Introduction to Special Feature: Alternative perspectives on school improvement     

Alma Harris  David Hopkins 《School Leadership & Management》2013,33(1):9-14

The growth of interest in school improvement in the last decade has been striking. In the UK, the educational system has moved to a position where school improvement is not merely expected but demanded. As a result, a large number of school improvement projects and initiatives have emerged to meet this demand. Many of these initiatives have emphasised structural change and have located change efforts at the level of the school. However, the research evidence concerning successful school improvement programmes demonstrates the importance of changing school culture and focusing upon teaching and learning. The Improving the Quality of Education For All (IQEA) project embraces both these elements. Over the last 10 years the project has achieved demonstrable success in a diverse range of school contexts and is at the forefront of school improvement work within the UK. This special feature considers IQEA from a variety of perspectives and provides important insights into the theory, process and practice of successful school improvement.  相似文献   

How fifth grade Latino/a bilingual students use their linguistic resources in the classroom and laboratory during science instruction     

Alma R. Stevenson 《Cultural Studies of Science Education》2013,8(4):973-989

  相似文献   

Poetic Representations in Sport and Physical Education: Insider Perspectives 1     

Andrew C. Sparkes  Lynda Nilges  Peter Swan  Fiona Dowling 《Sport, Education and Society》2013,18(2):153-177

As part of the emergence of new writing practices in the social sciences, qualitative researchers have begun to harness the potential of poetic representations as a means of analysing social worlds and communicating their findings to others. To date, this genre has been little used within the domains of sport and physical education. Accordingly, in this article, we provide examples of poetic representations and seek to generate insights into the process of their construction by exploring the perspectives of their authors. A rationale for choosing this genre is outlined and the potential benefits and risks of making this choice for both the researcher and the audience are considered. It is concluded that poetic representations are a worthy addition to the analytical repertoire in qualitative research.  相似文献   

Puerto Rican Identity: Themes that Unite and Divide     

Joan M. Fayer  Alma Simounet de Geigel  Joseph M. Ferri 《Journal of American culture (Malden, Mass. : 2003)》1985,8(4):83-91

  相似文献   

A generic performance appraisal system for classified employees     

William W. Swan  C. Thomas Holmes  Carvin L. Brown  Michael L. Short  Lois Deweese 《Journal of Personnel Evaluation in Education》1988,1(3):293-310

  相似文献   

Science achievement as it relates to science curricula and programs at the sixth grade level in montana public schools     

Malcolm D. Swan 《科学教学研究杂志》1966,4(2):112-123

This study deals primarily with the relationship between pupil achievement in science and factors in the science program. An inventory of science attitudes, interests, and appreciations was constructed and administered in connection with an advanced science test to a large sample of sixth graders. Their teachers completed science teaching questionnaires. The results of the study are significant and are a contribution to the field.  相似文献   

Authors and Open Access： Effective Ways to Achieve OA in China   总被引：6，自引：0，他引：6  

Alma Swan 《图书情报工作》2005,49(12):17-25

Although there are effective methods available to authors for providing open access to their work, more than half are still not doing so and provision in China is poorer than in many other countries. There are a number of issues and concerns that dissuade authors from making their work open access ： some are still unaware of the concept and of the increased visibility and impact that open access brings; many are unfamiliar with open access journals and how they work; many are uninformed about self-archiving and for some of those who are aware of the possibility of providing open access by this means, concerns about copyright and technical issues remain. Yet all these worries can be addressed with simple facts that reassure and encourage authors to adopt open access to benefit themselves, their research and their teaching. There is also a wealth of resources now available to authors that provide information and advice on open access and its effects. As institutions and research funders, both with a strong interest in maximising the visibility and impact of research they support, begin to develop formal policies on open access, models for its provision are emerging. The optimal model is a network of institution-based open access repositories from which content can be harvested by open access search engines （ the basic＇ no frills＇ variant） or by service providers who add functionality or selectivity to provide users with value-enhanced products.  相似文献   

Choice of operation in verbal problems with decimal numbers     

Alan Bell  Malcolm Swan  Glenda Taylor 《Educational Studies in Mathematics》1981,12(4):399-420

This article examines the conceptual problems that children experience when attempting to solve verbal problems which contain decimal numbers. After discussing the existing research, we then describe an experiment that was designed in three phases:

1. Exploratory interviews to discover existing conceptions and difficulties and to discover how pupils made use of diagrams, simpler numbers, and strategies. These interviews exposed difficulties with the understanding of place value, the effect of multiplying and dividing by a positive number less than one, the symbolisms of division and its noncommutative nature, the units associated with the numbers and also with familiar names for the operations. The three strategies were all found to be unfamiliar to pupils and their difficulties are discussed.
2. The design and administration of a diagnostic test, based on the results of these interviews, to a class of less able 14 year olds.
3. The preparation and use of calculator enriched teaching materials designed to remedy the identified misconceptions. From the pre- and post-test results we note the dramatic success of the teaching in improving pupils' understanding of place value, although there is a more modest improvement in enabling pupils to choose the correct operation by drawing diagrams, using easier numbers and estimating.

  相似文献   

Innovation and Commitment in Physical Education Teaching     

Michael J. Reynolds  Peter A. Swan 《Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education》1991,19(2):131-141

Based on a theory of organisational socialisation, this study aimed to investigate physical education teachers’ orientations towards teaching. These orientations were also compared with lesson objectives and the methods by which teachers coped with their school environments. Ten male physical education teachers were selected by a tertiary college teaching practice coordinator. Five were identified as innovators and five as custodial or non‐innovative teachers. Each teacher was interviewed at length by one of the two researchers. The results from this exploratory study indicated some support for the organisational theory in the career patterns of the innovative teachers significantly differed from the custodial physical educators. For examle, the custodial teachers had experienced very stable career histories and had showed little inclination for study leave or other substantive breaks from teaching. The analysis also indicated links between lesson objectives and coping behaviour; while the custodial teachers tended to adjust their ideas to match those of the schools, the innovators were more determined to change decisions or policies with which they disagreed.  相似文献   

Professional learning through the collaborative design of problem-solving lessons     

Geoff Wake  Malcolm Swan  Colin Foster 《Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education》2016,19(2-3):243-260

This article analyses lesson study as a mode of professional learning, focused on the development of mathematical problem solving processes, using the lens of cultural-historical activity theory. In particular, we draw attention to two activity systems, the classroom system and the lesson-study system, and the importance of making artefacts instrumental in both. We conceptualise the lesson plan as a boundary object and use this to illustrate how professional learning takes place through the introduction of carefully designed artefacts that draw on teachers’ professional knowledge of potential student approaches, and to the nature of progression in problem-solving processes. We identify the roles of instrumentalisation and instrumentation in supporting professional learning as these artefacts are prepared for use before a lesson and as they are again used as catalysts for reflection in post-lesson discussions. These artefacts are seen to effectively facilitate the socially situated learning of all participants. We conclude that the design of artefacts as boundary objects that support teaching and professional learning in their respective activity systems may be fundamental to the success of lesson study as a collaborative venture.  相似文献