PRISM :: Browsing by Author "Friesen, Sharon"

Browsing by Author "Friesen, Sharon"

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Open Access
2 Chapter Two -- Optimum Learning Literature Synthesis: What is Optimum Learning?
(2019-06-30) Friesen, Sharon; Brown, Barbara; Brandon, Jim
This synthesis of the literature is designed to undergird our 4-university longitudinal mixed methods study Optimum Learning for All Students Implementing Alberta’s 2018 Professional Practice Standards. Our ambition is to gain insights into how and how well Alberta’s Teaching Quality Standard, Leadership Quality Standard, and Superintendent Leadership Quality Standard are being put into place, how the standards are impacting practice, and what changes occur over time in teaching and learning. Indeed, our longitudinal design is premised on “uncovering sustained changes and implementation success” (Derrington, 2019, p. 8). Given this, our goals in preparing this manuscript were to (a) synthesize scholarship on policy processes so that we can situate our inquiry into the standards in a process-oriented way; (b) provide a jurisdictional review of standards-based approaches to teaching and leadership and what we know to be effective with respect to this approach so that we can discern how Alberta’s standards and pathways to certification are positioned compared to others who have gone before us; and (c) synthesize scholarship that demonstrates the link between the professional practice standards and quality teaching and leadership so that we are anchored to evidence when interpreting the forthcoming empirical data. Considering the comprehensiveness of the professional practice standards, we covered the waterfront, so to speak. But though we plumbed many strands and sources of knowledge, we do not claim it to be exhaustive or necessarily complete.
Open Access
6 Chapter Six -- Optimum Learning Literature Synthesis: What is Quality Teaching?
(2019-06-30) Brandon, Jim; Parsons, Dennis; Brown, Barbara; Friesen, Sharon; Thomas, Christy; Delanoy, Nadia
This synthesis of the literature is designed to undergird our 4-university longitudinal mixed methods study Optimum Learning for All Students Implementing Alberta’s 2018 Professional Practice Standards. Our ambition is to gain insights into how and how well Alberta’s Teaching Quality Standard, Leadership Quality Standard, and Superintendent Leadership Quality Standard are being put into place, how the standards are impacting practice, and what changes occur over time in teaching and learning. Indeed, our longitudinal design is premised on “uncovering sustained changes and implementation success” (Derrington, 2019, p. 8). Given this, our goals in preparing this manuscript were to (a) synthesize scholarship on policy processes so that we can situate our inquiry into the standards in a process-oriented way; (b) provide a jurisdictional review of standards-based approaches to teaching and leadership and what we know to be effective with respect to this approach so that we can discern how Alberta’s standards and pathways to certification are positioned compared to others who have gone before us; and (c) synthesize scholarship that demonstrates the link between the professional practice standards and quality teaching and leadership so that we are anchored to evidence when interpreting the forthcoming empirical data. Considering the comprehensiveness of the professional practice standards, we covered the waterfront, so to speak. But though we plumbed many strands and sources of knowledge, we do not claim it to be exhaustive or necessarily complete.
Open Access
A Review of the Literature on Online Collaborative Learning in K- 12 and Post-Secondary Education During COVID 19
(2022) Tay, Sharmaine; Friesen, Sharon
The COVID-19 pandemic posed challenges to familiar instructional practices as the national and international response to a global pandemic precipitated a shift to online teaching and learning. This en masse transition offered a novel opportunity to examine the benefits and challenges of the now more widespread context of technologically mediated education and its impact on collaborative group learning. This conceptual review of the literature reports the findings on the impact of COVID-19 on collaborative learning in Education between the years 2020-2022. Twenty-nine of the 54 published articles from K-12 to post-secondary education contexts met the criteria established for this review and were included in the review. Three themes emerged from the review: 1) impacts of online learning on collaboration; 2) student responsibility; and 3) collaborative knowledge building. The literature on online learning and student responsibility described widely varied results with collaborative learning while the literature on online Knowledge Building learning environments indicated many of the issues had been anticipated and reported learning gains were maintained in the shift to online learning. Our review of the studies conducted during COVID-19 indicates a need for increased proactive intentional design to support learners in online learning environments.
