Funds of Knowledge

Funds of Knowledge
Author: Norma Gonzalez
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 332
Release: 2006-04-21
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1135614059

The concept of "funds of knowledge" is based on a simple premise: people are competent and have knowledge, and their life experiences have given them that knowledge. The claim in this book is that first-hand research experiences with families allow one to document this competence and knowledge, and that such engagement provides many possibilities for positive pedagogical actions. Drawing from both Vygotskian and neo-sociocultural perspectives in designing a methodology that views the everyday practices of language and action as constructing knowledge, the funds of knowledge approach facilitates a systematic and powerful way to represent communities in terms of the resources they possess and how to harness them for classroom teaching. This book accomplishes three objectives: It gives readers the basic methodology and techniques followed in the contributors' funds of knowledge research; it extends the boundaries of what these researchers have done; and it explores the applications to classroom practice that can result from teachers knowing the communities in which they work. In a time when national educational discourses focus on system reform and wholesale replicability across school sites, this book offers a counter-perspective stating that instruction must be linked to students' lives, and that details of effective pedagogy should be linked to local histories and community contexts. This approach should not be confused with parent participation programs, although that is often a fortuitous consequence of the work described. It is also not an attempt to teach parents "how to do school" although that could certainly be an outcome if the parents so desired. Instead, the funds of knowledge approach attempts to accomplish something that may be even more challenging: to alter the perceptions of working-class or poor communities by viewing their households primarily in terms of their strengths and resources, their defining pedagogical characteristics. Funds of Knowledge: Theorizing Practices in Households, Communities, and Classrooms is a critically important volume for all teachers and teachers-to-be, and for researchers and graduate students of language, culture, and education.

Getting Teacher Evaluation Right

Getting Teacher Evaluation Right
Author: Linda Darling-Hammond
Publisher: Teachers College Press
Total Pages: 193
Release: 2015-04-28
Genre: Education
ISBN: 080777197X

Teacher evaluation systems are being overhauled by states and districts across the United States. And, while intentions are admirable, the result for many new systems is that goodoften excellentteachers are lost in the process. In the end, students are the losers. In her new book, Linda Darling-Hammond makes a compelling case for a research-based approach to teacher evaluation that supports collaborative models of teacher planning and learning. She outlines the most current research informing evaluation of teaching practice that incorporates evidence of what teachers do and what their students learn. In addition, she examines the harmful consequences of using any single student test as a basis for evaluating individual teachers. Finally, Darling-Hammond offers a vision of teacher evaluation as part of a teaching and learning system that supports continuous improvement, both for individual teachers and for the profession as a whole.

What Every Special Educator Must Know

What Every Special Educator Must Know
Author: Council for Exceptional Children
Publisher: Council For Exceptional Children
Total Pages: 160
Release: 2015-12-15
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0865865043

CEC wrote the book on special education ... literally. CEC s famous red book details the ethics, standards, and guidelines for special education preparation and practice. Delineating both knowledge and skill sets and individual content standards, What Every Special Educator Must Know is an invaluable resource for special education administrators, institutional faculty developing curriculum, state policy makers evaluating licensure requirements, and special educators planning their professional growth.

Teaching Problems and the Problems of Teaching

Teaching Problems and the Problems of Teaching
Author: Magdalene Lampert
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 518
Release: 2001-01-01
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780300099478

In this book an experienced classroom teacher and noted researcher on teaching takes us into her fifth grade math class through the course of a year. Magdalene Lampert shows how classroom dynamics--the complex relationship of teacher, student, and content--are critical in the process of bringing each student to a deeper understanding of mathematics, or any other subject. She offers valuable insights into students and teaching for all who are concerned about improving the learning that happens in the classroom. Lampert considers the teacher's and students' work from many different angles, in views large and small. She analyzes her own practice in a particular classroom, student by student and moment by moment. She also investigates the particular kind of teaching that aims at engaging elementary school students in learning fundamentally important ideas and skills by working on problems. Finally, she looks at the common problems of teaching that occur regardless of the individuals, subject matter, or kinds of practice involved. Lampert arrives at an original model of teaching practice that casts new light on the complexity in teachers' work and on the ways teachers can successfully deal with teaching problems.

