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Working within the Zone of Proximal Development: Formative Assessment as Professional Development

Authors:
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Journal of Science Teacher Education, 14(1): 1-313, 2003
©2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers, Printed in the Netherlands
Working within the Zone of Proximal Development:
Formative Assessment as Professional Development
Doris Ash
Education Department, 231 Crown College, 1156 High St., Santa Cruz, California, 95064, U.S.A.
Karen Levitt
Education Department, Canevin Hall, Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S.A
Introduction
Professional development efforts in science education have often emphasized
the workshop experience, where teachers learn new skills in order to infuse their
practice with current thinking. These “one size fits all” (Ball & Cohen, 1999)
experiences seldom are situated within an ongoing context of professional practice.
Ball and Cohen suggest that teacher learning is often seen as “either something
that happens as a matter of course from experience or as a product of training in a
particular methodology or curriculum” (p.4). They further argue that we need
“carefully constructed and empirically validated theories of teacher learning that
could inform teacher education, in roughly the same way that cognitive psychology
has begun to inform the education of school children” (p. 4).
In this paper, using a Vygotskian theoretical framework and the zone of
proximal development (zpd) as a core feature, we take the view that teachers who
strategically and intentionally participate in formative assessment practices can
undergo profound transformation in their professional growth. We argue that
formative assessment involves individual and mutual participatory appropriation
of learning products (Brown, Ash, Rutherford, Nakagawa, Gordon, & Campione,
1993; Griffin, Newman, & Cole, 1989; Hickey, 2001; Moschkovich, 1989) as part
of joint productive activity (Tharp & Gallimore, 1989) within the zone of proximal
development (Vygotsky, 1934/1986). We propose a trajectory of teacher
development as support for this claim, and present as evidence two case stories,
taken from different geographies and contexts.
Understanding teaching as mutual transformation demands a rich, powerful
theoretical framework. The approach offered by Vygotsky (1934/1986) and by
subsequent researchers who rely on Vygotsky (Brown, 1992; Brown & Campione,
1992; Rogoff, 1995, 1998; Jones, Rua & Carter, 1998; Tharp & Gallimore, 1989;
Wells, 1999) views learning and teaching as a sociocultural process in which the
interaction between the participants is the focus. Vygotsky considered the teacher-
student relationship transformative for both students and teachers (Rogoff, 1995,
2001; Tharp & Gallimore, 1989;Wells, 1999) but was concerned more with the
activities of the learner in joint interactions.
Formative assessment, also called assessment to assist learning, has gained
much attention over the past decade, especially since the publication of Black &
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William’s influential article on the ‘black box of assessment’ (1998) revealed that
classroom-based formative assessment, when appropriately used, can positively affect
learning (Black & Wiliam, 1998; Harlen, et al 1999). This past research has provided
a clear indication that “using [formative] assessment … does indeed improve learning
and raise standards of students’ achievement. (Harlen , 2000, p. 3). Most formative
assessment research has focused specifically on student gains, rather than on teacher
learning. In this paper we focus specifically on teacher transformation that occurred as
they engaged in formative assessment with students, taking the perspective that
interactions between teacher and learner are reciprocal. Tharp & Gallimore (1989)
suggested that “Assistance most often flows from the more competent to the less
competent participant - from teacher to learner, from trainer to trainee -but influence, a
more general concept, is inevitably reciprocal and shared” (p. 89).
Research by Jones, Rua & Carter (1998) has suggested that in mentor-novice
teacher dyads “not only did the less experienced teachers learn from the more
experienced one but the expert also learned from the novice” (p. 982). Achinstein
and Villar (2002, p. 18) at the New Teacher Center at the University of California,
Santa Cruz, suggest also that the relationship between mentor teacher and new
teacher works best when it is reciprocal, saying that “the two are involved in co-
construction of knowledge, co-exploration, problem solving and critique of their
work” (Achinstein & Villar, 2002, p. 18).
Taken together, this prior research suggests that experienced teachers are
transformed as they participate with students and with novice teachers in joint
productive activity. The question we ask in this research, is: If teachers are
transformed as they use formative assessment, in what way and under what conditions
does this happen and how can we characterize this transformation?
One lens for viewing transformation relies on understanding the ways people’s
participation changes over time, as they are jointly engaged in teaching and learning.
Transformation of participation implies that “what people learn is a function of
their transforming roles and understanding in the activities in which they
participate” (Rogoff, 1994, p. 1). Rogoff is clear that participatory appropriation is
the mutual constitution of personal, interpersonal and cultural processes (Rogoff,
1995, p. 156). She states that “the participatory perspective focuses instead [in
contrast an internalization model] on events as dynamically changing, with people
participating with others in coherent events (where one can examine each other
person’s contributions as they relate to each other, but not define them separately),
and [where] development is seen as transformation (Rogoff, 1995, p. 156-157).
In this paper we assume that formative assessment involves mutually interactive
participation between teachers and students, as described by Rogoff, and as part of
joint productive activity (Tharp & Gallimore, 1989). And, we argue that the
transformative participation occurs within the zone of proximal development. We
label these complex interactions ‘working within the zone of proximal
development’, and we view teachers and learners as participating in a mutual dance
of appropriation of ideas and actions (Brown, et. al., 1993). We draw upon others’
theories of appropriation (Brown, et. al., 1993; Griffin, Newman, & Cole, 1989;
Hickey, 2001;Moschkovich, 1989), all of whom support a reciprocal view of learning
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
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and teaching in their research.
As evidence for transformation we describe the participation of two different
groups of teachers, one each in California and Pennsylvania, who used formative
assessment as part of an inquiry in elementary classroom settings. Both were informed
by the same theoretical and methodological perspectives. The research occurred
on two levels simultaneously. At the first level, teachers used formative assessment
to guide learner growth, (in the California case, working with elementary students
on science inquiry investigations and, in the Pennsylvania case, mentoring new
teachers in using science inquiry). At the second level, our primary research focus,
the teachers developed a deeper understanding of their own teaching practices.
We present evidence that both groups of teacher/experts changed as part of
engaged participation (Hickey, 2001) in mutually defined tasks. Both used
scaffolding tools (rubrics) designed specifically to mediate understanding with
learners. Vygotsky was explicit on the use of mediating tools, which can be signs or
symbols, language or alphabet, beliefs or concepts acting within the zone of proximal
development. These “tools are artificially created stimuli that influence the behavior
of oneself and others” (Jones, & Carter, 1998, p. 968). Vygotsky talked primarily
about symbolic tools, but they can also be thought of as the physical tools of
science (Newman, et al, 1989).
We conducted research in two geographical areas using related but different
focuses. At the Exploratorium (CA), Ash focused on the work of two elementary
teachers engaged in classroom-based research using students’ inquiry-related
questions (van Zee, Iwasyk, Kurose, Simpson & Wild, 1997) as formative assessment.
The solicitation and examination of student questions and their subsequent work
towards independent inquiry became a vehicle for formative assessment, joint
productive activity, and self-examination and reflection for both the students and
their teachers. Teachers used a scaffolding tool (Figure 1), a questioning rubric
adapted from Harlen (1998).
As part of her work with student teachers and mentor teachers, Levitt explored
the professional growth of both the teacher candidate and the mentor teacher as
they participated in a learning group designed to teach and subsequently endorse new
teachers’ skills and competencies in the teaching of inquiry science. The Inquiry
Science Endorsement (ISE) (Appendix A) became a vehicle for ongoing, developmental
formative assessment, joint productive activity, learning conversations, and self-
examination for both the teacher candidate and the mentor teacher.
Theoretical Underpinnings
In this section, we discuss how several previously established theoretical
perspectives form the framework underlying this research. These theoretical areas
include the zone of proximal development, individual and mutual participatory
appropriation of learning products, joint productive activity, and formative
assessment. Out of this we created a proposed trajectory of teacher developmental
growth grounded in these theoretical perspectives and based on research with
classroom teachers.