Open Access
Ambiguity in Leadership: Perceptions of the Instructional Leadership Role of the Assistant Principal
(2020-12-09) Marler, Rita Marie; Brandon, James; Spencer, Brenda L.; Friesen, Sharon
This case study utilized multi-methods to address an identified gap in practice and in theory: the role of the assistant principal is largely undefined and unrealized. The purpose of this research was to investigate the distinct role of the assistant principal in instructional leadership by answering the following question: In what ways do assistant principals, as instructional leaders, support high-quality teaching and optimal learning? In this research I combined participant observation, document review, and a questionnaire and an activity log disseminated through Qualtrics Software to Battle River School Division’s (BRSD’s) participating principals and assistant principals to elucidate the following: the roles that are typically filled by assistant principals (i.e., instructional leader, teacher, school manager, student disciplinarian); the ways in which assistant principal roles are determined (i.e., authoritatively assigned and cooperatively determined); the main challenges to instructional leadership (i.e., district budgetary constraints, insufficient time, efficacy and confidence issues, insufficient personal initiative); and opportunities for instructional leaders (i.e., personal growth and learning, professional learning opportunities, and career advancement). The research reveals that assistant principals support high-quality teaching and learning through direct delivery, analysis and exploration, modelling, risk-taking, problem-solving, collaboration and communication, relationship building, organization, and innovation to create educational environments with the following characteristics: a collaborative and cooperative culture that values and builds relationships between all stakeholders; excellent communication; a safe, healthy, and inclusive environment; a dynamic approach to learning and teaching that encourages research-based analysis, innovation, and self-directed and life-long learning. The study concludes with a BRSD Instructional Leadership Model, which features distinct role descriptions for the principal and the assistant principal.
Open Access
Barriers to Systemic, Effective and Sustainable Technology Use in High School Classrooms
(The Canadian Network for Innovation in Education, 2014) Daniels, Jason; Jacobsen, Michele; Varnhagen, Stanley; Friesen, Sharon
The purpose of the Technology and High School Success (THSS) initiative was to encourage innovative strategies focused on improving provincial high school completion rates, using technology and student-centered learning to engage student interest. The primary purpose of this paper is to report on barriers that impede systemic, effective and sustainable technology integration within schools. Even with teacher and administrative support and commitment for THSS, evaluative research indicated minimal change in system capacity as a result of the initiative. Three primary barriers to program sustainability were: 1) schools and school districts did not leverage the opportunity to revisit their existing vision(s), 2) schools and school districts did not use data to make changes, and 3) limited access to technology. Le but de l’initiative « Technology and High School Success (THSS) » était d'encourager des stratégies novatrices visant à améliorer le taux d’achèvement des études secondaires dans la province de l’Alberta en utilisant la technologie et un apprentissage centré sur l'élève afin de susciter l'intérêt des élèves. L'objectif principal de cet article est de rendre compte des obstacles entravant l'intégration systémique, efficace et durable de la technologie dans les écoles. La recherche évaluative a révélé des changements minimes dans la capacité systémique à la suite de l'initiative, et ce, malgré l’appui et l’engagement des enseignants et des administrateurs envers le THSS. Les trois obstacles principaux à la viabilité du programme sont les suivants: 1) les écoles et les districts scolaires n'ont pas profité de l’occasion pour revoir leur(s) vision(s), 2) les écoles et les districts scolaires n'ont pas utilisé les données pour effectuer des changements, et 3) l'accès limité à la technologie.
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Bottlenecks and Breakthroughs: A Narrative Inquiry into the Storied Experiences of how School Administrators Understand their Efforts Towards Decolonization
(2023-02) Sarson, Andrea; Friesen, Sharon; Burwell, Catherine; Markides, Jennifer
This research study was undertaken to offer a space to engage in conversation and to make sense of how school administrators understand their efforts toward decolonization. It evolved out of curiosity in how narratives have shaped and continue to reshape our current context of the curriculum, and how to best (re)consider the current knowledge structures that are present in schools. The purpose of this study is to come to a better understanding of how school administrators understand their role towards decolonizing education. The guiding question for this research was, what does it mean to live together well in this world, and what is the role of curriculum in it? Narrative inquiry as a methodology, offered, by way of interviews and written narratives, an opportunity to attend to the stories using the commonplaces of temporality, sociality and place. The field texts included research conversations transcripts, field notes, and journals. Three narrative accounts were co-composed, one for each participant. The use of narratives allowed participants to express their views and articulate their own interpretation of their lives and stories. After looking across the narrative accounts, three resonant threads were identified that highlighted the importance of understanding a Settler1 identity, of unlearning colonialism, engaging in sustained professional learning, and of embracing ambiguity. One conclusion arising from this study is that unlearning colonialism is an ongoing process.
