Is transformational leadership the answer to education?

Reading some of the other blogs last week, in which different aspects of school systems from around the world were mentioned, such as the sport involvement of students in the US, or the Finish school system, got me thinking. Whilst undertaking some research, I happened to come across the PISA webpage and a link about the Singaporean leadership styles of teaching. This has led me to consider the role of transformational leadership in schools. For the next few weeks I will focus on how leadership styles and how those relate to the effectiveness of teachers and academic performance, and teaching-learning interventions existing in those contexts.

Singapore, a country that lacks natural resources, appears to take education quite seriously. The requirements towards teachers are consequently high and clearly communicate that learning can only be fostered in an environment, in which teachers are constant learners themselves and are prepared to integrate new pedagogy. Findings of transformational leadership in schools in Singapore suggested that such leader behaviour is related to commitment to the organisation, citizen behaviour, satisfaction of teachers with leaders, and academic performance for students (Koh, Steer, & Terborg, 1995).

What is Transformational Leadership?

“Leaders and followers make each other to advance to a higher level of moral and motivation.” James MacGregor Burns

Bass Transformational Leadership Theory: In his theory, Bass describes transformational leaders as people; who are trusted and respected, make others aware of the importance of task and its value, focus on organisational and team goals rather than individual interest, and activate higher-order needs. He also defined 4 components of Transformational Leadership:

1. Intellectual Stimulation
2. Individualized Consideration
3. Inspirational Motivation
4. Idealized Influence

Teachers in Singapore are instructing students based on those four concepts. Through facilitating such learning teachers encourage students; toward a creative approach in exploring new ways and opportunities of learning; by offering support through open communication with the learner to share new ideas and recognise others contributions; to be vision driven enabling them to experience passion and motivation in fulfilling goals; and influence them as trusted and respected role models to internalize ideals. This fosters a learner-centred environment in classrooms and aims at looking at the learning process and how it can be improved.

Learner-Centered Psychological Principles

McCombs and Whisler (1997) define learner-centered education as “the perspective that couples a focus on individual learners (their heredity, experiences, perspectives, backgrounds, talents, interests, capacities, and needs) with a focus on learning (the best available knowledge about learning and how it occurs and about teaching practices that are most effective in promoting the highest levels of motivation, learning, and achievement for all learners)”. It is based on fourteen principles pertaining to learners and the learning process. It includes cognitive and metacognitive factors, motivational and affective factors, developmental and social factors, and individual differences. http://www.apa.org/ed/governance/bea/learner-centered.pdf

A learner-centred approach in education includes use of technology, assessment, and institutional approaches. Technology integration in education in Singapore is applied in daily lectures; this is due to general acceptance of technology in classrooms and was found to be related to the perceived usefulness by teachers (Teo, 2009).

Designing learner- centred environments has been found to be effective in achieving higher academic results as well as reinforcing higher motivational orientation, moreover, to have a more structured learning environment benefits those at academic risk and students that tend to fall through the academic educational system (Alfassi, 2004). An investigation that examined the effect of transformational leadership in regards to teachers relationship with principles reported that it positively contributed to a school’s innovative climate among 51 elementary schools in the Netherlands (Moolenaar,2010).

To sum it up, the transformational leadership appears to be a relevant approach in education. It has been demonstrated to be influencing positive learning outcomes when you consider the result of Singapore at the PISA investigation 2009 and Singapore’s ranking. Studies that examined teachers’ job satisfaction, e.g. Bogler (2001), suggested that transformational leadership has direct and indirect implications toward the satisfaction of teachers on their profession. Examples from different countries support the positive effect such leadership has toward climate of learning and performance of students. Further suggestions have been made towards a model of transformational and instructional leadership in schools. Findings among 24 schools across America showed that when a structure of coexistence between transformational and shared instructional leadership was present, it substantially influenced school performance when the schools’ pedagogy and students’ achievements were considered (Marks & Printy, 2003).

Why is this educational system not adapting to transformational leadership style?

References

Alfasi, 2004. Effects of a Learner-Centred Environment on the Academic Competence and Motivation of Students at Risk. Learning Environments Research 7(1), 1-22.

Bass, B. M. and Steidlmeier, P. (1998). Ethics, Character and Authentic Transformational Leadership, at: http://cls.binghamton.edu/BassSteid.html

Koh, Steer, & Terborg,1995. The effects of transformational leadership on teacher attitudes and student performance in Singapor. Journal of Organizational Behavior 16 (4), 319–333.

Marks & Printy, 2003. Principal Leadership and School Performance: An Integration of Transformational and Instructional Leadership. Educational Administration Quarterly 39 (3), 370-397.