WORKING IN THE ZONE
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Categories of learners’ questions
Comments Philosophical Factual Complex Investigable
Actions by teacher can include:
Acknowledge Ask more Can child Focus on the Discuss
about what answer with part that can how to do
the question reference be done this
really means
How to Does it Give answer Consider Can it be
make into become or find it variables done now?
question a question? Break it down
to simpler
questions
Figure 1. A categorization of the kinds of questions children ask and a flow chart
for handling questions. Adapted from Harlen 1998, p.114. Original is more
extensive.
The Zone of Proximal Development and Appropriation
According to Vygotsky, the zone of proximal development (zpd) is “the region
of activity that learners can navigate with aid from a supporting context, including
but not limited to people” (Vygotsky, 1934/86; Brown, Ash, Nakagawa, Gordon,
Rutherford & Campione, 1993, p. 5). The zone of proximal development embodies
an emphasis on readiness to learn, “where upper boundaries are seen not as immutable
but as constantly changing with the learner’s increasing independent competence
at each successive level” (Brown et al, 1993 p. 35). “This process begins with the
adult at first doing most of the cognitive work. This phase is followed by one in
which the adult and child share responsibility. Finally, the child is able to perform
independently” (Brown, Ellery, & Campione, 1996, p 8).
Brown and Ferrara (1985) argue that instruction needs to be aimed at the upper
boundaries of a learner’s zone and that by doing so, “the student is led to levels of
success previously not envisaged by neither the student or the teacher” (p. 302).
The scaffolding is gradual, as the teacher regulates the interaction within the child’s
zone, until the child can complete the task independently of the teacher:
… with regards to instruction, Vygotsky believed that in most settings
adults and children work together to bring the child from his or her
initial level of mastery gradually to the most advanced level of
independent activity that the child can achieve…(Campione, Brown,
Ferrara & Bryant, 1985, p. 77).
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
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One way to look at formative assessment interactions between teacher and
learner is to view their activity as ongoing participatory appropriation (Rogoff,
1995) of each other’s ideas and activities in a co-constructed zpd. Newman et al,
(1989) have characterized appropriation as a two way process, emphasizing that
neither the teacher nor student have a complete understanding of the interaction
occurring between them:
In constructing the zpd for a particular task the teacher incorporates
children’s action but neither own the system of activity…Just as the
children do not have to know the full cultural analysis of a tool to begin
using it, the teacher does not have to have a complete analysis of the
children’s understanding of the situation. (pp. 63-64)
Vygotskian scholars would argue that both teacher and learner work together
to bring the learner from her initial level of mastery to gradual independent activity,
and that together they bring the teacher to greater expertise, so that they can be of
utmost assistance. In a co-constructed zpd, participatory appropriation can apply
to both learner and/or teacher because of the ongoing and changing interpretation
of each other’s ideas and actions. Thus, both the learner and the expert appropriate
cognitive products (a statement, tangible product or an action) but use it in different
ways, which may not always have been the one intended (Moschkovich, 2001).
Moschkovich (2001) talks about expert (teacher) and learner (student) appropriation
in the following way:
Expert and learner appropriation share central characteristics. Both
expert appropriation and learner appropriation involve joint productive
activity, developing shared attention and meanings, and taking another’s
product for one’s own use. This “taking for one’s own use” involves both
interpreting a product within one’s own knowledge system and using the
product based on this interpretation. Taking these common features, I
define appropriation in general as taking the product of joint activity
for one’s own use. (p. 8).
Moschkovich (2001) argues that appropriation is usually more intentional for
the expert than for the learner, because the expert has more complex domain
knowledge. During expert appropriation, “the expert interprets the student’s
cognitive product within his or her knowledge framework and subsequently engages
the student in an activity reflecting this expert understanding of the situation”
(Moschkovich, 2001, p. 6). For the learner, the appropriation consists of acquiring
knowledge, skills and/or strategies that help in moving towards upper levels of
competence. While the learner gains knowledge (understanding) of the content
and structure of a discipline (i.e. mathematics, writing, science, etc.), the expert, in
turn, makes advances in the ability to structure content, as well increase the skills
and strategies that make up pedagogical content knowledge (Shulman, 1989; Van
Driel,Verloop, & de Vos, 1998). This can only be accomplished by appropriating
WORKING IN THE ZONE
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each other’s products.
When appropriation is reciprocal or multidirectional, the term mutual
appropriation can be used (Griffin, Newman & Cole, 1989; Moschkovich, 1989) to
describe how teachers and learners together participate in the teaching/learning
process. Thus the same material might be appropriated by both the learner and the
teacher, but used in different ways. If joint activity is productive, one can argue that
the goals of the teacher and the learner move closer together. In the research
described in this paper, we rely on using formative assessment as the focus of joint
productive activity; knowing that current levels of participation in formative
assessment, and appropriation of knowledge change future participation, so that
“both the purposes and the means of joint action are themselves constantly
undergoing transformation” (Wells, 1999, p. 324).
Formative Assessment as Joint Productive Activity in the ZPD
Formative assessment can take a wide variety of forms and structures, for
example for soliciting learning products, the rubrics used for evaluation, and in the
manner in which feedback is given to the learner. One interpretation of a formative
assessment learning/teaching cycle is offered in Figure 2, taken from Harlen, Ash,
Bartels, Rankin, Bevan, Tucker, Ebisusaki & Kanevsky (2000). This iterative cycle
illustrates how teachers gather evidence during student activities, evaluate the
evidence, and determine the next steps in order to help move the student to a higher
level of understanding. In the language of joint productive activity or participatory
appropriation, we would say that the teachers appropriate the products of the learners
(evidence) in order to analyze these and to consider next steps; while the learners
appropriate the strategies and structures (next steps) of the teachers in order to
provide new products (more evidence) for continued analysis. At each stage, there
is opportunity for variation in practice. For example, while one teacher may rely on
learners’ written products, such drawings or writing, another may document student
questions or explanations, while another might watch the learner in action. Some
teachers use portfolio assessment to capture students’ best work, while others might
invite individual interviews. All fall within the broad practice of formative assessment
(Ash et al, 2000).
The cyclic determination of differences between teacher and learner
understanding can be interpreted as an ongoing diagnosis of the distance between
the learner’s current and potential levels of ability in the zpd. As the teacher collects
evidence of learner understanding, she appropriates products that reveal needs and
strengths. In order to interpret the evidence, the teacher compares her original
expectations against the actual performance of the learner. In order to assess evidence
for understanding and act on that knowledge, the teacher must appropriate the
student’s understanding into her own system of understanding, compare the two
understandings, and then decide how to guide the student within the zpd. We call
this ‘working within the zpd.
It seems clear that both expert and learner appropriation occur in these instances
but can we say that mutual appropriation is occurring? Mutual appropriation
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
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involves both expert and learner appropriations. The essence of this argument
involves cyclic appropriation and iterative use of another’s products. This
description is virtually identical to the formative assessment cycle already described
as Figure 2. For the teacher, it includes appropriation of student product such as
questions or drawings; for the student, it is learner appropriation of teacher strategies,
questions or activities.
Goals
Students’ activities
Next steps in learning
Evidence
Judgement of
achievement
Students
Teacher decides how to
help next steps
Teacher collects
evidence relating to
goals
Teacher interprets
evidence
Teacher decides
appropriate next steps
Goal B
Goal C
Goal A
Figure 2. Cycle of formative assessment adatped from Harlen, et al (2000).
