New learning in teacher education programs

Proceedings of the 2004 Australian Teacher Education Association Conference

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Making spaces: Regenerating the profession Proceedings of the 2004 Australian Teacher Education National Conference

Edited by Sharynne McLeod, PhD School of Teacher Education Charles Sturt University Bathurst, NSW 2795

A publication of Australian Teacher Education Association www.atea.schools.net.au The Australian Teacher Education Association Conference was held at Charles Sturt University Bathurst, 7-10 July, 2004.

© Australian Teacher Education Association, July 2004 National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication Data: Australian Teacher Education Association. National Conference, 2004. Making spaces: Regenerating the profession. Proceedings of the 2004 Australian Teacher Education Association National Conference. ISBN 0-9752324-1-X CD-ROM version Title: Making Spaces - Regenerating the Profession: Proceedings of the 2004 ATEA Conference, CSU Bathurst

Disclaimer To the best of the Australian Teacher Education Association’s (“the Association”) knowledge this information is valid at the time of publication. The Association makes no warranty or representation in relation to the content or accuracy of the material in this publication. The Association expressly dis claims any and all liability (including liability for negligence) in respect of use of the information provided.


Editorial The 2004 annual conference of the Australian Teacher Education Association Making spaces: Regenerating the profession was held in Bathurst from 7-10 July. The 50 papers in these proceedings are representative of the many outstanding presentations at that conference. The papers published here were subjected to a thorough and anonymous peer review process. The names of the reviewers appear on page xiii of these proceedings. Using stringent criteria, two reviewers independently commented on each paper. Provisionally accepted papers were then returned to the author(s) for revision before inclusion into the conference proceedings. Of the 59 papers originally submitted for peer review, 50 were finally accepted for publication. I would like to thank the contributors, reviewers, conference organizing committee and particularly Associate Professor Jo-Anne Reid, Tony Loughland, Wendy Hastings and Fiona Reedy whose support enabled the prompt publication of the proceedings. I am pleased to bring you these proceedings which I believe make stimulating reading and will further challenge us in our education of teachers.

Sharynne McLeod, PhD Editor of the 2004 Australian Teacher Education Association Conference Proceedings School of Teacher Education Charles Sturt University BATHURST NSW 2795 June 22, 2004


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Table of contents * 1

Jo-Anne Reid Peter Hudson & Campbell McRobbie

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Jennifer Rennie & Diane Szarkowicz Dianne Mulcahy & Gaell Hildebrand Susan Wilks, Manjula Waniganayake & Ron Linser Marilyn Pietsch & John Williamson Julie Lancaster Julie Lancaster Anne Power & Robert Waters Erica Smith

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5 6 7 8 9

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Alan Bain, Lucia Zundans, Julie Lancaster & Julie Hollitt Julie Clark

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Simone White

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Jennifer Munday & Richard Taffe

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Robert McFarlane & Sharynne McLeod Maggie Clarke

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David Zyngier

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Rosie Le Cornu

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Leonie Seaton

Introduction from the President Designing, implementing and evaluating a mentoring intervention for preservice teachers of primary science Careers in education: Developing inside and outside the classroom Co-constructing spaces and selves: Problembased learning and the beginning teacher Leadership on-line: Using a computermediated role play to promote critical thinking

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11 21 29

Ready and waiting: Beginning primary teachers in NSW Pedagogical spaces and memory traces Component analysis: Let’s be more efficient Community learning: Regenerating pedagogic spaces The effects of a decade of national training reform upon practitioners in vocational education and training Collaborative course design and mapping: A team-based approach to course development and review

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The impact of a field experience program on preservice teachers in elementary mathematics Redefining teacher education through a ‘multiple space’ model: Examining the forgotten spaces that teachers work in. Learning to learn: An investigation into the way student teachers transfer their own learning to help children learn Pedagogy, andragogy and teleogogy

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Teacher engagement in professional experience. Sustaining field experience for our future teachers. Choosing our ideas, words and actions carefully: Teaching and learning with our preservice teachers about how to teach. Learning circles: Providing spaces for renewal of both teachers and teacher educators Exploring the “gap between hope and happening”: Gender equity policy in New South Wales schools

45 53 61 69

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99

107

115 123

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141 151


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Ann Baxter, Garry Hoban & Brian Ferry Brenton Doecke & Alex Kostogriz Judy Peters

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Michael Dyson Sue Wilson

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Mary Klein

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Deb Clarke

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Dawn Naylor & Les Pereira Vickie Vance, Lynda Ireland & Lucia Zundans John Rafferty, Sally Knipe & Louise Hard Lizzie Chase, Alison Campbell, Ingrid Dalrymple, Donna Davison, Paul Ellis, Kris Euridge, Pam Johnson, Allison Throwden & Maryem Toufayli Christine Trimingham Jack, Linda Devereux, Mary Macken-Horarik & Kate Wilson Maxine Cooper & Elizabeth Hirst

