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This volume reviews the research in the field of school effectiveness and improvement. Many key questions are examined, such as different methods for assessing school effectiveness and variations in examination attainment in schools. It draws together the funding of the programmes of improvement being implemented in schools and provides practical discussion of effective school practice and its direct implications in schools. It is aimed at teachers, student teachers, administrators and advisors. The contributors are: Bill Badger, Louise S. Balkey, Bert P.M. Creemers, Carol T. Fitz-Gibbon, Anthony F. Heath, Daniel V. Levine, Peter Mortimore, Joseph Murphy.
The book discusses the idea of the learning community as a vehicle for professional learning and school development. As the authors show, the learning community develops in response to building capacity in three domains: personal, interpersonal and organizational. In the personal domain, educators deconstruct and reconstruct their professional narratives to enhance student learning and professional practice. In the interpersonal domain, educators generate norms and values that foster experimentation and critical analysis of educational practice and that promote collective and individual learning. In the organizational domain, visible and invisible structures are constructed that enable commu...
This book explores an approach to school improvement that merges the traditions of educational effectiveness research and school improvement efforts. It displays how the dynamic model, which is theoretical and empirically validated, can be used in both traditions. Each chapter integrates evidence from international and national studies, showing how the knowledge-base of educational effectiveness research can be used for improvement purposes. In a clear and practicable manner it outlines: Foundations of the improvement approach Research projects investigating the impact of the dynamic approach Guidelines and practical solutions to translating the approach into action Further developments for ...
This volume aims to provide an interdisciplinary and pragmatic, policy-oriented contribution to the current debate about educational reform. It assembles articles by experts on education and educational policy from various scientific disciplines and professional backgrounds. Based on a section considering general pedagogical, economic, political and methodological aspects, a number of country-specific contributions cast some light on the differing frameworks, approaches and experiences in recent education policy and education reform in number of countries of the western world.
There have been noticeable demographic changes recently in the use of English around the world. English as a medium of communication is now the contact language of native speakers from many diverse speech communities who interact with each other in multilingual contexts. The use of English as a lingua franca (ELF) and its implications has become a hot topic in applied linguistics and English studies. Communicating Strategically in English as a Lingua Franca reflects the growing interest in achieving communicative effectiveness in ELF situations and provides a comprehensive account of recent empirical findings in the field of ELF. It analyzes and interprets the author's own large corpus of na...
Like a strong foundation in a house, the climate of a school is the foundation that supports the structures of teaching and learning. This book provides a framework for educators to look at school and classroom climates using both informal and formal measures. Each chapter focuses on a different aspect of climate and details techniques which may be used by heads or classroom teachers to judge the health of their learning environment. The book sets out to enhance understanding of the components of a healthy learning environment and the tools needed to improve that environment. It also looks at ways to assess the impact of change activities in improving and sustaining educational excellence. The international team of contributors bring perspectives from the school systems in America, UK, Australia and Holland.
By applying cultural-historical activity theory and expansive learning theory to educational research, this volume illuminates new forms of educational activities as collaborative interventions in schools and communities where learners and practitioners generate expansive learning so that they can collectively transform their activities and expand their agency for themselves. It covers four cases of activity-theoretical formative intervention studies conducted in Japan, which are related to: fostering children’s expansive learning in classroom lessons; teachers as collaborative change agents in redesigning schools; expanding the school activity from below; and emerging knotworking agency i...
Over the years, researchers have developed statistical methods to help them investigate and interpret issues of interest in many discipline areas. These methods range from descriptive to inferential to multivariate statistics. As the psychometrics measures in education become more complex, vigorous and robust methods were needed in order to represent research data efficiently. One such method is Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). SEM is a statistical technique that allows the simultaneous analysis of a series of structural equations. It also allows a dependent variable in one equation to become an independent variable in another equation. It is a comprehensive statistical approach to testin...
Answering the question of effectiveness of educational interventions is no easy task for a multitude of reasons. The effectiveness of an intervention depends not only on the intervention itself but also, for example, on the target group, the available infrastructure, the current legislation, the time of implementation or the expertise of the teachers. This special issue shows the diversity in the goals pursued and the interventions used to achieve them. It also shows methodological differences in effectiveness research and argues the need for nuanced interpretation and for explicitly considering the context for the intervention.
The International Handbook of Teacher and School Development brings together a collection of research and evidence-based authoritative writings which focus on international teacher and school development. Drawing on research from eighteen countries across seven continents, the forty chapters are grouped into ten themes which represent key aspects of teacher and school development: Issues of Professionalism and Performativity What Being an Effective Teacher Really Means Reason and Emotion in Teaching Schools in Different Circumstances Student Voices in a Global Context Professional Learning and Development Innovative Pedagogies School Effectiveness and Improvement Successful Schools, Successf...