Successful Educational Actions for Inclusion and Social Cohesion in Europe

Successful Educational Actions for Inclusion and Social Cohesion in Europe
Author: Ramon Flecha (Ed.)
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 115
Release: 2014-11-14
Genre: Education
ISBN: 3319111760

This monograph analyses and describes successful educational actions with a specific focus on vulnerable groups (i.e. youth, migrants, cultural groups e.g. Roma, women, and people with disabilities). Concrete data that shows success in school performance in subject matters such as math or language will be provided, as well as children, teachers and families accounts of the impact of this success. Alongside, there is an analysis of the relationship between these children’s educational performance with their inclusion or exclusion from different areas of society (i.e. housing, health, employment, and social and political participation). Many studies have already diagnosed and described the causes of educational and social exclusion of these vulnerable groups. This monograph, however, provides solutions, that is, actions for success identified through the INCLUD-ED project, thus providing both, contrasted data and solid theoretical background and development. Some examples of these actions are interactive groups (or heterogeneous grouping in the classroom with reorganisation of human resources), extension of the learning time, homework clubs, tutored libraries, family and community educative participation, family education, or dialogic literary gatherings. All these actions have been defined as successful educational actions, which mean that they lead to both efficiency and equity. Finally, recommendations for policy and practice are included and discussed.

Ethnic Matching

Ethnic Matching
Author: Donald Easton-Brooks
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 155
Release: 2019-03-13
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1475839677

Ethnic Matching: Academic Success of Students of Color is an in-depth exploration on the impact of ethnic matching in education, the paring of students of color with teachers of the same race. Research shows that this method has a positive and long-term impact on the academic experience of students of color. This book explores what makes this phenomenon relevant in today’s classrooms. Through interviewing quality teachers of color, this book sheds a light on the impact these teachers make on the academic experience of students of color. This approach is meant to provide all teachers valuable insight into techniques for engaging with diverse learners. Also, from these conversations, the book shows how the intentionality of culturally responsive practice can enhance the academic experience of students of color. Topics such as the challenges of recruiting and retaining quality teachers of color, as well as the valuable work being done on the local, state, and national level to promote diversifying the field of education as a way to provide equitable education for all students is also explored in this book.

Teacher Attitudes

Teacher Attitudes
Author: Marjorie Powell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 353
Release: 2018-06-12
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0429944489

Teachers’ attitudes have been a subject of study and interest for many years. Originally published in 1986, this bibliography attempts to review the large field of research between the years 1965 and 1984. To identify all the sources of information, and to list documents that discuss research on teachers’ attitudes. It does not include an assessment of the quality of the research reported in the listed documents, however, the value is in its comprehensiveness. Users of the bibliography can locate the listed studies and then evaluate the studies using criteria relevant to their individual purposes.

Teacher Beliefs and Classroom Performance

Teacher Beliefs and Classroom Performance
Author: James Raths
Publisher: IAP
Total Pages: 214
Release: 2003-12-01
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1607529653

This volume of Advances in Teacher Education is about beliefs held by teachers and addresses the important topic of teacher beliefs from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. Most of the authors who have contributed to this collection of essays assume that beliefs are propositions that are felt to be true by the person embracing them, but that do not necessarily rest on the kind of evidence that justifies the use of the term “knowledge.” Teacher beliefs are an important topic because it is hypothesized that teachers and teacher candidates use them to shape the information they receive from formal teacher preparation and to direct subsequent decision-making in the classroom.

The Socialization of Teachers

The Socialization of Teachers
Author: Colin Lacey
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 170
Release: 2012
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0415698898

The change from a student role to a teacher role can be one of the most abrupt and stressful transitions in working life but the process of socialization does not end when the student becomes a fully qualified teacher, as many writers, laymen and sociologists, would have us believe. Colin Lacey argues that socialization is a partial and rarely homogenous process. He illustrates this from a wide variety of interesting case material to show how student teachers adapt their responses to the classroom situation.

Educational Research and Innovation Fostering Students' Creativity and Critical Thinking What it Means in School

Educational Research and Innovation Fostering Students' Creativity and Critical Thinking What it Means in School
Author: Vincent-Lancrin Stéphan
Publisher: OECD Publishing
Total Pages: 360
Release: 2019-10-24
Genre:
ISBN: 926468400X

Creativity and critical thinking are key skills for complex, globalised and increasingly digitalised economies and societies. While teachers and education policy makers consider creativity and critical thinking as important learning goals, it is still unclear to many what it means to develop these skills in a school setting. To make it more visible and tangible to practitioners, the OECD worked with networks of schools and teachers in 11 countries to develop and trial a set of pedagogical resources that exemplify what it means to teach, learn and make progress in creativity and critical thinking in primary and secondary education.