Browsing by Subject "Teacher certification"
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Item Middle school teachers, certification, classroom management, and student discipline : a study of early career teachers in Central Texas schools(2015-05) McMurrey, Allen Lamar III; Valenzuela, Angela; Reddick, Richard J; Holme, Jennifer J; Saenz, Victor BThere has been a substantial amount of research conducted that has studied teacher quality in regards to the types of certification training that a teacher received to become a highly qualified teacher. Within the research literature on this subject were arguments that supported both sides of the traditional teacher certification versus alternative teacher certification debate. While many studies have looked at test scores and student achievement as the most important aspects of teacher quality, this study explored the relationship between teacher quality as it related to type of teacher certification and their classroom management and student discipline beliefs and practices. Taken into account were the very real consequences of teachers mismanaging their classrooms by over disciplining students many of whom were disproportionately economically disadvantaged, minority, at-risk, and special education students. This study investigated traditionally certified teachers and alternatively certified teachers in four central Texas urban and suburban school districts that each served a high number of economically disadvantaged and at-risk students. The schools that were used were all middle schools. The literature that was used to develop this study revealed variances in how traditionally certified and alternatively certified teachers are studied and how they are perceived. The literature also revealed how classroom mismanagement via overuse of disciplinary referrals and suspensions for minor, discretionary infractions has had a detrimental effect on the academic outcomes of the most vulnerable students in our public schools. What this study does is add to the existing literature on teacher certification and teacher quality. How it was significant was that it stepped away from the more traditional, standardized test result based, or value added models of teacher certification studies by focusing on classroom management and discipline beliefs and practices of teachers new to the profession. This was a unique study in that it focused on the certification training and classroom management and student discipline beliefs and practices teachers new to the profession teaching in both urban and suburban middle school classrooms which served high numbers of poor, at-risk students. The study involved using a take home survey that asked teachers to provide basic demographic data about themselves, their certification programs, their challenges as new to the profession teachers, and how they felt about teaching in general. Included in the study were teacher’s responses to video scenarios of students breaking discretionary rules which they viewed in a face to face meeting in their own classrooms. The data from these were examined to discern whether or not there was a discernible difference in the way each group of teachers felt about their preparedness to teach and how they rated the infractions played out in the student video scenarios.Item Teacher Certification Exams: Predicting Failure on the TExES History (8-12) Content Exam (A Nonparametric Approach using Classification Trees)(2011-05) Gard, Dwight R.; Simpson, Douglas J.; Murray, John P.; Wang, Eugene W.; Tipton, Pamela E.Previous research efforts concerning teacher certification in Texas focused primarily on the Pedagogy and Professional Responsibilities exam; an exam that all teacher candidates must pass regardless of their specific content area. Few studies have attempted to explore which variables are useful for predicting the outcome of the TExES content-area certification exams, which represents a major gap in the literature. Because of its high failure rate, this study focused on identifying factors that were influential in predicting failure on the TExES History (8-12) certification exam. A convenience sample was used and only those who had taken the TExES History (8-12) exam from 2002 – 2008 were selected (n = 181). The study is an exploratory data design using classification trees—a nonparametric statistical technique often associated with data mining. The study was different from previous studies in two important aspects: a) the study included a much wider range of variables, and b) nonparametric, classification tree methodology was used to build predictive models. Using the proportional chance criterion and Press’ Q to assess significance, the models were statistically significant (p < .05), indicating that the models were capable of predicting outcomes well beyond what would be expected based on chance. Because classification trees produce a set of decision rules that can be graphically depicted, a model based on a decision tree paradigm is more intuitive, and more easily interpreted and implemented compared to regression methods. Although classification trees are not widely used in social science research, the success of the technique in the current study suggests that classification trees can be an effective, nonparametric alternative to the more traditional multiple regression and logistic regression methods and provides researchers a glimpse of the capabilities of classification trees.Item The effect of teacher certification on student achievement(Texas A&M University, 2005-08-29) Sparks, KarinThe purpose of this study was to review the empirical research evidence on the effect of teacher certification on student achievement. An exploratory meta-analysis was conducted on studies that examined the effect of fully certified and less-than-fully certified teachers on student achievement. The meta-analysis focused on the areas of mathematics, science and reading and explored trends across areas of achievement, school level and research design. The study was directed towards (a) a synthesis of findings, and (b) recommendations for future research and policy decisions.The meta-analysis population consisted of five individual studies that generated twenty-seven effect size estimates. Three studies utilized either an individual level or class level of analysis and yielded twelve mean difference effect size estimates. Two studies utilized either a school or state level of analysis and yielded fifteen correlational effect size estimates. The majority of findings in mathematics favor the positive effect of fully certified teachers. In science, the findings pointed towards equivalent levels of student achievement for fully certified and less-than fully certified teachers. All the findings associated with reading favored the positive effect of fully certified teachers. It appears that certification may be more crucial to student achievement in reading and mathematics than in science. Across school levels, the overall trend suggests that full certification may be more crucial to student achievement in elementary school than middle or high school. Across levels of analysis and research design, studies that utilize an aggregate level of analysis yield a greater number of positive study outcomes than designs conducted at the individual or class level. A key finding is that given the specifications of the meta-analysis, direct evidence of the relationship between certification and student achievement is limited to five peer-reviewed, published studies. Additional findings illuminated several issues that are vital to improving the quantity and quality of research on teacher certification. Eight specific recommendations were directed towards academic researchers who plan to study the topic. Four recommendations are directed towards policy-makers at the state and federal level who are involved in setting standards and planning legislation for educator preparation.