Quality learning of physics : Conceptions held by high school and university teachers
- Brass, Catherine, Gunstone, Richard, Fensham, Peter
- Authors: Brass, Catherine , Gunstone, Richard , Fensham, Peter
- Date: 2003
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Research in Science Education Vol. 33, no. 2 (2003), p. 245-271
- Full Text:
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- Description: This paper reports an exploration of the conceptions of quality learning held by two samples of physics teachers - final year, high school physics teachers and academics teaching first year university physics. We begin by outlining our view of quality learning, that is a view of learning in which learners take control of their own learning and engage with active construction and reconstruction of their own meanings for concepts and phenomena. This view of quality learning recognises the crucial role of the affective dimension of learning on the extent to which students engage with and maintain such constructivist and metacognitive approaches to learning. The study explored the qualitatively different ways in which individuals conceptualise quality learning in physics, using semi structured interviews that explored aspects of learning that the respondents regarded as worth fostering in their classrooms. The interview approach was a modification of the Interview-About-Instances approach that allowed the possibility of interviewees suggesting instances of particular relevance to their view of quality learning. This process resulted in a considerable quantity of rich and complex data related to a large range of aspects of physics learning. These data are summarised here, and the qualitatively different conceptions of the respondents with respect to four significant aspects of physics learning are discussed. These aspects are: doing experimental work; linking physics to the real world; students taking responsibility for their own learning and being confident/feeling proud of what you can do. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
- Description: C1
- Authors: Brass, Catherine , Gunstone, Richard , Fensham, Peter
- Date: 2003
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Research in Science Education Vol. 33, no. 2 (2003), p. 245-271
- Full Text:
- Reviewed:
- Description: This paper reports an exploration of the conceptions of quality learning held by two samples of physics teachers - final year, high school physics teachers and academics teaching first year university physics. We begin by outlining our view of quality learning, that is a view of learning in which learners take control of their own learning and engage with active construction and reconstruction of their own meanings for concepts and phenomena. This view of quality learning recognises the crucial role of the affective dimension of learning on the extent to which students engage with and maintain such constructivist and metacognitive approaches to learning. The study explored the qualitatively different ways in which individuals conceptualise quality learning in physics, using semi structured interviews that explored aspects of learning that the respondents regarded as worth fostering in their classrooms. The interview approach was a modification of the Interview-About-Instances approach that allowed the possibility of interviewees suggesting instances of particular relevance to their view of quality learning. This process resulted in a considerable quantity of rich and complex data related to a large range of aspects of physics learning. These data are summarised here, and the qualitatively different conceptions of the respondents with respect to four significant aspects of physics learning are discussed. These aspects are: doing experimental work; linking physics to the real world; students taking responsibility for their own learning and being confident/feeling proud of what you can do. © 2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
- Description: C1
From supervising practica to mentoring professional experience : Possibilities for education students
- Authors: Zeegers, Margaret
- Date: 2005
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Teaching Education Vol. 16, no. 4 (2005), p. 349-357
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- Description: This paper explores the possibilities presented in examining taken for granted aspects of pre-service teacher practicum practices, especially in terms of naming and positioning within teacher education, as they present at a regional university in Ballarat, Australia. The University of Ballarat has introduced a new P-10 teacher education course which is about to enter its fourth year. The course has focused some of its attention on traditional aspects of paid supervisory and assessment roles of practising teachers in relation to student teachers. As a result, changes have been made, with reconfigured foci on the roles of both practising teachers and undergraduate students, as well as those of other staff who support the new programme. One such focus is on what Schön described as "indeterminate zones of practice," and the result has been a research programme exploring those zones as part of mentorship in relation to mandated supervision and assessment requirements for graduate registration. Examination of data provided by transcripts of focus groups conducted with the students, mentors, community coordinators, and university teachers involved in the programmes suggests possibilities that may serve to inform efforts to meet a major part of the challenge to better prepare pre-service teachers in finding innovative and relevant ways to improve practicum experience from the outset of undergraduate education. Those involved in the programme at the University of Ballarat have examined assumptions underlying participants' roles in relation to partnerships within communities of practice in relation to the roles of university and educators in the field, as well as critically examining concepts of mentoring that guide reflection on practice and scaffold student learning. Such considerations go beyond concerns of individual pre-service teacher classroom performances, focusing on the generalizability of pre-service teacher experience in relation to the profession as a whole. © 2005 School of Education, University of Queensland.