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Natasha Wright

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Leonie Rowan & Chris Bigum

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Tony Loughland

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Rhetoric vs reality for beginning teacher competencies: Who says what beginning teachers need to know? Heteroglossic spaces: Interrogating academic literacies in teacher education Student teachers reflecting through problembased scenarios Dare to be different: Write an autobiography Reclaiming the agenda: Focusing on what teachers do best for building mental health capacity Thinking innovatively about advancing the innovative potential of preservice teachers Creating a relevant space: Evaluating a physical education elective Integrated classrooms in tertiary educational settings Defeating the tyrant of distance for academic high achievers in rural New South Wales

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Perceptions of reality: Meeting the challenges of establishing a new teaching degree

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Mentoring and questioning: Newly appointed secondary teachers set their own agendas for change in their classrooms

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Scaffolding academic literacy: Case study of pre-service teachers

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Mapping spaces and choreographing classrooms: A study of communities of practice, learning and identity. Teacher challenges: Making spaces for children with autism Beyond pretence: New sensibilities for computing and communication technologies in teacher education Dangerous orbits: Satellite campuses and educational ideologies

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167 177 187 195

203 213 221 229

279 287

295


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Jo-Anne Reid with Ninetta Santoro, Lee Simpson, Cathryn McConaghy, Laurie Crawford & Barbara Bond David R Cole Christine Gardner & John Williamson Vickie Vance

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Richard Pickersgill

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Gloria Latham, Mindy Blaise, Karen Malone, Shelley Dole, Julie Faulkner & Josephine Lang Pauline Jones & Stephen Relf Chris Bigum & Catherine Harris Susan Macdonald

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41 42 43 44

Noelene Weatherby-Fell & Brian Kean

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Lynda Ireland Tony Loughland & Robert John Parkes

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Michael Davies & Fiona Bryer

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Lindsay Fitzclarence & Scott Webster Brian Ferry, Lisa Kervin, Sarah Puglisi, Jan Turbill, Brian Cambourne, David Jonassen & John Hedberg Georgina Cattley

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Making spaces for Indigenous teachers in ‘the impenetrable whiteness of schooling’

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The mediation of teacher education: Part one From policy to practice: The forgotten interstices A quest for collaboration and community: One teacher’s search in online professional development Hearing voices: The linguistic turn and educational research New learning in teacher education programs

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Adventures in multiliteracies: Negotiating pedagogic relations in an online era Negotiating with ghosts and whales: Teacher education at Warrnambool School, space and recreation: An ethnography of adolescent girls’ experiences Mental health and teacher education: Preparing beginning teachers who are resilient for themselves and ot hers When teachers are with the babies Backward mapping and the big idea: Employing social constructionist theory in curriculum planning How lists of teacher attributes address emotional skills for healthy teacher professionals Liberating from literalness: Making space for meaningful forms of abstraction Using a simulated classroom to support preservice teacher decision making processes

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Feedback or reflective practice during teaching experience placement in schools?

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341 351

369 377 387

397 407

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425 435


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ATEA 2004 editorial consultants Dr Jo Ailwood, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Professor Tania Aspland, Faculty of Education, Edith Cowan University Dr Alan Bain, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Professor Richard Bates, Faculty of Education, Deakin University Professor Marie Brennan, Faculty of Education, University of South Australia Ms Deb Clarke , School of Human Movement, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Ms Maggie Clarke , School of Education and Early Childhood Studies, University of Western Sydney Dr Kennece Coombe , School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Dubbo Ms Rachael Cornius -Randall, School of Education, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga Dr Brenton Doecke , Faculty of Education, Monash University, Clayton Vic Associate Professor Rod Francis, School of Education, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga Dr Sandra Frid, Faculty of Education, Curtin University of Technology Ms Christine Gardner, School of Education, University of Tasmania Ms Trish Gibson, Board of Teacher Registration, Queensland Ms Annette Green, School of Education, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga Professor Bill Green, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Mr Graeme Hall, Board of Teacher Registration, Queensland Ms Louise Hard, Murray Education Unit, Charles Sturt University, Albury Dr Linda Harrison, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Ms Wendy Hastings , School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Ms Lynda Ireland, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Ms Pauline Jones, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Ms Santhi Krishnasamy, Murray Education Unit, Charles Sturt University, Albury Associate Professor Alison Lee, Faculty of Education, University of Technology Sydney Ms Julie Lancaster, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Mr Will Letts , School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Mr Tony Loughland, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Dubbo Ms Julie Martello, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Dr Kay Martinez, Teaching and Learning Development, James Cook University, Townsville Dr Sharynne McLeod, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Dr Jan Millwater, School Of Learning And Professional Studies, Queensland University of Technology - Kelvin Grove Ms Bev Pennell, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Dr Richard Pickersgill, School of Education, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga Mr John Rafferty, Murray Education Unit, Charles Sturt University, Albury Associate Professor Jo-Anne Reid, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Professor Peter Renshaw, School of Education and Professional Studies, Griffith University, Gold Coast Dr Ninetta Santoro, Deakin University Ms Tracey Simpson, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Associate Professor Erica Smith, School of Education, Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga Dr Noel Thomas , School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Dr Robin C. Wills , Faculty of Education, University of Tasmania , Launceston Dr Peter Wilson, School of Teacher Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst Associate Professor Robyn Zevenbergen, School of Education and Professional Studies, Griffith University

