Teacher perspectives and practices in two organizationally different middle schools /
by Nancy McIntyre Doda.
Description
- Language(s)
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English
- Published
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1984.
- Summary
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The purpose of this study was to understand teacher perspectives and practices, in relation to school context, in two organizationally different middle schools. Two middle schools that were notably different in organization, curriculum, and administration, but similar in community context, student body size and composition, and district-level requirements, were selected as sites for the investigation of four teachers' perspectives and practices. Using ethnographic fieldwork methods, two teachers from each school were observed and interviewed during the 1980-1981 school year as they conducted their daily lives as teachers. Additional interviews were conducted with each school's assistant principal and principal, as well as an additional teacher informant. Artifacts were also collected. These data were systematically analyzed in order to discover what characterized the teachers' perspectives and practices at each school. The findings revealed that the teachers at the two schools were markedly different and that a number of these differences were associated with differences in the organization, curriculum, and administration of the two schools. School A's teachers defined themselves primarily as curriculum-disseminators. Classroom instruction was information-centered and teacher-directed. The teachers subscribed to a vision of determined student improvability, acknowledging innate intelligence or social status as variables beyond a teacher's responsibility. They approached student behavior with skepticism, believing that students required a highly structured program and an authority role relationship with their teachers. Teaching was seen as an individual enterprise with limited autonomy. At School B, the teachers defined themselves with a dual -sided role, responsible for both student socialization and academic learning. Classroom instruction reflected the student's role in learning with curriculum adaptation as common practice. The teachers subscribed to a vision of universal student improvability and were confident about their own effectiveness. They also viewed themselves as part of a collective effort. Classroom autonomy was assumed. These contrasting findings were associated with school differences in teacher roles and responsibilities in relation to students, history, administration, principal values, student grouping pattern, and organization of teachers in relation to other teachers. These context variables warrant further study if an understanding of teacher perspectives and practices is to be achieved.
- Note
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Vita.
Typescript.
- Physical Description
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vii, 251 leaves :
ill. ;
28 cm.
Viewability