performance evaluation is one of the important components of each organization, and educational organizations are not the exceptions. teachers are believed by many researchers as the single most important factor influencing student academic success or failure. therefore, they need to be at the center of attempts to improve or reform the educational system of any country. considering the pivotal...

Utilizing the resources of the web in educational practices has made instructional processes more efficient and interesting and has made the learning process on the other hand much easier and attractive. With the web, English language teachers now have the option of engaging learners in online (web-based) instructions in addition to the use of conventional classroom instructions or alternativel...

With the proliferation of educational reform policies and strategies, the need for high quality professional development (PD) has emerged as one of the most important areas for research in education, particularly in determining the relationship between PD and student learning outcomes (Borko, 2004). Although research has begun to focus on the defining characteristics of quality PD, little has b...

This study aims to examine the promise and problems of learning progression-guided interventions of an important science topic: using the knowledge of photosynthesis and cellular respiration to explain plant growth. In particular, a Learning Progression Framework (LPF) was developed to describe the conceptual change from force-dynamic reasoning that frames phenomena in terms of plants using ena...

Accountability concerns in language education call for the development of more valid and authentic measures of assessment. In light of these concerns, performance assessment has received increasing interest in the context of teacher education programs and teacher licensing over the last decade. In Iran, a recent policy adopted by Farhangian University aims at assessing the professional competen...

This study investigated the nature of EFL teacher education programs with respect to implementation, practicality, and approach to teacher learning. The data were collected through observation of two teacher education programs and interviews with 8 teacher trainers. The results attested to the transmission orientation of the programs. It was found that a pre-specified body of teachi...

Problem Statement: Student teachers’ beliefs and conceptions affect not only what and how they learn in teacher education programs, but also their future professional development in their teaching careers. Examining and understanding student teachers’ beliefs and conceptions is therefore crucial to improving their professional preparation and development, as well as the effectiveness of teacher...

The bulk of current research on teacher professional development is focused on teacher learning in the context of teacher professional learning communities (PLCs). In teacher PLCs, groups of teachers meet regularly to increase their own learning and the learning of their students. Teacher PLCs offer a learning model in which, “new ideas and strategies emerge, take root, and develop, and where c...