- Description: C1
- Description: 2003001329
- Authors: Zeegers, Margaret
- Date: 2005
- Type: Text , Journal article
- Relation: Teaching Education Vol. 16, no. 4 (2005), p. 349-357
- Full Text:
- Reviewed:
- Description: This paper explores the possibilities presented in examining taken for granted aspects of pre-service teacher practicum practices, especially in terms of naming and positioning within teacher education, as they present at a regional university in Ballarat, Australia. The University of Ballarat has introduced a new P-10 teacher education course which is about to enter its fourth year. The course has focused some of its attention on traditional aspects of paid supervisory and assessment roles of practising teachers in relation to student teachers. As a result, changes have been made, with reconfigured foci on the roles of both practising teachers and undergraduate students, as well as those of other staff who support the new programme. One such focus is on what Schön described as "indeterminate zones of practice," and the result has been a research programme exploring those zones as part of mentorship in relation to mandated supervision and assessment requirements for graduate registration. Examination of data provided by transcripts of focus groups conducted with the students, mentors, community coordinators, and university teachers involved in the programmes suggests possibilities that may serve to inform efforts to meet a major part of the challenge to better prepare pre-service teachers in finding innovative and relevant ways to improve practicum experience from the outset of undergraduate education. Those involved in the programme at the University of Ballarat have examined assumptions underlying participants' roles in relation to partnerships within communities of practice in relation to the roles of university and educators in the field, as well as critically examining concepts of mentoring that guide reflection on practice and scaffold student learning. Such considerations go beyond concerns of individual pre-service teacher classroom performances, focusing on the generalizability of pre-service teacher experience in relation to the profession as a whole. © 2005 School of Education, University of Queensland.
- Description: C1
- Description: 2003001329
Beyond cognition : Affective learning and undergraduate education student engagement in learning
- Authors: Zeegers, Margaret
- Date: 2008
- Type: Conference paper
- Relation: Paper presented at The European Conference on Educational Research: From Teaching to Learning?, Gothenburg, Sweden : 10th-12th September 2008
- Full Text:
- Description: In this paper I report on a project designed to enhance student teacher engagement in learning by developing an explicit pedagogy of affective learning, traditionally ignored in teacher education as discipline-based studies have dominated the field. Strategies investigated are based on reading engaged on affective levels, intertwined with current approaches to academic reading, with metacognitive responses recorded by the students as part of student evaluation of their own learning. Reading has been structured around literature reading circles (affective reading component), and academic reading circles (professional reading component). The project uses strategy in relation to the identifiable stages in a teaching sequence which help students to realise a learning goal, so that they use learning strategies and respond to teaching strategies that scaffold their learning. The reading program pushes the boundaries of their discipline-based learning, engaging what Schön refers to as ‘indeterminate zones of practice’ as giving an affective dimension, having wider implications for student engagement in discipline-based units than straight academic encounters with discipline-based literature allows. The reading is designed to integrate discipline-based knowledge, the implications of this for professional lives, and the affective dimensions of professional practice. The results of this project indicate that, according to student evaluations, their capacities for self monitoring and self evaluation was enhanced at the same time as their own engagement with relevant literature deepened their understandings of issues that emerged from that engagement.
- Description: 2003006620
- Authors: Zeegers, Margaret
- Date: 2008
- Type: Conference paper
- Relation: Paper presented at The European Conference on Educational Research: From Teaching to Learning?, Gothenburg, Sweden : 10th-12th September 2008
- Full Text:
- Description: In this paper I report on a project designed to enhance student teacher engagement in learning by developing an explicit pedagogy of affective learning, traditionally ignored in teacher education as discipline-based studies have dominated the field. Strategies investigated are based on reading engaged on affective levels, intertwined with current approaches to academic reading, with metacognitive responses recorded by the students as part of student evaluation of their own learning. Reading has been structured around literature reading circles (affective reading component), and academic reading circles (professional reading component). The project uses strategy in relation to the identifiable stages in a teaching sequence which help students to realise a learning goal, so that they use learning strategies and respond to teaching strategies that scaffold their learning. The reading program pushes the boundaries of their discipline-based learning, engaging what Schön refers to as ‘indeterminate zones of practice’ as giving an affective dimension, having wider implications for student engagement in discipline-based units than straight academic encounters with discipline-based literature allows. The reading is designed to integrate discipline-based knowledge, the implications of this for professional lives, and the affective dimensions of professional practice. The results of this project indicate that, according to student evaluations, their capacities for self monitoring and self evaluation was enhanced at the same time as their own engagement with relevant literature deepened their understandings of issues that emerged from that engagement.
- Description: 2003006620
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