Tag: The A-Z of Education

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Teaching & Learning Strategies, Concepts, and Terms That Every Teacher Must Know: Letters AP-AR

To be considered a competent educator, there are almost 2000 strategies, concepts, and terms that you must know. However, since teachers wear so many hats, who has the time to learn them all? Don’t worry; we have you covered. In this series, we will discuss all the teaching and learning strategies, concepts, and terms that you need to know to be considered an effective educator. There are over 70 articles in this series, so pace yourself. We recommend reading one piece per weekday, which will allow you to complete the series in three to four months. We hope you enjoy it.

Click here to read all the articles in this series.

AP (Advanced Placement program) An initiative offered by the College Board, which gives students the chance to take university-level classes while in high school.

Apgar Rating A test for newborns immediately after birth that measures the heart rate, breathing effort, muscle tone, reflex irritability, and skin tone.

Applied Behavior Analysis The application of behavioral learning principles to behavior comprehension and modification.

Apraxia Is the absence of voluntary muscle control. Regardless of how healthy the muscles may appear, the user has no control over them. The inability to intentionally move normally developed muscles has a substantial impact on academic success because students learn by doing and communicating. Learners with apraxia may benefit from sip-and-puff systems that allow the user to control a computer or other mobile device.

Aptitude An innate capacity or talent in a particular area of study or work.

Aptitude Test An assessment designed to predict future learning or skill mastery if the appropriate instruction is provided.

Archival Portfolio A collection of a student’s work stored in a way that it can be passed on from one teacher to the next over the academic years.

Argumentative Writing A style of writing that uses forms of reasoning, persuasion, as well as factual and other evidence to support one or more claims about a topic or text.

Arrays Graphic form representations of the relationships between topics, ideas, and details. Examples include semantic webs, mapping, and the herringbone technique.

Articulation Disorder A disorder characterized by extraordinary challenges when it comes to forming the sounds of everyday communication. This may be due to a structural problem with the mouth or a motor-based issue. Collectively, these difficulties are considered to be articulation disorders. They can make classroom education extremely hard for both teachers and students. However, there are some ways that teachers can help students with articulation disorders still succeed academically.

Articulation The proper placement of the teeth, tongue, lips, and jaw when pronouncing speech.

Artifacts Items created by a student and included in a portfolio which display their capabilities, knowledge or dispositions.

Artificial Intelligence The development and ability of computer programs to complete tasks normally performed by people, such as speech recognition, language translation, visual perception, and even decision making. In the future, we can expect to see even more artificial intelligence in the classroom. Artificial intelligence could be used to personalize the education experience for students. Programs that use artificial intelligence can act as tutors for students by determining what each student is struggling with and delivering personalized interventions, just as a teacher would. Robots could someday provide one-on-one tutoring or coaching sessions to bring struggling students up to speed.

Arts Integration A teaching method which integrates the arts to expand learning opportunities for diverse student populations.

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The A-Z of Education: School Finance and Organization

In this series, I hope to guide you in acquiring the vocabulary that you need to know to be considered a competent education professional. In this article, we will discuss education vocabulary centered on school finance and organization.

Click here to view all of the articles in the series.

Adequate Yearly Progress is a No Child Left Behind requirement that schools make annual incremental progress toward 100 percent of students reaching the proficient level on state reading and mathematics assessments by the 2013–2014 school year.

American Federation of Teachers (AFT) is a nationally organized association, intended to represent the interests of all affiliated classroom teachers. It is comprised of professional teachers who advocate for teachers’ concerns, educational reforms, as well as for changes to current legislation.

American Recovery and Revitalization Act (ARRA) refers to a law passed in 2009 regarding the provision of a stimulus package to assist, among other things, in the creation and retention of teachers and school staff.

Authentic Assessment refers to the testing of students which measure accomplishment and mastery in a more holistic manner than standardized testing. The outcomes of these assessments are sometimes considered being more representative of a teacher’s effectiveness than the results of standardized testing.

Block Grant is a means for educational funding where federal government monies are paid to the state in a “block,” rather than being specifically designated to particular programs or purchases.

Categorical Aid refers to the means of federal funding for education where monies are targeted to specific federal programs or services and must only be used for those purposes. These monies are required to be accounted for and reported on periodically.

Chief State School Officer is the title given to the head of education for the state. This position may be elected, but is often appointed by the governor.

