The Elementary School Journal-By the University Of Chicago

ByThe Best Group

Katie, William, Khoo, Jack,

Authors James V. Hoffman (University of Texas at Austin) Cathy Roller (International Reading Association, Newark, DE)Beth Maloch (University of Texas at Austin) Misty Sailors ( University of Texas at San Antonio )GeraldDuf fy ( University of North Carolina, Greensboro )S. Natasha Beretvas (University of Texas at Austin )

National Commission on Excellence in Elementary Teacher Preparation for Reading Instruction Newark, DE

FocusThe preparation of elementary preservice

teachers to teach reading and on their first 3 years of teaching in schools.

Research questions:

What effects do participation in and completion of an excellent reading teacher education program have on the experiences of teachers as they enter schools?

How does teachers’ preparation relate to their teaching practices?

What procedures did the experimenter use for the study? Literacy Review

Reading Teacher Education: Background, Austin and Morrison’s (1962).

“The Torch Lighters-revisited”, Morrison and Austin, (1976) The IRA Commission’s survey of preservice preparation in

reading.Hoffman, Roller, & National Commission on Excellence in Elementary Teacher Preparation for Reading Instruction,2001).

Six reviews of the literature on teacher education in reading.

Grossman et al. (2001) conducted one of the few systematic studies of the long-term effects of teacher preparation.

The IRA commission – The eight common features identified.

Experimenting, analysis and findingsThe commission used both quantitative and

qualitative research methods to explore the research questions.

Data collected spanned 3 years

Year oneQuantitative data are collectedIt indicated clear differences between

graduates of commission programs and general education programs

Year TwoThe qualitative research perspective

continued with ongoing interviews.The method was expanded to include data

collection on the classroom environment and classroom teaching that was descriptive and quantitative

Statistical test was applied and the observation data indicated higher levels of engagement with texts in classrooms of commission teachers.

Year ThreeThe research expended the data collection

in participating classrooms to include more frequent observations.

The data were consistent with the patterns observed in year two.

The findings suggested that the graduates of high-quality preparation programs continued to maintain their advantage over the same year comparsion teachers.

Major conclusions for the studyResults suggested that participation in a

high-quality teacher preparation program has a positive influence on the transition of teachers entering the profession and on the adoption of effective teaching practices by these teachers.

Graduates of excellent programs were more effective than teachers in the comparison groups in creating and engaging their students with a high quality literacy environment.

Types of research studiesQuasi-experimental.