A Proposed Trajectory of Teacher Change
We have outlined a proposed developmental trajectory of teacher
transformation (see Figure 3). In proposing the trajectory, we synthesize others
interpretations of mutual appropriation, Tharp & Gallimore’s view of joint
productive activity, and Harlen’s interpretation of formative assessment, within
the Vygotksian zone of proximal development. The four steps of the proposed
trajectory are:
1. Teachers examine student work closely, using a prescribed scaffolding
tool, i.e. a rubric, as a guideline. Often, this is done in collaboration with
other teachers.
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Teachers start by examining student work, setting the stage for analyzing the
kinds of thinking that may have gone into their production. This often leads to
categorization of learner products. Student work may include students’ questions,
drawings, utterances, writings, presentation, etc. It also involves advancing the
teachers’ own understanding of the task with respect to expectation or goal, based
on the scaffolding tool. Typically, the teachers have in mind a set of strategies for
advancing learners’ understanding.
Teachers examine student work closely, using a prescribed scaffolding tool, i.e.
a rubric, as a guideline. Often, this is done in collaboration with other teachers.
Teachers begin to see a mismatch (using the scaffolding tool) between their
expectation and student level of performance, either in competence, proficiency,
ability or overall goals.
Teachers self-reflect, observe their own practice, and begin to adjust pedagogy,
either by changing the requirements of the task, by providing specific student
guidance, or by reevaluating the goals of the task.
Teachers continue to self-reflect and adjust or constrain tasks and/or expectations
according to the student’s ability. This helps students move towards desired
conceptual goals, but also moves the teachers toward increasing sophistication
in diagnosing and understanding their own pedagogy.
Figure 3. A proposed trajectory of teacher change.
2. Teachers begin to see a mismatch (using the scaffolding tool) between
their expectation and student level of performance, either in competence,
proficiency, ability or overall goals.
Using a scaffolding tool, the teachers begin to examine the learners’ evidence,
and to evaluate the mismatch between their expectations (goals) and student’s
performance. Noticing that there is a difference or mismatch in the expected and
actual outcomes can cause teachers to re-evaluate their own structures for teaching
or particular content areas, strategies or specific learning tools. Teachers begin to
think of effective means of instruction to mitigate the differences. Although teachers
may start with prescribed scaffolding tools, invariably these are re-evaluated in the
closer context of student work.
3. Teachers self-reflect, observe their own practice, and begin to adjust
pedagogy, either by changing the requirements of the task, by providing
specific student guidance, or by reevaluating the goals of the task.
During this step, teachers question the scaffolding tools, and their own goals,
more explicitly in order to more accurately reflect learners’ understanding. If the
tools are inadequate, then teachers can readjust the goals of the task in a variety of
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
9
ways. They can modify the criteria for decision-making based on current
understanding of learner’s products and the mismatch described in step 2, or they
may clarify or reify the scaffolding tool itself, typically making these decisions
public to learners. Teachers sort or select strategies that can take learners to new
levels of understanding. This requires a degree of questioning (of the self and
others) to ascertain the appropriate next steps and perhaps even abandoning or
revising preconceived ideas that teachers held when initially examining student
work (step 1).
4. Teachers continue to self-reflect and adjust or constrain tasks and/or
expectations according to the student’s ability. This helps students move
towards desired conceptual goals, but also moves the teachers toward
increasing sophistication in diagnosing and understanding their own
pedagogy.
In this last stage, the teachers are increasingly aware of the changes they have
had to make while using the formative assessment cycle. They are able to reflect on
their own processes and the products that were most useful in the participation with
learners. The examination of evidence and the actions taken to mitigate differences
in individual or joint understanding result in transformation for the teachers.
Data and Methodology
Two different studies inform this research. The first case investigated the work
of two teachers who participated in a teacher research group in California. The
teacher research group focused on using formative assessment in guiding student
science inquiries, with an emphasis on investigable questions. The second case
examined the relationship between a mentor teacher and a teacher candidate in
Pennsylvania. The focus was on using formative assessment of the pedagogical
skills of the teacher candidate in order to guide her toward the use of classroom
science inquiry.
Each of the authors has a long-standing relationship with the participating
teacher research groups. For this research, each collected ethnographic field notes,
conducted interviews with teachers, and regularly attended teacher research groups
in professional development sessions aimed at understanding teacher research
and formative assessment. Beyond that, direct experience with actual teacher
professional practice was obtained through in-class visits. Teacher interviews were
tape recorded and transcribed. Researchers acted as participant observers in teacher
research.
Transcripts from learning group meetings were coded and categorized until
patterns emerged forming the basis for the steps in the trajectory. The proposed
trajectory was then utilized as a framework for analyzing the particular interviews
described in this research. Case descriptions were shown to the teachers to check
for agreement of the portrayal of their developmental growth though the use of
formative assessment.
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The California Case
At the Exploratorium in California,
…teachers do the research, form the questions, gather and interpret the
data, and then use results to change their own practices. This formative
assessment of their own methodologies—using student work as a focus—
is part of a continuous feedback loop that allows children’s learning
and inquiry to be the core element around which changing practice is
informed. (Ash, Greene, & Austin, 2000, p. 1)
Over the course of 4 years, 12 teacher-researchers were actively engaged in the
annual teacher research group. The learning group met monthly throughout the
school year, not including two research release-days per teacher (Ash & Greene &
Austin, 2000). The case study for this paper is based on a subset of two teachers,
with one highlighted. All learning group teachers examined students’ work closely,
in particular students’ skill in asking questions that might lead to inquiry. All
teachers systematically collected and observed student questions, categorized
questions publicly with students, and then introduced a strategy for selecting
questions that helped move inquiry forward. One scaffolding tool (Figure 1), based
on the questioning rubric outlined by Harlen, (1998), focuses on five categories of
questions—comments as questions, philosophical questions, factual questions,
complex questions and investigable questions, questions which can lead to
investigation by children (Harlen, 1998). This tool was used most extensively by
teachers. Using the rubric typically involved the public sorting and discussion of
the questions with the children and subsequent collaboration towards making the
potentially investigable questions more investigable, more specifically, questions
that can lead to inquiry investigations by children in the classroom.
Wendy, the primary focus of the California case, was part of the teacher research
group at the Exploratorium for four years (Cheong, 2000). She is representative in
that her professional growth paralleled her use of questioning with students. Wendy
had previously participated in several professional development opportunities at
the Exploratorium, including two week-long inquiry and formative assessment
institutes. She started teaching in a second grade classroom, and later taught first
grade, both at a mid-size urban school in San Francisco, a school that included
many second language learners. The San Francisco Unified School District has
been involved in science education reform for many years.
She focused on both her own and her students’ use of questioning in her
classroom, at first using a kit-based sound unit as a vehicle for inquiry investigations.
She began by formatively assessing children’s questions in order to explore their
understanding of both scientific concepts and the processes of inquiry (observing,
predicting, etc). Later she studied her own use of questions as a way of eliciting
their understandings more strategically and efficiently. The collaborative evaluation
of student questions with her students allowed her to focus on their questions in
new ways. As she became more facile at asking and framing questions of the
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
11
students, so, too, did her students become more able to frame their own questions as
both moved towards deeper investigations.
The Pennsylvania Case
In a separate context, Levitt collaborated with mentor teachers and teacher
candidates engaged in formative assessment of the development of teaching skills
of inquiry specifically concentrating on five specific skill and knowledge areas.
Collaboration between the teacher candidates and their mentor deepened all teachers’
understanding and practices of inquiry in the classroom.
