The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of a Creative Drama Based Perception of Self-sufficiency Skills Training Program on 2nd grade bachelor degree students’ (who are attending a preschool teacher training program) perception of self-sufficiency. This is a quasi-experimental study. Totally 50 students were equally divided into two groups as they are experimental group and control group. Experimental group has attended to 24 sessions of a course as creative drama based training program. The training program was performed by involve in four elements of Bandura’s self-sufficiency as they are; performance success, indirect experiences, verbal persuasion and emotional states. It has been prepared to promote students’ perception of self-sufficiency skills. Perception of Self-sufficiency Towards Using Creative Drama Technique (PSCDT) has been offered as pre-test and post-test to both groups in order to obtain the data. It has been found that there was significance on behalf of experimental group in the end of this study (p< ,05).

The major purpose of the study was to investigate factors which contribute to the decline in students’ academic performance in junior secondary schools in Botswana since 2010. The study was mainly quantitative and used the positivist inquiry paradigm. The study employed critical theory for its theoretical framework. Questionnaires were used to gather data from two hundred participants. Some documents were analyzed to supplement the information collected through the questionnaire. Data were analysed using the computer package known as Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 15. The findings of the study showed that there were several factors that can contribute toward students’ low academic performance ranging from low staff morale to students unpreparedness for the examinations. The study, therefore, recommends that high teacher’s morale, availability of resources and parental involvement are critical for the attainment of high quality education in Botswana secondary schools. Furthermore, the findings of the study have implications for research and practice.

Lesson starts are transitional events which may cause management problems for teachers. In this study 131 lesson starts of equally many teachers were observed in primary and secondary schools in Finland. The results indicated that, in general, the problems were minimal. However, for various reasons lesson starts were delayed by an average of about six minutes. Calculated on this basis, the total loss of instructional time in the whole school year was about five weeks of schooling. No statistically significant relationships were observed between disturbances in the classroom and any background variable studied including grade level, classroom type,(special or mainstream), group size, presence of classroom assistant, sex of the teacher, weekday, time of day of the lesson, or subject of the lesson. In order to maximise instructional time more attention should be paid in future to starting lessons promptly.

This study aimed to comparatively examine the self-efficacy and burnout levels of preschool teachers in Turkey and the United States. Of the general screening models, the study uses the relational screening model. A total of 90 teachers participated in the study. 32 of the participants were from the United States and 58 were from Turkey. The Teacher Self-Efficacy Scale and Burnout Scale were used in the study. The data were analyzed through the Whitney U-Test. According to the analyses regarding the self-efficacy levels of teachers, a significant difference in student participation sub-dimension as well as in total points in favor of the teachers in Turkey were found. However, no significant difference was found between the two countries with regards to teachers’ burnout levels. Regarding the self-efficacy levels of teachers working in Turkey, a significant difference was found in favor of teachers with two to five years of experience in the student participation sub-dimension, while no significant difference was found in the other sub-dimensions and in total points. On the other hand, no significant difference was determined was found between the self-efficacy levels and years of experience for the teachers in the United States.

The major purpose of this study was to explore the social studies teachers’ perceptions and understandings of citizenship education in primary schools in Botswana. The study adopted a post colonial lens by using the notions of the pedagogy of imperialism and contrapuntal criticism to interrogate the teachers’ perceptions of citizenship education. The study was qualitative in nature and employed the naturalistic inquiry paradigm. Qualitative methods were used to collect data. Data were analyzed using grounded theory through the constant comparative technique. The findings of the study revealed that social studies teachers perceived teaching about Botswana as citizenship education. The paradox lies in the teachers’ view that knowledge about Botswana’s cultures, histories and politics constitutes citizenship education. Therefore, the study recommends that citizenship education be re-imagined to take into account both the local and global trends on citizenship education. Furthermore, teachers have to be cognizant of the politics of mainstream academic knowledge and work towards knowledge construction devoid of imperialist ideologies.

