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Postgraduate study is both challenging and demanding. Additionally, for teachers who study part time while employed full time, there are additional professional demands. So why would they enrol in postgraduate study? Utilising expectancy-value theory, the motivations of 27 experienced teachers for undertaking and completing a masters degree were explored. In using this theory, it appears that teachers' expectancy of value beliefs and expectancy of success beliefs were evident prior to, and throughout, their academic journey. However, the four different components of task value altered over this journey. How these motivational sources presented themselves and changed over time are discussed. The findings from this research have the potential to assist those working in Higher Education to better understand the motivational forces that drive students to return to study, particularly when they have demanding professional roles within a workplace, and how they can be supported to ensure successful completion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the context of Teaching as Inquiry (TAI), this study responds to calls for in-depth qualitative research documenting opportunities that have the potential to build Teacher Self Efficacy. Drawing on 4 data sets generated by 28 student teachers as they undertook a TAI project during their final practicum, we illustrate how TAI experiences fostered competence and confidence through knowledge and skill development. We also highlight the impact outcome expectancies had on student teachers’ behaviour including their expectations of students from diverse backgrounds. As well as building persistence and resilience we show how the cyclic nature of the TAI process developed student teachers’ understanding of task magnitude with reference to their inquiry goals and teaching in general. Finally, we argue that self-efficacy needs to be promoted as a core rationale for TAI if its full potential in developing self-efficacious student teachers is to be realised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While it is argued that use of rubrics and exemplars has the potential to develop students' ability to distinguish quality, make evaluative judgments and take productive action, few studies have directly investigated the latter. To address this gap the current study employed classroom observations, eight focus groups interviews with 18 students and the collection of teaching-learning artefacts to investigate how two teacher educators and their students used rubrics and exemplars. Data analysis yielded two themes. The first theme spoke to a series of inter-connected supports deliberately set in place to foster and utilize students' evaluative and productive knowledge and skill. The second theme highlighted ways in which students compared understandings from in-class experiences with exemplars and rubrics to works-in-progress, bringing the latter closer to the expected standard of achievement. These findings provide an authentic picture of student engagement with rubrics and exemplars and offer insights into ways in which they applied evaluative and productive knowledge and skills to works-in-progress. It was concluded that the ways in which these tools were used not only supported development of students' evaluative and productive knowledge and skill, they played a key role in stimulating task related self-monitoring and self-regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic self-efficacy is critical to academic success. Hence those working in higher education need to make deliberate and substantial attempts to foster academic competence, confidence, persistence and resilience in the students they teach, given they are essential components of academic self-efficacy. Addressing an identified gap in the exemplars literature, this article pays particular attention to how exemplars can be used in an embedded and sustained manner with the intent of fostering and supporting these components. Taking into account the three dimensions of self-efficacy – strength, magnitude and generality – and the various sources of information students draw upon to make judgements about their capabilities, four inter-dependent and inter-related practices and associated experiences are identified. We argue that collectively these practices and experiences can accentuate the positive effects and ameliorate the potential negative effects of exemplar use on student academic self-efficacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding the goals for learning is fundamental to students’ success as writers. We investigated how Year 6 students in New Zealand experienced, understood and responded to goals during a writing unit. The study took place over seven weeks. Data were gathered through interviews with two teachers and six student participants; field notes from lesson observations; informal chats with students; and the collection of teacher documents, resources and student artefacts. Student selected goals, success criteria and rubric statements served as points of reference for a number of writing experiences. Findings indicated that the discourses underpinning students’ goals and the way they were framed resulted in the checking, highlighting, adding and ticking off of elements of persuasive writing. It was concluded if writing is to be understood and practised as an art rather than a technical activity, goals for learning need to address the more substantive aspects of the genre and the writing process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of students as lifelong, self-regulating learners is a valued outcome of higher education. To this end, the current project investigated how students in an undergraduate course experienced and responded to a teaching-learning environment where they were expected to take responsibility for their learning. The pedagogic environment of this course was grounded in strategies and activities associated with assessment for learning (AfL). As such, students were expected to participate in activities that provided them with opportunities to exercise control over their learning. Data gathering comprised individual semi-structured interviews and the collection of artefacts. Findings indicated goals helped students know where they were going; exemplars provided insights into what was expected and what constituted quality work; course activities elicited evidence of learning; dialogic interactions around these generated feedback about understandings and progress; the evaluation of exemplars developed evaluative knowledge, skill and expertise; peer review and feedback provided an authentic context for evaluation and monitoring of works-in-progress. It was concluded that, while each of the AfL strategies contributed to student self-regulation, the full impact of AfL as a catalyst for self-regulated learning was realised in the cumulative and recursive effect these strategies had on students' thinking, actions and feelings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Families play important roles in children's learning. Yet, teachers' values and beliefs may sway how families may participate in assessment of their child's learning within early childhood education. This paper reports on a qualitative case study in a New Zealand early childhood setting