This article describes a four-year project undertaken to develop a set of performance tasks that could be used for assessing hands-on science in Irish primary schools. It begins by considering some of the literature on performance assessment and concludes with a discussion on the potential of the tasks to support teaching and learning in science.…

Certification tests for elementary teachers in Ontario were introduced in 1871 and in 2002. Although the provincial government's stated goals for the testing programs were similar, the 2002 program was opposed by the initial teacher education programs and the teachers' associations, but the 1871 program was not. The authors argue that much of this…

This study reports on a science professional development initiative with elementary school teachers in Canada. Grades 4 and 5 teachers were involved in the implementation and modification of science kits, together with corresponding professional development activities. Each kit was aligned to specific outcomes in the curriculum and provided a…

In this article, the authors explore the ways in which a selection of student teachers from two universities in Canada expressed their feelings of preparedness to teach literacy in elementary classrooms. The student teachers had experienced various approaches to literacy teaching as they progressed through their teacher education program. These…

The belief of educational researchers that teacher self-reports cannot be trusted, and the provision of validation evidence for a teacher self-report questionnaire on open education are the purposes of this study. Data were collected in two classes in each of eight schools, which were a stratified (by architecture and by programmatic openness)…

Investigates the effect of report-writing format and style on teachers' (N=81) comprehension of psychological reports. Results indicated that teachers better comprehended reports that organize information by functional domain, describe strengths and problems in clear behavioral terms, describe the child's learning style fully, and state specific…

Elementary school mathematics teachers (145), from 9 school units in northeastern Saskatchewan, preferred inservice mathematics activities consisting of demonstration of model units on new approaches and workshops and seminars by both local and visiting personnel. Least preferred activities were university courses, participation on planning…

Transformational leadership researchers have given little attention to teacher expectations that mediate between goals and actions. The most important of these expectations, teacher efficacy, refers to teacher beliefs that they will be able to bring about student learning. This study examined the mediating effects of teacher efficacy by comparing…

This interpretive case study explores an attempt to add an online component--the On-line Literacy Project--to a successful face-to-face professional development community. Participants were six members of the Literacy Project, which was carried out in the school board of a western Canadian city. The principal theoretical framework informing the…

Teacher education for literacy teaching is often fairly narrow in focus. New approaches are needed that are sociocultural in orientation and take due account of the diversity of language forms, both traditional and contemporary, formal and informal, literary and non-literary. We believe this need can be met by largely adopting a…

This article examines the influence of genre and gender on comments written by 108 sixth-grade teachers in response to two narrative and two persuasive papers. There were significant genre differences. Process, conventions, artistic style, and format were the focus of significantly greater numbers of comments directed to narrative writing. In…

Describes program sponsored by University of Ottawa Faculty of Education at Saint Pie X Elementary French Separate School. (RT)

Among 20 Ontario elementary school teachers (average teaching experience 13 years), none had ever taught creative dance but all felt it should be included in the elementary curriculum. Barriers to implementation included lack of training and confidence, little support from administrators and policymakers, and lack of resources and facilities. (SV)

Discusses the need for technological literacy and offers a proposed teacher preparation model specifically designed to help elementary education teachers integrate technological literacy across the curriculum. (JOW)

Background: To date, few studies have been conducted to investigate the preparedness of health educators in Canadian school systems. Purpose: This study assessed practicing and pre-service teachers' self-perceptions of preparedness to teach health education in British Columbia K-12 classrooms. It also investigated factors related to their…