Open Access
Bridging the Gap: When Mid-career Teachers Transition from Traditional to Multiage Contexts: Lessons from the Field
(2013-08-09) van Kommer, Julie; Friesen, Sharon
The purpose of this study was to describe and analyze from a cultural perspective the complex interaction of individual, organizational, and contextual influences on the development of mid-career teachers’ professional identity as they transitioned from traditional to multiage contexts. The following questions were answered: What do teachers perceive as their greatest challenges and opportunities in making the transition to a multiage classroom? Do these perceptions change over time? Do the teachers’ beliefs and perceptions match their actions and practices? What supports were put in place for teachers making the transition from traditional contexts to multiage learning environments? Were these supports effective? Ten key findings clustered in three areas emerged from this study: multilevel classrooms were: 1) beneficial to the teacher when they had students for more than the traditional academic year; multilevel classrooms allowed for the development of independent thinkers and learners; 2) students in the multilevel classroom exhibited positive interactions, nurturance and spirit of cooperation, and 3) team teaching provided an opportunity to learn and share new skills, and provided both pedagogical and affective support for the educators involved. Challenges included: 1) meeting the needs of a more diverse group of learners; 2) piloting change in a culture and climate that was largely against the change and/or did not fully understand the change, and 3) the instance of negative peer role models within the multiage class composition. Foremost, the findings of this study indicated that the participants initially drew from their experience as graded teachers to make sense of the multilevel philosophy, in essence filtering multilevel philosophy through the lens of gradedness. In doing so each participant created a ‘false understanding’ of the multilevel philosophy. It was not until they began employing multilevel strategies within their classrooms and saw the resultant benefits of those strategies that they began to reflect, personally challenge, deconstruct and finally begin to reconstruct their understanding of the multilevel philosophy, and in essence their professional identities.
Open Access
Bringing in Large Scale Technological Change: A Case Study
(2013-06-20) Keng, Govan; Friesen, Sharon
This qualitative case study explored the broad issue of how to successfully bring about large-scale technological change, and more specifically it examined the factors involved in technological change adoption. The research question was “What are the factors that enabled or impeded the wide-scale implementation of a student information system in a large, complex urban school district?” The setting for this case study was the educational sites of the Vancouver Board of Education. The case involved the implementation of an electronic student information system called the British Columbia enterprise Student Information System or BCeSIS. Participants in this study included four key members of the change implementation team and 186 people who were directly impacted by the change initiative. From the data, the following six findings emerged of which the first four factors enabled a technological change and the last two factors hindered the change: 1) an independent implementation team, 2) distributed leadership, 3) pilot/phased implementation schedule, 4) a customized training system, 5) lack of technological infrastructure/readiness, and 6) lack of comprehensive/cohesive messaging and communications. From the findings, four key conclusions were drawn: 1) a change implementation plan should be of a heuristic iterative design, 2) a prototype implementation model be used, 3) leadership density be created, and 4) change initiatives and strategies work best when they are institution specific.