McCombs, B.L., and Whisler, J.S. (1997). The learner-centered classroom and school. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Moolenaar N.M., 2010. Occupying the Principal Position: Examining Relationships Between Transformational Leadership, Social Network Position, and Schools’ Innovative Climate. Educational Administration Quarterly 46 (5), 623-670.

Teo, 2009. Modelling technology acceptance in education: A study of pre-service teachers. Computers & Education 52 (2), 302–312.

Outsourcing of learning- or where technology and pedagogy meet?

In today’s society outsourcing learning appears to be a topic of interest beyond the educational institutions, since it in-cooperates questions concerning future outcomes of value and cost for the society as a whole and the individual. The role of technology in education, however, continues to increase and therewith the challenge of outsourcing learning using the world wide web and applying it to the educational system. The demand for accessibility and exchange of knowledge is high and the internet provides means to facilitate this demand with manageable costs. But what are the prices being paid in outsourcing learning ? This blog entry will consider aspects of outsourcing learning in terms of the role of technology and pedagogy.

The term outsourcing of learning in this context refers to the various online learning facilities that are available via the internet, not the outsourcing of universities in other countries to provide services to students due to license losses caused by international students visa problems.

In particular, the popularity of outsourcing higher education appears to increase, as more and more internet platforms are being developed, which offer tuition-free university courses from leading universities.

https://www.coursera.org/, http://www.uopeople.org/groups/tuition-free-online-degree

Free access to learning is a great opportunity, however, a study in which academic achievement levels (high and low) for secondary students has been investigated showed that parenting style had a great effect on school performance. Moreover, results indicated authoritative parenting to be advancing high-achievement in students, which was shown in mastery of goals and self-efficacy.  Low-achievement in students, however, was found to be linked with neglecting parenting style, and results showed students had higher self-handicapping (Boon, 2007).

Baumrind’s developmental theory on general parenting style and Maccoby and Martin’s adjustment:

This theory refers to the relationship between the behaviour of the parent and the development and ability of the child to shape the surroundings in order to reach ones goal. Baumrind (1966) identified four characteristics in her research as the basic elements to form successful parenting: responsiveness vs. unresponsiveness and demanding vs. undemanding. She defined the parenting styles as: authoritative, authoritarian, and permissive.  Maccoby and Martin (1983) added to the model of parenting style by redefining the permissive style into indulgent and neglectful. In the styles where authority is strong, aspects of acceptance and responsiveness are drawn in and where it is weak, demand and control are involved.

Parental support in terms of authoritative parenting style and parental active involvement in schooling has been found to promote school success in adolescents by different studies, for example one by Steinberg, (1982). So what if educational settings would change and we would move away from the classical model of classroom teaching, would students with low intrinsic motivation and a lacking social skills be as ambiguous in their approach to learning? Or is this bringing as back to the debate of mixed versus ability classrooms?

This developmental principle brings rise to what changes in regard to social interactions and social environment will be caused by using more technology based learning and moving away from the tradition teacher-learner based classroom management, possibly to a more personalized/individualized learning  approach. How is technology revolutionary to education? Is the outsourcing of learning to the multimedia world a “pedagogy of poverty” (Haberman, 1991) as suggested, or a chance to facilitate an approach to learning that is controlled by students and requires their ownership?

Is the newly implemented technology an alert to the pedagogy of the teacher, is it causing a shift of the pedagogical practices ? Analyses in regard to the interrogation of technology in the context of teaching has revealed that such adaptation requires knowing the content,  and having an idea of the relationship technology and pedagogy hold with one another (Koehler et al, 2007).Findings suggest that this is the case, reporting evidence that the interactivity with technology requires transformation of the teachers  pedagogy (Glover & Miller,2001). As it challenges teachers to change pedagogical practices in learning, technology can act as a catalyst for students to be innovative and move away from a teacher-centered approach to learning to a collaborative working among students  and integrate project-based learning (Windschitl & Sahl, 2002).

To conclude, outsourcing learning, or the implementation of technology such as the internet as a learning tool in classrooms, has challenged the education to seek new ways in conveying knowledge and skills and provided means of applying new pedagogy. In particular, classrooms have adapted a more learned -based approach and such flexibility has resulted in increased motivation in students active learning and and changed their self-imaged, even among low-achievers (Doppelt,2003).

References:

Baumrind, D. (1966). Effects of Authoritative Parental Control on Child Behavior, Child Development, 37(4), 887-907.

Boon, H.J., 2007. Low- and high-achieving Australian secondary school students: Their parenting, motivations and academic achievement. Australian Psychologist 42,3. DOI:10.1080/00050060701405584

Doppelt, 2003. Implementation and Assessment of Project-Based Learning in a Flexible Environment. International Journal of Technology and Design Education 13 (3), 255-272.

