Background: Educators in the United States and internationally have become increasingly interested in incorporating international perspectives into curricula, programs, and policy (Hayden, 2011; Parker, 2011). Rooted in a long history of international education (Dolby & Rahman, 2008), these efforts have been described variously as…

Background/Context: Studio-based courses--the primary approach in design education--have been viewed as effective environments for learning. This study uses an ecological approach to explore how the studio environment creates opportunities for social interaction through immersive studies of studio learning. Purpose/Objective/Research…

Background: As social-justice-focused teacher education programs continue to gain prominence, a wealth of research explores approaches for preparing teachers for social-justice-minded teaching. This study looks closely at a key aspect of teacher education programs frequently absent from the research--the teacher educators (TEs) themselves. Focus…

This article presents case studies of two novice teachers and their mentors who, without formal knowledge of self-regulation theory, established a classroom environment that promoted self-regulated learning. This case was drawn from a larger descriptive study of novice teachers learning to integrate a student-centered visual literacy instructional…

While recognizing that instructional scaffolding in a whole-class context can engage students' learning as they move through individual zone of proximal developments (ZPDs), in this chapter, we argue that instructional scaffolding also can collectively engage a class through a shared ZPD when participant structures and discourse practices provide…

Background/Context: As states and districts have begun adopting texts inclusive of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people, debates about how LGBTQ issues should be represented in the curricular canon have emerged. While existing research investigates curricular questions that are arising as a result of LGBTQ curricular…

Background/Context: "Ambitious teaching" is teaching that aims to teach all kinds of students to not only to know academic subjects, but also to be able to use what they know in working on authentic problems in academic domains. Studies of individual teachers have identified the challenges of this work. Resources are often provided at the school…

Background/Context: Facilitating dialogues about racial issues in higher education classroom settings continues to be a vexing problem facing postsecondary educators. In order for students to discuss race with their peers, they need skilled facilitators who are knowledgeable about racial issues and able to support students in these difficult…

Background: Despite increased access to student learning data, scholars have demonstrated that teachers do not always know how to use these data in ways that lead to deep changes in instruction and often lack skills and knowledge to interpret results and develop solutions. In response, administrators have invested in instructional coaches, data…

Background/Context: A fundamental tension has long existed between school reform proposals and actual teaching practice. Despite a large literature on teacher change, the discontinuity between innovation and practice continues and many attempts to reform teaching fail to be enacted in most classrooms. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of…

Background: Over the past 30 years, the Brazilian Landless Workers' Movement (MST), one of the largest social movements in Latin America, has developed a series of pedagogical practices for public schools that support the movement's struggle for agrarian reform in the Brazilian countryside. The MST's educational initiatives can be viewed in terms…

Background/Context: The nature of the impact of state-mandated accountability testing on teachers' classroom practices remains contested. While many researchers argue that teachers change their teaching in response to mandated testing, others contend that the nature and degree of the impact of testing on teaching remains unclear. The research on…

Background/Context: Educational researchers and policymakers have often lamented the failure of teachers to implement what they consider to be technically sound assessment procedures. In recent years, the belief that teachers are unwilling or unable to implement appropriate assessment procedures has contributed to the rapid expansion of high…

Background: Although advances in distance learning have shown signs of a reconfiguration of the teacher's role in online environments, a large number of online teaching practices still do not show many signs of this shift. Given the need for a change in pedagogies, investigating how exemplary teachers transfer their thinking, pedagogical…

Background/Context: This opening article, like the other articles in this special issue, is situated in scholarship that attempts to understand the racialized nature of mathematics education in the United States and to examine the racial identities of students and teachers in the context of school mathematics. It is designed to respond to the…