We report on international research that compares linguistic ecosystems, that is, socially constructed public attitudes and ideologies concerned with foreign-language (FL) learning, in Canada and Japan. Analyzing responses to three interview questions from 125 interviews with five categories of respondent in each country, we suggest that there are…

Teachers play a vital role in the implementation of new programs. This article discusses how best to support teachers in the face of such change. Specifically, we describe the perspectives of teachers who participated in a pilot project of the responsiveness to intervention model. Through focus group data, the researchers explored the barriers…

This study explored teachers' perceptions of shy children in the classroom during the elementary school grades. Seven teachers (1 male, 6 female) from elementary schools located in geographically diverse areas of Canada participated in semistructured telephone interviews that explored their perceptions of and experiences with shy children in the…

What are the core competences required by teacher-librarians for developing exemplary school library programs in 21st-century schools? This article reports on a study that explored the experiences and attitudes of graduates from the Teacher Librarianship by Distance Learning program at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. Key findings from this…

This study aimed to determine if pre-internship teacher education students' participation in service-learning activities in K-12 classrooms would significantly affect their teachers' sense of efficacy (TSE). A secondary focus sought to determine if one type of service-learning activity (e.g., whole-class instruction) would affect teacher efficacy…

There is an inconsistency between a growing need for national research on issues of child and adolescent health and the wide range of diverse curriculum responses to health issues undertaken by individual provinces and territories in Canada. Measuring the effect of interventions is more difficult in this contradiction. In this study, the authors…

In order to become effective teachers of language and literacy, it is critical for teacher candidates to have a sense of who they are as literate beings, how their literacy pasts have been lived, and how this might have an influence on the students in their classrooms. As teacher educators, we should not allow teacher candidates to rest simply…

Positive teacher-student relationship has been established as an important contributor to students' social, behavioral, and academic adjustment. Nevertheless, current research has not employed relationship measures that examine both teachers' and students' perceptions. Furthermore, the measures currently being used lack breadth in the definition…

This article analyzes a social-justice teacher education project in a larger teacher education program in Western Canada. This program-within-a-program took an anti-oppressive education approach designed to help teacher candidates to understand and challenge various forms of inequity and their interconnections. We review the social justice project…

External diagnosis is recommended when schools lack the capacity to assess their needs. This qualitative study of one Ontario district compared 33 elementary schools that conducted external diagnosis with 47 schools that used internal diagnosis. External diagnosis created pressure for change, helped schools develop a plan that included previously…

This report describes the effect of cooperative learning in low-track and regular classrooms, using the dimensions of student alienation, academic self-esteem, willingness to cooperate, and academic supportiveness. The investigators examined the influence of student agency in choosing peers for the cooperative groups in a high school science…

The purpose of this study was to explore to what extent 87 grade 5 (10-12-year-old) children, supported by instruction about scientific models, could engage in thinking beyond a naive realist level about a globe. A qualitative framework allowed analysis of children's responses to worksheet questions in which they identified analog-target…

Most implementations of the Mantel-Haenszel differential item functioning procedure delete records with missing responses or replace missing responses with scores of 0. These treatments of missing data make strong assumptions about the causes of the missing data. Such assumptions may be particularly problematic when groups differ in their patterns…

This study explored the association between psychological strengths and perceptions of being a victim of a bullying relationship in the school environment. Using self-report questionnaires with grades 7 and 8 students, the role of psychological strengths as potential protective factors against various forms of bullying were examined including the…

Teacher education is critical to the development of Aboriginal teachers able to ensure success among Aboriginal learners and contribute to the preservation and renewal of Aboriginal communities. In a series of talking circles, six beginning Aboriginal teachers discussed their teacher preparation and their first years of practice. They expressed…