achievement will not significantly improve until teachers consistently use and school leaders consistently promote research-based instructional strategies. The purpose of this chapter is to prepare school leaders to assess the use of research-based instructional strategies in their school, and then use the data to promote more effective instruction. This chapter will provide user-friendly tools and strategies for collecting, organizing, and analyzing classroom observation data; case studies; sample data sets; findings and conclusions drawn from sample data tables; a step-by-step process for collecting the data; samples of research-based instructional strategies; and references for identifying research-based instructional strategies.

In the field of behavioral disabilities, systematic direct observation (SDO) has been an integral tool for describing and explaining relationships between student and teacher behavior in authentic classroom settings. However, this method of measurement can be resource-intensive and presents a series of complex decisions for investigators. The purpose of this chapter is to review a series of critical decisions investigators must make when developing SDO protocols to address their research questions. After describing each decision point and its relevance to the measurement system, we identify trends and special considerations in the field of behavioral disabilities with respect to each decision. We organize content according to deciding what to measure, deciding how to measure it, and critical steps to prevent system breakdowns. Finally, we identify avenues for research to further the impact of SDO in the field of behavioral disabilities.

Thirty-two qualitative research reports on co-teaching in inclusive classrooms, identified through a comprehensive literature search, are reviewed. Studies have included significant diversity in grade level, geographical location, setting, and took place in three different countries. Overall, teachers and administrators reported a high degree of satisfaction with co-teaching. However, a number of needs were also addressed, including administrative support, appropriate caseloads, planning time, student skill level, and co-teacher compatibility. Implications for research and practice are discussed.

Over nearly two decades the Supporting Effective Teaching project examined the characteristics of teachers that result in successful inclusion of students with disabilities in Canadian regular education classrooms. These studies revealed that teachers who rate high in adapting and calibrating instruction for students who have special needs are the most successful overall with all their students. In this chapter, we present an adaptation of the observation scale that we used to rate effective inclusive instructional practices. The adapted scale can be used both as a self-rating and as a third-party measurement scale of effective teaching practices. We link each element of the scale to the Universal Design for Learning framework. We discuss how challenges to effective practices are affected by teacher beliefs about ability and disability, collegial differences in beliefs and practices, and the focus set by the leadership in the school.

To describe the role one classroom writing community played in shaping students’ understandings of the analytical writing genre; and to discuss the impact the community had on students’ developing academic writing identities.

While research has demonstrated the impact of classroom writing communities on student writing practices and identities at the elementary level (Dyson, 1997) and for secondary students engaged in fiction writing (Halverson, 2005), less is known about the role classroom writing communities may play for secondary students who are learning to write in academic discourses. This chapter explores the practices of one such classroom community and discusses the ways the community facilitated students’ introduction to the discourse of analytical writing.

The teacher turned the classroom writing community into an authentic audience, and in so doing, he developed students’ understandings of the analytical writing genre and their growing identities as academic writers. First, he used the concept of immediate audience (i.e., writing to persuade real readers) as the primary rationale for students to follow the outlined expectations for analytical writing. Second, he used inquiry discussions around student work (i.e., interacting with other members of the writing community) to prepare students for a future audience of prospective independent school English classrooms.

By turning the classroom writing community into an authentic audience through inquiry discussions, teachers can develop students’ deep and flexible understandings of a potentially unfamiliar writing genre. Furthermore, by employing the classroom writing community as a support for moving students through moments of struggle, teachers implicate students’ expertise as academic writers, thereby facilitating their willingness to take on academic writing identities.

This chapter focusses on the complexity of observation, considering its role in lesson study, following a broader discussion of how observation is generally understood in teaching contexts. The authors argue that lesson study observation is formative and should not be performative in focus. In lesson study cycles, observation is a process conducted among peers ideally in a spirit of mutual support and collaborative inquiry, seeking to find answers to pedagogic challenges rather than measuring the effectiveness of individual teachers.

This chapter reports on the results from several extended qualitative investigations of co-teaching in science and social studies content area classes, on both elementary and secondary levels. In these investigations, co-teaching partners were studied and interviewed over several years, with the view of uncovering attitudes and procedures closely associated with successful collaborative partnerships. In some cases, these investigations took place in the context of implementation of research-based instructional strategies. Analysis of data from these investigations revealed that there was considerable variability in the way co-teaching practices were implemented, the attitudes toward co-teaching expressed by teachers, and the success of the co-teaching partnerships. It was thought that several variables, including content expertise, concerns for high-stakes testing, and the personal compatibility of co-teachers played an important role in the success of the co-teaching relationship.