Search Results for
"Teaching"

The orientation of vocational education towards competence-based education has led to fundamental changes in the work of vocational education teachers. This article pictures teaching in innovative, competence-based vocational education in the Netherlands. In a multiple case study, the teaching practices of 10 teachers from five vocational schools were thoroughly studied. By examining not only the actual behaviour of teachers but also their related personal ideas and professional attitudes, we learn about the ways teachers implement new educational concepts and their experienced uncertainties, dilemmas and practical tensions. These insights lead to a better understanding and specification of the concept of competence-based vocational education at the micro level of educational processes, that is, the interaction between teachers and students. Implications are described in terms of new repertoires of teaching behaviour and teaching methods-all in the context of vocational education. © 2012 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

This article uses a conceptual approach to understand how qualified teachers in England with occupational experience use pedagogic and occupational knowledge and experiences in their teaching practices. The conceptual approach consists of two parts: (1.) 'Putting Knowledge to Work' (PKtW), a generic concept which uses 'recontextualisation' processes to investigate how learners apply knowledge in different settings, and (2.) a structure for applying PKtW to teachers. This article is based on the qualitative findings of a project which consisted of eight qualified teachers. In addition to the discussions, the complexities of applying the conceptual framework to teachers with occupational experience and a typology of knowledge sources and recontextualisation approaches are offered. The last section outlines the implications for teacher training, work settings, continuous professional development and for other teaching professionals in different pedagogic settings. © 2012 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

The argument of this article is that assessment in higher education in the professions can benefit from quality assessment tasks linked to professional practice. Such an assessment task would need to be authentic requiring considerable intellectual skill as well as attending to the realities of professional demands. The idea of authentic assessment is developed by using five of Boud et al.'s propositions in higher educational assessment. This idea is illustrated by the use of action research in a teaching internship, that is, data driven learning in the workplace which also serves as an assessment task in the final year of a professional Bachelor degree. Some difficulties and some illustrative, positive student reactions are presented. © 2012 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

Within the last 15-20 years apprenticeship has had a revival, supported by theories about learning in practice (Schön, 1983) in particular situated learning (Lave and Wenger, 1991).These theories have contributed to developing the concept of learning to include formal and informal learning and to introducing general shift of focus from teaching to learning. Apprenticeship is in many ways perceived as an optimal way of learning, as it is closely connected to a specific and concrete practice and involves the luxury of individual training. However studies of and literature about apprenticeship training all point to the necessity of further developing apprenticeship in order to enable the general and expansive learning that corresponds to the modern demands for qualifications (Fuller and Unwin, 1998; Gamble, 2002; Guile and Young, 1998; Shaw and McAndrew, 2008). That part of the training, which aims at transcending the specific community of practice, often takes place in schoolbased education, (Brooker and Butler, 1997). In the Danish dual system the general training will typically take place in VET colleges. © VS Verlag fur Sozialwissenschaften | Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH 2012.

[No abstract available]

The purpose of the study was to determine the relationship between students' motivational orientations and their chemistry achievements and perception of learning within the original case of the hands-on approach to visible spectrometry. A total of 295 students from Polish and Slovenian vocational and technical high schools participated in the study. By applying the k-mean clustering procedure, two distinct clusters of students' motivational orientations were identified based on the SDT theory about autonomous and controlled motivation. Students classified as the good quality motivation group (Cluster II) outperformed students in the low quantity motivation group (Cluster I) in their knowledge gained through the hands-on approach and assessed the hands-on approach more positively with regard to their active participation in learning selected concepts from visible spectrometry. Altogether, the results of the present study confirm previous research findings about the importance of the quality of students' motivation for learning; the results show that hands-on laboratory work with autonomy-supportive teachers could create a motivating learning environment for students to learn with understanding and to cooperate with each other in academic tasks at a higher level of cognitive complexity. The main implication for teachers in chemistry classes is, therefore, to plan their teaching more systematically and creatively in order to provide students with individualised cognitively and motivationally challenging learning situations (both in terms of content and didactical methods) and to foster learning with understanding even within very abstract and cognitively complex learning tasks. © The Royal Society of Chemistry.

Many previous studies have shown that peer assessment teaching can help develop cognitive skills. There are also numerous studies that explore issues related to web-based peer assessment activities. However, most current studies focus on peer assessment instructional activities under an asynchronous collaborative learning environment. In turn, there is a lack of research related to the interactive process of synchronous peer assessment activities and the cognitive dimensions of the discussion. Therefore, this study conducts an empirical analysis of an instructional activity in which 38 students used online instant messaging tools to conduct peer assessments. Students viewed and evaluated each other's work on a one-to-one basis. This case study uses the cognitive processing dimensions from Bloom's Taxonomy to analyze the contents of the discussions. Quantitative content analysis, lag sequential analysis, and qualitative content analysis were conducted during the study to explore the cognitive dimensions of peer assessment, both the characteristics and limitations of interactive behavioral patterns, and the differences in discussion patterns between high- and low-quality discussion groups. The results show that synchronous peer assessment discussions can elicit a two-way interaction between basic and advanced cognitive dimensions, which may be valuable in developing cognitive abilities. However, the results also show a lack of advanced cognitive dimensions and a tendency for the discussion to repeatedly go off-topic in the observed discussion. After examining the results, we propose relevant recommendations and references for teachers and researchers interested in synchronous peer assessment instructional activities. © 2012 De La Salle University, Philippines.