Open Access
Building Digital Video Games at School: A Design-Based Study of Teachers’ Design of Instruction and Learning Tasks to Promote Student Intellectual Engagement, Deep Learning and Development of 21st Century Competencies
(2016-01-13) Lambert, Deborah; Jacobsen, Michele; Jacobsen, Michele; Friesen, Sharon; Kim, Beaumie; Woiceshyn, Jaana; Morrison, Dirk
With the continuous impact of advancing technologies on learning environments and today’s students, one of the challenges faced by K-12 educators in some Canadian schools is to find innovative pedagogies to intellectually engage students in deep learning of curriculum content and to promote the development and use of 21st century competencies. In an attempt to address this challenge, an intervention, the design and building of digital video games, was collaboratively implemented and explored by a research design team—the researcher, two grade 6 teachers, their students (100) and a professional development leader at a charter school in Calgary, Alberta. This intervention taps into the interest that many students already have in video games and tends to support the learning styles of today’s students. Employing one macro-cycle of the design-based research process, this intervention was adopted into the educational context, explored through the implementation of three learning tasks: game concept development, storyboarding and programming, and assessed as a potential innovative pedagogy to address the problem. This study was guided by two research questions, which focused on: (1) the ways in which teachers’ design of instruction and learning tasks need to shift to implement the intervention; and (2) the impact of the intervention on students’ intellectual engagement, deep learning of curriculum content and the development and use of 21st century competencies. Findings revealed that (1) teachers needed to employ more interaction modes to collaborate and communicate during these tasks; use extensive coaching and scaffolding; continuously use various forms of assessments with feedback loops to assess students’ progress; and use extensive conceptual and divergent thinking; and (2) as students/groups participated in these tasks’ activities, the storyboarding task seemed to represent the area of deepest learning of the curriculum content and highest intellectual engagement, and students seemed to become more proficient in all the 21st century competencies. An assessment of the findings also revealed that the intervention qualifies as a potential and developing effective innovative pedagogy for deep learning, and that findings are significant for informing K-12 educators, school jurisdictions and Alberta Education on the impact and implications of game design-based learning, in school.
Open Access
Building Leadership Capacity Through High-Quality Professional Learning
(2018-08-20) Thomas, Christy; Turner, Jeffrey; Brandon, James Edward; Friesen, Sharon
The purpose of this literature review is to synthesize the body of work that can inform leadership development through high-quality collaborative professional learning. In this literature review the authors draw on a combination of literature gathered by the Battle River School Division as well as literature gathered by researchers. The literature review is organized with an overview and followed by these sections: (1) capacity building, (2) leadership development, (3) professional learning, (4) assessing growth. At the end of the literature review a synthesis is provided along with recommendations for system leaders interested in designing professional learning for leaders in their districts.
Open Access
Challenging the conceptualizations of white privilege in education
(2011) Briscoe, Patricia L.; Friesen, Sharon
Open Access
Coaching the Coaches: Using Design-Based Research to Improve the Instructional Skills of Canadian Air Traffic Control On-the-Job Instructors Through Professional Learning
(2020-11-11) Dye, Christa; Lock, Jennifer V.; Friesen, Sharon; Groen, Janet Elizabeth
Coaching in air traffic control on-the-job training is challenging and instructor quality can affect outcomes. This qualitative study explored the phenomenon of how instructional coaching can be used as a means of professional learning to help air traffic control on-the-job instructors (OJIs) identify and implement improvements to their instructional practices. The study focused on using coaching to build the capacity of OJIs to provide trainees with effective formative feedback. A three-phase design-based research (DBR) methodology was used to (a) prepare, design, and evaluate a usable professional learning coaching protocol, and (b) contribute theoretical understanding through the development of design principles. Three main findings emerged from this study. First, through iterative testing of the designed coaching protocol, eight key components were identified, including: four process components (learning culture, coaching conversation, adaptable framework, logistical feasibility), and four content components (clarity of expectations, reinforce positives, targeted progression, actionable priorities). These key coaching protocol components formed the basis of a reflective process used to identify a set of theoretical design principles intended as a starting point for others undertaking design studies in similar contexts. Second, the training culture within the unit will either foster or inhibit the OJIs’ engagement with professional learning opportunities and willingness to adopt the coaching protocol. This highlights the necessity for effective leadership and change management in implementing new professional learning initiatives. Third, OJIs must receive adequate training to use the coaching protocol, following professional learning best practices, to effectively influence instructional capacity. The findings of this study have implications for policy and practice. First, a plan should be established to further develop a training culture that supports effective workplace learning for OJIs. Second, OJIs should be provided with initial training and ongoing support on effective use of the coaching protocol. Third, members of the training team should receive ample preparation as instructional coaches to effectively support ongoing OJI development and professional learning. The results of this study will be of interest to those involved in air traffic control training, both in Canada and internationally, as well as to those in other safety-critical industries relying on on-the-job training.