Elementary and Secondary Act (ESEA) was passed in 1965 in regards to various aspects of educational policy. This includes the funding of education up until the end of high school, and aims to promote the removal of achievement gaps between students of differing socioeconomic backgrounds.

Local School Board is the term used to describe the governing body for educational policy and funding at the local level. Members are usually elected by the community.

Local School District refers to the organization that channels funding and policies at the local level.

Local Superintendent is the head of education at the local school district. They are hired by the local school board.

National Education Association (NEA) is the largest professional organization and labor union, representing not only public school teachers and related personnel, but also retired educators and college students who wish to become teachers.

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act is an act which promotes the setting of high standards, as well as the setting and conducting of standardized testing, with a view to develop certain fundamental and core skills, such as basic literacy. Schools are rated in terms of performance, with sanctions imposed against schools that are not performing adequately.

Parent Teacher Association (PTA) refers to a formally organized association of parents, who work in conjunction with the school teachers in bringing about changes within the school. PTAs can receive federal funds.

Parent Teacher Organization (PTO) refers to a locally organized group of parents who work in conjunction with teachers in bringing about changes in a school. PTOs do not receive federal funds.

Privatization refers to the movement away from management by local or state-level government structures, and the move towards management by private individuals or corporations.

Site-based Management/Decision-Making is the process by which all school-related decisions are made at the school level with input from all interested stakeholders. As these decisions are taken by parties who are based at the school, they generally more accurately represent the true needs of the school.

State Board of Education is presided over by the Chief State School Officer and responsible for upholding the state educational legislation is observed.

State Department of Education is the department that channels funds and policy decisions from the governor and the legislature, to local educational authorities.

Title I Federal legislation that makes funds available to improve the educational experiences of children from low income families.

Are there any terms that we missed?

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The A-Z of Education: Education Law

In this series, I hope to guide you in acquiring the vocabulary that you need to know to be considered a competent education professional. In this article, we will discuss education vocabulary centered on education law.

Click here to view all of the articles in the series.

Code of Ethics refers to an individual’s chosen ethical behavior guidelines, providing direction in the daily activities of his or her chosen profession. This code of ethics assists an individual to make self-satisfactory decisions quickly.

Corporal Punishment is a form of discipline where physical pain is deliberately inflicted to punish, reform, and/or deter unacceptable attitudes or behaviors.

Due Process, in education, refers to laws pertaining specifically to education and mean that fairness should be rendered in all arenas and that teachers’ rights or students’ rights, as individuals, should under no circumstances be violated.

“Free Exercise” Clause is a clause in the U.S. Constitution that reads: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

Liability is the state of being legally obliged and responsible to perform certain actions, whether instructed to or not by an official of a judiciary court.

Procedural Due Process Rights includes the appropriation of specific legal procedures to ensure fair treatment of students.

Religious Freedom is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or religious belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance; the concept is generally recognized also to include the freedom to change religion or to follow any religion.

Sexual Harassment, in the context of the school environment, involves unwelcome sexual advances, including sexual remarks, and harassment that is sexual in nature.

Substantive Due Process Rights means that any restrictions imposed on student’s rights must be demonstrated by a valid reason.

Tort Laws are bodies of rights, obligations, and actions applied by courts in civil proceedings during which individuals are found to have been victims of the wrongful actions of others.

Are there any terms that we missed?

 

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The A-Z of Education: The Teacher Certification Process

In this series, I hope to guide you in acquiring the vocabulary that you need to know to be considered a competent education professional. In this article, we will discuss education vocabulary centered on the teacher certification process.

Click here to view all of the articles in this series.

Accreditation is a procedure in which certification of aptitude, authority, or trustworthiness is presented.

Alternate Route Program describes a state-defined route by which an individual who has previously completed a bachelor’s degree in another subject, can obtain a certification to teach.

Certification describes the process through which a teacher’s competency, professional preparation, and similar factors are assessed. These factors assist in determining if the candidate has the potential to become an effective educator. If an individual successfully completes the process, he or she is granted licensure.

Coursework includes all the theoretical and practical courses to be completed by a student enrolled in a teacher education program.

Field Observations, sometimes called field experiences, are part of a teacher-education program in which the teaching student is allowed to participate in and observe a K-12 classroom, with the classroom’s teacher and/ or the student’s instructor.

