Teachers who are positive deviants are the most effective teachers, able to produce results and solutions to problems that others in the learning community cannot. As a result, students in their classrooms usually produce assessment scores that are higher than those of students in their colleagues' classrooms. Teachers willing to learn from their…

This publication highlights the Reading First program as the academic cornerstone of the No Child Left Behind Act, and cites state achievement data indicating that Reading First students from nearly every grade and subgroup have made gains in reading proficiency. Restoration of full funding for the program has been requested for Fiscal Year 2009.

In the North Middlesex Regional School District, located in north central Massachusetts near the New Hampshire border, teachers knew that the district had urgent challenges. Isolated programs provided rigor to only some students, student achievement scores showed room for improvement, and a recent accreditation review had raised questions about…

When the Burke County Board of Education mandated Burke County High School in Waynesboro, Georgia to "seek a solution" to its poor graduation rate--specifically, to change the school's schedule, teachers were given the responsibility and authority to plan and facilitate the transition. The transition process taught teachers and…

Students with challenging behaviors are very deft at engaging teachers in power struggles as a way to either feel empowered, obtain attention, or escape an unpleasant task. The more frustrated that teachers permit themselves to get, the less capable they are of responding in a therapeutic, productive fashion to students' challenging behaviors. The…

In this article, the author examines the troubled history of the relationship between research and practice in the area of early reading instruction. He describes how researchers have historically addressed controversies about reading instruction and explains why good research seems to have a delayed and limited impact on reading policy and…

In Singapore, "decentralization" and "school-based reforms" are key words within the current education reform agenda. This article argues that a key success factor in this agenda is transformational leadership in school. With more autonomy given to the school, transformational leadership at the school level will facilitate the…

This paper outlines the efforts of an Educational Psychology Service (EPS) to develop its practice in the area of research. It will argue that the Action Enquiry model of service delivery can empower teaching staff and may allow an effective means of change and improvement to take place in schools. This model steers research towards providing…

Despite the norms of privacy that pervade teacher culture and the assumptions of behind-closed-doors independence, teachers actually "need" their colleagues, whether they like it--and them--or not. Teachers are inherently dependent on one another since no one of them alone constitutes their students' education. Students move from teacher to…

The numbers are in, and they are not rosy. According to the "Schools and Staffing Survey," 64,954 public schools reported vacancies during the 2003-04 school year. Even more alarming is the fact that projections suggest teacher attrition rates will continue to soar, while student enrollments climb, well into the 21st century. American schools have…

Several constraints influence the formation of a professional identity by full-time distance education faculty at the University of the Philippines. One of these is the marginalisation of distance education (DE) in the academy as a consequence of DE's identification with low status disciplines, as well as with developments in higher education that…

In teaching science today, the emphasis is on inquiry-based pedagogies, with the expectation that students in the science classroom will be exposed to the theories and practices of scientists in the science community. However, for many science teachers, implementing inquiry in the classroom is a daunting task. In the traditional classroom setting,…

This article reports on Ontario's way of school improvement which focuses less on test-score results and more on engaging teachers and principals. Like the United States, the Canadian province of Ontario has committed itself to reaching key numeric targets: at least 75 percent of 6th graders able to read, write, and do mathematics at the…

A learning environment survey can be easily used in the science classroom to evaluate new instructional approaches, to spark enthusiasm, and to produce evidence showing that science teachers are indeed becoming a reflective practitioner. Conducting learning environment research in the classroom is personally rewarding as well. It allows science…

Modern primary teachers must adapt literacy programmes and ensure efficient learning for all. They must also support children with language and literacy difficulties, children learning English as an additional language and possibly teach a modern foreign language. To do this effectively, they need to understand the applied linguistics research…