Miriam Ben-Peretz

University of Haifa | haifa · Department of Learning, Teaching and Training

Sharing experiences among teachers is an important part of professional development. Coaching is defined as an ongoing process in which experts engage with practice, with the purpose of continuous improvement. This article will discuss the principles of peer coaching in teacher development, by examining a specific case of peer coaching between two...

This paper focuses on the tensions and paradoxes in teaching. At present time, teacher education has the obligation to prepare teachers for diverse student populations, living in a highly varied context. This situation creates several competing expectations of the meaning of teacher education. For instance, preparing for professional autonomy in a...

This curriculum inquiry explores scholarly influence by examining how Joseph J. Schwab’s ideas travelled over time and how his research was disseminated. The study begins with Schwab’s biography and a literature review, followed by descriptions of the research method and sources of evidence. Data analysis centre on (1) The influence of Schwab’s ide...

This chapter analyzes the ongoing quest for quality in teacher education programs, as related to the interplay among three factors: (1) Global and local influences; (2) The relationships between past experiences and anticipations for future developments; (3) The impact of societal circumstances on the realm of teacher education. Inquiry into the tr...

Elementary classroom teachers in eight school districts across Colorado, United States, share the knowledge of their students’ home and community life, define culturally responsive mathematics based on the children they instruct, and give examples of how students learn math through culture in their classrooms. Findings from two interviews, classroo...

Although recent years have seen an increase in professional learning communities, use of video and lesson study groups, most teachers still work and learn in isolation. What they know is personal and remains private; little opportunity exists for most teachers to develop shared knowledge or language. The scale of the teaching force, and the rapid t...

This paper follows the ways in which publications in TATE, that focus on teacher knowledge, provide insights into the development and growth of scholarly understanding of teacher knowledge. Relevant questions are: How is teacher knowledge defined? What modes of inquiry are adopted by the researchers? What are conceived as the implications of teache...

Curriculum use is conceptualized as the interaction of three stakeholders - teachers, learners, and society - with curriculum materials. The article analyzes each stakeholder's mode/s of curriculum use based on relevant literature. Intensity of engagement from low to high with curriculum is conceived on a continuum. After presenting the uses of eac...

The central argument of this article contends that, presently, globalization is reflected in two aspects of teacher education programs in many national systems: in the diversity of the student population that teacher candidates are required to support, and in the rhetoric of the proclaimed goals of these programs. The realization of the proclaimed...

Reform efforts, whether trying to affect policies, programs, or practices, are difficult to plan and even more difficult to implement successfully. Successful and sustained change requires “a combination of changes in what people say, do, think and feel” (Sarason, 1996, p.360).

Based on the premise that teachers’ perceptions of their professional roles are closely linked to their self images and their impact on the learning and achievement of their students, a study was conducted to investigate the relationship between the context of teachers’ work and their views of themselves as professionals. Sixty teachers in Israeli...

An attempt to clarify how learning from experience takes place and the role memory plays in the process was carried out in the frame of a study of retired teachers' accounts of their teaching, focusing on their views on the transformation of experience into professional wisdom. Forty-three retired teachers participated in the study and were asked t...

The thesis of this article is that the external demands placed on teacher education at the present time, combined with inherent professional needs of teachers and student teachers, create a nearly impossible situation for teacher educators. The article starts with a brief analysis of some of the external demands and constraints on teacher education...

Reviews "Re-making Teaching: Ideology Policy and Practice" (Smyth and Shacklock), which focuses on the relationship between social ideologies, policies, and the work of teachers, highlighting timely issues concerning worldwide educational reform movements and the ensuing changes in teachers' roles. Suggests that the book has a gloomy outlook that i...

A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth even glancing at, for it leaves out the one country at which Humanity is always landing. And when Humanity lands there, it looks out, and, seeing a better country, sets sail. Progress is the realization of Utopia. (OSCAR WILDE, The Soul of Man under Socialism).

Students in Israel who wish to enter institutes of higher education are required to hold a matriculation certificate. Matriculation exams are therefore high-stake and stressful. In 1993 the Minister of Education appointed a committee to consider reforming the matriculation policy. This paper describes the political and societal aspects of the polic...