During the 1999/2000 school year, thirteen teacher candidates and their mentor
teachers participated in a field test for an Inquiry Science Endorsement for the teacher
candidates. The Inquiry Science Endorsement (ISE—ASSET, 2000), although initially
designed to summatively assess the teacher candidate’s competence, eventually became
a vehicle for ongoing, developmental formative assessment of these skills for the
teacher candidate. Mentor teachers examined the teacher candidate’s teaching skills
closely. The mentor teacher carefully observed the teacher candidate’s teaching
performance, recording evidence of achievement of a specific skill, then subsequently
analyzed the teacher candidate’s skills using the ISE as an assessment tool (see Figure
2). The teacher candidates and the mentor teachers participated jointly in a learning
group to discuss and deepen their understanding of the interpretation and
implementation of the skills of inquiry in an elementary classroom. The learning
group met monthly throughout the school year. This case focuses on the relationship
of one particular mentor teacher (Barb) and teacher candidate pair.
Barb has over 17 years of teaching experience. At the time of her participation
as a mentor teacher in the learning group, Barb was teaching fourth grade. Previously,
she had participated for several years in a teacher learning group that focused on
implementing inquiry in the elementary classroom. This particular year, the group
expanded to having individual teacher candidates paired with a mentor teacher.
The group focused on using the ISE guide as a tool for deepening their understanding
of implementing inquiry science in the classroom. Ultimately, the goal of the group
was to recommend changes in the skills and competencies described in the ISE,
based on their actual paired work in the classroom. Barb’s involvement in the
learning group came through her connection to an LSC (Local Systemic Change)
targeting the reform of elementary science education. Through this LSC she had
provided professional development instruction for teachers as well as participated
in professional development designed to increase the effectiveness of her own
teaching of inquiry. To this end, she participated in the Institute for Inquiry (at the
Exploratorium, San Francisco, CA), and served as staff on a local adaptation of this
Institute held annually for the LSC.
Using the ISE guide, Barb determined the gap between the expected outcome
(the skill as described in the ISE) and the actual teaching performance of the teacher
candidate in order to determine which next steps would most assist in the
development of her skills from their current level to an upper level of competence.
Often, these gaps between expected and actual performance were discussed in the
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learning group to gain a better understanding of the nature of the skill and its
implementation in the classroom. Together, each mentor teacher and teacher candidate
pair would discuss a plan for improvement. The formative assessment process caused
the mentor teachers to reflect on their own skills of teaching through inquiry to recall
specific episodes that could be used as demonstrations of a skill for the teacher candidate
or to decide on a strategy for demonstrating a skill for the teacher candidate.
Two Case Stories of Teacher Transformation
In the following pages, we describe in greater detail how the two different
cases follow the proposed trajectory of professional transformation.
Step 1. Teachers examine student work closely, using a prescribed
scaffolding tool, i.e. a rubric, as a guideline. Often, this is done in
collaboration with other teachers.
In California, Wendy started by using active listening to better understand
students’ scientific thinking.
I practice active listening to the children’s responses, since their questions
often come in the form of statements. Then it’s up to me, the teacher, to
help turn their statements into investigation questions by asking things
like “Do you mean...?” or “Is this what you are asking?” I acknowledge
and record all of their questions.
Her aim was to specifically examine their questions. Initially, she used the
Harlen questioning taxonomy as a general template. When discussing questions
with students, she focused on formatively assessing their questions, since her primary
goal was to facilitate them frame questions in the investigable category—that is,
questions that will move towards investigation.
Because questions can be investigable without being interesting or complex,
this teacher and her students added complexity as a criterion to the investigable
questions in order to help their movement towards more complex questions. Most
teachers who work with questioning agree that it takes active listening to hear the
students’ questions. Yet, active listening relies on knowing where children start and
where they can proceed and it also relies on expert appropriation of some of the learner’s
questions and helping them move towards more productive areas. Wendy said:
…While watching the children explore, I encourage them to ask questions
about whatever seems curious to them. Because students often have
difficulty asking questions, I support them in various ways. For example,
I do a lot of modeling. I also ask a lot of open-ended questions, such as:
“Can you tell me what you are trying to find out with this instrument?”
or “Is that what you expected to hear?” Eventually, the children get used
to hearing the kinds of questions that can lead to investigations.
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
13
She routinely captured all questions on paper but did not stop there. She
discussed the questions with the students, and together they selected the best
examples. They grouped questions that belonged together and then combined
them to create more interesting inquiries. Increasingly, Wendy revealed a greater
capacity to listen to what children meant, to formatively assess the gist of children’s
thinking when they framed questions, so that she became more able to think of
ways to help them express their ideas. Wendy talked about her increased capacity
for listening and moving students to a higher level of questioning. One can say that
the students and the teacher mutually appropriated the questions and the categories.
Applying the trajectory to the mentor teacher/teacher candidate relationship
reveals similar patterns of action. At the beginning of the semester, Barb, the mentor
teacher, discussed each skill in the ISE with the teacher candidate in order to come
to a mutual understanding of that skill and to recognize the related criteria for
achieving mastery. She began the process of assessing the teacher candidate’s skills
by observing her teach and carefully keeping an anecdotal record of each teaching
episode. Initially, Barb observed the teacher candidate’s overall teaching ability in
science while using the ISE as a basis for her thoughtful analysis of the teacher
candidate’s practice. According to Barb,
The Inquiry Science Endorsement serves as a neutrally agreed upon set
of standards and validates the important skills of inquiry. At the same
time, the teacher candidate’s comfort with the skills is increased because
“others” [not the mentor teacher] have determined them. I observe [the
teacher candidate] for the general teaching skills, but focus on the skills
as described in the Endorsement. Because we had talked about these
skills prior to teaching, we have agreed on what the skills might look like
when actually used. When I have observed other student teachers, I have
not necessarily had such a specific tool to help me assess their strengths
and weaknesses to provide feedback for improving their teaching. My
strategy had typically been to teach the lesson providing a model of
general teaching skills. I didn’t used to think about breaking down the
lessons into specific skills for examining.
After the lesson, Barb and the teacher candidate discussed the lesson, providing
opportunities for the teacher candidate to examine and reflect on her own teaching.
When the teacher candidate then taught a lesson, she felt her lessons flowed “more
smoothly” and that she knew “this is what I have to do and what I have to do next”,
because the skill had been discussed and the noticeable gaps related to specific
established criteria that provided her with a framework for her lesson. Ultimately,
the teacher candidate believed she was more “in tune” to the different skills necessary
for teaching through inquiry because Barb modeled the expected specific skill in
her own teaching. This grounded the teacher candidate’s growth in the actual events
of teaching. The formative assessment that occurred in the context of the ISE made
the teacher candidate, as well as the mentor teacher, more aware of their identifiable
practices and enabled both of them to extend their understanding of their practices.
WORKING IN THE ZONE
14
One can say that they mutually appropriated the skills in question.
Step 2 . Teachers begin to see a mismatch (using the scaffolding tool)
between their expectation and student level of performance, either in
competence, proficiency, ability or overall goals.
At this stage in the process, teachers began to see the gap between learners’
understandings and teachers’ expectation, either in ability or overall goals.
For example, as Wendy observed students’ ability to raise questions, inevitably
she found ways to assess the questions in order to devise a way to improve their
development. Wendy said
I always start by modeling how to ask questions that can be investigated,
and how to look at a list of questions and eliminate some or re-word
some that can’t be investigated easily. By inviting students into the process
of recognizing questions that can be investigated, I found that I help
them to be better questioners, yet to also do investigations based on their
questions and get to the content I am responsible to teach.
In this statement, the teacher recognizes that there are different kinds of
questions and that her job is to build children’s’ understanding of the same. However,
it is not enough to just get the questions out, meaning to simply brainstorm them,
even if that is an important step in the process. A second teacher who relied on
student questions, Judy, said at this stage:
… I have found that it is highly successful to post [these] questions
on the classroom walls with sentence strips throughout the unit of
study. This provides a continual discussion of unanswered questions
that the students know they will have the opportunity to explore.
