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How do teachers perceive and experience the impact of evaluation feedback across various domains of their work? This study investigates whether there are qualitatively distinct groups of teachers in the United States based on teacher perceived impact of evaluation feedback using the 2013 Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS 2013). Applying latent class analysis to the U.S. sample of lower-secondary school teachers (n=1,824), we find that there are four distinctive groups of teachers: Receptive (25%), Compliant (15%), Motivated (27%), and Indifferent (33%). Our analysis shows feedback sources and teacher beliefs about the evaluation's purpose are significant predictors of teacher class assignment. Finally, controlling for various individual and school-level characteristics, these teacher groups vary significantly in their intention to change school.

Education policy research has seen a growing interest in the consequences of teacher trade unionism of global education reform. Less attention has been paid to teacher unions as strategic social actors attempting to influence both national education policy and employment relations at the school level. Addressing this topic, the article examines the challenges and dilemmas of teacher trade unions as they negotiate education policies in crisis contexts. With a particular concern for school and teacher evaluation, it focuses on reforms in Greek education, as these have played out in a period of structural adjustment and prolonged austerity (2010-2023). Drawing on interview data with leading members of the primary and secondary teacher unions, the article discusses the conditions in which reforms have emerged and the responses they have evoked from teacher unions in an education state undergoing historically significant change. It argues that the crisis provoked uncertainties of strategy in Greek teacher unionism. Nevertheless, unions maintain their identity as active components of movements for educational change and as organisations that aim to defend the status and working conditions of their members. Debates in Greece highlight a combination of economic and political aspirations, characteristic of teacher unions across Southern Europe.

Purpose: Improving and assuring the quality of higher education has become a key element of policy agendas worldwide. To this end, a complete accountability system has been developed through various evaluation procedures. Specifically, this study analyzes the perceptions of university teaching staff on the impact of performance appraisal systems on their professional activity, health and personal lives. Design/methodology/approach: The study adopted a nonexperimental descriptive and causal-comparative design using a questionnaire that was completed by a sample of 2,183 Spanish teachers. The data obtained were analyzed using descriptive statistics and comparisons of differences. Findings: The results show that, according to teachers, the evaluation criteria undermine the quality of their work by encouraging them to neglect teaching, increase scientific production and engage in unethical research practices. Their views also emphasize the social and health-related consequences of an increasingly competitive work climate, including increased stress levels. Finally, significant differences are observed regarding gender, professional category and academic discipline, with women, junior faculty and social sciences teachers expressing particularly strong views. Originality/value: The originality of this study lies in the application of a method that contributes to the international debate through a national perspective (Spain) that has so far received little attention.

We study the returns to experience in teaching, estimated using supervisor ratings from classroom observations. We describe the assumptions required to interpret changes in observation ratings over time as the causal effect of experience on performance. We compare two difference-in-differences strategies: the two-way fixed effects estimator common in the literature, and an alternative which avoids potential bias arising from effect heterogeneity. Using data from Tennessee and Washington, DC, we show empirical tests relevant to assessing the identifying assumptions and substantive threats--e.g., leniency bias, manipulation, changes in incentives or job assignments--and find our estimates are robust to several threats.

Faculty members are entrusted with great power to decide who deserves space within the academic profession. Given that the profession's central mission is knowledge production, such decisions inevitably concern epistemic matters, and specifically, what constitutes legitimate knowledge. From this perspective, faculty hiring is not only a matter of inviting new scholars into the academy but an opportunity to welcome new, creative knowledge, or perhaps knowledge that unsettles what has been taken-for-granted. Through interviews with 33 research university professors, we explored how search committees approached epistemic matters throughout the hiring process. Our analysis surfaced three distinct approaches. Defensive committees acted as if their primary task was safeguarding their discipline and department from disruptive epistemic contributions. Inclusive committees foregrounded local community, especially students' learning interests, and welcomed innovative even disruptive epistemic contributions. Conflictive committees displayed both tendencies, but ultimately favored scholars whose epistemic contributions would not disrupt the department or discipline. Across all three approaches, participants described how committees relied on conventions that generated both epistemic and demographic exclusion.

Purpose: This study introduces a policy with great strategic significance and far-reaching impact by analyzing the background, measures, and future development trends of teacher evaluation reform in China. Design/Approach/Methods: This study primarily conducts a policy text analysis of the section on teacher evaluation of the "Overall Plan for Deepening the Reform of Educational Evaluation in the New Era". Findings: The "Overall Plan for Deepening the Reform of Educational Evaluation in the New Era" was drafted to enhance the quality of Chinese teachers and address many problems in teacher evaluation. It comprised four sections: teachers' professional ethics, teaching effectiveness, evaluation models and methods, and honorary titles. The policy has distinctive features such as the high status and authority of the issuing body, a holistic and systematic nature, and an orientation toward practical issues. This article proposes three major policy foresights: promoting implementation through the force of political trends, giving schools autonomy in teacher evaluations, and implementing progressive reforms. Originality/Value: This study conducted a specialist analysis of the policy in combination with the real scenario and institutional environment of Chinese teacher evaluation, which could encourage international peers to better understand Chinese teacher evaluation policies and promote policy learning and dissemination internationally.