that explored teachers' views about involving families in assessment of infants’ and toddlers’ dispositional learning. Methods comprised interviews with five teachers, researcher field notes and documentation about children's learning. Findings suggested that teachers’ views about learning dispositions, teaching and assessment positioned families as consumers of, rather than participants in, assessment. Theoretical tensions arose between Gerber's Resources for Infant Educarers (RIE) approach that guided teachers' philosophy and practice andTe Whāriki, the mandated early childhood curriculum of New Zealand. The paper argues that weaving RIE with a national curriculum framework requires teacher engagement in critical thinking and discussion regarding actively involving families in assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Students need support to complete research masters degrees. Many of the studies aimed at enhancing the student experience to date have tended to focus on structural aspects of the degree, the academic needs of the students or the qualities of the supervisor. Few studies focus on the support needed to complete research masters degrees and even fewer consider the affective needs of the students. Semi-structured focus group interviews, analysis of the participants' academic transcripts – including thesis examination reports – and a content analysis of postgraduate coursework comprised the dataset for this qualitative pilot study. Using Bandura's theory of self efficacy (1977), the subjective experience of mature age teacher practitioners undertaking a Masters of Education degree was explored. Teachers' efficacy and outcome expectations were found to be influential in regard to enrolment in and completion of a masters degree. This initial foray into the emotional world of the student uncovers aspects that help us to understand more deeply the nature of the research masters students' journey through gaining a degree. As a result, this may help students to understand their journey and help university supervisors to support students through to successful completion of a masters degree. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The topics and framing of news stories relevant to skin cancer prevention have shifted over time. This study examined agenda-setting effects of such news stories on public attitudes and beliefs about tanning and skin cancer. Content analysis data on 516 articles published in two major daily newspapers in Melbourne, Australia, from 1994 to 2007 were combined with circulation data to generate indices of potential news exposure. Associations between these indices and cross-sectional telephone survey data from the same period on 6,244 adults’ tanning attitudes and perceived susceptibility to skin cancer were examined using logistic regression models, accounting for the temporal precedence of news content. Pro-sun protection stories on attitudes and behavior were associated with older adults not thinking a tan looks healthy. Pro-sun protection stories on solaria were associated with less preference for a deep tan among young adults who like to suntan. Stories on vitamin D that were unsupportive of or ambiguous about sun protection were associated with a number of pro-tan attitudes among younger adults. Results indicate news coverage during 1994–2007 served an important agenda-setting role in explaining the public's attitudes and beliefs about tanning and skin cancer. Vitamin D stories appeared most influential, particularly among young adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Engagement in self and peer assessment are authentic ways in which students can develop evaluative and productive knowledge and expertise, necessary prerequisites if they are to become autonomous learners. Teachers in the current study who had articulated similar beliefs in regard to the importance of developing student autonomy and who had described similar practices to develop self-monitoring behaviour were observed teaching a written language unit. However, the ways these practices ‘played out’ in the classroom was a matter of considerable variation in regard to the nature of the judgements made, the degree of student involvement in evaluative and productive activities, and the amount of control maintained by the teacher. Two particular cases are used to draw attention to teachers’ espoused beliefs and their congruence with practice. Given the powerful role that beliefs play in the enactment of specific assessment for learning practices, recommendations for teacher professional development are made. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Informed by an amalgam of notions drawn from constructivist, socio-cultural, metacognitive and self-regulation theory, the discourse created to describe assessment to enhance learning has gone through a number of iterations or discursive shifts. As a result, the current discourse is both ambitious and complex with the roles and responsibilities assigned to teachers and learners in learning and assessment radically transformed. Sponsored by the New Zealand Ministry of Education, the Teaching and Learning Research Initiative (TLRI) seeks to develop teachers' research capability and to build knowledge about teaching and learning with the intention of improving outcomes for learners. Using a range of qualitative data generation strategies this TLRI research project investigated secondary school teachers' and students' conceptions of assessment and feedback. This paper reports on the professional learning that accrued for these teachers using the data gained from the four mathematics teachers in the project. It also details changes in these teachers' thinking about the roles and responsibilities of teachers and learners in the assessment process and documents reported changes to their professional practice resulting from these changed views. Whilst it is argued that involvement in the project became a valuable form of professional learning whereby these teachers, to varying degrees, achieved accessibility to, and greater understanding of, the current discourse of formative assessment, the mediating influence of teachers' efficacy beliefs is also acknowledged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sponsored by the New Zealand Ministry of Education, the Teaching and Learning Research Initiative has sought to develop teachers' research capability and to build knowledge about teaching and learning with the intention of improving outcomes for learners. Fortunate to receive a two-year grant, our research collaboration investigated secondary school teachers' and students' conceptions of assessment and feedback. In addition to the ongoing collection and discussion of student achievement data, during the first year a key task for the teacher-researchers was to develop and implement a tool that could provide them with greater insight into their students' conceptions of assessment and feedback. This paper reports on how the teacher-researchers were supported in a continuing manner to achieve this task, and documents their growing understanding of formative assessment through engagement in teacher research. While there was considerable learning for teachers, it is argued that teacher research, even when supported, is complex and problematic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]