Jon J. Denton

Early Field Experience Influence on Performance in Subsequent Coursework.

Pre-student teaching field experiences are held to be desirable in the preparation of teachers. To illustrate this position, the Commission on Education for the Profession of Teaching (AACTE, 1976) endorsed a field-oriented approach to teacher education. Similarly, spokespersons for competency-based education (Elam, 1971; Houston, 1974) and teacher centers (Andrews, 1980; Devaney, 1976; Edelfelt, 1972) have accepted a field-based approach for the preparation of teachers. The rationale for placing emphasis on early field experiences is associated with teacher educators’ desire to make their programs more realistic, practical and stimulating. Logically, field experiences can fulfill these qualities, thereby enhancing the perceived overall effectiveness of a teacher preparation

Effects on Survey Responses of Subjects, Incentives, and Multiple Mailings

AbstractThis inquiry was conducted to examine potential influences on perceptions of survey subjects regarding characteristics of the subjects, incentives to enhance mail returns, and multiple requests for information. A mail survey sent to 297 former students produced responses from 48.3% of the sample. Analyses of returns yielded the following results: (a) Sampling former students across level of teaching experience and year of graduation did not result in a response bias to an instrument seeking perceptions on topics of general professional interest; (b) using incentives to increase the number of responses to a survey did not introduce a response bias, although using a small monetary incentive (＄.25) was nonproductive in this inquiry; and (c) using multiple mailouts to increase the number of responses did not result in differences in response patterns across mailout requests.

Attainment of Selected Earth Science Concepts by Texas High School Seniors

AbstractThis investigation was conducted to determine the degree to which 492 high school seniors in Texas attained five earth science concepts. The study examined the influence of school type and years of science background on the attainment of these concepts. A concept attainment instrument was developed, validated and administered to the seniors sampled in this investigation. The results of this investigation indicated that the enrollment of the school attended by the senior affected whether the concepts were attained, with students in suburban high schools (AAA) attaining more concepts than seniors from small rural high schools (A). In addition, students with more than two years of science coursework attained significantly higher scores on the concept instrument.

Alternative Teacher Preparation Programs: A Cost-Effectiveness Comparison.

pensive, without knowing whether any of them produce the desired effects. Treating outcomes without attention to costs can result in selecting program alternatives that are only marginally more effective, but exorbitantly more expensive than other alternatives. Only by incorporating both costs and outcomes within comparative studies of program alternatives can one reliably determine which alternative is most effective for a given cost, or how much it would cost to obtain a desired level of effect. A few writings designed to help researchers use cost-effectiveness analysis in program evaluation do exist. Alkin (1970) provided an early chapter advocating its use in the evaluation of instructional programs. Levin (1975) provided a sound general introduction to the topic, followed by an instructional analysis of specific applications in educational evaluation (Levin, 1981). Thompson (1980) also discussed the use of cost-effective-

Two Investigations into the Influence of Incentives and Subject Characteristics on Mail Survey Responses in Teacher Education.

Two investigations were conducted to examine whether incentives in crease the number of survey returns from former students and whether ideographic characteristics, incentives, and multiple mailings influence perceptions of respon dents. Sampling former students (graduates of teacher education programs) across years of experience and level of teaching did not result in response bias from these characteristics. Second, using small monetary incentives (

Productivity of Faculty in Higher Education Institutions

.25,

Assessing Instructional Strategies and Resulting Student Attitudes Regarding Two-Way Television Instruction

.50,

Causal Modeling and Research on Teacher Education.

1.00) and a raffle for a professional journal to encourage responding to a survey was unproduc tive, whereas establishing a communication network (newsletters) with former students was productive. Third, using multiple requests to increase the number of returns did not affect item response patterns across mail-out requests. EDUCATIONAL DECISION MAKERS expend substantial resources in gathering perceptional data from students, former students, and colleagues regarding existing programs and proposed plans and experiences. This ob servation is particularly appropriate in teacher education where institutions are required to evaluate their programs in order to meet accreditation re quirements of the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) and state departments of education. Information-gathering ef forts that employ survey techniques often play an important role in pro viding data for academic planning and policy decisions as well (Galluzzo & Craig, 1990). Given limited resources of personnel and funds plus demand ing time schedules, the mail questionnaire often is the most feasible tech nique for obtaining survey data. Yet the validity and utility of this approach to data gathering depend on the response ratio (decimal value of individuals surveyed who complete and return the instrument) as well as response quali ty (whether respondents actually complete the returned instrument).

An Evaluation Design to Examine the Instructional Effects of Classroom Teachers.

Denton, Tsai, and Cloud investigate in quiry productivity in teacher education among colleges and universities in the United States. For the purpose of this investigation, productivity was based on contributions to annual meetings of ATE, AACTE, AERA (SIG on Teacher Edu cation), and to leading journals in teacher education over a five-year period: 1980-1984. Data were analyzed in terms of total productivity yielding a list of 50 institutions that have been ac tive in knowledge production and utiliza tion in teacher education.

Effects of Organizational Climate and Sex on the Language Arts Achievement of Disadvantaged Sixth Graders1

This inquiry was conducted to examine the potential of two-way television as an instructional medium. Classroom observation data were collected from thirty-two presentations by seven medical faculty. Half of the observed presentations were from two-way television mediated lessons, while the remaining observations were made in a conventional professor-in-front-of-class mode. Comparisons of observation data from these two presentation modes revealed similar instructional strategies by the professors regardless of the presentation mode. An additional analysis revealed attitudes of students were mixed regarding instruction provided via two-way television.