Licensure refers to the granting of a teaching license, which gives permission from a state to instruct and supervise school-age students.

Praxis is the name of a series of tests taken by individuals who wish to obtain a teaching certificate. It is part of the certification process and is endorsed by many states and professional licensing organizations.

Student Teaching includes weeks of teaching in a classroom, under the supervision of the classroom teacher and a supervisor.

Are there any terms that we missed? Are you nervous? Don’t worry, getting certified as a teacher is as easy as obtaining pmp certification in New York. A little business humor lol. My friend Joshua gets it.

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The A-Z of Education: Assessment and Evaluation

In this series, I hope to guide you in acquiring the vocabulary that you need to know to be considered a competent education professional. In this article, we will discuss education vocabulary centered on assessment and evaluation.

Achievement Tests are tests used to measure knowledge in specific areas: mathematics, chemistry, social studies, etc.

Alternate Choice Tests are the most common form of objective tests. They include variations of the popular true or false format (yes/no, agree/disagree, etc.).

Assessment refers to the methods used to measure or gather information about what students have learned. This may be done formally, by requiring students to complete tasks on paper and giving grades, or informally, by assessing students based on their performance without extensive prior preparation or warning and where no grade is assigned.

Authentic Assessment refers to a type of evaluation requiring students to provide answers to real-life situations by means of critical thinking. These assessments place emphasis on problem-solving by integrating content learned in the year/period/lesson.

Bell Curve refers to a statistical distribution of measurement. Its function is to show the frequency with which a phenomenon is repeated. In this case, it will reflect the percentage of students who got each of the grades (1 to 10). A certain distribution is expected, where, the high and low range will turn out to be similar, and the majority of scores will be distributed in the center.

Completion Tests are a type of test where students are required to fill in a gapped lead sentence with a phrase, word, or number that best suits the context.

Corrective Feedback is feedback provided by an educator focused on the area where the student excelled or made a mistake.

Criterion-Referenced Tests are tests in which the students being tested are not compared to a norm-group, but rather are required to reach a predetermined standard. All students may be required to achieve an average above a certain percentage or to obtain full marks to be considered as having successfully completed the assessment. These tests are generally suited to specific testing objectives with definite outcomes.

Diagnostic Tests are designed to identify or assess learning difficulties that students may experience. Diagnostic tests are often delivered to students by professionals trained in the area of presumed difficulty.

Formative Assessment is conducted to allow a teacher to assess whether or not the instruction being given is appropriate and being understood, which may inform their decision-making with regards to learning direction.

Mean refers to the mathematical average of a group of scores, giving a value that is representative of the overall scores.

Monitoring Tests are evaluated by descriptive criteria. Monitoring is an evaluating method of the informative assessment technique.

Normal Distribution refers to a statistical data distribution pattern. Certain data, when graphed as a histogram (data on the horizontal axis, amount of data on the vertical axis), creates a bell-shaped curve known as a normal curve, or normal distribution. Normal distributions are symmetrical with one central peak at the mean (average) of the data. The contour of the curve is bell-shaped. The spread of a normal distribution is determined by the standard deviation. The smaller the standard deviation the more concentrated the data.

Norm-Group refers to the representative group that the students being tested are being ranked against comparatively. This takes place in norm-referenced testing.

Norm-Referenced Tests are tests where assessment is conducted with reference to a norm-group. These tests generally cover a broad range of topics rather than specific, defined objectives.

Objective Tests are easy to mark, as the answers are either right or wrong. Examples include multiple-choice, true or false, fill in the blank, and dictation tasks.

Performance Feedback refers to the process of providing information to learners about their progress.

Quizzes are tests that consist of three or four questions based on previous lessons.

Standard Deviation refers to how widely measured values differ from the mean value. High standard deviations imply that scores varied widely from the mean value, irrespective of what the mean value was. It is given as a numerical value.

Standardized Tests are assessments with consistent and predetermined elements, administration, and scoring.

Summative Assessment refers to testing that occurs at the end of a defined learning unit to determine whether the learning content has been adequately retained by the students. This is also referred to as an evaluation.

Validity refers to whether or not a test has content validity, i.e., if it measures the knowledge it was designed to measure.

Are there any terms that we missed?

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The A-Z of Education: Preparing for Your First Year of Teaching

In this series, I hope to guide you in acquiring the vocabulary that you need to know to be considered a competent education professional. In this article, we will discuss education vocabulary centered on preparing for the first year of teaching.