English has long been regarded as the universal language. Countries that were earlier reluctant to learn English have also changed their stand due to its global reach. The nonnative English speaker's proficiency largely depends on the College English Teaching (CET) and its evaluation methods. Traditional teaching evaluation models failed to consider all the difficulties of language learning. This drawback has led to researchers focusing on integrating Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques in CET evaluation. This work is in line with such an effort to contribute a novel Teaching Evaluation Method (TEM) that employs a Machine Learning (ML) algorithm. The objective of this work is to provide colleges and other institutions with a practical framework for evaluating the CET by modifying the existing models through contemporary pedagogical approaches, thereby helping the institutions meet the complex demands of teaching and collaborative research. The study proposes a novel ML model that combines Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) with a Grey Correlation-Based Genetic Algorithm (GCBGA) to meet the challenges in the traditional TEM. The proposed TEM model fared better than the other models in terms of English Teaching Evaluation. The performance enhancement is attributed to the novel GCBGA that optimized the proposed CNN model by avoiding it from getting stuck in local minima. This new method makes it easier for CNN to consistently judge the quality of teaching because it gets rid of the subjectivity and unpredictability of the conventional methods.

Instructional leadership has become the dominant paradigm in principal preparation and professional learning. In parallel, teacher evaluation has risen in prominence. Using interviews from 84 principals in 23 districts and three states, we asked how teacher evaluation influenced principals' reported priorities and conceptions of instructional leadership. We found that although teacher evaluation loomed large in principals' priorities, their implementation of it generally seemed far from robust. Although 81% of our sample noted teacher evaluation as a priority, only 24% reported integrating it into their efforts to improve teaching and learning. As one of the first studies to investigate how teacher evaluation factors into principals' priorities and conceptions of instructional leadership and the resulting implications, our study extends prior research.

This paper presents a qualitative study of the interactions between public kindergarten teachers and their superintendents, using the symbolic interaction theoretical framework. The purpose of the study was to gain insight into the meaning-making processes and social dynamics that occur in these interactions, specifically monitoring ones. The study is based on interviews with 24 kindergarten teachers in Israel. The data were analyzed using a thematic analysis approach that focused on identifying the key themes and patterns in the participants' experiences and perspectives. The findings reveal two key themes that emerged from the interactions between kindergarten teachers and superintendents: the centrality of visibility, with teachers expressing a desire to be seen by superintendents, and the significant effect that the superintendents' visits to kindergartens had on the teachers' experiences and practices. Teachers regarded the visits as opportunities to showcase their skills and achievements, but the visits also generated anxiety and pressure to perform well. The study offers insights into the nature of the teacher--superintendent relationship in kindergartens and provides a foundation for future research in this area.

From the perspective of historical institutionalism, based on several critical junctures of the past half-century in China, this paper divides over 40-year history of China's teacher certification institution into four stages and elaborates on mechanisms and processes of critical junctures that impact even determine teacher certification institution reforms. The features of China's teacher certification institution are as follows: Its examination system is increasingly perfect; its direct accreditation depends more on graduates' quality rather than major categories; its history is a seesaw effect history between pedagogic and academic orientation of teacher education; teacher certification institution and normal specialty students' quality is the bottom line of teacher workforce performance under the open teacher education system; and the intersection between pedagogic and academic orientation of teacher education leads to the standardization and professionalization of teacher education in all respects.

Quality partnerships are imperative for successful project implementation. The partnership between project personnel and independent evaluators is often overlooked. In effective partnerships, both the evaluators and the education project management team collectively ensure that educational initiatives are well-planned, executed, and assessed. This collaborative approach fosters a culture of continuous improvement and accountability, ultimately leading to better educational outcomes for English learner students, educators, and the community. This conceptual article highlights eight elements of an effective project management and evaluator partnership: (1) clear communication and collaboration, (2) goal alignment, (3) early planning for evaluation, (4) multi-purpose evaluation activities, (5) shared responsibility, (6) feedback loops, (7) transparency, and (8) evaluation capacity building. The authors present these elements through the design, deployment, analysis, and use of the Better English Learners Instruction and Education in Varied Environments (BELIEVE) classroom observation tool. The tool was collaboratively created and deployed across two National Professional Development grants in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, addressing the need for a tool that could be used in varying learning modes and capture how effectively classroom teachers were teaching academic content and literacy to English learners in elementary and middle schools. The article illustrates how this tool has been used by program personnel to inform the teacher-coach relationship and educate teachers and administrators about best practices, and by the evaluation team to assess the progress of teachers' use of research-based practices to teach English learners.

