The quality of education and instruction is related to effective execution of educational and instructional activities and efficiency of these activities is related to how the class is managed. Considered to be the manager of the classroom processes and program, teachers are expected to effectively direct and manage various material and human…

In 2012, a new assessment and rating process for Australian early childhood education and care (ECEC) services was introduced, using a new National Quality Standard (NQS). The NQS assessment and rating process has similarities to observational assessment systems used in educational research, and involves similar strategies for upholding…

This study clarifies the basic structure of student teachers' reflective thinking. It presents a constructivist account of teacher knowledge through a detailed analysis of various patterns of reflection in student teacher portfolios. We aim to gain a greater understanding of the process and outcomes of portfolio writing in the context of teaching…

This study describes the phenomenon of how first-year teachers learn to evaluate students learning by (letter) grades. Grades seem simple enough; but in reality, each grade carries serious consequences with it--for either good or bad. For example, grades affect benefits/consequences at home; they affect placement in remedial or advanced courses;…

Constructionism can be a powerful framework for teaching complex content to novices. At the core of constructionism is the suggestion that by enabling learners to build creative artifacts that require complex content to function, those learners will have opportunities to learn this content in contextualized, personally meaningful ways. In this…

Educational researchers and academics cannot ignore the ever-present call for education, and schooling in particular, to reflect the needs of the twenty-first century knowledge economy. Since the 1990s, national curricula and education systems have reflected this call in their focus on technology and shifting pedagogy to increasingly…

Background: Despite increasing interest in teachers' and students' conceptions of learning and teaching, and how they influence their practice, there are few studies testing the influence of teachers' conceptions on their students' learning. Aims: This study tests how teaching conception (TC; with a distinction between…

Master narratives frame students' historical knowledge, possibly hindering access to more historical representations. A detailed analysis of students' historical narratives about the origins of their own nation is presented in terms of four master narrative characteristics related to the historical subject, national identification, the main theme…

We propose a systemic-constructivist perspective for analyzing knowledge construction. In contrast to theories that focus on individuals as actors, the systemic-constructivist approach emphasizes the relevance of social systems and regards the construction of knowledge as a self-referential process that takes place in social systems. We propose…

This article offers a critical interpretation of the current trends in instructional models for English language learners in California. We review key instructional models and analyze them from traditional (teacher-centered), progressive (student-centered), and critical orientations (society- and power-centered). These instructional models share…

The study explored in this paper describes a course that was purposefully designed using a constructivist approach to teaching and learning. The intent was to stimulate learning within a traditional classroom environment with the specific aim to promote the retention of theory in such a manner that student's would apply it into his/her own…

There is a need for a holistic usability evaluation framework that accommodates social constructivist online courses. Social knowledge construction may not be adequately evaluated using current frameworks. This qualitative research study examined the usability needs of a social constructivist online course. Data from an online course were analyzed…

Indigenous peoples around the world are struggling to create their own, unique early childhood system that reflects their cultural values and supports their dream of raising their children to proudly wear their own cultural identity. In this research, we share the work being undertaken by Pacific early childhood professionals. The study is part of…

It is no secret that the student attending university classes today is different from the learner of several years ago (Blakefield, 2013). Educators have been recently encouraged to shift the paradigm of traditional lecture-style education to incorporate service-learning and experiential activities involving media and technology whenever possible…

The purpose of this study was twofold: first, to explore the relationship between students' learning styles and their online participation in a blended learning course, and second, to investigate the relationships of students' online participation with their learning achievement and with course satisfaction. A total of 78 undergraduate students…