This article reports the development and application of two instruments for assessing science teachers' pedagogical knowledge in the context of teaching higher-order thinking: a Likert-type research instrument, and an instrument that analyzes classroom observations. The rationale for developing these instruments and their main categories is…

As community colleges embrace learning-centered practices, student affairs professionals have an opportunity to recommit to building and maintaining partnerships with their academic colleagues. This chapter explores the development, nature, and culture of learning-centered partnerships between academic and student affairs professionals, identifies…

Implementing best practices like cooperative learning, using concrete manipulatives, problem solving, technology, active learning, multi-age grouping, and team teaching have shown benefits for students when learning mathematics concepts within the curriculum (Zemelman, Daniels & Hyde, 1998; NCTM, 2000). What started as a professional development…

In a highly collaborative process we developed an introductory science course sequence to improve science literacy especially among future elementary and middle school education majors. The materials and course features were designed using the results of research on teaching and learning to provide a rigorous, relevant and engaging, standard based…

This article reports a study on the effectiveness of university teachers training involving 22 universities in 8 countries. A training group of teachers and their students were studied at the start of their training and one year later. A control group of new teachers received no training and both they and their students were studied in the same…

Developing children's capacity to learn is at the forefront of all endeavours in schools. Teachers strive to capitalise on a wide range of teaching styles and innovations to stimulate, motivate and engage their children to become "better learners". Since September 1999, the Centre for Science Education at Sheffield Hallam University has…

The original project, the foundation for all subsequent work, was set up in 1981 by Michael Shayer, with Philip Adey and Carolyn Yates, and became known as CASE @ KS3 (Adey and Shayer, 1994). CASE stands for Cognitive Acceleration through Science Education. The original CASE project drew on Piaget's work on the stage theory of cognitive…

This study explored the impact of learning a new instructional practice in a US school district that places great value in a statewide student assessment. Grounded Theory methodology (Strauss & Corbin, 1998, Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory, 2nd Edition, Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, CA)…

This article describes a systematic overhaul of a teacher preparation program and presents outcomes based on studies of the program's effectiveness in improving the knowledge and skills of teacher educators--university and PK-12 based--related to technology, diversity, and democratic education. The renewal program was peer designed and implemented…

School leaders can benefit by considering their faculty as adult learners in transformation while they are learning educational technology. In this article a Journey of Transformation model is presented to assist school leaders in meeting the challenges of the postinformation age. The model is grounded in transformational learning research and…

Both the National Commission on Teaching and America's Future and the Holmes Group suggest that the solution to improving student learning is through formal university-school collaborations, or Professional Development Schools (PDSs). As the research base on PDS partnerships grows, so does the evidence that PDSs improve the quality of teaching in…

Objective: To identify reinvestment strategies of 11 senior health-education faculty from 3 degree programs. Methods: Data from individual, in-depth interviews were inductively analyzed for content. Results: The identified strategies grouped around 6 themes: growth and success in work, realization of an optimal fit into profession, investment into…

This article analyses the nature of learning in three long-term professional development approaches from different disciplines--teacher research as used in educational contexts, action learning as used in business contexts, and problem-based learning as used in medical contexts. The lens used for analysis focuses on three dimensions or influences…

Findings are presented from research in a teacher education course on diversity and the social studies that takes gender and sexuality as subject matter. Five themes emerge from five years of qualitative data related to teaching the course and following the experiences of graduates attempting to apply their learning to new teaching situations. The…

A research project used critical incident technique to investigate the expertise of staff development leaders in higher education institutions in the United Kingdom. Problems inherent in such analyses are considered and the methodology briefly outlined. Interviewees' conceptions of their professional learning and the basis of their expertise are…