All over the world, countries are paying close attention to how teachers are recruited, selected, and prepared for the nation’s schools. Increasingly, teachers are expected to teach all students to high standards at the same time that they play a major role in meeting rising expectations regarding social equity. Preparing teachers for these challenges is among the most pressing and complex tasks in teacher education. In response to these and other challenges, some initial teacher education programs now include among their major goals preparing teachers to teach for social justice, work toward equity and access for all students, and/or challenge inequities in existing educational systems and policies. This article focuses on three initial teacher education programs—one each in the United States, New Zealand, and Ireland. Although these programs differ from one another in many ways, they also share some goals related to teaching for social justice and equity. The article examines longitudinal survey data regarding teacher candidates’ scores on the “Learning to Teach for Social Justice-Beliefs” scale, which was designed to measure candidates’ endorsement of beliefs consistent with the concept of teaching for social justice. For each of the three research sites, the article analyzes: (a) demographic and teacher quality contexts, (b) initial teacher education program goals related to social justice/social equity, and (c) the results of surveys administered to teacher candidates at entry to and exit from the programs. The article concludes with discussion of learning to teach for social justice as a cross-cultural concept.

The aim of this study is to reveal the benefits gained from “Special Training Methods II” course and the problems prospective mathematics teachers encountered with it. The case study method was used in the study. The participants in the study were 34 prospective mathematics teachers studying at a Primary School Mathematics Education Department. The data collection tools were a form composed of open-ended questions and semi-structured interviews. Descriptive analysis of the quantitative data was carried out. In the “Special Teaching Methods II” course, beginning in the spring term of the 2015-2016 academic year, teaching activities on “multiple intelligences”, “discovery”, “group work”, “problem-solving”, “history of mathematics” and “computer-assisted teaching” were developed and implemented. It was concluded that these activities helped students like mathematics more, understand the importance of helping each other and cooperation and have more enjoyable lessons, as well as aiding their cognitive, social and emotional development. It was also found that through these activities participants improved their belief in themselves and increased their confidence regarding teaching mathematics. The participants also faced with some difficulties during the application process. They mostly mentioned that preparing worksheets was time-consuming, finding a school to perform the activity was hard and students were reluctant.

Effective school administrators and teachers are those who provide the least restrictive learning environments for all students. The main goal of this study was to analyze the effects of inclusive science education on the general education population of middle school students’ scientific conceptual understandings. The study was designed as a quasi-experimental model and conducted in a middle school in a large urban school district in Midwestern US. Approximately 4% of students in the school were receiving special education services. The participants in the study were selected through non-random selection. The participants of this study included 20 students without disabilities in each classroom with a total number of 120 students from a total of six different middle school classrooms. The study included two classrooms (one inclusive and one non-inclusive) for each grade level (6, 7, and 8). The conceptual change of students without disabilities was measured using the Density Assessment, which included 20 multiple choice questions. SPSS program was used for data analyses. Paired samples t-test and a multivariate group analysis test were conducted to investigate significant differences on students’ conceptual understandings. The findings showed that the effect of inclusive education was significant and positive on the conceptual understanding of students without disabilities in inclusive science classrooms.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of creative drama as a teaching method on academic achievement and retention in social studies, students’ attitude towards social studies of 4th grade. The research is designed according to quasi-experimental model. The research was conducted with 4th year students in a public school in Adana in Turkey. There are 42 students in experimental group and 39 in control group. Creative drama activities were used to develop social studies achievement and attitude of students as a treatment for the experimental group. The treatment consisted of 15 hours, 40 minutes sessions that equal a class hour in school and 3 hours a week. Control groups had been taught by classroom teachers as the way they do traditionally. Data collection tools are “Attitude Towards Social Studies Scale” developed  by Gencel “Achievement Test” developed by the researchers.  Data were processed by using covariance analysis. Findings indicated that creative drama method has a significant effect on social studies achievement and students’ attitude towards social studies but not a significant effect on retention of social studies knowledge.

