Kelli Thomas

A Collaborative Immersio Approach to Evaluation Capacity Building

The purpose of this article is to describe a new collaborative immersion approach for developing evaluation capacity that was used in kindergarten through Grade 12 (K-12) schools and to place this new approach on a continuum of existing capacity-building methods. The continuum extends from individualistic training-oriented methods to collaborative real-world methods of building evaluation capacity. The strengths and weaknesses of various evaluation capacity building methods are analyzed and critiqued. Included are examples of capacity building focused on technical assistance, workshops, fellowships, and collaborative immersion. The authors make the case for considering a collaborative immersion approach to evaluation capacity building.

Evaluating constructivist beliefs of teacher candidates

Abstract Teacher education programs that want their future teachers to embrace and employee constructivist principles must strive to provide opportunities for teacher candidates to develop an understanding of constructivism. The paper presents a structure for embedding constructivist principles into early childhood and elementary teacher education courses and the results of a pilot study at a Mid‐Western University. The results of the study demonstrate that teacher candidates believe that constructivist practices are very to extremely important. In addition, their responses indicated that the teacher candidates believe that their role in a constructivist environment is very to extremely important. The study reinforces the importance of providing experiences in teacher education programs that will result in positive views of constructivism.

Pre-Service Elementary Teacher Dispositions and Responsive Pedagogical Patterns in Mathematics

The movement toward viewing dispositions as a construct for the field of teacher education began in the United States during the 1990s. During that time the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (INTASC) and the National Board for Professional teaching Standards (NBPTS) replaced the construct of “attitudes” with “dispositions” in the knowledge, skills, and attitudes triad.

NAVIGATING THE CHALLENGES OF HELPING TEACHERS USE DATA TO INFORM EDUCATIONAL DECISIONS

In this paper we present a model of collaborative evaluation that has been used to engage teachers in data-based decision making for improving teaching and learning in mathematics and science. We examine three external challenges that threaten the process of continuous school improvement; namely, making sense of data, policy changes, and curriculum changes. In addition, we describe how the collaborative evaluation model facilitated progress beyond these challenges. Keywords: data-based decision making, evaluation, mathematics education, science education