Colin J. Marsh

Teachers’ Use of the Social Education Materials Project (SEMP)

The Social Education Materials Project (SEMP) was launched into the Australian education arena in 1975 and was heralded as yet another major project to overcome current curricular deficiencies — in this case ‘to develop an understanding of contemporary society and the forces shaping the lives of people in that society’ (Jones, 1977, p. 91). The project was the first one to be fully administered by the newly created Curriculum Development Centre (CDC). Eight teams, with at least one allocated to each State, worked on specific topics during 1975-76. Their brief was to develop a wide range of materials for a variety of school contexts and for various social education subjects (including the social sciences).

A Study of the Maintenance of Some Pedagogical Attitudes Held by Social Studies Teachers after Their First Year of Teaching in a School

The maintenance of specific pedagogical attitudes held by a group of student teachers during the period from fourth year preservice teaching training, through to the end of their first year of teaching was investigated. Attitudes to characteristics pertaining to inquiry teaching in social studies at the high school level in Western Australia were examined by a semantic differential. After extensive pilot testing of concepts and bipolar scales, the final form of the semantic differential was administered to a final year (N = 63) group of social studies preservice teachers. The instrument was again administered to the group (N = 40), after they had completed their first year of teaching. Significant differences on seven concepts revealed a decline in attitude scores on some major characteristics of inquiry teaching, especially on concepts representing classroom management techniques in inquiry teaching.

Recent developments in primary initial teacher training in wales: An outsider's perspective

ABSTRACT The (British) Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (CATE) criteria have now been in operation for five years. They have required substantial changes for many initial teacher training (ITT) institutions. The initial questionnaires and follow‐up, in‐depth interviews provided a wealth of data about the achievements and problems experienced by a group of ITT institutions in implementing the CA TE criteria, over the last five years. Major problems for institutions have included financial burdens resulting from the CATE criteria, impediments to the effective working of local committees, problems in providing recent and relevant teaching experience for tutors, and difficulties in reallocating time for the equivalent of two years’ subject study. These notwithstanding, there was considerable support for the improvements which have occurred overall as a result of the CATE criteria.

Implementation of a High School Geography Syllabus: Issues and Applications.

The field of curriculum implementation has been an area of considerable interest to researchers over the last decade...

Inquiry Teaching in Social Studies and the Social Sciences: A Critical Review of Research Findings 1967–1972

In this paper, twenty-eight recent research studies on inquiry teaching in social studies and the social sciences are reviewed. Although a number of statistically significant results were claimed by the respective researchers, methodological deficiencies in many of the studies greatly reduce the importance of their efforts. Reference is made to a number of research deficiencies, including unsuitable evaluation instruments, lack of comparability of groups, lack of comparability of tasks and instructors for experimental and control groups and inadequate research designs. Although inquiry teaching has become widely espoused as a teaching method in schools, there are few substantial research studies to support its superiority over other teaching methods.