Background/Context: High teacher turnover has directed a great deal of scholarly attention toward the connection between teacher retention and teacher working conditions. Prior work has identified a set of key working conditions associated with teacher retention, including supportive school leadership, school safety, a collaborative professional…

Teacher preparation programmes (TPPs) find many ways to shape the development of their teacher candidates while bridging the research to practice gap in university and school partnerships. Recently, accountability models built on high-stakes standardised student assessments (Value-Added Models [VAM]) have been mandated as a way to evaluate the…

Holding teachers responsible for the behavior of students is an inappropriate policy that results in ineffective teaching, diminished enthusiasm for learning, and lower levels of achievement. The reasons this is so are discussed. Students must be responsible for their own learning. (Author/SLD)

Describes one school district's mandatory 2-hour workshop designed to certify substitute teachers. The workshop explains the district's expectations of substitute teachers, provides information and instructional techniques to facilitate learning and proper classroom control, and allows questions and concerns to be raised and clarified by…

This monograph sets forth in detail the concepts included in the five domains of teaching as identified by the Florida Coalition for the Development of a Performance Evaluation System. The first domain, planning, includes the concepts: (1) content coverage; (2) utilization of instructional materials; (3) activity structure; (4) goal focusing; and…

Describes (and presents in an appendix) the Multidimensional Reading Instruction Observation Scale, a formative evaluative instrument to evaluate the quality of reading instruction by recording interactions between student and teacher regarding cognitive processes, affective processes, and management skills from three perspectives: teacher…

The literature of teacher supervision assumes that supervision should focus on the teacher and teacher behavior within the classroom setting. The administrative model of supervision, however, focuses on pupils and pupil learning and takes the school system as its setting. It makes teachers and supervisors partners in deciding how well the…

Training in Teaching for Higher Order Thinking (THOT), a 12-week training program, resulted in substantial increases in THOT performance by middle school teachers (N=4), but it did not affect performance levels on essential skills (performance related to student achievement and conduct). Implications for teacher training and teacher evaluation are…

This monograph presents an assessment instrument that utilizes teacher and student behavioral indicators to assess the quality of inquiry instruction. The instrument provides teachers with feedback which not only assesses the presence of critical teaching skills, but also serves as a valuable training aid for helping them perceive how their own…

Two studies are reported in which supervisor observations of teachers' performance rate and accuracy were found to result in positive changes in teacher performance and the behaviors of their severely handicapped students (ages 6-21), when compared with baseline supervisor observations that did not specify rate and accuracy feedback. (Author/JDD)

This paper: (1) provides the conceptual underpinnings of the knowledge about effective school practices that bear directly on the quality of the teacher workforce; and (2) analyzes current policy decisions and their ability to affect positive changes. Working conditions enhancing teacher commitment, retention, and teaching effectiveness are…

Educative teacher self-evaluation is proposed as a method to improve instruction. Envisioned is a mathematics-teaching evaluation instrument that includes a classroom student-behavior checklist, a procedural-conceptual-discrimination component, a projective-teaching-model-identification component, and an assessment of content understanding. (MDH)

Results are presented of a survey of 500 teachers in New York who were asked their opinions on public education in the state. A summary of findings provides information about teachers' opinions on: (1) emphasis on basic skills; (2) school discipline and safety; (3) extension of school day or year; (4) teacher apprenticeships; (5) career ladders…

The relationships between Myers-Briggs Type Indicators (MBTI), 16 personality types, and 55 behavioral indicators of teacher competency were explored. Subjects were 103 classroom teachers, grades K-12, who were observed in regular classrooms during a two-year period using five objectively-scored, low-inference observation systems. These included…

Two groups were asked to judge teachers' willingness to tolerate inappropriate behaviors in regular classrooms. Seventy-four teachers in regular classes judged themselves, and 28 special education teachers predicted how regular teachers might respond. Results showed that special education teachers were quite accurate in their judgments of regular…