Glover & Miller,2001. Running with technology: the pedagogic impact of the large-scale introduction of interactive whiteboards in one secondary school. Journal of Information Technology for Teacher Education 10 (3).

Koheler et al, 2007,

Steinberg, 1982. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8624.1992.tb01694.x/abstract

Windschitl & Sahl, 2002. Tracing Teachers’ Use of Technology in a Laptop Computer School: The Interplay of Teacher Beliefs, Social Dynamics, and Institutional Culture. Am Educ Res J 39, 165-205

 

2nd blog entry Science of Education

Extension of classrooms to the virtual environment = teaching revolution?

Throughout the last century, many studies have been conducted to observe effects and advantages of using technology in education. Some new ideas have been explored rather by chance like the Khan Academy and research by educationalist, like Sugata Mitra (on TED) ,  who has run experiments across different continents that showed the immediate positive engagement with virtual learning tools. Ted speakers like Diana Laufenberg have pointed out that sources of information have changed from a building to an always accessible virtual platform. Such findings should be evidence enough to call for a teaching revolution, in particular in Higher Education.

The importance of conceptual understanding is more important than mere memorization, as suggested by Glynn, Yeany, and Britton in research they had conducted in the 1990’s. Moreover, an approach of “Thinking out loud” (Glynn, Muth & Britton, 1990) is of great relevance in today’s society in which knowledge changes quickly and the updating of one’s knowledge is a lifelong activity. Universities should be a places that equip students how to utilize relevant skills such as sourcing and filtering knowledge and how to apply those skills beyond education.

There are a few models already existing on the educational field that promote virtual learning in Higher Education. For example, the Massive Open Online Course a technology that encourages students to learn together, through exchange. However, it has been suggested that the motivation for learning has changed in the last decade amongst students and the high level of self-regulation towards learning reveals a challenge in setting up such teaching tools in Higher Education.  Similar platforms have been set up for botany (iSpot, UK Open University) and design (DIDET).

An experiment carried out by Moreno and Mayer (2004) found evidence that deeper learning takes place when students are learning with an on scree instructor in a computer-based simulation game, in which the instructor talks to them in a personal compared to an impersonal style.  This brings me back to the Khan Academy. Salman Khan developed this simple and easy accessible way of online tutoring after receiving feedback from a cousin, who had enjoyed learning this particular way since he was able to pause, stop, and rewind the recoding as needed.

It could be suggested that in nowadays collective and collaborative learning is extremely important learning tool and already modelled in the working place by companies such as Shell. Does this emphasise the need for Higher Education to have classrooms be extended to the virtual environment?

In his experiments, the Indian educationalist Sugata Mitra, demonstrated that young students and even children from rural areas in the world with limited prior knowledge applied self-regulated and peer  guided learning by using technology.

Research that has considered the impact of Internet-based tutoring given by older adults to students in the 5^th grade revealed that such a programme remained effective months after instructions had been provided (Meyer et al, 2002). Studies in which e-tutoring was observed given by undergraduate students to children resulted in positive feedback from all involved parties (Johnson & Bratt, 2008). The increasing importance and engagement of internet tutoring emerges all around the world and beyond classrooms as pointed out by Ventura and Jang. Therefore, the need arises to find more application of such learning tools on the educational field, in particular in HE.

In terms of higher education, consisting research described virtual classroom learning as an opportunity to create spaces in which educational inquiries, reflection, discourse may take place, but considers it a challenge of how it can be integrated into the teaching environment, in particular computer conferences (Garrison, et al, 1999).

This evokes the question how significant teaching presence, social presence, and cognitive presence are in correlation with creating an effective teaching and learning environment. According to the Col model (Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2001), it is important for the learner to receive productive instructions, feel part of a community, and be in a surrounding in which critical thinking is challenge. Moreover, perceived usefulness is also an import aspect to foster learning. Findings by Joo, Lim, and Kim (2011) have suggested that online learning for university students have to implement all of those aspects. Other evidence emphases that face-to face interaction should be kept in teaching at Higher Educational Institutes (Vaughan & Garrison, 2005).

To sum it up, there are many interesting and useful resources that are offered through e-learning and the virtual world via the internet. Using technology in education in today’s society appears to be a necessity, and an innovative idea that embarks challenges, but most of all an important aspect to be included into classrooms. The world is all about connecting and learning from each other, therefore creating a virtual environment in classrooms bears many benefits. However, there are some myths about e-learning despite all the great findings, which cannot be ignored in this debate of classroom virtualisation. As pointed out by Njenga and Fourie in their report on the involvement of e-learning in HE, aspects such as considering e-learning as a saviour, increasing HE’s competitiveness, and resulting in a cut of finances can be somewhat misleading.