Children can be taught questioning strategies. Many enjoy the
challenge of brainstorming, refining, and working with questions as
they picture themselves doing the investigation. Those who are able
to grasp this process provide help for those who are at a more
elementary stage of questioning.
Also at this stage teachers reflect on their prior work, specifically their
prior practice of moving through lesson plans without formatively assessing
or reflecting on what students really want to know. They understand that
questioning as formative assessment provides powerful information regarding
what the students want to know but more importantly what they still do not
understand. This allows for important feedback for lesson design. More
importantly it tells the teacher what strategies may not have been working,
which allows them to reflect on their own teaching and to attempt to close up
the gap between their original intentions and the students’ understandings. In
Wendy’s words,
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
15
I did not always realize the power of questioning. These days, I see myself
as a guide that helps the children scaffold, re-word, and constrain their
questions, to help move them towards knowing how to do independent
investigations.
In the mentoring case, similarly, as a result of the observation and subsequent
discussion, the mentor teacher and the teacher candidate began to see the gap
between the teacher candidate’s performance and the expected outcome as outlined
in the criteria of the ISE, either in proficiency, ability or overall goals. For example,
Implementing an Inquiry Lesson is one of the five skill areas in the ISE. Within this
skill, several of the criteria include the use of questioning as a strategy consistent
with the use of inquiry. Evidence that the student teacher has mastered the skill
includes posing questions and using open-ended questions to assess and further
student understanding. In reflecting on several of the teacher candidate’s lessons,
Barb determined,
[The teacher candidate] was not yet demonstrating competence in this
area. Primarily, she was using closed questions that only required single-
word answers and she did not ask questions that encouraged students to
think.
Barb felt strongly that the teacher candidate was capable of exhibiting this
skill as she had demonstrated strengths in her general teaching abilities and had
been receptive to integrating feedback into her teaching practice. Barb thought
that perhaps the teacher candidate had not yet observed this skill implemented in
a classroom or had not been exposed to these types of questions during her teacher
education program, so she modelled them and explained them as part of this
modelling process.
Step 3. Teachers self-reflect, observe their own practice, and begin to
adjust pedagogy, either by changing the requirements of the task, by
providing specific student guidance, or by reevaluating the goals of
the task.
As their assessment of students’ understanding increased, teachers began to
match next steps to their students’ perceived needs in a formal and explicit way.
Wendy said,
I see myself …helping the children scaffold, moving from [a] more teacher-
directed kind of science learning experiences to being able to start and
do more of an independent investigation. I am definitely at this
intermediate stage of transition…to [help] them [in] owning the
questions, learning how to question themselves, taking a look and
reflect[ing] on their own practices as they do their investigations …
WORKING IN THE ZONE
16
A second teacher said,
… First, I model the process of selecting an exploration, turning it into
an investigable question, designing the experiment, and developing a
list of materials needed. Throughout this process, many scientific attitudes
are discussed, such as flexibility in the process of the investigation, what
constitutes success, how scientists work together, share data, and interpret
results. It is also during this stage that I share how I will assess the
students’ investigations. Some of these assessments take the form of
rubrics, checklists, required elements, and point systems.
Both of these teachers implied that they had in fact appropriated the students’
questions, were able to measure their potential against a rubric that allowed them to
guide student questions towards investigations and to select those that were more
likely to ‘pay off’. This was done in conjunction with the students because, in the
end, the student needs to do the experiment, not the teacher.
In the case of the mentor teacher, it was important to discuss each skill in the ISE
with the teacher candidate, to come to a mutual understanding of the skill, and the
related criteria for achieving mastery. These discussions, along with input from the
learning group, heightened Barb’s awareness of each element of that skill area. After
reviewing the document, Barb found that while she was teaching she might recognize
a specific skill that had been discussed, and she then would stop in the middle of a
lesson to point out how that particular skill had been demonstrated. Sometimes, Barb
would pull the teacher candidate aside during the lesson to reflect on the teaching
practice she had been demonstrating. Barb stated that she believed that participating
in these conversations with the teacher candidate and modeling the skills “pushed
buttons” in her own practice in areas that she may not have otherwise explored, thus
causing her to reflect, and as a result develop these skills even further.
In addition, because the goals of the ISE were standardized for all the teacher
candidates, the goals of the task could only be modified with group consensus.
Therefore, the primary course of action for the mentor teacher was to adjust pedagogy
and/or to use a different strategy for providing aid to the teacher candidate. This aid
came in the form of very specific suggestions that helped the student teacher bridge
the gap between her original skill level and the desired goal. For example, when
modeling the skill of asking open-ended questions seemed not to help the teacher
candidate’s progress in her proficiency of this skill, Barb provided her with a written
guide for developing specific types of questions. The guide provided question stems
that the teacher candidate could use to plan the questions she might ask during her
lesson. The teacher candidate used this guide as the next step in her development of
this skill. The mentor teacher further adjusted her own pedagogy, deepening her own
understanding of effective strategies for helping the teacher candidate.
The move from other-assisted to self-assisted for the teacher can occur when
he or she relies less on the formalized practices set within the activities given in
Figures 1 and Appendix A and becomes more able to internalize and use these step
in a natural and less formulaic fashion. Again the teacher can begin to see that there
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
17
are ways to interpret student work that are more productive and strategic in guiding
learners in the zpd.
Step 4. Teachers continue to self-reflect and adjust or constrain tasks
and/or expectations according to the student’s ability. This helps
students move towards desired conceptual goals, but also moves the
teachers toward increasing sophistication in diagnosing and
understanding their own pedagogy.
In this stage, teachers grow more explicit in their ability to help shape students’
development. For example, teachers understood that they can constrain the task to
maximize understanding in certain areas. The following is an example of such a
constraint from Wendy’s work.
Over the past year, I have come to see that if I limit or constrain the
questions to a manageable number - like five or six - my students still
maintain ownership over what they want to investigate, and we also
move towards the content I want to cover. This intermediate step has
been very helpful in getting me closer to my goal.
When I started doing inquiry in my classroom, I accepted all questions
the students asked, allowed them all to be investigated, and then had a
discussion at the end. I found, however, that allowing children to do
investigations based on all of their questions wasn’t moving us toward
the content, or some of the process skills that I wanted to teach.
[Now] I add an intermediate step of grouping some of these questions
because I know what concepts I need to teach. I work together with the
students to re-word some of the questions so the students still have
ownership over the questions they get to choose to investigate. We do this
by doing a lesson on how to sort questions into different groups.
Using questioning as the focus, teachers were increasingly able to
diagnose their students’ understanding and to move closer to providing the
next steps to develop their own understanding.
Once I set up this climate in my classroom, that is how I plan to do the rest
of my lessons or topics in science. …This way, children are more self-
reflective when they ask questions. They know what questions are, which
questions will lead them to doing tests, which question would be more
like a reference kind of question, which questions we can easily answer
with a yes or no, and which ones are maybe too big, because we don’t
have the materials or they seem too difficult unless we change it somehow.
Similarly, the mentor teacher Barb began to constrain the task according to the
WORKING IN THE ZONE
18
needs of the teacher candidate, which promoted defined growth in the teacher
candidate. At the same time, Barb deepened her understanding and awareness of her
teaching practices. Through joint reflection on the teacher candidate’s lesson, Barb
and the teacher candidate agreed that the teacher candidate needed to focus on and
reexamine specific questions that would “open up” the lesson and move away from
“dead end” questions, as Barb called them.
I became more aware of my own use of these questions and tried to
increase the use of this type of question in my own teaching. As I asked
the students more open-ended questions, I would stop and point them out
to [the teacher candidate]. As she [the teacher candidate] continued to
plan for the use of open-ended questions, and I modeled them more
specifically, she [the teacher candidate] was able to better integrate
these types of questions into her lessons and encourage more thoughtful
participation from students through her developing skills.