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Making Spaces: Regenerating the Profession Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, July 7-10 2004 Introduction from the President Australian Teacher Education Association Over the past ten years, as the teaching profession has ‘aged’ and large numbers of teachers have moved towards retirement, a large number of university-based professional teacher educators have aged with it. For Tony Vinson (2003) this is an important consideration “from the point of view of importing new ideas into teacher education’ (Inquiry into the Provision of Public Eduction in NSW p. 302). Education academics, he says, “have an older and more peaked age profile than all [Australian] university academics […]. In 2001 in New South Wales 74% of education academics, but only 61% of all academics, were aged 45 or older (Vinson 2003, p. 302). For the past four or five years, members of the Executive of the Australian Teacher Education Association have noted with concern the ‘greying’ of ATEA and the decreasing numbers of active and energetic young members involved in the association. For us it seems that our profession is ‘regenerating’, and that our professional associations need to do this too, in the sense of needing to make space for new people, new ideas and new approaches to teacher education. There are increasing numbers of younger academics employed in university settings as members of the profession, who are keen to move teacher education forward to meet the challenges of preparing teachers for the changing nature of education in Australia in the twenty-first century. But many of these are still in less powerful positions within their university hierarchies, many are still working double and triple time to complete research doctorates to establish their career paths, and many find that there is not much space in which their voices may be heard. Many, too, are left insecure and unsettled by the continuing climate of economic rationalism of academic work practice and regimes of accountability for performance in research and teaching that characterises the higher education sector at the present time. Key issues from ATEA’s point of view in the current educational agenda include the community of practice ideal for teacher education, and the forms of partnership and situated learning that this entails; including the expansion of teacher education away from a focus on just the school setting. We are also concerned with the professional development and education of teachers in the tertiary sector, and with the increasing involvement of government into debates on teaching standards and the registration of teacher education providers. National priorities, including the establishment of the National Institute for Quality Teaching and School Leadership, which will exert marketdriven impact on our practice, do focus on the need for teacher education to move towards change in its scope and processes. Although setting external frameworks on our conversations as a profession, such external interest and investment offers opportunities for speculative and innovative practice and reform. Our conference themes: pedagogical spaces, emotional spaces, sustainable spaces and the unbounded ‘other’ spaces that characterise such review are evocative and generative within the current context – and conference participants have much to say about them.


These proceedings from our 2004 conference, Making Spaces: Regenerating the Profession, are one means by which ATEA is working to ensure that the new generation of teacher educators can be heard in the professiona l arena. Teacher education reform is an ongoing process that needs to be led by the profession itself, on the basis of significant and well- informed research into the material, social, emotional, pedagogical, historical, intellectual and political conditio ns and knowledge bases that structure and produce educational policy and practice. The papers in this volume range across these areas, encompassing the sorts of concerns and issues that we need to make space for in our curriculum and pedagogy – from mental health to simulated classrooms, from online leadership and multiliteracies to mentoring and course innovation. On behalf of the ATEA executive committee, who have steered this Association through 2003-2004, I commend these papers to you, as participants in this conference, and as readers beyond this context. Jo-Anne Reid President of ATEA June 22, 2004

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Designing, implementing and evaluating a mentoring intervention for preservice teachers of primary science Peter Hudson and Campbell McRobbie Centre for Mathematics, Science and Technology Education Queensland University of Technology

The quality of primary science teaching in Australia needs to be enhanced. Sixty final year preservice teachers (control group) and 12 final year preservice teachers (intervention group, who received a mentoring program) were compared after their four-week practicum. A 34-item Likert scale survey measured mentees’ perceptions of their mentoring in primary science teaching on five mentoring factors (i.e., personal attributes, system requirements, pedagogical knowledge, modelling, and feedback), and intervention mentors were interviewed. ANOVA results indicated statistically significant differences on the first four factors for the intervention group. Mentors also claimed the intervention assisted the mentees’ development and their own development in primary science teaching.

