Student engagement is emerging as a key focus in higher education, as engagement is increasingly understood as a prerequisite for effective learning. This paper reports on the development of an Engagement Framework that provides a practical understanding of student (and staff) engagement which can be applied to any discipline, year level or…

This article calls for a new paradigm of professionalism in the field of gifted education. The definition of professionalism varies, and yet the need for a common vision of professionalism in the field is necessary to strengthen gifted education in the future. The authors delineate a framework for sustaining professionalism within the field and…

This article introduces a descriptive conceptual framework to provide teachers with a means of recognizing and describing instructional activities that use primary sources. The framework provides structure for professional development programs that have been established to train teachers to access and integrate primary sources into lessons. The…

Given the scarcity of scaffolding in classrooms, we developed a professional development program (PDP) focusing on scaffolding. The PDP was based on a model of contingent teaching consisting of three steps: diagnostic strategies, checking the diagnosis and intervention strategies. The development of four social studies teachers' scaffolding…

Academic department chairs serve as front-line managers and leaders who perform a wide variety of tasks. These tasks may include mundane chores, such as ordering office supplies, or important ones, such as changing the department culture to one that embraces assessment. Too often, however, individuals take on the chair position with little to no…

Rhode Island is committed to ensuring that all educators receive fair, accurate, and meaningful educator evaluations that provide information that can help all support professionals improve and refine their practice. This document describes the process and basic requirements for the Rhode Island Model Support Professional Evaluation and Support…

Many models of professional self-regulation call upon individual practitioners to take responsibility both for identifying the limits of their own skills and for redressing their identified limits through continuing professional development activities. Despite these expectations, a considerable literature in the domain of self-assessment has…

The rationale for the introduction of standards in the United States in the late 1980s was that the quality of education would improve. Assessment instruments in the form of written tests were constructed in order to perform a monitoring function. The introduction of standards and the associated monitoring have been replicated in South Africa. It…

The purpose of this study was to compare elementary classroom teachers' actual practice and perceived importance of English Language Arts professional development in five professional development dimensions: alignment, content and modeling, active learning, collaboration, and follow-up, in high and low mastery, low needs schools. The schools…

As information and communication technology (ICT) continues to develop, it is essential for teachers to acquire ability for teaching with ICT. In China, new higher education (HE) teachers often lack teaching experience because there are limited teaching opportunities during their postgraduate studies. This status quo may compromise the quality of…

Preparing teachers in clinically rich contexts requires teacher educators who are skilled and knowledgeable about university coursework as well as the complexities of classrooms. Retired teachers or principals have often assumed the role of field supervisor, bringing to their work extensive practitioner knowledge but often lacking theoretical…

This article presents a model that can inform the continued professionalisation of student affairs as both a field and a practice in Africa. After providing a brief overview of the African post-secondary educational climate and establishing student affairs as an internationally recognised profession, I analyse three pieces authored or co-authored…

Action research is defined as using research activities to develop concrete societal practices. Action research understands the change of practice as being already a central aim of the research process itself, and it also seeks to contribute to the professional development of all participants in the particular field of study. Even though (or maybe…

This report describes characteristics of the 11 model SEL schools in AISD and compares them to nonmodel SEL schools.

The purpose of the study was to investigate and describe the perceptions of recently NBPTS certified teachers in Maryland of the NBPTS certification process as both a professional development activity and as an evaluation instrument to identify teaching excellence. This descriptive survey used an online survey to collect data from 125 teachers for…