This conceptual essay explores the role a teaching philosophy plays in the experiences of K-12 classroom teachers who are firmly established in a school context. We draw on our experiences as in-service teacher educators and K-12 teachers to examine the extent to which teachers make decisions that are grounded in a well-thought out and clearly…

Experience may influence beliefs and beliefs may influence practices. Following these premises, we investigated teacher candidates' post experience reflections nine months after an international practicum where they taught for three weeks in rural Kenya. Teacher candidates were placed in non-governmental organization (NGO) sponsored schools on the…

The practices of Reconstructive Reflective Teaching as discussed in the works of Schon, Smyth, and others can provide sound staff development for teachers at all grade levels, kindergarten through college. This review of the literature on the topic provides a definition and a detailed explanation of the assumptions, preconditions, and processes of…

Two teachers participating in professional development involving research were asked to read and respond, in light of their own teaching, to Lisa Delpit's study of the dilemma of progressive education versus teaching traditional skills to disadvantaged black students. The teachers' responses illustrate the importance of teachers' prior beliefs and…

Discusses how language teacher education has shifted to constructivist, process-oriented theories of learning; the idea that teacher education programs have failed to prepare teachers for the classroom; the importance of teachers' prior experiences; and the concern that teaching be viewed as a profession where teachers have an active role in…

This exploratory-interpretative study has the objective of describing patterns of cognitive-ethical developmental changes using Perry's model and data-driven content categories. In-service teachers taking a multicultural education graduate course (n=55) participated as insightful subject-researchers. Three major patterns were found: (1)…