Mentoring appears to be a key for enhancing the knowledge and skills of primary teachers, and this includes preservice teachers (Edwards & Collison, 1996; Reiman & Thies-Sprinthall, 1998; Tomlinson, 1995). Educators (e.g., Mullen, Cox, Boettcher & Adoue, 1997) have pushed for new patterns of mentoring within preservice teacher education, particularly emphasising the shift from generic to specific mentoring (Jarvis, McKeon, Coates & Vause, 2001). Identifying effective mentoring practices for primary science teaching may lead towards developing quality mentoring programs for learning how to teach primary science education, consistent with current education reforms (Hudson & Skamp, 2001). However, general primary teachers are not experts in all subjects in the primary school (e.g., Mulholland, 1999) so they must learn to teach more effectively in subject areas where their quality of teaching is low, and because of the general nature of primary teaching, mentors must also learn to mentor in such subject areas. This will require considerable guidance to ensure that me ntors are developing not only their mentoring skills but also their own teaching skills in specific subjects such as primary science if mentors and mentees are to be effective in their practices. The mentoring intervention employed in this study aimed to develop the mentor’s mentoring knowledge and skills of primary science teaching and, simultaneously, enhance the mentee’s primary science teaching. It (referred to as the “mentoring program”) was designed to be collaborative, and was constructed to reflect the development of the factors and associated items contained in a final survey and previously subjected to confirmatory factor analysis (Hudson, Skamp & Brooks, 2004). The factors identified from the literature and pilot studies were: Personal Attributes, System Requirements, Pedagogical Knowledge, Modelling, and Feedback. For example, the attributes and practices associated with the Feedback factor for developing the mentee’s primary science teaching, required a mentor to: (1) articulate expectations (Ganser, 2002), (2) review lesson plans (Monk & Dillon, 1995), (3) observe practice (Tomlinson, 1995), (4) provide oral feedback (Ganser, 1995), (5) provide written


feedback (Rosaen & Lindquist, 1992), and (6) assist the mentee to evaluate teaching practices (Long, 1995). Each attribute and/or practice on the mentoring program was provided with literature background information and suggested mentoring strategies that aimed to target survey items. For example, Item 32 (factor: Pedagogical Knowledge) states, “During my final professional school experience (i.e., internship/practicum) in primary science teaching my mentor showed me how to assess the students’ learning of science.” Mentoring strategies associated with this item included: linking assessments to outcomes, making references to the syllabus, and demonstrating an assessment procedure (e.g., Figure 1). The aim of this study was to design, implement, and evaluate a mentoring intervention for preservice teachers of primary science.

Assessing the students’ learning of science Background information • A mentor with knowledge of assessment methods of science teaching can assist the mentee in sequential and purposeful planning for the teaching of science (Corcoran & Andrew, 1988). • Gilbert and Qualter (1996) emphasise the importance of assessment for teaching and learning activities within the science curriculum. • Conducting an assessment of students is addressing a system requirement (Kahle, 1999). • Mentors need to help mentees “use and respond to a variety of appropriately designed assessments at the beginning of new science topics as well as throughout the teaching process” (Jarvis et al., 2001, p. 10). Strategies • Tell the mentee that assessments of students are related to the learning outcomes of a science lesson(s). Refer the mentee to the science syllabus. • Demonstrate how you would assess students’ learning on a science lesson you had just taught, and show how you would record the students’ progress, e.g., checklist. Figure 1. Example of background litera ture relating to an item and associated mentoring strategies related to the “Pedagogical Knowledge” factor Research methods The study reported here is part of a larger study investigating mentoring in preservice primary science teaching. This was a mixed method study including a randomised twogroup posttest only design (control group and intervention group; Hittleman & Simon, 2002) investigating the perceptions of mentees’ mentoring in primary science teaching through a validated survey instrument after their professional experiences and interviews with mentors to elaborate their survey responses. The “Mentoring for

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Effective Primary Science Teaching” (MEPST) instrument used in this study evolved through a series of iterations including small-scale interviews with mentors and mentees (n=10), two pilot tests, and confirmatory factor analysis of 331 final year preservice teachers’ perceptions of mentoring preservice primary science teaching. The final theoretical model produced good “goodness of fit” indices (χ2 =1335, df=513, CMIDF=2.60, IFI=.922, CFI=.921, RMR=.066, RMSEA=.070, p