Understanding how learning environments productively mobilize children's ideas as resources for participation in joint activity is an ongoing focus of research on classroom instruction. We investigated whole-class mathematics conversations in which multiple students participated in ways previous research suggests are consequential for learning. We…

This study examined the ways in which White teachers talk about facilitating conversations about race in their classrooms. Through semistructured interviews of eight teachers in a suburban school district in Central California, information was gathered about how teachers talk about race or avoid talking about race in their classrooms and what…

Teachers affect a wide range of students' educational and social outcomes, but how they contribute to students' involvement in school discipline is less understood. We estimate the impact of teacher demographics and other observed qualifications on students' likelihood of receiving a disciplinary referral. Using data that track all disciplinary…

Understanding mathematics teacher noticing has been the focus of a growing body of research, in which student work and classroom videos are often used as artifacts for surfacing teachers' cognitive processes. However, what teachers notice through reflecting on artifacts of teaching may not be parallel to what they notice in the complex and…

This paper highlights the results of a study on the effects of student-faculty interaction on academic dishonesty; the results were used to develop an explanatory model showing how faculty's classroom demeanor and attitude can impact the likelihood of cheating. Individual, confidential interviews pertaining to student-faculty interaction and…

This paper represents a narrative of the process of department-level reform through the eyes of the initiating agent of change. Over the course of reform, our program has grown by 40%, primarily through retaining students. We exhibit a 10% net important rate of engineering students in the first two years of the curriculum relative to the college's…

We set out to understand how different instantiations of inquiry emerged in two different years of one elementary teacher's classroom. Longitudinal observations from Mrs. Charles' 5th grade science classroom forced us to carefully and deliberately consider who exactly was responsible for the change in the class activities and norms. We provide…

Background/Context: With the installation of No Child Left Behind, teachers, particularly those who serve marginalized students, have increasingly been told what and how to teach. Previous research demonstrates that teachers can act as mediators between policy and practice, even within coercive environments such as those generated by high-stakes…

This article explores the use of scoring rubrics in the context of deteriorating material conditions of writing instruction. The author hopes to offer a consideration of rubrics that enables a revision of rubric designs, in order to facilitate teacher response to student writing, and that offers suggestions for uses of rubrics that account for…

Describes a California elementary school's plan to help teachers develop portfolios for year-end assessments. Teachers toss notes from parents, student work samples, photographs of class activities, lesson materials, and other "artifacts" into cardboard boxes. They help each other sort by four subject categories and develop final…

THIS STUDY INVESTIGATED THE EXTENT TO WHICH SOUND FILM RECORDINGS OF PUPILS IN TEACHING-LEARNING SITUATIONS CAN BE USED AS A BASIS FOR TRAINING TEACHERS TO IMPROVE THEIR ACCURACY IN INTERPRETING NONVERBAL COMMUNICATIONS, AND THE EXTENT OF DIFFERENCES AMONG TEACHERS, NEW TEACHERS, AND NONTEACHERS IN THEIR ABILITY TO INTERPRET NONVERBAL…

Chico, California, schools adopted multimedia distance learning using ISDN (integrated services digital network) to resolve a serious problem: the shortage of well-qualified science and math teachers. Problems encountered with using the equipment included audio signal difficulties, user-unfriendly conferencing equipment, stationary cameras,…

Confronting low student performance, staff at a central California elementary school tackled curriculum-alignment problems; identified available instructional, support, information, and human-resource processes; and dealt with the language issue. The school's "Student Portfolio and Assessment System" helped teachers discover feasible…

Describes New College of California's implementation of the year-long Elementary Teacher Credential program, a broad multicultural vision with extensive pedagogical goals. The article focuses primarily on innovative aspects of the program designed to provide teachers with the skills and understanding needed for the culturally diverse twenty-first…