Learning To Teach in an Age of Accountability

Learning To Teach in an Age of Accountability PDF Author: Arthur T. Costigan
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135619867
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 282

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book documents the "brave new world" of teacher, administrator, school, and student accountability that has swept across the United States in recent years. Its particular vantage point is the perspective of dozens of new teachers trying to make their way through their first months and years working in schools in the New York City metropolitan area. The issues they grapple with are not, however, unique to this context, but common problems found today in urban, suburban, and rural schools across the United States. The stories in this book offer a compelling portrait of these teachers' encounters with the new culture of accountability and the strategies they develop for coping, even succeeding, within such demanding settings. Learning to Teach in an Age of Accountability: *introduces research on teaching and engages the "big ideas" concerning teacher research, highlighting what we know and where that leads us; *offers a rich set of teacher narratives that are organized to widen the angle of vision from biography, to classrooms, schools, and society; and *includes questions and activities to encourage discussion and further research about the ideas raised; and *addresses the possibilities for best practice and curricular decision making in light of the issues and ideas presented in the book. This volume--unique in its portrayal of new teachers' encounters with issues of accountability--makes a singular contribution to the educational literature on new teachers. It is relevant to everyone interested in the contemporary world of teaching, and is particularly appropriate as a text for preservice and in-service students. All readers who believe that the key to a good school lies in attracting and keeping good teachers will find the issues presented here both personally engaging and deeply troubling.

Learning To Teach in an Age of Accountability

Learning To Teach in an Age of Accountability PDF Author: Arthur T. Costigan
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135619867
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 282

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book documents the "brave new world" of teacher, administrator, school, and student accountability that has swept across the United States in recent years. Its particular vantage point is the perspective of dozens of new teachers trying to make their way through their first months and years working in schools in the New York City metropolitan area. The issues they grapple with are not, however, unique to this context, but common problems found today in urban, suburban, and rural schools across the United States. The stories in this book offer a compelling portrait of these teachers' encounters with the new culture of accountability and the strategies they develop for coping, even succeeding, within such demanding settings. Learning to Teach in an Age of Accountability: *introduces research on teaching and engages the "big ideas" concerning teacher research, highlighting what we know and where that leads us; *offers a rich set of teacher narratives that are organized to widen the angle of vision from biography, to classrooms, schools, and society; and *includes questions and activities to encourage discussion and further research about the ideas raised; and *addresses the possibilities for best practice and curricular decision making in light of the issues and ideas presented in the book. This volume--unique in its portrayal of new teachers' encounters with issues of accountability--makes a singular contribution to the educational literature on new teachers. It is relevant to everyone interested in the contemporary world of teaching, and is particularly appropriate as a text for preservice and in-service students. All readers who believe that the key to a good school lies in attracting and keeping good teachers will find the issues presented here both personally engaging and deeply troubling.

Teacher Retention in an Age of Performative Accountability

Teacher Retention in an Age of Performative Accountability PDF Author: Jane Perryman
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 100055547X
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 186

Get Book Here

Book Description
In this insightful and timely volume, Jane Perryman provides a definitive analysis of the crisis in teacher recruitment and retention through a critique of the culture of performative accountability in education, bringing together theory, literature, and empirical data. Drawing on data across several long-term research projects and through a Foucauldian theoretical framework, Perryman argues that teachers’ working lives, both in the UK and internationally, are being increasingly affected by the rise in the neoliberal performativity and accountability culture in schools. Teachers’ work is increasingly directed towards assessment, exams, progress measures, and preparation for review and inspection, and drawn away from the more individualistic and creative aspects of the job. This culture of hyper accountability and super-performativity, Perryman argues, has created a ‘discourse of disappointment’ – where the hopes and aspirations of teachers are crushed beneath the performative pressures under which they work. Teacher Retention in an Age of Performative Accountability offers a convincing, compellingly written critical analysis of how the values, purposes and practices embedded in education affect the working experience of teachers over time. Perryman makes a significant contribution to our understanding of the effects of accountability and performativity mechanisms in schools and offers insight into why so many teachers leave the profession. This analysis is important to scholars, educators, and policymakers alike.