This exploratory study investigates how international students perceive and experience communication challenges in Iran's higher education context. This study explores the real-life experiences of international students enrolled in various academic programs. This study employs a qualitative approach using interviews to gather data. This study involved 70 international students from different countries. Participants were enrolled in various programs at Iranian universities. The findings revealed five communication challenges: "linguistic barriers," "cultural differences," "lack of confidence," "ineffective teaching practices," and "poor teacher rapport." As mentioned by the participants, these challenges influence effective communication and participation in academic settings. This study found that these communication challenges often co-occur together and can lead to other communication challenges. In this regard, linguistic barriers among international students can contribute to a lack of confidence, and ineffective teaching practices can lead to language barriers. The most common pattern observed in the data was linguistic barriers leading to a lack of confidence. This study emphasizes the importance of addressing these challenges to establish a more inclusive and engaging learning environment for international students. By acknowledging and actively addressing the communication challenges faced by international students, educators and policymakers can play a crucial role in establishing a supportive and inclusive learning environment that enhances students' communication skills and overall academic success.

This study introduces the development of a new, transferable, customizable, authentic, and analytic framework for addressing different dimensions of teacher reflection. Given the emphasis on teacher reflection as a socially situated practice spawned by cognitive and affective aspects, this study covers four dimensions (i.e., breadth, depth, dialog, and affectivity). Ultimately and importantly, this empirical study constructs and validates an innovative vignette-based instrument and its analytic coding scheme on the basis of this framework for assessing the quality of reflection of elementary science teachers. The instrument includes eight vignettes, which include various authentic science teaching contexts, followed by three open-ended questions for each vignette to prompt teacher reflection on (1) the issues raised in the vignette, (2) the actions that could be taken to solve the problems, and (3) teacher emotions concerning the problems encountered. The instrument is validated through content, construct, internal, and face validity; and audit trial and inter-coder reliability are used to ensure the reliability of the data and findings. In summary, the study recruits 81 elementary science teachers from 24 public elementary schools in urban and suburban schools in Ankara for two reasons: (1) to ensure that the vignettes are clear and authentic as intended and (2) to develop a coding scheme involving descriptions and indicators of behaviors for each dimension of reflection quality accordingly to assess the quality of teacher reflection. For data analysis, once statistical conclusion validity and inter-coder reliability are established and a high percentage of agreement is obtained for each dimension across all vignettes (a > 0.70), content validity is once again explored by assessing whether the guiding framework of the instrument capture teacher reflections. The results indicate that the instrument can be an effective tool for assessing the quality of reflection of elementary science teachers. The preliminary validity and reliability of the vignettes and the coding scheme suggest that the vignettes warrant further testing.

While teacher preparation in the United States continues a long period of decline, the largest-producing state, Texas, is experiencing substantial changes in how it prepares teachers. The number of teachers prepared by traditional university pathways continues to decline, and the number from alternative pathways is rising. Using extensive da ta from Texas, we find that traditionally prepared teachers from universities obtain significantly higher student learning gains than alternatives. We use value-added models to estimate changes in student test scores in many grade levels and test subjects as a function of teacher preparation pathway. We compare all Traditional programs to all Alternative programs, and we compare all For-Profit programs to all Not for-Profit programs. For most subjects and grade levels, students learn significantly more from Traditional or Not for-Profit program teachers: 0.02 to 0.05 in standard deviation units. There is not one significant estimate in any model where students learn more from Alternative and For-Profit programs teachers than they do from Traditional and Not For-Profit program teachers.

Sensing and Detection Technology is a core course in engineering specialties. Traditional sensor teaching methods have obvious deficiencies in cultivating students' ability. To better foster students' comprehensive qualities, this study explored a 4D1P (Four Dimensions and One Penetration) teaching mode. We independently developed an industrial sensor teaching platform with intellectual property rights, integrating classroom and sensor experiments to address the disconnection between traditional sensor teaching and practical application. This mode combined the teaching platform with SPOC (small private online courses) and Rain Classroom teaching software, enriching classroom teaching and stimulating students' interest. By applying industry-academia-research integration to sensor teaching, students' horizons were broadened and their creative thinking enriched. The mode set up discussion-based learning in the classroom, making the class atmosphere lively. Throughout the teaching process, data-driven learning and teaching evaluation were consistently applied, allowing teachers to promptly understand students' learning situations. Data shows that under the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, students' grades improved and they were satisfied with this teaching mode. This mode solves most current problems in university classroom teaching and significantly enhances students' practical abilities. It also has certain significance for education in other disciplines.

