Teacher preparation programs and school districts annually invest significant personnel and money to support cohorts of preservice teachers and new first-year teachers. Despite this support, the transition from teacher preparation to the first years of teaching remains challenging. In this article, the authors discuss the impact of a New Teacher…

The aim of this self-study was to critically consider the authors' individual thinking and practices as they worked toward a shared understanding of connecting science and literacy during instruction. As teacher educators from different disciplines, this work required them to carefully and recurrently examine their individual understandings of the…

How does teacher change get conceptualized, supported, and realized? The authors address this far-reaching question by exploring how teacher collaboration, centered on examining student learning data, can result in changes in instructional perspectives and practices. Their case study consists of a middle school mathematics teacher group working…

Despite persistent questions about the nature and purpose of social studies education in the United States, there exists general agreement that social studies should be about democratic citizenship. But much depends on how individuals view democracy, and the extent to which they think it has been, or could be, realized through education. This…

Over the last 20 years, collaborative practices in teacher education and professional development have received a great deal of (mostly positive) attention from researchers. More recently, lesson study, a common form of teacher learning in Japan, has been explored as a promising practice in part because it promotes collaboration. Because…

This article explores how 12 classroom teachers, enrolled in one of the author's graduate social studies methods course, used service-learning as an instructional tool to help students practice active participation in their community and beyond, while also recognizing the relevance of academic coursework as they applied their knowledge and skills…

The authors of this article are two professors from a northwestern regional university. One of them works in the special education department and the other works in the elementary education department. As they began to work together on their research and teaching, they found that there were many communication barriers between their departments and…

Some common explanations for the difficulty of transferring newly learned teaching skills and strategies into classroom practice are questioned, and other hypotheses are proposed. Coaching, by peers, supervisors, principals, college instructors, or others, is presented as a strategy to implement innovation in the classroom. (Author/MT)

Four programs, two for preservice graduate students and two for inservice teachers, in which teachers were encouraged to analyze their teaching with a partner, are presented. The sessions to support teacher partnerships, how new patterns of teaching were demonstrated, and the extent to which teachers conducted cooperative projects are described.…

Project SUPPORT provided instruction and encouragement in activity-oriented elementary science teaching to 38 teachers. The project involved two summer sessions and school-year activities including teacher partnering. The project is described, and teachers' perceptions of their partnerships are reported. (Author/MT)

This article describes roles and responsibilities to be taken by groups within a school district in order to promote teacher collaboration as part of the work life of a school. Included is a checklist for use by individuals responsible for staff development in schools, with suggestions for initiating teacher collaboration. (Author/MT)

Six teachers who participated in a program to analyze their patterns of teaching with a partner were interviewed extensively. Their reactions and perceptions after working with their partner are reported. Three partnerships are described briefly. (Author/MT)

Focuses on current reform efforts in teacher development and links teacher reflection to what the author considers the essence of current educational reform. In addition, examples are provided from research and practice to support the argument that teachers who are able to reflect are better able to accomplish their goals. (GLR)

As a university professor who has taught at the teacher education, masters, and doctoral levels, the life of teaching has been an enduring interest, particularly teaching that occurs in K-12 settings. From the author's own work as a K-12 teacher and administrator to her earliest studies of effective teaching and in her own university teaching, she…