IJER Vol 23-N3

IJER Vol 23-N3 PDF Author: International Journal of Educational Reform
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1475816782
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 71

Get Book Here

Book Description
The mission of the International Journal of Educational Reform (IJER) is to keep readers up-to-date with worldwide developments in education reform by providing scholarly information and practical analysis from recognized international authorities. As the only peer-reviewed scholarly publication that combines authors’ voices without regard for the political affiliations perspectives, or research methodologies, IJER provides readers with a balanced view of all sides of the political and educational mainstream. To this end, IJER includes, but is not limited to, inquiry based and opinion pieces on developments in such areas as policy, administration, curriculum, instruction, law, and research. IJER should thus be of interest to professional educators with decision-making roles and policymakers at all levels turn since it provides a broad-based conversation between and among policymakers, practitioners, and academicians about reform goals, objectives, and methods for success throughout the world. Readers can call on IJER to learn from an international group of reform implementers by discovering what they can do that has actually worked. IJER can also help readers to understand the pitfalls of current reforms in order to avoid making similar mistakes. Finally, it is the mission of IJER to help readers to learn about key issues in school reform from movers and shakers who help to study and shape the power base directing educational reform in the U.S. and the world.

Handbook of Leadership and Administration for Special Education

Handbook of Leadership and Administration for Special Education PDF Author: Jean B. Crockett
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136869689
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 398

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book brings together for the first time research informing leadership practice in special education from preschool through transition into post-secondary settings. It provides comprehensive coverage of 1) disability policy 2) leadership knowledge, 3) school reform, and 4) effective educational leadership practices. Broader in scope than previous books, it provides in-depth analysis by prominent scholars from across the disciplines of both general and special education leadership. Coverage includes historical roots, policy and legal perspectives, and content supporting collaborative and instructional leadership that support the administration of special education. Comprehensive – This is the first book to integrate the knowledge bases of special education and educational leadership as these fields impact school improvement and the performance of students with disabilities. Chapter Structure – Chapters provide a review of the knowledge base as well as recommendations for special education leadership and future research. Multicultural Focus – Addressing special education leadership within the context of a multicultural society, chapters incorporate content related to the diversity of families, teachers, and students. Expertise – Chapter authors have made significant contributions to the knowledge base in their specific areas of study such as educational policy, special education law and finance, school reform,, organizational management, and instructional leadership. This book is a reference volume for scholars, leaders, and policy makers and a textbook for graduate courses in special education, educational administration, and policy studies.

Change(d) Agents

Change(d) Agents PDF Author: Betty Achinstein
Publisher: Teachers College Press
ISBN: 0807752185
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 225

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book examines both the promise and complexity of diversifying today's teaching profession. Drawing from a 5-year study of 21 new teachers of colour working in urban, hard-to-staff schools, this book uncovers a systemic paradox that the teachers confront. They are committed to improving educational opportunities for students of colour by acting as role models, culturally/linguistically responsive teachers, and change agents. The teaching profession encouraged such commitments and some teachers acted with support from individual, organizational, and community-based sponsors. However, many of these new teachers work in schools that are culturally subtractive and have restrictive accountability policies that challenge their ability to perform cultural/professional roles to which they are committed. Many teachers internalize the contradiction, resulting in their becoming changed agents within the educational system they sought to change. This book is essential reading for educators, leaders, and policymakers.

Educational Research in an Age of Accountability

Educational Research in an Age of Accountability PDF Author: Robert E. Slavin
Publisher: Allyn & Bacon
ISBN:
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 436

Get Book Here

Book Description
The book is designed to enable students to become intelligent consumers of educational research in order to help create effective and accountable learning environments. Written in a very clear and user-friendly style, this text focuses on understanding the intent of the researcher, the procedures, and the results so that students can use appropriate research findings to inform school change. This text emphasizes how responses to the accountability movement in schools can be focused around using and understanding scientific inquiry. It balances quantitative and qualitative research methodology and discusses action research and mixed methods in detail. Principles for conducting research and criteria for evaluating its overall credibility are presented in a concise manner. Students are shown how to analyze and evaluate research, and judge the usefulness of the findings for educational practice. In addition, students are shown how this knowledge can translate to their own classrooms.

