Each issue of this annual newsletter focuses on a particular area of the Kettering Foundation's research. The 2013 issue focuses on citizens and the importance of the choices they make in politics. In many ways, politics is about choice--not only among policies and candidates in elections, but also among the many actions to address and solve…

State and local school systems maintained autonomy of schools, curriculum, classrooms, and instructional practices until roughly the year 2000. The passage of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation in 2001 shifted the educational role of the Federal Government, beginning an increased focus on accountability measures to ensure that the…

Teaching for work-integrated learning (WIL) competency is largely directed at delivering knowledge based cognitive skills with little emphasis on affective skills. This study looks at empirical evidence of WIL students through their understanding of the cognitive and affective domains. The research is based on a validated employability framework,…

Currently, teacher education colleges in Tanzania are being equipped with computers to prepare teachers who can integrate technology in teaching. Despite these efforts, teachers are not embracing the use of technology in their teaching. This study adopted Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) as a framework for describing the…

This paper presents the development and implementation of a professional development workshop series on integrating mobile phones into science teaching for a group of teachers in Sri Lanka. The series comprised a 3-day Planning Workshop followed by implementation of the planned lessons in real classrooms and a subsequent 1-day Reviewing Workshop.…

The preceding articles in this issue describe a diverse range of projects which had in common the aim of implementing or improving the practice of formative assessment, and thereby to secure some of the benefits attributed to it. This article attempts to set up a framework within which each of the different studies may be located and…

Research highlights the importance of individualized approaches and coaching to ongoing professional learning (Darling-Hammond, Wei, Andree, Richardson, & Orphanos, 2009). The purpose of this article is to describe an initiative that set out to help all students become proficient readers by 3rd grade. It demonstrates how coaching can support…

Teacher preparation programs (TPP) rely on school-based mentor teachers and university mentors to assist their teacher candidates with bridging the information presented in courses to the "real world" of teaching. Given the important role that the clinical components of teacher preparation provide in terms of candidate development, the…

A comprehensive research review carried out on behalf of the Norwegian Ministry of Education in 2008 concluded that the competence to establish and maintain good teacher-student relations is a central and important one for a teacher in today's schools. Together with teaching competence and classroom management competence, other competencies that…

This article reports an investigation of the musical and extra-musical outcomes of participation in a music programme for students in four socio-economically disadvantaged school settings. Drawing on the theory of Positive Youth Development, which provides a focus on the positive assets young people bring to their engagement rather than perceived…

Purpose: Approaches to build farmers' analytical capacities are said to trigger wide-ranging changes. This article reports on the communication process between participants and non-participants in one such approach, related to the technical and management skills learned by participants and the changes these participants subsequently made, and the…

The implementation of technology enhanced learning in higher education is often associated with changes to academic work. This article reports on a study of staff experiences with curriculum development and teaching in multiple modes of blended and online learning in a Bachelor of Education degree. The findings indicate that the changes…

This study, conducted over a one-year period, examined the collaboration practices in a large-scale school-university capacity-building collaborative action research project that was designed to help English language teachers develop the skills needed to deal with the reforms to assessment practices in Hong Kong's school curriculum. The study…

Peer review of teaching is recognized increasingly as one strategy for academic development even though historically peer review of teaching is often unsupported by policy, action and culture in many Australian universities. Higher education leaders report that academics generally do not engage with peer review of teaching in a systematic or…

Education is accepted as an important tool for human development in all dimensions of life, it is at same level of significance for boys and girls. Despite this recognition, girls are one of the most vulnerable groups, deprived of education by various socio-cultural, economical and political reasons. The present study is a perceptual study, which…