A PDS Partnership Goes International: Phase I of an American Slovenian Collaborative Research Project.
The focus of the article is on Phase I of an American Slovenian collaborative research project that was aimed at investigating effective classroom teachinglearning performances. The international project involved Dowling College and its fi rst Professional Development School (PDS) the Belmont Elementary PDS and the University of Primorska at Koper and its partnering elementary school, the Dr. Ales Bebler School. As part of the fi rst phase of the project, a video based action research study was conducted to analyze and assess videotaped lessons taught by American PDS teacher candidates and Slovenian student teachers. Based on the fi ndings changes were made to aspects of the teacher education programs and their respective school university/college partnerships. For purposes of this article the authors present an overview of Phase I of the project, a working conceptual framework for the project, and selected fi ndings of the Phase I video based action research study. A PDS Partnership Goes International 395 Scholar Practitioner Quarterly Volume 5, Number 4 Introduction and Overview In May of 2007 a letter of understanding was signed by representatives of four institutions agreeing to engage in a collaborative research project that came to be known as the American Slovenian Collaborative Research Project on Effective Classroom Teaching Performances. Phase I of the international project involved Dowling College and its fi rst Professional Development School (PDS) the Belmont Elementary PDS in America and the University of Primorska at Koper and its partnering elementary school, the Dr. Ales Bebler School in Slovenia. The fi rst study of the project focused on investigating videotaped performances of teacher candidates (i.e. student teachers) and their pupils in classrooms of the partnering elementary schools. The study involved cooperating teachers, supervising and mentoring teachers, teacher candidates, graduate students, professors, and administrators. The long term goals of the collaboration are to (a) develop quality teachers, (b) investigate effective teaching learning performances in school university partnerships and PDS settings, and (c) contribute to the body of knowledge on teaching and learning. The goals and outcomes of Phase I (2007 2009) of the collaborative project included the following: 1. The development of a data bank of fi ndings and 62 videotaped teaching performances of lessons taught by student teachers in grades 1 through 5 in collaborating classrooms. 2. Creation of a working conceptual framework for the collaborative research project. 3. The design and implementation of an initial action research study to analyze and assess 34 performances of the lessons taught by participating Slovenian and American PDS teacher candidates. 4. Adaptation of three existing observational tools, rubrics, and procedures for analyzing and assessing classroom teaching performances. 5. Dissemination of the analyses and comparisons of American and Slovenian classroom teaching performances at national and international conferences. 6. The publication of a book in 2009 describing the two year study entitled Analyzing Effective Teaching Performance. A contemporary theoretical description of the teacher's role as an effective facilitator of student learning formed the basis and perspective from which our initial investigation was designed. Based on our ultimate goal to develop teachers as effective facilitators in PDS settings, and our intent to institute educational change and improvement, we chose action research as the method and process for the fi rst study. Our source of data was a set of 34 videotaped performances of lessons taught by 20 American PDS teacher candidates and 14 Slovenian teacher candidates. All 34 taped performances were coded, analyzed, and assessed using an adapted observational system, and a set of adjusted rubrics and assessment 396 Linda Catelli, Joan Carlino, Valerie Jackson, GinaMarie Petraglia Volume 5, Number 4 Scholar Practitioner Quarterly criteria from the PATHWWISE program (Educational Testing Services [ETS] 1995) and the National Board's Middle Childhood/Generalist Standards Scoring Guide (Nation Board for Professional Teaching Standards [NBPTS] 1998) The taped performances of the lessons were analyzed and assessed with reference to a series of instructional actions that were drawn from teacher effectiveness research (TER) and the research teams' conceptualization of the teacher as a new and effective facilitator of student learning and development (see Catelli, 2002, 2010; and Catelli, Likon, Vonta, Pisot, 2009, for a description of the teacher's role; and Muijs Reynolds, 2005, for TER) A quantitative approach to the analysis of the teaching performances provided us with percentages of time the teacher candidates engaged in 12 key instructional classroom actions. A qualitative approach to the analysis of the same