This study investigates whether adequate yearly progress (AYP) status, locale, and sector--common variables used to judge the quality of schools--accurately signal true differences in instructional practices in high school mathematics and science. Using data from the High School Longitudinal Study (HSLS), we find the school-to-school variation in…

There is a correlation between language proficiency and achievement in mathematics (Riordain & O'Donoghue, 2009), and this is particularly evident for children who speak English as an additional language or dialect. More effort needs to be made in mathematics classrooms to develop cognitive competencies, including the ability to decode and…

The objective of this paper is to discuss how blind students learn basic concepts of probability using the tactile model proposed by Vita (2012). Among the activities were part of the teaching sequence "Jefferson's Random Walk", in which students built a tree diagram (using plastic trays, foam cards, and toys), and pictograms in 3D…

The problem which this paper addresses is the difficulty of knowing students in large diverse classes in pedagogically useful ways. The paper discusses how the phenomenographic methodology can be employed to address this problem. It describes how phenomenographic studies and their results can enable teachers to "know their students" at a…

In this paper we focus on variation of the design and the implementation of a specific task during three mathematics lessons in the 8th grade in a learning study (Marton & Tsui, 2004; Runesson, 2008). The theme of the lesson was division, with a denominator between 0 and 1. The teachers wanted their students to understand that when dividing…

Teacher preparation programs on a national level have been called to change, focusing on clinical practice as a primary focus of teacher education rather than course work. Concurrently, performance based assessment is becoming the tool to measure candidate capacity to plan and instruct. This study highlights one teacher education program and the…

This article documents an ongoing study of educational policy enactment in a Chinese university. Drawing upon data collected through document analysis, semi-structured interviews and classroom observations, this paper argues that the enactment of China's systemic College English curriculum reform is not a matter of simple implementation but the…

The purpose of this three-year case study was to understand how a beginning biology teacher (Alice) designed and taught a 5E unit on natural selection, how the unit changed when she took a position in a different school district, and why the changes occurred. We examined Alice's developing beliefs about science teaching and learning,…

In many institutions of higher education worldwide, faculty members manage lessons based on information transfer whereas their students become passive listeners. According to international research, passive learning has disadvantages mainly because students do not engage in the lesson. The study introduces a new model for higher education called…

The aim of this study is to describe and then contrast the New South Wales Department of Education and Training's model of quality teaching with the Jordanian Ministry of Education's conception of quality teaching, looking particularly at potential differences in interpretation. A content analysis methodology was used. Each perspective has been…

Background: Many researchers agree that students, especially primary students, have learning difficulties on the "Particulate Nature of Matter" unit. One reason for this difficulty is not considering individual differences for teaching science. In 4MAT model learning, environment is arranged according to individual differences. Purpose:…

This study examines the relationship between epistemological beliefs and perceptions of practice through the analysis of teacher-generated metaphors. In a multilevel qualitative examination of the self-descriptive metaphors of 32 working teachers, the authors uncovered a dissonance between teachers' metaphors and their epistemological positions.…

In 1999, Ball and Cohen proposed a practice-based theory of professional education, which would end inadequate professional development efforts with a more comprehensive approach. Their work has been referenced over the past decade, yet there have been limited attempts to actualize their ideals and research their implications. In this article, I…

Federal legislation, namely the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act of 2004 ([IDEA], 2005), ensures that students with disabilities have the right to participate in general education curriculum taught in general education classrooms (§ 300.314). A team of school professionals and parents identifies supports necessary for success and…

The present study should be thought as a socioconstructivist teaching approach (a teaching model) for the concept of energy in primary education. It contains important and crucial aspects of the History and Philosophy of Natural Sciences, introduces the concept of energy using the macroscopic framework of thermodynamics, takes into consideration…