Open Access
Considering the Implications and Mechanisms of Scale within Open Education
(2022-07) Elias, Tanya; Burwell, Catherine; Alonso Yanez, Gabriela; Eaton, Sarah; Friesen, Sharon; Kanuka, Heather
My dissertation is the culmination of a five-year critical investigation of the implications of scale within contemporary open education. My qualitative, critical, and tentative study is guided by the question: How do open educators perceive the mechanisms and implications of scale? It uses situational analysis theory-method package and a three-phase research process, including a qualitative online survey, collaborative map annotation, and focus groups. My study presents a multi-dimensional representation of open education’s complicated relationship with scale, both big and small. At a massive scale, open online course providers are increasingly delivering standardized content on data-gathering platforms built to control the learning experience to generate profit that bear no resemblance to these connectivist-inspired MOOCs imagined by open educators just over a decade ago. At the same time, open educators working at a much smaller scale are increasingly turning their attention towards emerging areas, including open educational practices and open policy. Using situational analysis social worlds/arena, relational, and positional mapmaking techniques, this study exposes the silences surrounding these apparently contradictory approaches to open education and elucidates a different approach to scale adopted by many open educators. It further finds that because open educators are often motivated by an intention to improve education, due to co-option, the games of scientific language and overwork, they are at risk of falling into the prescriptive patterns that they seek to transform. My study concludes that mitigating that risk will require open educators to articulate their tacit awareness of the holistic growth and prescriptive production mechanisms of scale and to clearly articulate their scale-related intentions. Moreover, it suggests that open educators seeking to re-pattern prescriptive production within educational systems must learn to embrace unpredictability and uncertainty as a means of minimizing educational disasters.
Open Access
Creating Coherence Through Implementation of a Strategic Plan: A Case Study
(2019-09-20) Stensland, Tim; Friesen, Sharon; Donlevy, James Kent; Gereluk, Dianne; Roy, Sylvie; Fallon, Gérald
Using case study methodology, this study examined the experiences of 6 senior educational leaders to understand (a) how do school jurisdictions’ senior administrative decision-makers define coherence, and (b) how are those leaders involved, directly and indirectly, in contributing to the development of coherency during the implementation of the district’s strategic plan? Data were gathered through semistructured interviews, artifacts, and reflexive memoing. Three key findings emerged: coherence was defined as a clear strategic priority supported by a shared understanding and a common leadership approach to facilitate its development in the organizational structure, coherence is created through the enactment of the strategic plan, and there was little consistency in the implementation and enactment of the strategic plan. A disconnect was evident between policy implementation and policy enactment in matters of strategic planning. The leaders’ day-to-day decision-making and actions required to create coherence were strained under the organizational structure within which they worked; the binary relationship between formulation and implementation, or thinking and action; the challenging transition from the analytical process of planning, deduction, or reductionism to synthesis; and the challenge of moving from a linear process of planning to an iterative process which supports the emergence of strategic priorities and the development of coherence. Results suggest that the complexity of creating coherence makes it important for organizations to clearly define the outcome and that the common practice of strategic planning needs to be reconsidered if coherence is an intended outcome.
Open Access
Designing an Authentic Assessment of Elementary Citizenship Competency Through Real-World Democratic Deliberation
(2022-01-27) Waatainen, Paula Joann; Chu, Man-Wai; Friesen, Sharon; Scott, David
As education systems increasingly emphasize the development of competency, teachers need support in building their assessment literacy in how to design classroom assessments of competency. Teachers who aim to plan classroom assessment and instruction to support their students as they learn democracy together (Biesta & Lawy, 2006) will not find a cohesive, useful framework operationalizing what the citizenship competencies associated with this learning entail. In this design-based research study, a researcher and teachers designed and administered an authentic assessment (e.g., Gulikers et al., 2004; Koh & Luke, 2009) of citizenship competencies that grade 6 and 7 students may have developed in deliberating together as participants in a real-world public consultation process in their city. Data was collected through student self-assessments, artifacts of the design process, observation, and semi-structured interviews with students, teachers, and city representatives. Thematic analysis identified potential contributions to theory and practice from this first three-stage cycle of design in what will be a multi-cycle design process. The practical significance of this study is in the creation of an exemplar of practice and a graphic organizer, adapted from the conceptual framework, which together provide procedural scaffolding and provocations for discussion to help teachers develop their assessment literacy in designing authentic assessments of competency. Theoretical significance is in some promising contributions to our understanding of how citizenship competency might be operationalized for assessment. Findings included: a) the value of using a situated approach over a generic framework to operationalize what competency might entail in a real-world context b) the ability to prioritize and deliberate as potentially transferable citizenship competencies, c) the value of supportive task framing through graphic organizers and games in supporting young students in their authentic participation as citizens, and d) the capability of students as partners in conversations about the assessment of their competency. A contribution to the problem of practice was made in the design of an exemplar of practice and graphic organizer that are intended to be used as provocations and scaffolding for professional conversations about the design of authentic assessments of competency. Findings described in the exemplar of practice include: a) student reports of fairness and clarity of the assessment, b) the challenge of assessing student learning when socio-emotional dynamics impact student comfort in civic engagement with other students, c) the challenge of using a multi-pronged approach to assessment in a realistically busy classroom and teaching context, and d) the great value of exploring competency requirements in a real-world context before designing assessment and instruction. Recommendations are made to enhance use of authentic assessment strategies in teacher-education and teacher professional learning and to provide significantly more support for teachers in this work. Recommendations for future research include field-testing the exemplar of practice and graphic organizer with Bachelor of Education students, a second iteration of design with a new class in the next phase of the city public consultation process, and a study with a purpose to design an authentic assessment of citizenship competency in a high school context that requires grading.
