Describes an English-teacher educator's teaching/learning process that honors the voices of the students and builds on their needs and questions. Describes how she combines reflection on her teaching with "refraction": finding a new view on teaching using the oblique light from students' responses from their various dialogs. Includes responses…

California is field-testing a model to help new teachers become competent professionals via planning, teaching, reflecting, and applying. Beginning Teacher Support and Assessment/California Formative Assessment & Support System for Teachers acknowledges that teachers learn good practices gradually through consulting with colleagues and…

Presents a reflective account of a science teacher's endeavors to use the referent of critical constructivism to transform her pedagogical practices. The context of the action research is a Year 10 bioethics unit taught at an independent girls' school. Contains 44 references. (DDR)

Reports a longitudinal study of the mentoring relationship between an experienced middle-school teacher and a novice teacher (which was supported by a university educator), highlighting what the experienced teacher learned about herself as an educator through the relationship. Data from observations, journals, and transcripts of research and…

Describes the "Book Club Plus Inquiry Group," a group of classroom teachers and university teacher educators in Michigan involved in practitioner research. Offers perspectives from the group on the question of what counts as teacher research. Concludes with a model of their conception. (SR)

Focuses on what transpired during a mentor-training course in Hungary that involved prospective mentors and student English-language teachers. In the course, role plays proved to be the stimulus for an exploration of how far the model of mentoring commonly promoted takes sufficient account of contextual factors. (Author/VWL)

Discusses the study of teacher researchers undertaking research into self-chosen aspects of their own mathematics teaching at the secondary level by using qualitative methods to explore the processes and practices of this research and the issues that it raised. Emphasizes that emergent theory of teachers' research activity fit strongly with a view…

Shares one strategy used to empower preservice and inservice teachers as they respond to children's literature--the creation of Personal Text Sets. Examines teachers' reflections concerning their Personal Text Sets. Considers how teachers share with their students books that have touched their hearts. Describes how they create communities for…

Describes action learning as a potentially powerful peer-based approach to teaching consultation at the college level and offers a case study of its use at Coventry University (England). Explains how action learning supports teaching improvement through reflective practice and peer dialog in group consultations about specific concerns (such as…

Explores the way a high school teacher's intuitive teaching principles developed over time through an autobiographical analysis. Employs a tennis metaphor to describe feelings about the teaching process. Opines that it takes "not thinking too much" to teach well. (DSK)

Describes the accounts of four Grade 1 teachers as they take action to improve their science teaching skills. Provides information on teacher background, early teaching strategies, confronting ideas about teaching science, and the steps taken to reform practice. (DDR)

Shares the perspectives of two newly qualified teachers who suggest ways in which new teachers should be supported. These views were shared in the context of a professional-development conference. (DDR)

Proposes a framework for teacher reflection based on a longitudinal study of the development of six experienced second-language teachers who attempted to implement reflection and reflective action into their teaching practice. The resulting framework included several phases in the development of reflective teaching: engaging with reflection,…

Constructivist teachers are guided by three basic principles when teaching math to young children. They encourage students to think about their answers, conceptualize how they resolved the problem, and represent their thinking with words, pictures, or symbols. Demonstrating mathematical logic is more important than memorizing rules. (MLH)

Offers observational tools that physical education teachers can use to gather objective data on their teaching for the purpose of reflection. The tools are based on complex research tools associated with effective teaching. The three types of observational tools focus on student behaviors, teacher behaviors, and teacher-student interactions. (SM)