When asked about her professional growth in the process of helping the teacher
candidate to open up the classroom to inquiry and advance her skills, Barb talked
about her use of the assessment of the teacher candidate’s skills to explore her own
understanding of, and proficiency with, teaching through inquiry. She noticed that
as she became more skilled at examining the practices of teaching through inquiry
and engaging in dialogue with the teacher candidate, she brought her awareness of
her skills to a more conscious level, so that they could also be examined and honed.
So, as the teacher candidate became more able to self-assess her own progress toward
these skills through examination and questioning of her practices, so did the mentor
teacher, as they cooperatively moved their work towards the teaching of inquiry.
Discussion and Implications
Through two rich case stories, we have described teacher transformation as
they participated in formative assessment with learners. We described these
interactions as ‘working within the zone of proximal development’. The
development of each of the participants was accomplished through participatory
appropriation of ideas and actions during ongoing formative assessment cycles of
joint productive activity. For the learner, the appropriation consisted of acquiring
concepts and strategies that guided them towards science inquiry, in the case of
students towards performing their own investigations, in the case of new teachers,
towards improving their teaching of inquiry.
Transformation for the learner was only one outcome of joint productive activity.
The other outcome, the main focus of this research, was teacher transformation. Using
Rogoffs (1995) transformation in participation model, the question became that of
discerning how expert teacher participation was transformed. We now look at formative
assessment and appropriation, first, in light of ‘working in the zone of proximal
development’, and second, with respect to the scaffolding tools used by teachers.
Last, we discuss the broader implications of this kind of research.
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
19
Working in the ZPD
We have made the argument that formative assessment involves mutual
appropriation of products within the zone of proximal development. Another way
of stating this is that transformation occurs as teachers and learners appropriated
each other’s thinking and actions, and as they understood better the meanings
associated with them. While both the expert and the learner appropriate the same
products, for example, the kinds of questions asked by learners, the expert and
learner use the appropriated products in different ways.
In the two case studies, teachers became more adept at appropriating the learners’
ways of thinking, their concepts, and their strategies, and then assessing their
relevance, in order to select the most productive pedagogical strategy for moving
the learner towards a goal that became mutual. Part of the power of using the zone
of proximal development as a framework is that it encourages us to think in terms
of a series of successive changes within an ever-changing zone of mutual
understanding. While the particular focus of observation within the zpd can vary a
great deal, as we have seen (in California, the focus was on students’ questions,
while in Pennsylvania, the focus was on novice teacher actions), in both locations,
experts appropriated learners’ products in increasingly sophisticated ways. The
result for the expert was more effective ways of teaching.
The patterns seen in both cases studies exemplify the description given
previously by Brown and Ferrara (1985) saying that “the student is led to levels of
success previously not envisaged by neither the student or the teacher” (p. 302).
This is true because “upper boundaries are seen not as immutable but as constantly
changing with the learner’s increasing independent competence at each successive
level” (Brown et al, 1993 p. 35).
In both case studies formative assessment spurred a continual assessment of the
teacher’s own methodologies as part of a feedback loop. As teachers looked at learners’
work in more detail, they saw discrepancies. But closing a perceived gap was not done
in one easy single step. One step resulted in several others. Nor was the band-width of
mismatch constant; instead there was continuous change in the participants’ knowledge.
In effect, just as a one perceived mismatch was closed, others opened up. Thus the
process of assessing within the zpd was ongoing, so that formative assessment activities
occurred over many cycles. In these two cases change developed over the course of a
full academic year. Throughout each turn of the formative assessment cycle,
discrepancies highlighted the need to move towards an ever-greater consistency
between expected and actual (individual and mutual) goals. At each point, the teacher
needed to change expectations or change teaching practice. This striving for
consistency informed teachers’ practice ongoingly. In both cases, by using formative
assessment, the experts themselves were changed in their own thinking.
Scaffolding Tools in the ZPD
The primary scaffolding tools used during the formative assessment cycle
were Harlen’s questioning rubric in the California case, and the Inquiry Science
WORKING IN THE ZONE
20
Endorsement in Pennsylvania. In both cases, the experts, over time, began to rely
less on the standard rubrics and more on revised, self-selected strategies, as they
became more able to select the strategies that helped the learner move towards
more independent understanding. In both cases, an ever-increasing fine-tuning of
scaffolding tool use, within iterative formative assessment cycles, occurred as
teachers entered into collaborative relationships with learners, who were invited to
co-construct ways of participating.
The teacher experts at the Exploratorium discussed questioning techniques
with students, categorized questions, reviewed and revised them, iteratively, over
the school year. They appropriated students’ questions, and these questions became
an object of research in and of themselves. By categorizing student questions
according to the Harlen rubric, teachers relied on a beginning scaffold for
organization, and for a method of guiding learners to meet their joint goals. They
collected student questions in a variety of ways, but in all cases they noted distinct
changes in student work, both qualitatively and quantitatively, and this resulted in
an improved ability to ask questions by the teacher and the students over time.
In working together to determine the match between goals, both student and
teacher jointly appropriated questions. The students gained insight into how to
maintain their own questions with certain goals in mind. The teachers learned how
to listen carefully to student goals and to find the questions that best suited these
goals. As teachers learned that not every question needed to be answered and that
questions served as a means to an end, both gained authority over the process. Teachers
first gained these insights as they used Harlen’s questioning rubric, but they quickly
moved beyond that as they independently put into practice altered selection processes
and modeled more sophisticated ways of guiding students’ questions.
By systematically collecting questions and tracking how they changed over
time, the teachers gained insights into the value of questioning, and their role in
guiding their activity. As teachers moved beyond Harlen’s guidelines, they
determined that questions need to be constrained, and that students needed expert
modeling in framing and carrying questions forward. They learned to trust their
insights regarding management of questions in important ways. For example, we
saw that Wendy transformed as she attended to her students’ questions in ever more
sophisticated ways and as she decided on next steps to help them in the zpd. Prior
to this training Wendy and other teachers thought that each student question needed
to be answered; now they have perhaps shifted to an understanding that, while each
might be honored, only some will be answered. Before studying student questions
directly, these insights did not occur. In her own words, Wendy said:
Over the past year, I have come to see that if I limit or constrain the
questions to a manageable number—like five or six—my students still
maintain ownership over what they want to investigate, and we also
move towards the content I want to cover …
[and later]
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
21
I did not always realize the power of questioning…
[and later]
By inviting students into the process of recognizing questions that can be
investigated, I found that I help them to be better questioners.
In these statements, Wendy suggests that she has changed her ability to assess
and guide children’s thinking forward. Her statements indicate that she understands
that she has improved her teaching practices in several key areas. First, she used
student questions to inform herself of their understanding of content material;
second, she allowed herself to constrain students questions according to some
standard criteria, in this case California State Science standards; and third, she
maintained collaborative ownership of the content and process by working towards
mandated standardized goals collaboratively with students.
A comparable pathway to transformation was demonstrated in Pennsylvania
by both expert and novice teachers through the use of formative assessment and
mutual appropriation of products and thinking. Mentor teachers appropriated ideas
about the skills used in teaching through inquiry from the teacher candidates, as
well as from each other during the learning group meetings, continually revising
the skill definitions and deepening their understanding of the implementation of
inquiry. Therefore, while the mentor teachers promoted growth in the teacher
candidates, they simultaneously examined their own practice in light of the use of
a scaffolding tool, the Inquiry Science Endorsement. Progression in the skills and
competencies of the teacher candidate occurred throughout the process in the course
of the semester as did the transformation of mentor teachers’ skills in the teaching
of inquiry.