Open Access
Designing for a School System that Learns
(2020-09-04) Hill, Joshua T.; Friesen, Sharon; Davis, Brent; Alonso-Yañez, Gabriela; Clark, Douglas B.; Laferrière, Thérèse
In a complex and dynamic world young people need to devise ways of adapting flexibly, they need to be prepared to undertake something unforeseen, to renew our common world. Yet education emphasizes conformity and compliance underpinned by the deeply seated metanarratives of scarcity, standardization, fragmentation, and control. These metanarratives are embedded in the learning, teaching, and leadership in our schools and in the very reform initiatives that seek to change them. In this study I endeavoured to disrupt and replace these ideas. I draw on system thinking, design, and designing learning to reframe school system leadership as designing for a system that learns. From a design-based approach I partnered with school district leaders to redesign a school district’s strategic plan and implementation process. I share the practical design solutions that were developed in response to the needs of the context and chronicle the iterative design process that was driven by the analysis of empirical data. With the aim of opening up possibilities for how system leaders might practice design for a system that learns, I present a theoretical model featuring four interconnected design principles: divergence and convergence to balance autonomy and coordination; feedback cycles to drive iteration; network connectivity to encourage brokerage between and within systems; and design culture to create the conditions for learning to become a collective responsibility. Finally, I reflect on design-based research, complexity, and Indigenous ways of knowing to expand the space of the possible for future research.
Open Access
Designing for Knowledge Building: An Action Research Study in an Elementary Classroom
(2018-01-12) Parker, Robin Jayne; Jacobsen, Michele; Parchoma, Gale; Friesen, Sharon
This study sought to better understand knowledge building as defined by Scardamalia and Bereiter (2003) as “the production and continual improvement of ideas of value to a community, through means that increase the likelihood that what the community accomplishes will be greater than the sum of individual contributions and part of broader cultural efforts” (p. 1370). This study, which was carried out in a grade three and four classroom, was bound by the following research question: What learning designs enable a class of students to engage in knowledge building? I employed practitioner action research as a methodological approach to examine, critically question, and transform my understandings of my practice, how I conduct my practice and the conditions under which I practice (Kemmis et al., 2014). Sources of evidence included samples of computer supported collaborative work, documents, observations and journals. Designs for knowledge building included the use of hooks to elicit real ideas and authentic questions from students, ongoing reference to knowledge building principles as defined by Scardamalia (2002), scaffolds to support student discourse, both face-to-face and online, and the use of Google Applications for Education (GAFE) as a networked space to support sharing and feedback for improving ideas. The outcomes of this research suggested that students did, with the support of scaffolds, engage with knowledge building principles, worked as a community to improve ideas of value to the community and used GAFE in support of the work of knowledge building. Findings of this study support an ongoing understanding of how both a teacher and a group of students new to knowledge building advance in their effort to continually improve ideas as a community. Recommendations for further research include: 1) how a culture for knowledge building might continue to shift in a classroom over time; 2) how those students with some experience in knowledge building might support those new to knowledge building; and 3) how the Social Infrastructure Framework (Bielaczyc, 2006, 2013) can support in the design for knowledge building.