References:

http://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&lr=&id=NZ5lceOc9g0C&oi=fnd&pg=PA3&dq=psychology+of+learning+science&ots=Ovz2vkkZ__&sig=QWy7ta0NH7zGctZ14HpMTTERfXo

Personalized Messages That Promote Science Learning in Virtual Environments. Moreno, R. & Mayer, R. E., Journal of Educational Psychology, Vol 96(1), Mar 2004, 165-173. doi: 10.1037/0022-0663.96.1.165

Effects of structure strategy instruction delivered to fifth-grade children using the Internet with and without the aid of older adult tutors. Meyer, B.J. F.; Middlemiss, Wendy; Theodorou, Elena; Brezinski, Kristen L.; McDougall, Janet; Bartlett, Brendan J.

Journal of Educational Psychology, Vol 94(3), Sep 2002, 486-519. doi: 10.1037/0022-0663.94.3.486

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8535.2007.00805.x/full

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12564-009-9065-5/fulltext.html#Sec7

The myths about e-learning in higher education, Njenga and Fourie 2008

Garrison, Anderson, & Archer. 1999.University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Critical Inquiry in a Text-Based Environment: Computer Conferencing in Higher Education

Garrison, Anderson, and Archer (2001), Critical thinking and computer conferencing: a model and tool to assess cognitive presence. American Journal of Distance Education, 15 (1) (2001), pp. 7–23

Joo, Lim, and Kim (2011). Computers & Education, Pages 1654–1664.Online university students’ satisfaction and persistence: Examining perceived level of presence, usefulness and ease of use as predictors in a structural model

Vaughan & Garrison, 2005. Creating cognitive presence in a blended faculty development community. The Internet and Higher Education, 8 (1), 1st Quarter 2005, Pages 1–12

Week 2

Testing Effect

This blog entry will focus on the testing effect, one of the learning principles to guide pedagogy and the design of the learning environment. The relevancy of frequent testing, the effect of feedback, and formative assessment to achieve learning will be explored.

There has been a great debate of whether regular tests are an effective tool to use in order to assess if students are learning. It has been argued that testing does not merely assess learning; it even has a greater effect since it leads to facilitating learning (Carpenter, Pashler, & Vul, 2006).

Some research has found that the testing effect is dependent upon what kind of measures are being tested, suggesting that when retention was demanded to answer a question a testing effect was observed, however not in a condition in which transfer of knowledge had to be applied (Campbell & Mayer, 2009). This has led to the assumption that the testing effect is not universal. Other studies in support of the testing effect suggest that there are cognitive processes involved when testing is at hand which requires the learner to be able to select from information and organise it, as well as integrate it with already obtained knowledge to form meaningful learning (Mayer 2001, 2005, 2008). Moreover, the testing effect is being supported by tests in which recall is tested, which can be measured in examinations in which students have to provide answers that consist of several sentences (Glover, 1989). The theory of retrieval difficulty (Bjork & Bjork, 1992) which suggests that the testing effect is enhanced by difficult retrieval processes and depends on retrieval strength for enduring and momentary accessibility of information.

A significant argument in line with the testing effect is the role of receiving feedback. It has been suggested that regular testing serves are a great indicator of how well students are engaged in learning and provides feedback to the learner as well as the instructor. This idea has been explored by several different models, for example trough precision teaching. Precision Teaching is a method by which mastery or fluency of a task is measured on a regular basis by precise measures that help both student and teacher to plan the next step since it provides immediate feedback. It is a great tool that aids in guiding teaching and learning. It has a high testing frequency and due to its learner directed approach, students are constantly engaged with the material and it provides self-paced learning by testing oneself daily. This is in support of the testing effect since receiving feedback after the completion of a task, also referred to as delayed feedback, has been observed to facilitate retention more (Bangert-Drowns, Kulik, Kulikm & Morgan, 1991).

To sum it up, learning is facilitated by regular testing of the students since such assessments provide the learner and teacher with the necessary feedback to guide the learning process and make adjustments. Precision Teaching is one example in support of the testing effect, since it provides means by which decisions can be based on and enhances learning and memory.

References:

Bjork, R. A., & Bjork, E. L. (1992). A new theory of disuse and an old theory of stimulus fluctuation. In A. Healy, S. Kosslyn, & R. Shiffrin (Eds.), From learning processes to cognitive processes: Essays in honor of William K. Estes (Vol. 2, pp. 35-67). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.

Campbell, J., & Mayer, R. E. (2009). Questioning as an instructional method: Does it affect learning from lectures. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 23, 747-759.

Carpenter, S. K., Pashler, H., & Vul, E. (2006). What types of learning are enhanced by a cued recall test? Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 13, 826-830.

Glover, J. A. (1989). The testing phenomenon: Not gone, but nearly forgotten. Journal of Educational Psychology, 81, 392-399.