Opportunities and Challenges in Teacher Recruitment and Retention

Opportunities and Challenges in Teacher Recruitment and Retention PDF Author: Carol R. Rinke
Publisher: IAP
ISBN: 1641136618
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 370

Get Book Here

Book Description
Opportunities and Challenges in Teacher Recruitment and Retention serves as a comprehensive resource for understanding teachers’ careers across the professional lifespan. Grounded in the notion that teachers’ voices are essential for understanding teachers’ lives, this edited volume contains chapters that privilege the voices of teachers above all. Book sections look closely at the particular issues that arise when recruiting an effective, committed, and diverse workforce, as well as the challenges that arise once teachers are immersed in the classroom setting. Promising directions are also included for particularly high-need areas such as early childhood teachers, Black male teachers, STEM teachers, and urban teachers. The book concludes with a call for self-care in teachers’ lives. Chapter contributions come from a variety of contexts across the United States and around the world. However, regardless of context or methodology, these chapters point to the importance of valuing and respecting teachers’ lives and work. Moreover, they demonstrate that teacher recruitment and retention is a complex and multifaceted issue that cannot be addressed through simplistic policy changes. Rather, attending to and appreciating the web of influences on teachers lives and careers is the only way to support their work and the impact they have on our next generation of students.

Who Controls Teachers' Work?

Who Controls Teachers' Work? PDF Author: Richard M. Ingersoll
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674038950
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 370

Get Book Here

Book Description
Schools are places of learning but they are also workplaces, and teachers are employees. As such, are teachers more akin to professionals or to factory workers in the amount of control they have over their work? And what difference does it make? Drawing on large national surveys as well as wide-ranging interviews with high school teachers and administrators, Richard Ingersoll reveals the shortcomings in the two opposing viewpoints that dominate thought on this subject: that schools are too decentralized and lack adequate control and accountability; and that schools are too centralized, giving teachers too little autonomy. Both views, he shows, overlook one of the most important parts of teachers' work: schools are not simply organizations engineered to deliver academic instruction to students, as measured by test scores; schools and teachers also play a large part in the social and behavioral development of our children. As a result, both views overlook the power of implicit social controls in schools that are virtually invisible to outsiders but keenly felt by insiders. Given these blind spots, this book demonstrates that reforms from either camp begin with inaccurate premises about how schools work and so are bound not only to fail, but to exacerbate the problems they propose to solve.

Many Children Left Behind

Many Children Left Behind PDF Author: Deborah Meier
Publisher: Beacon Press
ISBN: 0807004596
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 115

Get Book Here

Book Description
Signed into law in 2002, the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) promised to revolutionize American public education. Originally supported by a bipartisan coalition, it purports to improve public schools by enforcing a system of standards and accountability through high-stakes testing. Many people supported it originally, despite doubts, because of its promise especially to improve the way schools serve poor children. By making federal funding contingent on accepting a system of tests and sanctions, it is radically affecting the life of schools around the country. But, argue the authors of this citizen's guide to the most important political issue in education, far from improving public schools and increasing the ability of the system to serve poor and minority children, the law is doing exactly the opposite. Here some of our most prominent, respected voices in education-including school innovator Deborah Meier, education activist Alfie Kohn, and founder of the Coalition of Essential Schools Theodore R. Sizer-come together to show us how, point by point, NCLB undermines the things it claims to improve: * How NCLB punishes rather than helps poor and minority kids and their schools * How NCLB helps further an agenda of privatization and an attack on public schools * How the focus on testing and test preparation dumbs down classrooms * And they put forward a richly articulated vision of alternatives. Educators and parents around the country are feeling the harshly counterproductive effects of NCLB. This book is an essential guide to understanding what's wrong and where we should go from here.

Case Studies of Teacher Development

Case Studies of Teacher Development PDF Author: Barbara B. Levin
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135635838
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 317

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book represents the results of a 15-year longitudinal study based on in-depth case studies of the development of four teachers' pedagogical thinking. These studies illustrate how teachers' thinking--about children's behavior, development, learning, and teaching--develops over time, based on their personal and professional life experiences. It is an especially significant book because understanding how pedagogical thought develops over time and how these ideas are put into action in classrooms can be used to improve teacher education, teacher induction, and teacher retention programs. Case Studies of Teacher Development: An In-Depth Look At How Thinking About Pedagogy Develops Over Time: *provides insight into reasons why some teachers remain and others leave the teaching profession; *combines narrative with scholarship; *highlights the voices of four educators through extensive quotes from their interviewers, includes vignettes of their classroom teaching, and incorporates their own writing; *contributes to the field of teacher education and teacher development because of the long duration of the four case studies (1985-2000) and the accompanying scholarly analysis of internal and external influences on their lives as teachers; and *addresses changes in the nature of qualitative research as it influenced this longitudinal study over time. At a time when teacher induction and teacher retention are critically important, this book will help teacher educators, school and district leaders, and policymakers understand better how to retain novice and experienced teachers by supporting their professional growth and development.