In 1993, the University of Melbourne's Institute of Education determined that School Experience and Professional Practice subjects would be graded according to the University's standard assessment scheme instead of a pass/fail scheme. To establish a framework for assessment, the Beginning Teacher Competencies from the National Project on the…

Valencia Community College's (VCC's) Faculty Academy was established to assist new tenure-track faculty successfully meet the college's criteria for tenure. In planning the Academy, surveys were conducted with administrators, full-time faculty and staff, and 34 new tenure-track faculty who were to participate in the Academy regarding their…

A new national research consortium, the Center for the Study of Teaching and Policy (CTP), is designed to investigate the relation between excellent teaching and policymaking at the national, state, and local levels. Policy efforts to produce excellence in teaching must: (1) attract, recruit, and retain capable teachers; (2) develop teachers'…

This book suggets that teachers and teacher unions should take the lead in making changes to promote educational quality and prepare students for the 21st century, where knowledge rather than industry will be the organizing principle. Part 1, "A Call to Action," describes how American society is changing and how these shifts necessitate the…

The integration of technology into education, in particular, secondary English education, challenges that notion of wanting to become an English teacher. Today, it is not enough to be a "teacher of English"; instead, 21st-century English teachers must utilize and impart a number of literacies in their classrooms. It is challenging to…

Moral feeling, moral thinking and moral acting are aspects in Moral Education for Malaysian schools. Students are encouraged to practice what they learn within and outside the boundaries of the class room. In the year 2000, there were shift in assessing teaching and learning of Moral Education in which equal weightage were given to the…

"FACTC Focus" is a publication of Faculty Association of Community and Technical Colleges (FACTC) with the purpose of presenting diverse views on faculty issues. Included in this issue are: (1) Shooting In The Dark: Evaluating Distance Learning Instruction (Stephanie Delaney); (2) Trust Who? - Trust and Learning: Crafting a Conversation That…

This book helps principals and all others who hire and retain teachers to sharpen their ability to hire better teachers for their schools, improve the ones who are already there, and keep their best and brightest on board. It demonstrates that the quality of the people on staff will ultimately determine the quality of the school and the success of…

Prospective secondary mathematics teachers continue to lack images of "reformed" teaching. This investigation studied prospective teachers' development of reform-oriented teaching through Micro-teaching Lesson Study [MLS], an experience based on Japanese lesson study (Stigler and Heibert, 1999). A qualitative analysis of various data sources…

This policy brief provides guidelines grouped into five areas: personal and professional behavior; classroom environment; health, safety and nutrition; working with families and communities; and administration and management. The document discusses the topics that teacher competencies generally cover, options for how they might be developed and…

This collection of papers reviews the state of U.S. education 20 years after the original "A Nation at Risk" report on the quality of schools by the National Commission on Educational Excellence. The first paper presents "Findings and Recommendations by the Koret Task Force on K-12 Education." Part 1, "'A Nation at Risk': Then and Now," includes:…

The purpose of this document is to support school districts in their efforts to serve the special needs of English language learners (ELLs) in reaching high academic standards as well as in attaining English language proficiency. The materials included should provide educators with information on appropriate and effective services for ELL…

In this paper I discuss the impact that both conceptual and contextual problems have in inhibiting teachers' disposition towards capacity for development. These problems were highlighted from teachers' participation with a teacher educator in a collaborative culture of learning and within their schools? culture. They were challenged, supported and…

Teachers attending a 5-week in-service retraining course completed a survey asking them to rate their current competencies and training needs in 24 variables (N = 210). Intuitively, teacher competencies and their perceived needs of retraining should be negatively correlated. However, the correlations between teacher competencies and perceived…

Developments in computer-mediated communications are not only providing new opportunities for educators but also changing roles and competencies in learning and teaching environments. Experts agree that teaching online requires different roles and competencies. The literature includes several studies on roles and competencies for online teaching.…