Local Theories of Teacher Change: The Pedagogy of District Policies and Programs

Abstract

This paper examines district officials’ theories about teacher learning and change, identifying and elaborating three perspectives—behaviorist, situated, and cognitive— based on a study of 9 school districts. The behaviorist perspective on teacher learning dominated among the district officials in the study. The author also considers whether the prominence of the behaviorist perspective on teacher learning among district officials may be cause for concern when it comes to the classroom implementation of the fundamental changes in instruction pressed by state and national standards.

Non-affirmative Theory of Education as a Foundation for Curriculum Studies, Didaktik and Educational Leadership

“…Kelley and Halverson 2012;Klar 2012) have considered instructional leadership as a distributed construct, drawing on Spillane's (2002) research to consider how social networks affect such objects as curriculum and instruction. A distributive view of leadership recognizes that leading schools can involve multiple individuals in addition to the school principal-"the leader-plus aspect"-and that leading a school is fundamentally concerned with social interactions around curriculum/instruction and other important objects of group leadership influence rather than about the actions of individual leaders-"the practice aspect" (Spillane and Healey 2010).…”

“…And while globalization and internationalization have been recognized in recent curriculum theory/didaktik (Pinar 2000(Pinar , 2004 and educational leadership studies (e.g. Day 2005;Spillane 2002;Hallinger 2005), curriculum and leadership have not been explicitly connected in theoretical logics.…”

Addressing the Disproportionate Representation of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students in Special Education through Culturally Responsive Educational Systems

“…School systems in which all students are successful create policies that are based on a thorough and timely analysis of data related to student learning, teacher quality, beliefs about teacher learning and change, the school contexts in which students are expected to learn and teachers teach, and changing community demographics (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999;Elmore, 1996;Miramontes, Nadeau, & Commins, 1997;Spillane, 2002). Effective systems are built on several features: (a) partnerships with local community resources including museums, business, non-governmental nonprofits, mental health, police and social services, (b) alliances with families, (c) productive working relationships with teachers' unions, (d) collaboration with faith-based organizations, and (e) commitments to inform and involve the community through local media as well as the internet (Shanklin, Kozleski, et al, 2003).…”

Using pressure and support to create a qualified workforce.

“…capacity have generally focused on what types of support are needed to change teachers' classroom practice and facilitate their understanding of new curricula (Spillane, 1999(Spillane, , 2002Spillane, Reiser, & Reimer, 2002). Effective professional development has therefore been viewed as one of the key supports for increasing teachers' capacity (Cohen & Hill, 2001).…”