Reporting on a mixed methods study carried out in China, this article explores the impact of an educational initiative some years after delivery. Taking data from a three staged longitudinal study, this paper facilitates debate about the nature of Continuing Professional Development (CPD) delivered in a transnational context. To promote such…

This study utilizes semi-structured interviews to explore the status quo of teacher training of rural and urban public primary school teachers in Henan Province China. Our findings showed that both rural and urban teachers had very limited training opportunities available to them. Most of the participants did not find the current training…

Despite empirical evidence in support of the effectiveness of using tasks in young learners' classrooms, task implementation has been repeatedly reported as a thorny problem. An essential but under-researched issue is how in-service teacher education programme can be conducted to facilitate teachers' implementing tasks in their classrooms. This…

China has launched a nation-wide project of learning English as a "core" subject starting from the third grade in primary schools after the Ministry of Education (MOE) issued "National English Curriculum Standards for Compulsory Education" at the beginning of this century. However, EFL teachers are far from sufficient in rural…

This paper explores the attitudes of teachers, as adult learners, towards learning to do animation. A part of popular culture which second-language students enjoy, until recently, animation has been technically too demanding for non-specialists to learn. Adult learners can experience e-learning as transformative, but also as a barrier. Thus,…

Beliefs about knowledge, learning and teaching are assumed to impact teachers' practice (Brownlee, 2004; N. Entwistle, Skinner, D. Entwistle, & Orr, 2000). A change of beliefs is an important step for teacher learning, but it is often seen as difficult if not impossible (Cooney, Shealy, & Arvold, 1998). This study investigated the impact…

Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTAs) are front-line facilitators with first-hand contact with students. They play an important role in providing an engaging learning experience for undergraduate and postgraduate students. However, most of them have not received adequate training and guidance in teaching. This paper reports on an intensive and…

Recent educational changes in China such as the decentralization policy and the marketization of education have introduced concepts such as performativity, competition and effectiveness to the education sector and they have become part of the educational lexicon. Such policy shifts force more local participation in teacher education programmes and…

In-service teacher education in China has traditionally been mainly lecture-centred, theory-orientated, and experience-led. For various contemporary reasons such an approach may not be effective since it is unlikely to provide a context in which teachers are able to put educational theories into practice. "Action Education", a…

In China there are two kinds of teachers in skilled worker schools. One is the theory teacher who teaches general knowledge courses, basic technical courses, and specialized technology. The other is the production practice instructor who teaches basic skill and comprehensive competence in the production process. Teachers in skilled worker schools…

This volume contains papers submitted to the 10th Annual Conference of the Bulgarian Comparative Education Society, held in Kyustendil, Bulgaria, 12-15 June 2012. The overall goal of the 10th BCES conference is to facilitate discussion of different perspectives on international education providing a forum for scientific debate and constructive…

This paper describes an inservice training project for teachers of deaf children in Liaoning Province (China) by Gallaudet University (District of Columbia) faculty. The paper discusses challenges faced by the project, inservice program preparation, and implementation of the training experience. Suggestions include early assessment of participant…

Four American professors formed a team to provide instruction in English as a second language (ESL) to university professors in the People's Republic of China. Participants received 180 hours of instruction in ESL methodology and English language skills based on individual approaches that covered the Silent Way, Community Language Learning, and…

These three journal issues include the following articles: "Competence in Facilitation" (Graham O'Connel); "Is My Map to Scale?" (Mark Wilson); "A Trainer's Dozen" (Barbara Thornton and Mary Lou McCloskey); "Carrot Ice Cream: Reactions to the New or Different" (Tessa Woodward); "Feeding (back to) the…

This book presents a selection of papers from the annual, international, interdisciplinary conference of the World Association for Case Method Research & Application. Papers are categorized into six areas: (1) "Case Studies and Research" (e.g., subjectivity as a source of insight in case study research, evolution of a teaching case,…