This book contains activities and discussions regarding the essential skills, understandings, and behaviors needed to profit from being mentored. Each chapter provides principles for success and offers suggestions for action. An annotated compendium of publications and Internet sites of interest to new teachers is included. Chapter 1,…

This book describes the use of Literacy Teams, teams of teachers and others who systematically look for ways to help one another and draw on a wide range of campus and community resources to help children struggling to learn to read. The book is written to help teachers, parents, reading specialists, counselors, and principals to work together in…

This paper reports the results of a literature review on the subject of beginning teacher induction, presenting a conceptually oriented discussion of the induction literature. It examines the multiple meanings associated with induction as a phase in learning to teach, a process of teacher socialization, and a program for beginning teachers. The…

This book presents a modern fable for middle school teachers. It is a fanciful account of finding and sharing the "Jamal papers," the minutes of that first committee thousands of years ago in which a camel was created by reconstituting a horse. The tale provides a way to bring front and center such concerns as team isolation, personality…

This report discusses literacy coaching as one strategy for professional development, describing how three San Francisco Bay Area school districts use literacy coaching, highlighting the benefits of using literacy coaching, and offering recommendations to districts and states. The report describes why the Bay Area School Reform Collaborative and…

This digest examines considerations and strategies for selecting and retaining teacher mentors, suggesting that the degree to which mentors are meaningfully engaged in the mentoring process may have a significant impact on a program's success. Strategies for recruiting mentors range from opportunistic appointment to promoting self-nomination to…

This paper reviews the literature on teaching conditions, stress variables, and demands placed upon teachers, focusing on the situation in Belgium. Researchers examined whether and how teachers in Flemish elementary schools experienced intense, stressful, and negative working conditions, focusing on which forms of stressors and negative conditions…

This paper describes an effort to coordinate teaching in two college classes--an Introduction to Sociology class and a Writing II class--to focus on issues of entitlement, such as race, ethnicity, class, gender, and sexuality. The tandem effort was designed to encourage students to explore the subjects more deeply than would have been likely in…

Teachers can be sources of energy, creativity, and expertise in their own growth. This provides powerful learning opportunities and lessens dependence on outside experts. Principals can help by encouraging teachers to select areas for informal study and specialization, providing opportunities for teachers to present case histories of special-needs…

This article offers a framework for planning teams to use to implement inclusive education. Four planning dimensions (action planning, management, evaluation, and reflection) are discussed, including specific considerations for classroom teams. An example of one school's efforts toward developing an effective inclusion program is provided. (DB)

Self-study research is a mode of scholarly inquiry in which teachers examine their beliefs and actions as educators and explore pedagogical questions. A three-phase model of collaborative self-study research is offered as a framework for university faculty to engage in self-study for the purpose of improving teaching and creating new knowledge.…

Describes the University of Georgia's Deans' Forum, a group of approximately 30 faculty members who have engaged in collaborative work on issues of teacher education for over 4 years. Discusses its design, activities, and impact, and elements necessary to sustain it. (EV)

One Pennsylvania school district requires that new teachers spend an additional 15 contractual days each year during their first 5 years of teaching in a comprehensive New Teacher Academy. They are also mentored during their first year. During those 15 days, teachers participate in workshops, personal choice staff development, graduate course…

Examined cooperating classroom teachers' perspectives regarding the professional block of a secondary education program. Data collection involved surveys assessing their perceptions of the importance of the program's standards and interviews regarding program strengths and weaknesses and college-school collaboration. Results indicated that…

Schools cannot produce students as continuous learners and effective collaborators without teachers who possess those same characteristics. Learning organizations thrive on attention to staff orientation, curricular and/or interdisciplinary teams, peer observation, study groups, action research, school improvement task forces, professional…