Understanding Educator Backgrounds, Beliefs, Work Lives & Concerns

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Understanding Educators: Backgrounds, Beliefs, Work Lives & Concerns

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The preponderance of studies and work on teacher development has been focused on specific health or social issues to measure the effect of a training program to deliver a particular instructional program. The successful integration of health & social development programs and multi-intervention approaches within school systems requires a good understanding of the sociology, work lives, professional norms, concerns about programs and education change, beliefs about issues, professional identities and other aspects of classroom teachers so that such programs and approaches can be successful and sustainable in the long run. As well, basic facts about the qualifications, experience, assignments, satisfaction, turn-over, current teaching and classroom management practices of the teachers assigned to teaching and promoting health, safety, personal and social development as well as the beliefs of all educators about equity and inclusion are not readily available. A deeper understanding is required of how w the extremely accessible, visible, multiple roles of the school principal as the front-line manager will affect their starting, supporting, maintaining and succession planning of school programs. The different work assignments of different categories of teachers should also be considered.
More research, consultations with teacher unions, teacher specialist organizations and models of teacher education and development need to be developed and implemented on these types of specific aspects:

How will the work lives, professional identities and career paths of educators will affect their ability and willingness to engage in health & social programs
How will relatively high rates of teacher turnover, especially for new teachers and for health teachers, will affect the delivery of health & social programs
What are the the “adopter concerns” of teachers when they are asked to promote inclusion and equity more in their classrooms and in student assessment?
What are the implications of teaching being a flat career, with most teachers choosing to remain in the classroom rather than seeking promotion? (Good teachers will not use the same lesson plans every year. Consequently, they are constantly looking for new lesson ideas and materials. Yet many health education programs expect teachers to use the same lesson plans every year.) Should advocates and program planners shift towards creating banks of good lesson ideas instead of a pre-selected lesson-based program?
How do the daily work routines of educators affect their role in promoting health and development? For example, there is little free time in a teacher's work day for meetings because most teachers are teaching at any given time during the day or even after school, when many are engaged in extra-curricular activities with students. Consequently, teachers are often time-starved and reluctant to meet together to collaborate.
How will the beliefs/perceptions that educators have about the health and social issues being addressed affect their treatment of that issue?

Sources:

Lortie, D.C. (1975, 2002). School Teacher: A Sociological Study. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Zeichner, K., Gore J. (1999). Teacher socialization in W.R. Houston (ed.) Handbook of Research on Teacher Education, New York, NY: Macmillan
Lortie DC (2009) School Principal: Managing in Public, , University of Chicago Press

This summary was first posted in June 2015. Currently it has been posted as a "first edition" version. The following individuals or organizations have contributed to the development of this topic. ASCD, Education International, Peter Paulus, Marthe Deschenes, Doug McCall. We encourage readers to submit comments or suggested edits by posting a comment on the Mini-blog & Discussion Page on Integrating Health & Social Programs Within Education Systems for this section or posting a comment below:

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This summary was first posted in June 2012. Currently it has been posted as an "excerpt/adaptation", "first draft" or "revised draft" and "first or revised edition" version. The following individuals or organizations have contributed to the development of this topic.
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Research	Reports, Resources
Understand the Approach/ Program & Its Effectiveness in Different Contexts on Different Aspects of HPSD, Populations How to Implement, Maintain, Scale Up, Sustain, Build Capacity, Leverage to Support Core Components. How to integrate within Education Systems Use of Ecological/ Systems Approach Research Questions/ KDE Agenda	Understand the Approach/ Program & Its Effectiveness in Different Contexts on Different Aspects of HPSD, Populations How to Implement, Maintain, Scale Up, Sustain, Build Capacity, Leverage to Support Core Components. How to integrate within Education Systems Use of Ecological/ Systems Approach Research Questions/ KDE Agenda

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