Comparative Perspectives on Motivations and Values Among Novice Teachers

The current study aims at analyzing and comparing novice teachers’ motivations, values, and beliefs (N=810) from two different countries, namely the United States and Switzerland. Both groups, the US participants (n=327) and the Swiss participants (n=483) were enrolled in a teacher training program in their respective countries. Study results identified the main teaching motivations across all subsamples as related to participants’ personal values, social values, their teaching views, and instructional beliefs. Study results show that while motivational factors were similar at many levels between the two subsamples, their teaching views and their instructional beliefs were different and varied across participants from the two countries. Findings can help educators understanding the interplay between teaching motivations and beliefs as well as cultural nuances related to these concepts.

A Multi-Institutional Analysis of Instructional Beliefs and Practices in Gateway Courses to the Sciences

This paper builds on previous studies of instructional practice in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics courses by reporting findings from a study of the relationship between instructors’ beliefs about teaching and learning and their observed classroom practices. Data collection took place across six institutions of higher education and included in-depth interviews with 71 instructors and more than 140 hours of classroom observations using the Teaching Dimensions Observation Protocol. Thematic coding of interviews identified 31 distinct beliefs that instructors held about the ways students best learn introductory concepts and skills in these courses. Cluster analysis of the observation data suggested that their observable practices could be classified into four instructional styles. Further analysis suggested that these instructional styles corresponded to disparate sets of beliefs about student learning. The results add momentum to reform efforts that simultaneously approach instructional change in introductory courses as a dynamic relationship between instructors’ subjective beliefs about teaching and learning and their strategies in the classroom.