Pat: Conceptual Framework

Conceptual Framework

Teacher Quality and Student Success

Rationale:   The pentagon at the top of the page with the words "High-Quality Teachers", is surrounded by some characteristics of exceptional teachers.  High-quality teachers are motivated, prepared, subject area experts, and have extensive training and experience.  The arrow in the middle indicates that high-quality teachers "contribute to" the academic achievement of their students.  The scroll at the bottom represents College and Career Ready Students.  Some of the characteristics that are required to be college and career ready are contained in this area, including work-ready, strong knowledge base, prepared to attend college without remediation, etc.  This diagram was created to visually represent the relationship between high-quality teachers and college and career ready students.

Article Summary:

The article Teaching Effectiveness and Student Achievement: Examining the Relationship, by Cody Ding and Helene Sherman, examines the relationship between teacher effectiveness and student achievement.  The three issues that are examined are teacher effects, teaching or teacher effectiveness, and an educational model of school and teacher effects on student achievement (Ding and Sherman, p. 39).  Teacher effects include gender, salary, experience, etc.  They are typically things that can be easily quantified and measured.  This is not necessarily the same as teacher effectiveness and that teacher effects do not necessarily translate into teacher effectiveness.  Teacher effectiveness has more to do with one's ability to positively impact student learning and assessment outcomes.  The authors point out that much of the prior research on this topic did not clearly define the term teacher effectiveness, which as a result, weakened their studies.

In reviewing prior research, the authors presented Odden's model for studying teacher effectiveness with respect to student performance on assessments.  They pointed out that this model lacked the component that identifies a student and other individuals, as having impact on student learning.  They then presented their own model, which was based on Odden's model and uses it as its foundation.  This new model holds the various players equally accountable for student learning and incorporates the idea that factors other than what happens in the classroom, contribute to student learning.  Once parents and students realize they have a role in the students success, issues of teacher effectiveness can be more thoroughly explored.

References

Ding, C., & Sherman, H. (2006). Teaching effectiveness and student achievement: Examining the relationship. Educational Research Quarterly, 29(4), 40-51. http://search.proquest.com/docview/61918299?accountid=14068; http://www.gram.edu/education/erq/