Introduction: Medical education in Australia is increasingly delivered through longitudinal placements in general practice and other community settings. Early meaningful exposure to patients has been shown to improve the transition from medical student to junior doctor. This study examines the experience of the first year cohort of the University of Western Sydney (UWS) Medical School long-term rural placement students. Results have been placed in the context of other published results for rural training schemes, comparing and contrasting the present results to those of others. Methods: Students undertaking a rural placement in their final year of the UWS medical program (n=21) participated in a mixed methods evaluation. Students filled out a quantitative survey, modified from a validated instrument, and also participated in a focus group. Class ranking of students, and changes over the time of their placement, were also examined. Results: Overall, students were very pleased with their rural experience, both clinically and socially. Students found the rural experience more comprehensive than they had expected. They considered that they had a stronger learning experience in most aspects than they expect they would have received in a metropolitan area. The smaller realm of the medical world in a rural area was considered an advantage in providing more hands-on experience and more interprofessional team approaches to healthcare provision. It was also considered a drawback by some that more advanced cases of all kinds were sent out of the area to metropolitan hospitals. Between their ranking in the end of Year 3 examination and the examination in the middle of Year 5, during which period students undertook their year-long placement, 14 of 22 students increased their class rank while two experienced no change and six decreased their class rank. Overall, the rural cohort advanced 4.2 places compared to their urban-placed peers. Conclusions: The present results confirm that rural placements have come into their own in Australia. Curriculum content regarding Aboriginal health issues should emphasise the complexity of culture and range of living conditions that makes up Aboriginal Australia and avoid a 'deficit-based perspective' that emphasises extreme cases over routine presentations. Taken together, the results reported by Australian medical schools now offering long-term rural placements suggest that rural long-term placements are at least as effective, and may even be more effective, than metropolitan hospital placements as an effective means of providing clinical education to medical students in their senior years. ©HH Birden, I Wilson, 2012.

This, the first publication to collate a broad international perspective on the pedagogical value of GIS technology in classrooms, offers an unprecedented range of expert views on the subject. Geographic Information Systems (GISs) are now ubiquitous and relatively inexpensive. They have revolutionized the way people explore and understand the world around them. The capability they confer allows us to capture, manage, analyze, and display geographic data in ways that were undreamt of a generation ago. GIS has enabled users to make decisions and solve problems as diverse as designing bus routes, locating new businesses, responding to emergencies, and researching climate change. GIS is also having a major impact in the classroom. Students and teachers around the world are using this significant emerging technology in the secondary school classroom to study social and scientific concepts and processes, to broaden their technical skills, and to engage in problem solving and decision making about local and global issues. International Perspectives on teaching and Learning with GIS in Secondary Schools brings together authors from 34 countries who profile the current status of GIS in secondary school teaching and learning in their country. Each chapter includes a summary of the country's educational context, a case study illustrating how GIS is used in secondary schooling, and an assessment of the opportunities and challenges in teaching and learning with GIS now and in the future. The book demonstrates that GIS is not only a technological tool to be used in the classroom, but also a catalyst for motivation, encouragement, and cooperation in understanding and solving global problems. The most up to date and extensive survey of GIS in the secondary education landscape, covering both principles and practice. Professor David Maguire, Pro-Vice-Chancellor, Birmingham City University, UK International Perspectives on teaching and Learning With GIS in Secondary Schools is a highly relevant, critically important, reflective contribution to the literature, providing strong arguments supporting the inclusion for spatial studies for all in secondary school education. Karl Donert, President, EUROGEO This is an invaluable and inspirational examination of innovation in geospatial technologies in secondary schools around the world. Each chapter contains practical models for how to integrate powerful tools for spatial analysis into a range of subjects. It will be useful to classroom teachers and administrators seeking pathways to implementation and teacher educators considering how to prepare the next generation to use geospatial technologies. Sarah Witham Bednarz, Department of Geography, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA. © Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012.

This article explores the suggestion that the UK should follow the lead of the United States and establish Troops to teaching programmes. In particular, it examines the worth of the suggestion that non-graduate qualifications similar to those that have been designed for teaching assistants might be usefully employed to achieve this. In England, foundation degree study has typically been the route followed by teaching assistants who have decided that they would like to become qualified teachers. The value of adopting such an approach, in relation to the UK coalition government's desire to establish a viable Troops to teaching programme, is specifically explored. Research which has investigated English school-based teaching assistants' experiences of participating in foundation degree study is drawn upon to interrogate this theme. © 2012 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.