The essential features of the programme of the Anne Frank Haven are the complete integration of children from low SES and different cultural backgrounds with Kibbutz children; a holistic approach to education; and the involvement of the whole community in an "open" residential school. After 33 years, it is argued that the experiment has proved succ...

This paper analyzes some of the characteristics of research on teacher thinking as it relates to educational policy. An introductory section discusses the problems inherent in relating research on teacher thinking to educational policy, based on the difference between conclusion-oriented research (which is appropriate for teacher thinking) and deci...

The present study is concerned with assessing the factors which affect principals' roles as change facilitators in the area of curricular innovation. It is designed to identify the prevailing modes of principals' change facilitator leadership styles in curricular related activities and to estimate the relative predictive ability of policy, strategy...

This article looks at teachers' knowledge and understanding of classrooms in terms of interpretation of nonverbal and situational cues. Two sets of videotapes of classroom episodes were prepared, one in Hebrew and one in Dutch, which were viewed by teachers in cross-cultural settings. Teachers responded in writing and in group discussions regarding...

Proposes an analytical conceptual framework and an instrument (Teacher Implementation Autonomy Profile) to reveal teacher autonomy in curriculum implementation. The instrument disclosed components describing expected autonomy and differentiated types of curricula. Sample analysis suggests an operative interpretation of autonomy, indicating that gre...

Without Abstract

A study of one school's involvement in school-based curriculum development (SBCD) for nearly 30 years provided researchers with information on the factors affecting the success of SBCD programs. The school studied serves 3,500 students in 12 grades at several sites in an Israeli city. Following interviews with faculty members, the researchers formu...

These 16 papers address 3 areas of research deemed to be of particular importance to teachers. The first topic concerns the leading metaphors used by researchers to delineate what is understood by teacher thinking. These metaphors include "teachers' conceptions,""frames of reference,""personal constructs,""teacher principles of practice," and sever...

This paper explores criteria used by teachers examining curriculum materials and proposes a strategy for enhancing the scope of teacher interpretations. Prepared curriculum materials, the product of an external curriculum development process, can be interpreted in many ways (Ben-Peretz, 1975). These interpretations may be based on varied educationa...

EnglishIn this article, the authors examine the nature of curricular decision‐making at two levels which relate, respectively, to external curriculum developers and to teachers as curriculum users. At the first level, the process of translating scholarly, scientific material into formal curriculum materials is influenced by the curriculum developer...

The relationship between education and community is perceived at a metalevel by Oliver (1976). He distinguishes between a "corporate organization" (characterized by a technically based social order) and a "community" (a system based on a traditional, "moral" social order). These two social orders lead to different educational forms and styles, the...

Teacher participation in the curriculum planning process is considered essential, whether it be in the definition of problems or the presentation of concrete solutions in the form of programs of studies. Here, we propose to approach curriculum development as it relates to the double role assigned to teachers: that of in-the-field researcher, and th...

Environmental education may be characterized along the following dimensions: 1. The interdisciplinary nature of the relevant subject matter. A number of disciplines may be considered as sources for environmental education, e.g. biology, geography, sociology, history, etc. 2. The nature of the target population which is not confined to school pupils...

A number of guiding principles for teaching the total human ecosystem were formulated by a curriculum development team at the Curriculum Development Center at Haifa University. These include: 1. Actual environmental problems confronting the learner have to serve as the starting point of the curriculum. 2. One specific environmental issue has to be...

The process of curriculum development involves two phases: transformation of research findings into curriculum material by external developers and implementation of curriculum materials by teachers. In a study of the development of an eighth grade biology unit in Israel, the authors examined the characteristics of and relationships between the acti...

This paper deals with issues concerning curriculum development in Israel over the last 50 years. The impact of the changing cultural and ideological context on the process of development, the nature of materials and their implementation is analyzed and discussed. The paper begins with a brief description of the nature of the educational system in I...

This paper focuses on two main issues: 1) the complex relationships between center and periphery in curriculum development, and 2) the unexpected ways in which educational policies lead to paradoxical and unintended outcomes.