Garry Hoban

Using a Reflective Framework to Study Teaching-learning Relationships

This paper explains how pre-service teachers used a reflective framework to study the relationship between teaching and learning in a 13-week science method course. The course was in the second year of a three-year Bachelor of Teaching (Primary) degree at the University of Wollongong, Australia. The students had a three-hour class each week made up of a one-hour lecture followed by two hours of hands-on activities. After each class the students had to reflect on their experiences to study the relationship between teaching and their learning. There were three phases which guided students in using a reflective journal: (i) analysis of their class experiences to identify influences on their learning according to four categories-personal, teaching, peer and situational; (ii) synthesis of their reflections in which the students collated and identified key factors for each of the four categories; and (iii) theorising to identify a metaphor as a representation of a relationship between teaching and learning. The metaphor represented an optimal learning environment in a university class and was labelled with key personal, social (teaching and peer) and situational factors identified in their reflections. Students were then requested to deduce implications for their future role as classroom teachers. All students were able to reflect on teaching and learning, but two issues need to be considered before students uses the framework. First, reflecting upon how they learn was a new experience for the pre-service teachers and the framework needs to be modelled to them at the beginning of a course. Second, there are ethical issues that need to be discussed with students when they are expected to constructively analyse teaching and learning. Although the pre-service students claimed that using the framework was the hardest task they had attempted at university, they gained insights into how they learned which had implications for how they planned to teach.

Learning Science through Creating a ‘Slowmation’: A case study of preservice primary teachers

Many preservice primary teachers have inadequate science knowledge, which often limits their confidence in implementing the subject. This paper proposes a new way for preservice teachers to learn science by designing and making a narrated stop-motion animation as an instructional resource to explain a science concept. In this paper, a simplified way for preservice teachers to design and make an animation called ‘slowmation’ (abbreviated from ‘slow animation’) is exemplified. A case study of three preservice primary teachers creating one from start to finish over 2 h was conducted to address the following research question: How do the preservice primary teachers create a slowmation and how does this process influence their science learning? The method of inquiry used a case study design involving pre- and post-individual interviews in conjunction with a discourse analysis of video and audio data recorded as they created a slowmation. The data illustrate how the preservice teachers’ science learning was related to their prior knowledge and how they iteratively revisited the content through the construction of five representations as a cumulative semiotic progression: (i) research notes; (ii) storyboard; (iii) models; (iv) digital photographs; culminating in (v) the narrated animation. This progression enabled the preservice teachers to revisit the content in each representation and make decisions about which modes to use and promoted social interaction. Creating a slowmation facilitated the preservice teachers’ learning about the life cycle of a ladybird beetle and revised their alternative conceptions.

Seeking Quality in Teacher Education Design: A Four-Dimensional Approach

The quality of existing teacher education programs is currently being debated in many countries and at many educational levels. This article examines the nature of teaching and challenges the common mechanistic approach to teacher education design. If teaching is a complex profession, then a more integrated and dynamic approach to designing teacher education programs is needed. This article proposes a four-dimensional approach for thinking about a conceptual framework to guide teacher education design. The four dimensions include: (a) links across the university-based curriculum; (b) links between schools and university experiences; (c) socio-cultural links between participants; and (d) personal links that shape the identity of teacher educators. It is argued that a conceptual framework based upon the consideration of these four dimensions is likely to ensure quality in a teacher education program.

Using Information and Communication Technologies for the Self-Study of Teaching

This chapter provides an offerview of the relationships between self-study as a field of research and technology. A distinction is made between technology as a tool and technology as a social and cultural practice. The focus of the chapter is on the contribution of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to knowledge construction in self-study. In particular, the research processes facilitated by ICTs such as representing, accessing, analyzing, retrieving, sharing, communicating, and editing data are discussed. These processes are highlighted in three case studies of self-study that feature either e-mail, multimedia, or the World Wide Web. Limitations of technology for self-study are discussed including how technology can weaken our sense of reality and identity. The conclusion of the chapter summarizes the key arguments and presents future directions and considerations for using technology in self-study research.