Nationally, teachers have experienced major changes in how their performance is evaluated. Teacher satisfaction with the evaluation system likely influences whether they will use the evaluation data to make instructional improvements, yet we know little about teachers' perceptions of their evaluations. Using survey data from Chicago Public Schools, we explore teacher satisfaction with the evaluation system and their perceptions of its fairness and accuracy. Sixty percent of teachers reported being satisfied with the district's reformed teacher evaluation. However, satisfaction declined following the implementation of the district's more rigorous evaluation system, driven by tenured teachers' differentially negative impressions. Notably, teacher satisfaction was higher in schools with strong climates, particularly where teachers perceived instructional leadership as effective. These findings underscore the importance of school leaders in the implementation of teacher evaluation policies and suggest that some principals need support fostering school climates focused on instructional improvement and building strong relationships with staff.

Purpose: The number of international faculty members in universities is increasing worldwide, and Japan is no exception. However, despite this quantitative expansion, these faculty remain peripheral. Though recent studies have identified various challenges faced by international faculty, they have focused on international faculty's individual experiences and have lacked perspectives from the host institution. To more accurately understand the challenges facing international faculty, this study aims to uncover compatibility issues between these faculty and their host environment. Design/Approach/Methods: In this study, I adopted a qualitative case study approach targeting a local national university in Japan. Seven international and six Japanese faculty members were interviewed. Findings: The analysis revealed various issues underlying the problems faced by international faculty, including new challenges arising from recent national university reforms. The compatibility issues they experienced can be categorized into the following six areas: organizational goals, systems and practices for hiring and evaluating faculty, division of roles between international and Japanese faculty, organizational support for international faculty, organizational culture and atmosphere, and Japanese society's overall system and values. Originality/Value: This study responds to a crucial academic need to understand the host institution's perspective on international faculty recruitment by providing new evidence of the challenges facing international faculty and their host institution in a low-resource environment in the midst of reforms.

Teacher Professional Education (known as PPG) is an Indonesian government programme to produce professional teachers who can implement Higher-Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) in learning so that students in Indonesia can be expected to have high HOTS. However, in reality, students' HOTS in Indonesia are still low, raising questions about the effectiveness of PPG in producing teachers who can implement HOTS. This study aimed at investigating the implementation of HOTS in physical education learning by teachers who participated in the online PPG programme based on gender and tenure, so that it can be a benchmark by the Indonesian government for the effectiveness of the PPG programme. This was a comparative study and the population comprised 35 physical education teachers who participated in the PPG programme online at Padang State University in 2022 Batch I. The research sample of 30 people was determined by the purposive sampling technique. HOTS implementation data was taken from video documentation of participants' teaching practice and then assessed using 19 items of the Teaching Performance Guidelines. Data were analysed with an independent sample t-test and ANOVA test. The results showed that physical education teachers who participated in the online-based PPG programme were able to implement HOTS into the learning process well, and the implementation of HOTS, based on gender and tenure, was not significantly different.

High-performance work systems (HPWS) have been a topic of interest in various industries, but their impact on teachers' productivity in Nigeria is a crucial area of study. The education sector in Nigeria faces numerous challenges, including inadequate resources, large class sizes, and limited professional development opportunities. In addressing the challenges, this research was conducted to seek their perception of the role of HPWS on teacher's productivity. Data were collected from the six educational districts of public schools, among 492 teachers in Lagos, Nigeria. The data was analyzed using Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). The findings provide new insights into the value of HPWS in SHRM in the education sector. The result showed that implementing high-performance work systems in this context could potentially lead to improved teacher productivity, benefiting both educators and students alike.

Peer teaching is a valuable practice that helps pre-service teachers to acquire the knowledge and the expertise required for teaching as well as improving their pedagogical content knowledge. For that reason, this study focused on the pre-service mathematics teachers' peer teaching, with the intention of exploring their pedagogical content knowledge as mirrored in peer teaching. The participants were four pre-service secondary mathematics teachers. Each participant designed a lesson plan and conducted peer teaching on a mathematics concept of her choice. The lesson plans and videotapes of the participants' peer teaching were the data collection instruments. The components of pedagogical content knowledge were used to analyze the data. The findings revealed that the pre-service mathematics teachers were knowledgeable about the subject content matter, but their knowledge of learners, understanding of instructional strategies and familiarity of context was inadequate about the topic of their peer teaching. The study recommends an amalgamated teaching of mathematics content courses and pedagogy courses.

Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) is considered an important ingredient in shaping classroom practice. PCK requires valid measurement at domain-specific level on different components excluding the teaching context. While the research focuses on measuring the PCK of unqualified teachers and pre-service teachers, the description of qualified teachers' domain-specific PCK is often overlooked. The purpose of this study was to measure quantitatively the domain-specific PCK of qualified physics teachers focusing on the five PCK components: content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, assessment knowledge, knowledge of students and curricular knowledge. Data were collected through the paper-and pencil PCK test that was responded to by 87 Physics teachers teaching the last two years of secondary school. Data were analyzed using the Extended Rasch Model and descriptive statistics. The results revealed that Physics teachers have a low PCK in general and low levels of PCK components, the lowest being content knowledge. The study recommends regular refresher workshops for qualified teachers focused on developing different PCK components, with more emphasis on content knowledge.

Field experiences provide opportunities for early childhood and early childhood special education (EC/ECSE) educators to implement effective practices in learning settings, and are, therefore, a vital part of EC/ECSE teacher preparation. In this article, we describe field placement models from four universities in the United States: The Bridge Project, Getting Started Early, Peer Coaching to Increase Naturalistic Developmental Behavioral Interventions, and University Supervisors Coaching Teacher Candidates: Supporting Young Bi/Multilingual Children with Disabilities. Although there is variety in the settings and effective practices supported through these field placements, performance feedback and collaboration are clear themes across models.

Local culture has undergone significant shifts and alienations, leading to the neglect of societal values. This situation underscores the need for teachers to be well-prepared to incorporate local wisdom into science education, supporting Cultured-Based Learning. This study, conducted from January to June 2022, aimed to assess the relevance of items in a teacher readiness instrument for implementing local wisdom-based science learning in Bali. An ex post facto research design was employed to analyze the preparedness of 72 science teachers in Bali through a detailed questionnaire. The collected ordinal data were converted into an interval scale using the Method of Successive Interval (MSI) and analyzed using the Rasch Model with the Jamovi application to assess item relevance. The study's findings highlight the cognitive and emotional readiness of science teachers as being in the high category, while collegial support and instructional tools are in the low category. These results suggest that improving collegial features and instructional tools through lesson studies and workshops could enhance the integration of local wisdom into science education in Bali.

The significance of environmental education has become more evident, driven by global concerns surrounding climate change. In Vietnam, a country facing significant environmental challenges, developing environmental knowledge of elementary school teachers is crucial. This study aimed to validate a questionnaire for assessing professional knowledge of elementary school teachers in teaching environmental issues, originally designed in the Korean context. Recognizing the need for adaptation to the Vietnamese educational system, language, and local environmental issues, the initial 39-item questionnaire underwent a validation process. A total of 86 elementary school teachers participated in the construct validity and reliability, while eight qualified professionals evaluated the content validity. The results indicated that content validity indices for each item ranged from 0.88 to 1.00, and a scale-content validity index was 0.90. Exploratory factor analysis confirmed construct validity, organizing the 27 items into seven dimensions. The Cronbach's [alpha] coefficient was 0.86, which confirmed the questionnaire demonstrated a high level of reliability. Therefore, it is a reliable instrument for assessing elementary school teachers' professional knowledge in teaching environmental issues, which is relevant in the Vietnamese context. The validated instrument supports the development of professional development programs and contributes to the broader goal of enhancing environmental education in Vietnam.

The purpose of the current study was to develop and validate the Pre-Service Teacher Online Teaching Motivation Scale (PST-OTMS), a survey instrument designed to reliably measure motivational constructs related to online teaching and learning in pre-service teachers. Due to increasing opportunities to teach within online learning contexts where challenges were magnified during the COVID-19 pandemic, a reliable and valid instrument is needed to measure such motivational constructs. The Pre-Service Teacher Online Teaching Motivation Survey (PST-OTMS) underwent a thorough validation process resulting in a 31-item survey aimed at assessing pre-service teacher motivation for online teaching across four dimensions: (1) pre-service teacher self-efficacy for online teaching, (2) pre-service teacher perceptions of online teaching and learning, (3) online teaching professionalism, and (4) pre-service teacher anticipated administrative support for online teaching. The PST-OTMS demonstrated strong reliability and validity within the research context. Future research aims to widely administer the PST-OTMS to explore reliability and validity within additional settings and with a more diverse demographic.