Open Access
Digital Literacy Development in Teacher Education: A Case Study
(2021-12-14) Fedorko-Bartos, Kristi-Mari; Lock, Jennifer; Friesen, Sharon; Burwell, Catherine
With increasing technological advancement, developing citizens’ digital literacy is more crucial than ever before in supporting Canada’s societal and economic future. Teachers hold a critical role in fostering their students’ digital literacy development. Using case study methodology, the objective of this research was to gain a deeper understanding from the perspectives of an administrator and five instructors on how pre-service teachers understand and develop digital literacy with the central research question of: How is digital literacy developed within a Design-based Thinking course in a teacher education program? The research question was investigated through collecting data on opportunities in one teacher education program for pre-service teachers in developing digital literacy in a Design-based Thinking course. Data were collected using individual interviews, focus group interviews, and document analysis. The collected data were analyzed through thematic analysis and two cycles of coding to identify emergent themes of participants’ understanding and perceptions of digital literacy development within the context of the Design-based Thinking course within the teacher education program. Four key findings emerged from this research study. First, instructors’ openness (or risk-taking) and modeling the usage of digital technologies in courses within the teacher education program encourage pre-service teachers to use digital technologies. Second, opportunities for feedback in support of pre-service teachers’ digital literacy development can be provided through learning tasks and assessments. Third, teacher education programs need to consider establishing program goals focused on developing digital literacy and provide professional development opportunities to support instructors’ in designing and facilitating pre-service teachers’ digital literacy development. Fourth, instructors need to have an understanding of digital literacy to design authentic and embedded learning tasks for pre-service teachers focused on supporting digital literacy development.
Open Access
Education Thoughts and Acts: Decisions School Leaders Feel They Need to Make
(2016) Baron, Violet; Davis, Andrew Brent; Friesen, Sharon; Gereluk, Dianne
Abstract This study examines how school leaders choose to focus time and attention on implementing substantive change amid the aims of overarching and often conflicting purposes without creating an environment of “too much stuff.” Using a dual process theory analogy, findings suggest that school leaders, as the consciousness of the school collective may interpret legislative direction and set a vision that aligns with their understanding and enacted practice of the purposes of schooling. Findings also suggest that school leaders choose to focus resources on initiatives that promote the vision and values of the school—and correspondingly, choose not to focus resources on initiatives that the school leader does not see as in alignment with the visions or values of the school.
Open Access
Effective Teaching Practices for English as an Additional Language Learning in Alberta, Canada
(2023-07) Salmon, Katherine Lee; Friesen, Sharon; Chu, Man-Wai; Dressler, Roswita
English as an additional language (EAL) learners lag behind their English-speaking peers academically and it takes longer for them to achieve high school completion requirements (Alberta Education, 2017; 2018, 2019a). Teachers play a critical role in providing intentional language instruction alongside content instruction to support these vulnerable learners. This study addressed three research questions: i) What instructional practices do teachers use to support EAL learners? ii) How does background knowledge inform teachers in their decision making and in determining the effectiveness of the instructional practices they use to support EAL learners? iii) In what ways do pre-service and in-service teacher education impact teachers’ effective instruction for EAL learning? Participants (n=17) were teachers who were recognized as holding specialized EAL knowledge and administrators who lead EAL learning in their jurisdiction. They participated in semi-structured interviews about the instructional practices that they perceived as the most effective for EAL learning. Six key findings were identified: i) positive relationships are foundational for EAL learners, ii) explicit language instruction needs to be embedded in the content areas, iii) teachers ideology influences their background knowledge and impacts their decision making, iv) knowledge of learning theories that impact EAL learning informs teacher’s decision making, v) effective instructional practices for EAL learning should be embedded in post-secondary courses for pre-service teachers, and vi) professional learning in EAL learning is needed for in-service teachers’ and administrators’ decision making for instruction and programming. A conclusion drawn from this study is that the language intentions have to be explicitly identified and stated along with learning intentions for each lesson/unit of study. Another conclusion is that there are some Alberta educators who have a strong theoretical knowledge and a repertoire of effective instructional strategies for EAL learning, however, many teachers and administrators do not have solid theoretical and practical knowledge. As such a recommendation from this study is that professional learning about EAL Learning is required for pre-service and in-service teachers and for practicing administrators.