Barb, the mentor teacher, gained professional knowledge and personal skills
by using the ISE guide but she was also able to move beyond it and to significantly
contribute her insight to “assessing the usefulness of the ISE as a way to accurately
assess novice teacher’s performance.” This mentor teacher was formatively assessing
both the novice teacher’s performance as well as the usefulness of the guide itself.
This is similar to the Exploratorium teachers’ initial use of the questioning rubric,
which they then moved beyond. This is another case of a teacher moving beyond
external guidelines towards internalized versions as metrics.
Additionally, mentor teachers expanded their beliefs and skills regarding
supervision of novice teachers. Rather than entering a traditional hierarchical
relationship, where the mentor teacher is the sole “authority” about teaching and
learning and simply watches for evidence of the accomplishment of certain skills
typically required of teachers, these mentor teachers actively engaged in discussions
with their respective teacher candidates, coming to a mutual understanding of the
requirements of skill and competence. Thus, through joint productive activity and
mutual appropriation of ideas about teaching and learning through inquiry, the
relationship became a mutual learning experience propelling each forward in her
own understanding.
WORKING IN THE ZONE
22
In this case, in which the focus was on the teaching relationship between the
mentor teacher and the teacher candidate, there was a deepening of understanding
of inquiry for both the mentor teacher and the teacher candidate. For the mentor
teacher there was also the increased ability to understand how to measure a learner’s
ability to understand inquiry. As stated earlier, “doing formative assessment allows
the [mentor] teacher to reflect critically on their own understanding of inquiry, as
well as to reflect on their own practice, as part of a unit of mutual growth. This
feedback loop of mentor teacher and teacher candidate change propels each forward
“ with mutual appropriation of knowledge serving to improve the practice of both
the expert and the learner simultaneously.
Implications
This paper presents a theoretical proposal explaining why formative assessment
serves as effective and transformative professional development for teachers. While
this is not meant as a “how to” for designing professional development, the research
presented as case studies within this paper generates implications for the professional
development of teachers. Together with the work of Tharp & Gallimore (1989) ),
Achinstein and Villar (2002), Jones, Rua & Carter, (1998) and others, we can claim
to have the beginnings of a response to Ball & Cohen (1999) who asked for a
“carefully constructed and empirically validated theories of teacher learning …”
(p. 4).
Taken together, these cases studies of actual professional development move
beyond the current interpretation of professional development in the sciences and
mathematics (Loucks-Horsley, Hewson, Love & Stiles, 1998). Loucks-Horsley et al
acknowledged that collaboration and reflection are essential to professional growth
and cannot be minimized. This research, using Vygotskian theory as underpinning,
explicates the conditions that encourage reflective activity to occur, by arguing
that collaboration and reflection occur as a outgrowth of participation and
appropriation in joint productive activity the zpd.
We are aware that other important discussions need to occur. One such
discussion centers on the role of the scaffolding tool itself. Whether working directly
with children or with other teachers, teachers started by using a pre-established set
of guidelines or standards, i.e. scaffolding tools. In each of these cases, the learners
were also aware of the expectations set forth in the tool and jointly negotiated the
meaning of the standards with the teacher. In both cases, the tools established
expectations, allowed the expert to determine the gap between expected and actual
performance of the learner, and provided a lens for self-reflection. Using the
scaffolding tool in these ways offered the expert support in making pedagogical
decisions. While this research did not expressly explore the role and use of tools in
joint productive activity, we are pursuing this issue in subsequent research.
There is another compelling form of scaffolding for experts in these cases. In
each case, teacher research occurred collaboratively in the context of a teacher
learning group, in which other teachers and researchers worked together to refine
their inquiry into pedagogy. As members of these research groups, teachers were
DORIS ASH & KAREN LEVITT
23
actively involved as learners as they explored various aspects of inquiry, including
questioning, rubrics, and other thinking tools, all the while having the support of
other teachers as peers with whom to collaborate. Thus, as Rogoff described,
teachers’ “transforming roles” impacted their learning. In the role of teacher experts,
learning occurred during the use of the formative assessment cycle with learners. In
the role of learners, learning occurred for the teachers as they collaborated with
peers to inform their teaching. This assumption of the dual roles of teachers as
means of professional growth is also being further researched (Ash, Levitt, Cheong,
Hess, Sciulli. 2001).
Conclusion
Using the notion of joint productive activity as truly mutual, we can ask as did
Yeats, “How can we know the dancer from the dance?” Embedded in this question
is the notion that each participant’s activities, thinking and goals are intertwined
even when one is teaching and one is learning. Using Yeats as a jumping off point,
Wells has said that “in the teaching and learning process...the entraining movements
of the other participants (the teacher in this case and the music) are just one part [of
the overall activity], [as] the novice gradually constructs the organizing cognitive
structures for him or herself and brings his or her actions into conformity with the
culture-given pattern” (Wells 1999 p. 323). Yeats captures the essence of the
conundrum of when is the teacher the learner and when is the teacher the expert.
Wells suggests that entraining within the zpd is composed of the actions of all
(teacher, learner, tools and/or other) participants and that within the zpd “activity
can be seen from the perspective of the individual participant acting with
mediational means or from that of the social practices in which they [are] and the
mediational means are involved. The value of the zpd is that it allows us to look at
both sides of this perspective simultaneously” (Wells, 1999, p. 322).
We have suggested that formative assessment, or assessment that informs
learning, (Harlen, 1999; Harlen, et al, 2000), involves mutual appropriation as joint
productive activity within zones of proximal development (Tharp & Gallimore,
1989). In this research, expert teachers appropriated learner cognitive products
(sample work, questions, strategies, etc.) in order to decide among multiple
competing strategies to help move the learner forward. We have argued that by
using formative assessment, teachers are ‘working within the zone of proximal
development’.
We have provided evidence in the form of two cases studies that formative
assessment provides a vehicle for growth for not only the learner, but for the teacher.
In each of the projects, teachers’ use of formative assessment propelled their
professional transformation in tandem with the development of the learners as they
self-monitored their practices through the lens of assessing the understanding of
the learner. A developmental trajectory was proposed, in each case, out of the data
from the two science education reform efforts. Such trajectories are based on the
assumption that teachers grow professionally when they have an opportunity to
study and modify their practices in the interest of student learning. The joint
WORKING IN THE ZONE
24
productive activity involves all participants receiving and giving assistance
mutually in the zone of proximal development.
Applying a new theoretical perspective to an existing set of educational
challenges has far-reaching ramifications for educational practice. By using the
zone of proximal development as the theoretical underpinning for formative
assessment and professional growth, these cases studies have allowed a closer
examination of the steps that involve both student and teacher change. The larger
significance of this work lies in understanding why formative assessment works as
an effective strategy for ongoing professional development across a wide range of
teaching practice, from pre-service through experienced teachers, to university
professors. This interpretation of formative assessment relies on promoting both
reflective practice and mutuality of perspective founded on Vygotskian theory.
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WORKING IN THE ZONE
26
Appendix
Sample page from the Inquiry Science Endorsement
SKILL # 2: DESIGNING AN INQUIRY LESSON
National Science Education Standards
Teaching Standard A: Teachers of science plan an inquiry based science program.
In doing this, teachers
· Select science content and design and adapt curricula to meet the interests,
knowledge, understanding, abilities, and experiences of students.
· Select teaching and assessment strategies that support the development of
student understanding and nurture a community of learners.
Teaching Standard B: Teachers o science guide and facilitate learning. In doing
this, teachers
· Focus and support inquiries while interacting with students.
Teaching Standard D: Teachers of science design and manage learning
environments that provide students with the time, space, and resources needed for
learning science. In doing this, teachers
· Make the available science tools, materials, media, and technological
resources available to students.
CRITERIA
1. Identify content and learning objectives clearly.
Evidence: Statement of objectives of lesson.
