Professional learning is a social enterprise where peers rely on the expertise and support of one another to adopt innovative practices. Reciprocal interactions in a community of practice, where teachers take responsibility for each other's learning and development, may provide an effective means of supporting situated professional learning. We…

Collaborative learning has been gaining momentum as a promising pedagogy in higher education. Research on student collaboration is increasing. However, one arena is often overlooked--faculty collaboration. In this article, a cross-institutional faculty collaboration is presented. The context is faculty collaboration on the design of an…

This paper presents aspects of good practice in international teaching. The paper incorporates a review of literature on international teaching, quality assurance in collaborative provision, and selected literature from the Human Resource Management field on expatriate workers. Primary data have been drawn from two sources. Qualitative data have…

In study after study, three priorities appear to make a difference to the principal's view of the teacher-librarian. First, teacher-librarians who collaborate with classroom colleagues make a difference to literacy and student achievement; those who don't, don't. Second, teacher librarians who perform leadership roles in the school and in the…

Good teachers possess a capacity for connectedness. They are able to weave a complex web of connections among themselves, their subjects, and their students so that students can learn to weave a world for themselves. The methods used by these weavers vary widely; lectures, Socratic dialogues, laboratory experiments, collaborative problem solving,…

Following a comparison of two approaches to mentoring--the traditional model and a relatively new "synergistic" or co-mentoring model--a new formal mentoring program for faculty in the School of Education at the University of Colorado at Denver, based on the synergistic approach, is described. First-year program evaluation data revealed…

The author raises issues about collaborative work throughout her eight years in teacher education in two different higher education institutions. Her experiences as a graduate student, faculty member, and administrator give her insights about teacher education and the struggle for change within institutional systems. Her preference for working…

There are many synonyms for the word "mentor": coach, guide, role model, peer advisor, and sponsor, among others. The plethora of terms would suggest that we know something about this role, but most of the research on mentoring has been conducted in business and industry rather than in education. In fact, junior and senior faculty and…

Both in structure and focus, FLCs create a necessary construct for a cultural transformation of teaching and learning that invites all to achieve their intellectual and social potential. The following are appended: (1) Self-Assessment Inventory on Inclusiveness; and (2) Student Assessment of Classroom Climate.

It is difficult to retain teachers who work in isolated communities, in very poor communities and communities where parental levels of education are not high. This paper describes the creation of a "New Teacher Academy" in one such unstable school district. Working closely with the new teachers in the district, a program was created based on peer…

Training legal English specialists is one area in which cooperation between discipline and language specialists is particularly valuable. Seven short excerpts from a short training course run jointly by teachers of English for legal purposes and legal specialists are presented and analysed to illustrate the contribution an ESP oriented approach,…

What social studies project challenges students with interdisciplinary learning, engages their various abilities and learning styles, offers them the opportunity for collaborative work-and encourages them to speak in strange voices? The answer is an eighth grade radio drama project. For most of the month of March 2004, the entire eighth grade at…

This study reveals the school culture and the teachers' professional development activities in a Japanese high school learning environment. Furthermore, it documents the relationships among the context, teachers' beliefs, practices, and interactions. Using multiple data sources including interviews, observations, and documents of teachers from an…

Teacher researchers in a Professional Development School context identify two important shifts in traditional school cultures in order for teacher inquiry to thrive as a means for teacher development: a shift to community and a shift to uncertainty. PDS teachers in this study spoke about their need for supportive learning communities where they…

Today's classrooms are a reflection of today?s society; and more than anything else, they can be characterized as diverse. Every day, new students arrive at school who speak a language unknown in the community, who are recent immigrants to the United States, who are struggling to learn because of stresses in their lives outside of school, or who…