teaching performances provided the research teams with information about "how well" the candidates performed specifi c instructional acts that are known from the literature to facilitate student learning, e.g. encouraging students to extend their thinking, making content comprehensible, etc. The rubrics and assessment criteria were used by the researchers to measure how well an instructional act was performed. Thus, both types of analyses provided the American and Slovenian research teams with video profi les of classroom teaching that could eventually be linked to student learning, growth, and achievement. During the two years of Phase I of the project (2007 2009) research activities took place at both sites to assess and compare teacher candidate classroom performances of lessons taught to youngsters in the partnering schools. Members of the project visited the schools to implement their plans and exchange information. Also, they presented their work together at national and international conferences (e.g. Catelli Likon, 2007; Catelli, Likon, Jackson, Carlino, Pisot, 2008; and Catelli Pisot, 2009) In addition to the research activities, the project included a seminar and workshop on effective teaching that was conducted in Slovenia by the American team's principal investigator. Also, a grant award from the U.S. Embassy was obtained to support project activities. The workshop was attended by teachers from Italy, Croatia, and Slovenia. For the fi rst study, a set of general research questions (below) were formulated by the researchers and then arranged in a cluster and classifi ed as either quantitative or qualitative. The unit of analysis for the study was the teacher candidate's videotaped performance of a lesson. The lessons were taped during a candidate's second month of student teaching. The objectives and learning outcomes of the lessons were directed at either the development of a skill or an understanding of a concept. Lessons ranged from 30 minutes to 1.5 hours and took place in different subject areas, e.g. science, mathematics, social studies, etc. The following questions were designed for the study: Quantitative Questions 1. How is time spent during a lesson? How do the American and Slovenian teacher candidates as novices spend their time during a lesson? What A PDS Partnership Goes International 397 Scholar Practitioner Quarterly Volume 5, Number 4 percentage of the time do they engage in substantive instructional interactions that are focused on subject matter, and what percentage do they engage in managerial, organizational, and disciplinary actions that are considered nonsubstantive or not relevant to the subject matter? Are there important differences between the groups? 2. Is the percentage of time that candidates devote to substantive actions more or less than 75% of the total time of a lesson? How many of the lessons meet the 75% criterion? 3. Of the total time the candidates engaged in substantive instructional actions focused on subject matter, which of the 12 substantive instructional actions (e.g. asking higher order questions, giving feedback) did they engage in and for what percentage of the time? Are there differences between the two groups? 4. What percentages of time are students cognitively and/or physically "on task" and engaged in the learning activities? And what percentages of the students who are present for the lessons are "on task" and engaged? Qualitative Questions 1. Using adapted rubrics and performance criteria from Educational Testing Services' PATHWISE (ETS, 1995) and the National Board's scoring guide (NBTS, 1998) how well did the teacher candidates perform 9 desirable instructional actions that are known from research to facilitate learning? How many of the teaching performances met the 2.5 criterion set for each of the 9 instructional actions? Do the American and Slovenian teacher candidates perform at or above the 2.5 criterion level of competency? 2. What methods of teaching do they use to achieve the objectives of the lesson? And are their video performances in accord with current teacher effectiveness research fi ndings? 3. What will the fi ndings from the fi rst action research study mean for improving the partnerships and teacher education programs of the four participating institutions? And what will the fi ndings mean for changing and improving the performances of teacher candidates and their supervisors at both partnership sites? The action research study for Phase I primarily focused on teacher candidates as novice teachers engaged in the clinical portion of their programs. The project was unique in that it was the fi rst time two institutions of higher education and their partnering elementary schools engaged in a four way international research collaborative to investigate effective teaching and teacher education in a coordinative fashion. And it was unique in that never before has videotape analysis been used in such a four way collaboration to research novice levels of teaching. By June