This paper responds to the need to support complexities of literacy instruction by identifying and illustrating teaching strategies used by a practicing special education teacher rooted in a multi-theoretical approach to teaching literacy. We argue the importance of teaching from multiple theoretical standpoints and utilizing student-centered,…

This volume examines the agency of second/foreign language teachers in diverse geographical contexts and in both K-12 and adult education. It offers new understandings and conceptualizations of second/foreign language teacher agency through a variety of types of empirical data. It also demonstrates the use of different methodologies or analytic…

For many decades, English language educators across the world have been locked in a paradigm of ESL/EFL/ESD methods that have circumvented the growth of any pedagogical will for Immersion in English (IE) or the Sustained Use of English (SUE) in speech environments where other languages challenge English-in-use and the preparation of teachers of…

"Leading for Literacy" provides tools and real-life examples to expand the benefits of a literacy approach that sparks students' engaged reading and thinking across disciplines, from middle school through community college. A companion to the landmark "Reading for Understanding," this book guides teachers, leaders, and…

The paper examines the implementation of an external written curriculum in the classroom. The study is based on observation of and interviews with 26 Israeli Bible teachers who followed a formal curriculum and used a teachers' guide. The study identified three types of curriculum narrative: the frame narrative, the task narrative, and the…

The idea of collective decision making in schools has been a popular democratic educational reform model. One of its claims is that participation in school decision making empowers teachers and improves teaching. This research investigates this claim by exploring seven teachers' experiences with a unique democratic school reform in Porto Alegre,…

This book examines the new learning and telecommunications technologies and their potential applications to enrich the learning process, to ensure educational equality for all students and to help cultivate the educated person. In the light of recent studies, educational technology developments, and emerging educational needs of the twenty-first…

In his experiences as a prekindergarten teacher, this author was struck by a simple revelation that has informed and guided his teaching practice. He discovered that the things he enjoyed teaching most were almost always connected to his own passions and values. He found that during fascinating, teachable moments the most novel thing happened: He…

This article describes the critical experiences of a middle school mathematics teacher as she progressed from a novice to a knowledgeable creator of technology-enhanced learning activities for her classroom. During an eight week intervention, cognitive apprenticeship strategies (Collins, 1991) were utilized in a partnership with the teacher until…

This text examines the forces that keep educators and students from feeling fully empowered, that is, gaining the power to self-actualize and to facilitate this process for others. A feminist perspective is used to consider directions for educational reform and innovation broadly under an umbrella philosophy of empowerment, suggesting a paradigm…

The administrators at Earlham College wanted teachers who entered its M.A.T. program to develop a "fire in the belly" to teach, and to have the ability to confront the realities of U. S. schools, including standardized testing (which seems at odds with passionate teaching and learning). Prior to entering the Earlham College M.A.T. program,…

Constructivism is a response to the depersonalized hugeness of our society and institutions. The constructivist model for education offers a way to decentralize the authority of a large and distant administration and return decision-making to the local level, that is, to learning communities, teaching teams, and individual classroom teachers. This…

This book serves as a response to recurring questions from preservice teachers regarding the practice of student-centered teaching within the traditional school culture. The book uses the experience of one beginning teacher, Sheila, to develop its theme. It suggests that if practicing teachers have direct continuing access to teacher educators for…