Click here to view all of the articles in this series.

Active teachers are teachers who proactively seek to make advancements and improvements in all areas of education.

Activities are practical tasks given to students to perform in order to learn a concept.

Block schedule is a method of daily scheduling that allows students to change between fewer classes throughout the day.

Content is the information presented during a lesson.

Content-area reading describes opportunities for students to read for information rather than just for pleasure.

Collaborating/Mentoring teacher is the experienced teacher with whom you will be observing and/or working for the duration of your field experience placement.

Core courses describe the basic courses that are required for most college students prior to declaring a major and entering a specific field of study. These classes typically account for 30-40% of a bachelor’s degree.

Credentials file describes a file containing your resume and cover letter, your letter of recommendations and references, your transcripts and test scores, and your digital portfolio, if applicable.

Curriculum is a defined program of how a teacher, school, and district meet the educational goals of each course. This is subdivided into subjects, which each deal with a particular area of specialized learning.

Departmentalized scheduling refers to the teachers teaching only their subject area to multiple classes.

Digital portfolio describes a teaching portfolio contained on an external storage device rather than hard copies filed in a notebook.

Distance learning refers to the use of technology, such as video or web cams, allowing large numbers of teaching students to observe classrooms without causing disruption to the teaching or learning process. These can then be discussed afterward.

Early intervention services pre-kindergarten children who have been discovered to have a disability or to be at risk for developing a disability. Studies show that the earlier intervention services are administered, the greater the chances of success are for the child.

Electives are student-chosen classes of interest.

Extracurricular activities are school-sponsored clubs, sports, and activities that are outside the realm of the basic academic courses.

Field experiences, commonly known as practica or practicums, are the opportunities given to each pre-service teacher to gain contact in their future professions by observing and working in classrooms within the schools.

Focused observation is an observation that is conducted with a clear purpose, where the observer is an active participant in the process.

Highly qualified refers to a status given to teachers in content areas upon completing coursework and/or passing a Praxis exam or its equivalent. The No Child Left Behind Act requires that teachers be highly qualified in their content area.

In-person interview is a face-to-face interview with an interviewer or team of interviewers.

Interdisciplinary team refers to a situation in which a team of approximately 4 teachers to share and rotate approximately 80-100 students.

Lesson plan is a written reminder of how a lesson is to be presented and how important information and essential skills should be practiced and learned.

Materials list is a list of supplies needed for the lesson.

Objectives are the main purposes of the lesson or what you want the students to learn.

Observations refer to the act of attentively watching what takes place in a classroom.

On-site observations are observations that take place in an actual school setting.

Outcome refers to the goal set by the teacher in order to evaluate the skills the student has mastered.

Passive teachers are teachers that put little or no effort into advancing or improving the school environment and strictly come to work in order to collect a paycheck.

Praxis I is an entrance exam for the teacher education program that is much like the SAT/ACT tests taken for entry into college.

Praxis II is a standardized test that must be taken and passed to earn a degree and receive licensure in a subject area.

Praxis III is a performance measurement tool. It assesses teachers in a classroom setting during their first year. It includes direct observation and structured interviews.

Prior knowledge refers to what the students already know or do not yet know about the lesson topic.

Procedures are the sequence of actions taking place during the lesson, referring to what the student does.

Rationality is the ability to think and reason.

References are recommendations of employment provided by people who know you and have worked with you. They can be either written or verbal.

Reflective teaching log describes a journal that records a high amount of detail regarding the teaching experience. The student teacher is required to log the day’s events, then choose one specific event and analyze it.

Resume is a one- to two-page written summary of your abilities and experiences.

Rubric is a specifically stated set of standards that allow subjective ideas, observations, and projects to be scored equally.

Student teaching journal is a daily log of events. Journal entries are unstructured and open-ended.

Student teaching is the most extensive and in-depth field experience and is required to obtain a teaching degree.

Substitute teachers replace full-time teachers when they must be out due to illness, family responsibilities, or other personal or professional reasons.

Teacher certification or teacher licensure refers to a mandatory document needed in order to teach in the public school system

Teacher education courses are classes that focus on training you to be a teacher.

Teaching portfolio is a compilation of works collected throughout your teaching career that highlights your work and accomplishments.

Are there any terms that we forgot?