The third annual conference of the National Academy for Integration of Research, Teaching and Learning (NAIRTL) was held at Trinity College Dublin on 11-12 November 2009, and was attended by over 300 delegates. The theme--"Research-Teaching Linkages: Practice and Policy"--was timely and generated some fascinating papers, workshops and…

Since 2002 the "Zurich E-Learning Certificate" offers lecturers and academic staff from the three main universities in Zurich the possibility to take part in a professional development program which supports the acquirement of eCompetence. The program is the result of a cooperation between the University of Zurich (UZH), the Swiss…

In recent years, a growing political emphasis has been placed upon the development of transformative assessment-driven reform in schools. There is global consensus on the value of assessment activities that are carefully designed to be consistent with desired learning outcomes, and which coherently connect learning theory, the curriculum,…

The state of mathematics and science education in South Africa is a cause for concern. This situation can be attributed, in part, to many mathematics and science teachers' limited content knowledge, ineffective teaching approaches, and unprofessional attitudes. To address these three problem areas simultaneously, a holistic model for the…

In most teacher education courses, instructional strategies are merely listed and explained. Students rarely have the opportunity to see these strategies in use until they become student teachers. What better way to teach secondary instructional strategies to pre-service teachers than by modeling these strategies using teacher education content?…

This article sets out to identify key competencies which language tutors need to develop in order to manage synchronous online teaching. In order to aptly monitor interactions with distant learners, it is proposed that three types of regulation pertaining to socio-affective, pedagogical and multimedia aspects are required. On the one hand, this…

Language education has a long tradition in the Finnish educational system owing to the official bilingualism of the country with the Finnish and Swedish languages, its geopolitical location, and the limited possibility to use the national languages in international contacts. Since the end of the 20th century, English has gained ground from other…

Criteria for the design and selection of literacy and thinking tools that allow educators to justify what they do are described within a wider framework of learning theory and research into best practice. Based on a meta-analysis of best practice, results from a three year project designed to evaluate the effectiveness of a secondary school…

This resource book reflects the way that migration affects personal identity and offers educators and students the resources to examine this migration through methods of storytelling. It reveals experiences of immigrants from the individual to the collective through memoirs, journalistic accounts, and interviews. These experiences reflect a recent…

This article describes a possible praxis for an undergraduate learning theories course. The philosophies of "a language-based theory of learning" (Wells, 1999), writing across the curriculum (Young, 1994), learner-centered education (Lambert & McCombs, 1998), and critical-thinking (Paul, 1995) are interwoven with the rationale and…

This article explores the idea that teachers can improve their practice through reflection and action research. The author discusses the constructivist and socio-constructivist roots of action research. The case study explores the use of a project to improve learner autonomy and cooperation. Students made key decisions about the project content,…

The disconnection between what counts as social research (SR) and what serves society's needs and interests results in a way of theorizing which, while useful, does not integrate theory and practice; a form of social theory that is not embodied in real lives and does not help non-academic people understand their contexts and practices. This…

A theoretical framework centering on four classes of self-referent constructs is offered as a device for integrating the diverse areas constituting medical sociology. Guidance by this framework sensitizes the researcher to the occurrence of parallel processes in adjacent disciplines, facilitates recognition of the etiological significance of…

Including reflective practice in tertiary learning design is one way of working towards making effective learning possible for students. This article considers how elements of reflective practice in teaching delivery and assessment have been successful in satisfying principles of effective teaching in the context of the study of law at first year…

For the final assessment piece of her Bachelor of Education the author was asked to use the STELLA Standards Framework (Standards for Teachers of English Language and Literacy in Australia) to critically analyse and reflect on personally significant incidents which occurred during her final practicums. The objective was to be able to communicate…