The purpose of this study is to examine the opinions of middle school mathematics teachers on the integration of mathematics course and social issues. For this purpose, qualitative research method was used in this study. As for determining the participants of the research, criterion sampling among purposeful sampling methods was used. Being a middle school mathematics teacher as an occupation was considered as a criterion for determining the participants. The participants of the research consist of 13 middle school mathematics teachers in Turkey. So as to collect the research data, the semi-structured interview form created by the researchers was used. The data analysis was performed according to the content analysis, and Nvivo 10 program was used for the analysis. As a result of this study, the themes of the situation and methods of the integration of mathematics course and social issues, the attainment of democratic values in mathematics course and the ways of its attainment, gaining awareness of social justice and equality in mathematics course and the ways of its gaining, the activities performed by teachers for social issues in mathematics course and the teachers’ suggestions for the integration of mathematics course and social issues were reached and the results were discussed within this frame.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of lessons conducted in out-of-school learning settings on 5th graders science achievement within the scope of a guidance material that was prepared to be used in out-of-school learning settings in accordance with the “Let’s Solve the Riddle of Our Body” chapter objectives. The pretest / posttest equalized control group design, which is one of the quasi-experimental designs, was used in this study. The sample of this study was composed of a total of 31 5th grade students (15 were in experimental group, 16 were in control group) that were selected from secondary schools in the first semester of the 2015-2016 academic year in Tokat Province. Let’s Solve the Riddle of Our Body Chapter Achievement Test (LeSROBAT) was administered before and after the implementation of the guidance material to measure the students’ achievements and retention. The lessons were conducted as suggested by the current curriculum in the control group. The data were analyzed using independent samples t-test and covariance analysis (ANCOVA). As a result of the analyses, it was found that the LeSROBAT post-test scores of experimental group were significantly higher than the control group. Within this context, it was concluded that the out-of-school learning settings positively contributed to academic achievement and the guidance material that was developed within the scope of this study was effective. The results of retention test analyses didn’t reveal any significant difference between the posttest and retention test scores of experimental and control groups. When the LeSROBAT retention test scores were examined, it was observed that the scores of experimental group was higher than the control group.

To determine the effectiveness of a peer tutorial strategy in the school achievement of English to high school students, whose mother tongue is not English, we made a comparison of two groups; in one, peer tutoring was carried out through the support of high average students and compared with the results of a group that did not receive the intervention. The tutors were 121 students who scored higher than 80 points in the initial exam and accepted to participate in the program. The group of tutees was formed by those who obtained scores lower than 65 and accepted to be tutored (101 formed the experimental group and 112 the control group). The peer tutoring was done in the classroom with the monitoring of the teacher, lasted 11 weeks, and focused on taking class notes and comparing them, giving feedback and clarifying doubts for 30 minutes after the teacher's explanation. The results of the midterm exam and final exam were analyzed through the Student's t-test, showing significant differences in the group that was tutored compared to the low-performing students who did not receive the intervention. The procedure was effective, finding that the use of peer support can improve school performance. It is necessary to monitor the profile of the tutors and systematize the tutorial strategy.

The purpose of this research is to describe the effectiveness of STEM on the physics concepts understanding seen from gender differences. The research method used is a type of quasi-experimental design with 2x2 factorial design and saturated sampling technique. The data collecting technique used a tested method to see the results of students’ concept understanding. Hypothesis testing was done using two-way ANOVA 2 x 2 factorial designs. The results of the study are: (1) there are differences in STEM and conventional learning on concepts understanding and the use of STEM learning is more effective than the conventional one; (2) there are differences in the results of understanding the concept between male and female students where male students are higher than female students; and, (3) there is no interaction between learning and gender towards concepts understanding. The research recommends designing the STEM-integrated ESciT learning to be relevant with the indicator measurements and to manage the learning effectively to obtain optimum learning outcome.

The purposes of this research are: 1) to compare two equalizing tests conducted with Hebara and Stocking Lord method; 2) to describe the characteristics of each equalizing test method using windows’ IRTEQ program. This research employs a participatory approach as the data are collected through questionnaires based on the National Examination Administration of 2018. The samples are classified into group A and group B respectively by 449 and 502 respondents. This paper discusses how to equalize shared items using the anchor method with a set of instruments in the forms of 35 questionnaire items and 6 shared items. In addition, the researcher also uses PARSCALE to estimate each respondent’s skills and each item’s characteristics. The shared items are eventually equalized using IRTEQ program. The results show that there is a significant difference between those conducted using Haebara method (0.592) which produces bigger mean-sigma value and Stocking & Lord (0.00213). Thus, the results show that the shared testing items may improve respondents’ discrimination and increase the difficulty level (parameter b). Due to the availability of shared items, it is good and appropriate to equalize two different tests on different theta skills.

According to General Statistics Office of Vietnam on 30th September, 2017, Vietnam has 858,800 teachers, and among those, 615,720 people were female (occupied 71.7%). It can be seen that female teachers made up a big percentage in the education sector. Besides, STEM education is soaring as a new approach in training with prominent advantages, such as: theories embedded in actual practices, ability-oriented development, pressure reduction in studying … This is not only a trend but also a necessary element in new teaching modules at high school – which will be implemented in academic year 2020-2021 in Vietnam. As a result, it is necessary to consider the gender factor in the process of training and developing teaching with STEM education. This paper will present the results from the research that took place from 2015 to 2018 within Thai Nguyen University of Education.