Dimensions of Learning for Long-term Professional Development: comparing approaches from education, business and medical contexts

Abstract This article analyses the nature of learning in three long-term professional development approaches from different disciplines – teacher research as used in educational contexts, action learning as used in business contexts, and problem-based learning as used in medical contexts. The lens used for analysis focuses on three dimensions or influences on learning – the action setting, personal influences and sociocultural influences. Although the dimensions are present in each approach, they have a different emphasis. It is argued that planning for long-term professional development needs to consider all three dimensions in conjunction because the key for sustainability in professional development is the dynamic interplay between the dimensions

Facilitating Self-Study of Professional Development: Researching the Dynamics of Teacher Learning

In this study a teacher educator worked with two elementary teachers to facilitate a self-study of their learning during a professional development programme. The programme extended for 6 months and was underpinned by four learning processes—reflection, sharing, action and feedback. The two teachers documented their learning experiences and were interviewed several times during and after the study. At the end of the 6-month period, the teachers sketched and shared models of their learning and then collaborated to produce a joint model. Sue learned that she needed to start with a small change in her teaching and that her learning involved multiple factors that interacted to create change. Loraine learned that focusing on the teaching of science reminded her of childhood experiences and that it was important for her to analyse why she taught the way she did. Self-study helped the teachers to develop insights about how they learned and enabled them to better understand and manage their own professional development.

Making Practice Problematic: Listening to student interviews as a catalyst for teacher reflection

This paper describes a two-year professional development programme in which three secondary science teachers listened to audio-tapes of interviews conducted with their own students describing their school experiences. The audio-tapes were compiled from interviews with 30 year 9 students who identified aspects of teaching and learning across different subjects in their secondary school. This study shows how listening to student data on the tapes provided teachers with a different perspective on classroom practice which confirmed or challenged their assumptions about student learning. The student data were a catalyst for the three teachers to reflect on their practice and to consider changes in their teaching.

Pharmacology students’ perceptions of creating multimodal digital explanations

Students can now digitally construct their own representations of scientific concepts using a variety of modes including writing, diagrams, 2-D and 3-D models, images or speech, all of which communicate meaning. In this study, final-year chemistry students studying a pharmacology subject created a “blended media” digital product as an assignment to summarize an independently prepared technical literature review on a current research topic in pharmacology for a non-expert audience. A blended media is a simplified way for students to combine a variety of modes to complement a narration to explain a concept to others. In this study, the students learned how to create a blended media during a one-hour workshop, and used the technique to create the representation as an assessment task. The research question that guided the study was, “What are the students’ perceptions of making a digital product such as blended media and how did these shape their multimodal awareness?” We draw from theoretical perspectives in multimodalities, representations and meaning making. Data included interviews at three points of the semester, the literature review and the digital media product. We present three case studies with volunteering students, who demonstrated a strong awareness of effective communications techniques as they attended to the audience. Making a blended media is a creative way for chemistry students to summarize complex scientific information and as a task may help to focus their multimodal awareness and developing communications skills.

Developing a model for a self-study professional learning community

Although the term self-study may suggest an individual teacher educator studying his or her own practice, most self-studies involve pairs or small groups of teacher educators working together in what is often called collaborative self-study. An extension of an informal collaboration is to formalize self-study as professional learning for teacher educators. This means that a group of teacher educators and other academics can study their practices over an extended period of time and share experiences as a community. This chapter identifies and explains the nature of a professional learning framework that underpins a group of academics becoming a self-study community. The framework is developed from previous research with teachers in schools and is adapted for self-study of academic teaching practices. The framework is based on the dynamic interaction of three professional learning influences: (1) content, (2) process, and (3) conditions that support such a community. Development of the framework is based on the progress of a group of ten academics, mostly teacher educators, over a 12-month period. Refinement of the framework is supported by case studies of the experiences of two of the participants in the self-study community.

Australia’s supervising teachers: motivators and challenges to inform professional learning

ABSTRACT This paper offers an overview of what motivates and challenges Australian supervising teachers to work with preservice teachers in their classrooms. In the contemporary Australian context of new National Professional Standards for Teachers, a new national curriculum and new standards for Initial Teacher Education programs, what motivates and challenges supervising teachers becomes a focus for professional learning through analysis presented in this paper. Data are reported from a national data set that includes 314 responding supervising teachers who took the Mentoring Perspectives Inventory from 2012–2014. The MPI data are aggregated in this paper to suggest that the wider system of teacher education could benefit from attention at various levels of interest to develop the underlying knowledge base of supervising teachers and our understanding of how they are challenged and motivated in their work with preservice teachers.