This study examined the relationship between effective educational planning and teaching staff performance among public secondary schools in Zamfara State, Nigeria. A research null hypothesis was established to guide the research work. The study adopted correlational survey design. The population of the study comprised 24 public secondary schools with 670 in-service teachers. From the population of the study, a total number of 12 public secondary schools and 225 in-service teachers were sampled to serve as participants in this study using simple random sampling technique. The sample size was determined using Krejcie and Morgan's (1971) table of determining sample size. Two (2) self-structured questionnaires entitle: "Effective Educational Planning Assessment Questionnaire (EEPAQ) and "Staff Performance Evaluation Questionnaire (SPEQ)" were constructed and utilized as instruments for data collection. The data analysis was computed using Descriptive Statistics and Inferential Statistics. The Pearson Moment Product Correlation Coefficient analysis results (r=0.514, P<0.05) revealed that there is a moderate but significant relationship between effective educational planning and school staff performance among public schools in Gusau Local Government Area, Zamfara State, Nigeria. Based on findings, the study recommends that in order to maintain the high level of the effectiveness of educational planning in Nigeria, the Federal, State, and Local, and Governments as well as other relevant international and local organizations should put hands on deck in employing more professional planners and deploy them to the ministries and agencies for effective planning of education.

Educational research plays a crucial role in the advancement of knowledge in the teaching profession. In fact, raising the quality standards in education necessitates teachers' engagement in different levels and dimensions of research. To this end, improving teachers' research literacy is an essential first step, which also entails assessing the current state of teachers' research literacy using reliable and valid instruments. The present study provides a comprehensive review of the available instruments for assessing teachers' research literacy, along with a description of the characteristics of the reviewed instruments. It also presents a review of the results of using these instruments in measuring the research literacy of various populations. Based on the findings, teachers' research literacy is below the expected average level, reflecting the need for a change in policies and planning to improve it. Moreover, the results of this scoping review indicated that the instruments developed for measuring research literacy reflected the expectations of just the instructional context in which they have been developed and may not reflect the full dimensions of research literacy. Furthermore, the developed instruments each came with its own strengths and weaknesses in assessing teachers' research skills. Therefore, it is suggested that research literacy instruments be selected based on the research skills expected from teachers in their institutional contexts and with full awareness of their limitations. To enhance the strengths and minimize the weaknesses, it is suggested that different sections from the current research literacy assessment instruments be combined selectively to assess teachers' research abilities.

Scientific thinking constitutes a vital component of scientific competencies, crucial for citizens to adapt to the evolving societal landscape. To cultivate students' scientific thinking, teachers should possess an adequate professional knowledge foundation, which encompasses pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). Assessing teachers' PCK of scientific thinking facilitates the development of effective curricula tailored to their continuous professional development. Despite its significance, empirical studies on biology teachers' PCK of scientific thinking are notably lacking. Hence, this research aimed to create a reliable and valid tool to evaluate upper-secondary school biology teachers' PCK of scientific thinking. The results showed that the instrument exhibits high reliability and good validity, affirming its efficiency for investigative purposes. A collective of 292 in-service biology teachers from upper-secondary schools participated in this investigation through the completion of an online survey. The results indicated that, overall, as well as for each component, upper-secondary school biology teachers' performance on PCK of scientific thinking fell within the lower to middle range. Specifically, the performance levels of four components: knowledge of students (KSU), knowledge of instructional strategies (KIS), knowledge of curriculum (KC), and knowledge of assessment (KA) declined sequentially.

In the present study, the Teacher Formative Assessment Literacy Scale (TFALS), developed by Yan and Pastore (2022a), was translated into Turkish to examine the factor structure and psychometric characteristics of the scale in a Turkish sample. Data was collected from 318 teachers, of whom 168 were males and 150 were females, working in different state schools in a city in the Central Anatolia Region of Türkiye. As the first step, the scale items were translated and back-translated by experts in both English and Turkish. Afterward, experts were presented with the scale to check for consistency and accuracy based on the feedback received. A pilot study was carried out to establish the linguistic equivalence of the scale, followed by an examination of its structural validity in a Turkish sample. To demonstrate evidence of the confirmed factor structure of TFALS with 22 items, the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted. The CFA results demonstrated that the three-factor model of the TFALS-Turkishversion had adequate fit indices. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient of the total scale was found to be 0.93. The Cronbach's alpha for each of the dimensions of TFALS was 0.90 for the conceptual dimension (7 items), 0.86 for the practical dimension (8 items), and 0.88 for the socio-emotional dimension (7 items). Composite reliability coefficients of the dimensions ranged from 0.78 to 0.84. The results of this study provide important evidence for the validity and reliability of the Turkish version of the TFALS, confirming that it has good psychometric properties in a Turkish sample.