Methods Professor or Cooperating Teacher Date
2. Incorporate a learning cycle in planning.
Evidence: A science lesson plan with the components of a learning cycle (e.g.
FERA, EEEEE, FOSS) framework.
Methods Professor or Cooperating Teacher Date
3. Make lesson plans that identify students’ prior knowledge and understanding
and establish motivation for and objectives for the activity.
Evidence: Written lesson plans have students share their current understanding
of the subject, identify learning interests, and clarify the goals of the activity.
Methods Professor or Cooperating Teacher Date
ã ASSET Inc. September 2000
... Correctly identifying this zone allows teachers to design targeted and meaningful learning experiences that promote student growth. One of the most effective methods for pinpointing a learner's ZPD is through formative assessment, which relies on intentional and strategic engagement between teachers and students (Ash & Levitt, 2003). ...
... The software is often used to administer uniform tests to entire classes, with teachers correcting mistakes immediately or asking students to present solutions to the whole class. This approach overlooks the fundamental purpose of formative assessment: tailoring instructions to meet the individual cognitive levels of learners (Ash & Levitt, 2003). As a result, the transformative potential of tools like Microsoft Forms remains underutilized. ...
... Teachers diagnose the gap between students' current abilities and their potential within the zone of proximal development, interpreting evidence by comparing their initial expectations with learners' actual outcomes. This process enables teachers to align their understanding of student comprehension with instructional goals and decide how to guide students effectively (Ash & Levitt, 2003). ...
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... Teacher candidates plan with support, teach, and get feedback (Ash & Levitt, 2003). Extended ...
... Studies using an embedded structure to learning/enacting AfL were those in which teacher candidates had opportunities to enact AfL practice in a course (k = 5), in a course and in the field (k = 6), in the field (k = 8), or across a program (k = 4) with support and/or guidance. These studies overwhelmingly reported on practices and contexts that promoted teacher candidates' AfL learning/enactment (Ash & Levitt, 2003;Bannister & Linder, 2015;Brevik et al., 2017;Casey & Amidon, 2020;Dann & Allen, 2015;Dann & Dann, 2015;Graham, 2005;Keen, 2005;Kelting-Gibson et al., 2013;Koh et al., 2019;Levy-Vered & Alhija, 2018;Macken et al., 2020;Mooney & Gullock, 2013;Redington Bennett & Cunningham, 2009;Sabel et al., 2015;Siegel & Wissehr, 2011;Tolgfors et al., 2020;van Dinther et al., 2015;Willis, 2014;Xie & Cui, 2021). ...
... However, across studies with embedded structures, there were factors that affected teacher candidates' learning/enactment of AfL. In teacher education courses, in programs, and in the field, factors included summative evaluation that spurred external motivation (Ciuffetelli Parker & Volante, 2009;Tang et al., 2006;Tolgfors et al., 2020); school cultures and mentor teachers' orientations to assessment and support, both positively and negatively affecting the degree to which teacher candidates could practice AfL enactment (Ash & Levitt, 2003;Brevik et al., 2017;Graham, 2005;Tang et al., 2006;Tolgfors et al., 2020;Xie & Cui, 2021); the quality and frequency of opportunities for practice (Casey & Amidon, 2020;Willis, 2014); alignment of field and coursework experiences (Graham, 2005); authenticity of tasks and practice (Keen, 2005;Kelting-Gibson et al., 2013;Koh et al., 2019); duration of work with teacher candidates (e.g., too short; Macken et al., 2020); frequency and comprehensibility of feedback (Dann & Allen, 2015;Tang et al., 2006); and the usability of technology purposed to support AfL learning/enactment (Redington Bennett & Cunningham, 2009). Additionally, teacher candidates' AfL enactment was affected by their beliefs about teaching, learning, and assessment (Bannister & Linder, 2015;Dann & Dann, 2015;Mooney & Gullock, 2013;Siegel & Wissehr, 2011); peer support ; experience with AfL practices (Macken et al., 2020;van Dinther et al., 2015); repertoire of instructional strategies (Sabel et al., 2015); and content knowledge (Sabel et al., 2015). ...
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... Then, the learner and MKO share responsibility for the work being done. Finally, the learner is able to perform the task independently, thus moving themselves to a new ZPD (Ash et al., 2003). The development that occurs through the ZPD is part of a larger, deeper framework, which encompasses: ...
... Limited research is available about the teachers' zone of proximal development regarding reading instruction and reading comprehension. This systematic search contributes to further development in the area of teacher knowledge and growth through the lens of teaching and learning as a socio-cultural process (Ash et al., 2003). I intended to answer these research questions through this systematic review: ...
... Of the 22 methods used to collect data among the nine studies in this systematic review, pre/post questionnaires, video recordings and videosupported reflections, self-reflection, and scaffolding were among the most used (Kuusisaari, 2014;McCullagh, 2012;Murphy et al., 2015;Van Wyk et al., 2019;Wennergren, 2016;and Wu, 2004). Several modes of interview were used in the studies: formal and semi-structured interviews, focus group interviews, and interviews taped and transcribed (Ash et al., 2003;Elhussain et al., 2020;Murphy et al., 2015;Van Wyk et al., 2019;Wennergren, 2016;and Wu, 2004). Collaboration and peer collaboration were used in both Elhussain et al. (2020) through online shared journals and Murphy et al. (2015) where co-planning, co-practice, and co-evaluation were used as a collaborative tool between preservice teachers and in-service teachers. ...
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... Assessment for teaching (AfT) implies the use of classroom assessments by teachers to facilitate their instructional strategies through identifying learners' "zone of proximal development. " This zone, a metaphor conceptualized in a sociocultural and historical context that developed as a spatial and temporal symbol reflecting the sociogenetic base of all human psychological functions (Ash & Levitt, 2003;Eun, 2019), is an important concept in language learning. First proposed by Vygotsky (1978), it refers to the point of learning where learner exposure to guided learning through teaching interventions is ideal (Karimi & Shafiee, 2014). ...
... To develop teachers' CAL, they should be exposed to the theoretical and practical aspects of key skills, competences, and pertinent assessment practices in their initial teacher education and in continuous professional development programs. Apart from self-directed learning, collaborative learning approaches based on professional learning communities, termed the "new paradigm" to support the learning of teachers and students (Ash & Levitt, 2003;Darling-Hammond & Richardson, 2009), need to be promoted at the level of policy and practice. In addition, in CAL development process, it is important to recognize and address issues related to teacher agency, autonomy, and self-efficacy (Bandura, 1997;Davison & Leung, 2009;Wray et al., 2022); challenge and explore various facets of teachers' assessment beliefs, histories, personal theories, and attitudes (Latif & Wasim, 2021;Latif & Wasim, 2022;Xu & Brown, 2016); consider teachers' specific assessment training needs and contextual dynamics while planning and designing teacher training programs (Latif, 2021;Vogt & Tsagari, 2014); and ensure the sustainability and continuity of CAL development initiatives (Deluca et al., 2015). ...
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Conventions of transcription Introduction Part I. Establishing the Theoretical Framework: 1. The complementary contributions of Halliday and Vygotsky to a 'language-based theory of learning' 2. In search of knowledge 3. Discourse and knowing in the classroom Part II. Discourse, Learning, and Teaching: 4. Text, talk, and inquiry: schooling as semiotic apprenticeship 5. Putting a tool to different uses: a reevalution of the IRF sequence 6. From guessing to predicting: progressive discourse in the learning and teaching of science 7. Using the tool-kit of discourse in the activity of learning and teaching 8. Making meaning with text: a genetic approach to the mediating role of writing Part III. Learning and Teaching in the ZPD: 9. On learning with and from our students 10. The zone of proximal development and its implications for learning and teaching Appendices References Indexes.
Chapter
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