The purpose of this research is to analyze the achievement of the results, progress, and obstacles encountered during the two years of the commencement of the principals’ partnership program in Indonesia. The scope of the Principal's Partnership program comprises three main components, such as curriculum management, academic supervision, and management of the school ecosystem. Data were analyzed using survey methods. Sampling data were taken from 106 impacted schools, using the percentage results of action plan reports in 15 indicators from the three main components program's implementation. The findings indicate that the principal partnership program activities, in general, have been well implemented and according to the percentage target of the principal's partnership program with a national increase in achievement of the Curriculum Management component from 61% to 69%, academic supervision from 61% to 71% and management of the school ecosystem from 48% to 56%. The percentage increase also occurs when instrument data is processed per indicator in components. The findings imply that the partnership program has a significant impact on equity growth in remote areas.

This quantitative research aims to analyze the effects of the principal's decision-making, organizational commitment and school climate on teacher performance in vocational high school. The research sample was 160 vocational school teachers in North Minahasa Regency with simple random sampling method. The data were collected using a Likert scale questionnaire 25 with statements. The data analysis was performed using simple linear regression and multiple linear regression. The results showed that the principal's decision-making, organizational commitment and school climate had a positive and significant effect on the performance of vocational school teachers, both partially and simultaneously. The results of this research can be an important reference for educational administrators at vocational high school level to design school strategies and policies that can encourage increased teacher performance to achieve better school productivity.

This study aims at investigating the impact of implementing digital storytelling as a method to be utilized to help pupils acquire active listening skills and creative thinking skills, including fluency, flexibility, and originality, in the Arabic language classes of the primary third grade. The sample consists of (200) pupils in a mixed-gender type and divides into two equal groups; one is the experimental group, and the other is the control one. Both groups expose to two posttests, the first test is a post active listening test and the second is a creative thinking test; the validity and reliability of these tests have assured. The results showed significant differences in (p ≤ 0.05) between means scores of the control and experimental groups students in the posttest of active listening skills in favor of the students who studied through storytelling. The results also showed that the storytelling strategy affected the experimental group students’ acquisition of one skill of the three creative thinking skills, which is fluency.

Education faces barriers all over the world, which sometimes makes it difficult to look after children’s rights and their individual development. Hence, society is clamoring for new practices, and different approaches are emerging, Montessori among them. Despite the fact that this approach was developed to attend to the poor strata, nowadays it is basically promoted by elitist sectors, though it can be perfectly applied as an education system for all children, regardless of their socio-economic and cultural backgrounds. This study analyzes the bases of Montessori pedagogy in a school from a low-to-middle-income country (LMIC), Burkina Faso, and another school in a high-income country (HIC), Spain. The study takes into account children, family, school environment and teacher training all of which contribute to children’s development.

A Descriptive-correlational study was sought to investigate the influence of metacognition on the academic achievement and learning style of undergraduate students. Using the survey method, data was collected from a sample of 150 undergraduate students selected through a stratified random sampling technique which includes 50 students each from the three schools namely School of Humanities and Social sciences (HSS), School of Engineering (SOE), and School of Sciences (SOS) of Tezpur University. The tools used are five-point Likert-type Metacognitive skills scale and five-point Likert-type Learning Style Inventory. Academic Achievement of the students was measured based on the semester grade point average SGPA obtained in the semester examination. The data were analyzed using percentage, simple regression, multiple regression and one-way ANOVA. The result showed that only 34-36% of the undergraduate students have above-average metacognitive skills. The undergraduate students have equal preferences in all the five learning styles rather than focusing on one learning style. There is a significant difference between metacognition levels and academic achievement of the undergraduate students of SOS, HSS and SOE. The metacognitive skill explicates only 43% variability of academic achievement of the undergraduate students which implies that the undergraduate student’s metacognitive skills influence and determines their academic achievement to some extent. However, the undergraduate student’s learning style doesn’t account for variation in metacognitive skills. Thus, it is suggested that metacognitive skills should be integrated into curricular components and learning strategy which will help the students to monitor and regulate their own learning to meet the challenges of academic society.