With the aim to provide teachers with more specific, frequent, and actionable feedback about their teaching, we explore how Large Language Models (LLMs) can be used to estimate "Instructional Support" domain scores of the CLassroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS), a widely used observation protocol. We design a machine learning architecture that uses either zero-shot prompting of Meta's Llama2, and/or a classic Bag of Words (BoW) model, to classify individual utterances of teachers' speech (transcribed automatically using OpenAI's Whisper) for the presence of Instructional Support. Then, these utterance-level judgments are aggregated over a 15-min observation session to estimate a global CLASS score. Experiments on two CLASS-coded datasets of toddler and pre-kindergarten classrooms indicate that (1) automatic CLASS Instructional Support estimation accuracy using the proposed method (Pearson R up to 0.48) approaches human inter-rater reliability (up to R = 0.55); (2) LLMs generally yield slightly greater accuracy than BoW for this task, though the best models often combined features extracted from both LLM and BoW; and (3) for classifying individual utterances, there is still room for improvement of automated methods compared to human-level judgments. Finally, (4) we illustrate how the model's outputs can be visualized at the utterance level to provide teachers with explainable feedback on which utterances were most positively or negatively correlated with specific CLASS dimensions.

This article examines the power dynamics underpinning performance management at a selected South African university. It specifically employs Michel Foucault's (1977) ideas on Governmentality to interpret the envisioning of performance management in this context at the level of Policy. The study employed a qualitative research methodology to address the questions at hand. Data were generated from one primary source: a discourse analysis of the Performance Management Policy (2013) at a selected university in South Africa. Using Michel Foucault's (1991) theories on governmentality, a discourse analysis of Performance Management Policy documents was conducted with the goal of critically interrogating the kinds of new academic subjectivities being created in South African higher education. The findings show that the Policy on Performance Management at the university in question works towards creating academic subjects which conform with the university's expectations and are consistently self- regulated. Findings also show that management of academics is constantly controlled and regulated by a powerful matrix of governance, comprising the university and the wider global community. This paper recommends that performance management discourses should take into stronger cognizance the matter of academic freedom and autonomy. We further recommend that Policy developers and management teams at universities be conscious of the complex forces of power that shape academic identities so that their policies move away from oppressive discourses. We argue that there is much we can learn from governmentality theory if we hope to build more just and equitable societies going forward.

Higher-order thinking and metacognition are closely related and are part of learning to develop competence. The goal of this research was to determine the practice of teaching biology that develops metacognition and evaluate whether teachers require specific professional training for this purpose or if broader cognitive-focused training can also enhance metacognitive development in students. The original Teaching Observation Form (TOF) has been adapted for research objectives. A survey was designed to capture the subjective perspectives of 292 students and their teachers regarding metacognition development. Additionally, the research involved six biology teachers who were professionally trained in a program focused on higher-order thinking. The survey results indicate a self-assessed good teaching practice for the development of metacognition. However, analysis of the first lesson's video recordings showed that some components had been eliminated from biology classes which hindered students' ability to develop metacognition. Although higher-order thinking and metacognition are interconnected phenomena, professional development training focuses solely on higher-order thinking whose impact we established through analysis of other lessons does not induce the necessary positive changes for the comprehensive development of metacognition in students. In a nutshell, explicit professional development programs aimed at fostering metacognitive awareness among teachers need to be designed. These programs should instruct teachers on how to model the development of metacognition in students through their teaching.

In this study, we estimated the relationship between two popular measures of teacher effectiveness--teachers' value-added model (VAM) estimates, represented in this study via median growth percentiles (MGPs), and teachers' observational scores, derived from the TAP System for Teacher and Student Advancement. We examined the relationship between these measures separately for teachers at different values of the MGPs distribution, as opposed to examining a conventional aggregated correlation. Previous research has shown that these aggregated (co)relationships are typically very weak, but in this study, we demonstrate that such correlations vary by the location of the score in the overall score distribution, and that the relationship between teachers' MGPs and observational scores is non-linear. This suggests that when these two indicators of teacher quality are used together, especially for high-stakes decision-making purposes (e.g., tenure, merit pay, termination), teachers' positions in the score distribution should be considered in the design of any teacher evaluation system or formulation.

This article examines a national policy of performance-related pay for teachers in the educational context of England, as understood in relation to the concept of New Public Management. Using a mixed methods approach employing surveys and in-depth interviews, the article considers the perspectives of working teachers, thus engaging directly with those who might be incentivized (or disincentivized) by performance pay. Significant implications for the broader international policy context are drawn in terms of teachers' complex and problematic attitudes towards incentivization, particularly when performance pay is located within a wider agenda of New Public Management.

Scores from observational measures of teaching have recently been put to many uses within school systems, including communicating a standard of practice and providing teacher feedback, identifying teachers for professional development, monitoring system equity, and making employment decisions. In each of these uses, observation scores are interpreted as representing some aspect of the enacted instruction or teachers' capacity to enact instruction, as seen through the observation systems lens for understanding teaching quality. The quality of these interpretations, or the extent to which observation scores are composed of a signal that accurately reflects the interpretation, has important implications for the overall validity of uses of observation systems. Starting from an explicit conceptualization of instruction, this paper combines generalizability theory and hierarchical linear modelling approaches to decompose observation scores to explore the extent to which scores from observation systems are composed of signal, error, and bias across four different uses (i.e., teacher feedback, professional development, monitoring system equity, and employment decisions) of scores. We show that the quality of observation scores may depend more on what scores are interpreted as representing (i.e., the proposed use) than on the specific observation rubric being used. Further, we show that rater errors and biases are a major threat to any attempt to interpret observation scores as capturing the observation system's understanding of teaching quality. We discuss implications for using scores from observation systems.

This study examines perspectives of seven Jamaican primary school teachers on the degree to which their principals' leadership behaviours include emphasizes recognition, promotes participation in decision-making, takes account of their diverse skills, and demonstrates openness to criticism. The study further explores whether teachers consider the principal's behaviour as contributing to the culture of the school. The study found that teachers value expressions of recognition and opportunities to participate in decision-making. The study also found that while teachers are consulted, they are of the view that their contributions are not sufficiently considered. Instructively, all respondents held the view that while all members of staff were responsible for shaping the culture of the school, the principal had a leading role to play. The findings of the study suggest the need for post-training executive coaching component be implemented which would involve periodic structured conversations about growth, leadership, interpersonal relationships, and culture leadership, among other issues. This mechanism would allow the principal to reflect critically on how he/she in shaping the culture of the school. This coaching exercise would have an even greater impact if it were reinforced by confidential 360° performance reviews focussing on various aspects of cultural leadership.

The effective implementation of evidence-based teaching (EBT) in large college courses benefits from the successful use of instructional teams. An instructional team's feedback allows instructors to act based on evidence of student learning, addressing students' needs. This feedback may be particularly important for novice instructors or experienced instructors teaching a class for the first time. This study sought to characterize the nature of an instructional team's feedback as well as its influence on the decisions and actions of a seasoned instructor teaching a new class. Instructional team members provided feedback in the form of anticipations, noticings, and suggestions. Anticipations and suggestions seemed to have the largest impact on the instructor's decisions and actions, while noticings, despite providing insights into student thinking, had a smaller effect. Our findings indicate that an instructional team can provide valuable feedback to instructors when team members have an opportunity to meaningfully participate in the planning and teaching processes.

Teacher evaluation and teachers' professional learning are too often confined to separate areas of research and professional practice. Rather than approach evaluation and enquiry as distinct or irreconcilable, this paper applies the ideas of Stenhouse to explore new possibilities for the reappropriation of mandated appraisal in ways that support teachers' professional growth. Illustrative case studies of laboratory schools in the United States and England are used to examine the interaction of local and lateral forms of professional accountability with external and hierarchical regulatory frameworks. The article reports the design and enactment of change in two schools (a US kindergarten through twelfth grade school and a UK high school) connected through the International Association of Laboratory Schools (IALS) that purposively redesigned appraisal over a three-year period to build capacity for collaborative curriculum enquiry. Attention is afforded to the space for manoeuvre between advisory and mandatory guidance, and the challenges to relational trust and collective responsibility posed by performance-based accountability systems. The findings provide new insights into how teacher-led collaborative enquiry (curricular co-design) can address the unintended consequences of test-based accountability and rubrics-based observation as principal drivers of educational improvement.

Deep neural networks are increasingly employed to model classroom dialogue and provide teachers with prompt and valuable feedback on their teaching practices. However, these deep learning models often have intricate structures with numerous unknown parameters, functioning as black boxes. The lack of clear explanations regarding their classroom dialogue analysis likely leads teachers to distrust and underutilize these AI-powered models. To tackle this issue, we leveraged explainable AI to unravel classroom dialogue analysis and conducted an experiment to evaluate the effects of explanations. Fifty-nine pre-service teachers were recruited and randomly assigned to either a treatment (n = 30) or control (n = 29) group. Initially, both groups learned to analyse classroom dialogue using AI-powered models without explanations. Subsequently, the treatment group received both AI analysis and explanations, while the control group continued to receive only AI predictions. The results demonstrated that teachers in the treatment group exhibited significantly higher levels of trust in and technology acceptance of AI-powered models for classroom dialogue analysis compared to those in the control group. Notably, there were no significant differences in cognitive load between the two groups. Furthermore, teachers in the treatment group expressed high satisfaction with the explanations. During interviews, they also elucidated how the explanations changed their perceptions of model features and attitudes towards the models. This study is among the pioneering works to propose and validate the use of explainable AI to address interpretability challenges within deep learning-based models in the context of classroom dialogue analysis.