Teachers' professional development

• In the past thirty years, there have been many political changes in Croatia. These changes have had an impact on the education system, as well. The success of such educational changes depends on the teacher. The importance of teachers' knowledge and their beliefs about teaching and learning for their action in the classroom is well known. Beliefs influence teach-ers' representation of science, science knowledge and the organisation of knowledge and information. Keeping teacher professional development in mind, preservice teachers' beliefs need to be sought out and examined by educators. These beliefs should be developed in the direction of teaching chemistry taking into account recent reforms, as well as teaching and learning theories. Various studies have been undertaken in different education backgrounds and systems regarding the beliefs of both preservice and in-service teachers. These studies show different results depending on the context in which they are undertaken. Transferring data to the Croa-tian system is therefore difficult. However, there are no studies in Croatia focusing on the teachers' beliefs regrading teaching and learning chemistry. The present study evaluates the initial beliefs of preservice chemistry teachers in Croatia. The participants were instructed to draw themselves as chemistry teachers in a typical classroom situation in chemistry, and to answer four open questions. Data analysis follows a pattern representing a range between the predominance of more traditional orientations versus more modern teaching orientations, in line with educational theory fo-cusing on: 1) beliefs about classroom organisation, 2) beliefs about teaching objectives, and 3) epistemological beliefs. The data revealed mostly traditional and teacher-centred knowledge among all of the participants. In the present paper, the data will be discussed and the implications for Croatian chemistry teacher training will be established.

With the permeation of the Internet in teacher’s personal and professional life, teachers are going online to connect, share ideas and expand their learning opportunities. This qualitative study focuses on the use of digital applications that leverage opportunities for teachers in the design phase, that is, at the time they are developing and curating curriculum materials and designing learning sequences within their discipline areas before implementation in the classroom. Data drawn for this paper is part of a research project examining expert ICT teacher’s approaches to their ongoing online professional learning. Semi-structured interviews of internationally recognized ICT-expert, specifically from Australia, Europe and United States of America are the main data source. The findings suggest that each teacher leveraged their online social media as their first approach or starting point within their design activities, with a curiosity to investigate the pedagogical application of a ‘new’ tool. These teachers looked first to the expertise of the colleague for their recommendation of the tool, engaging in little pedagogical reasoning before implementation. Additionally, elaboration of the term sharing is provided for deeper understandings of the ways teachers engage in their professional learning networks.

The purpose of this study is threefold: 1) to determine the levels of university students' engagement and trust in professors, 2) to investigate if there is a significant difference between students' engagement and trust scores in terms of some variables, and 3) to explore the relationship between student engagement and trust in professors. The participants comprised 1840 university students studying at seven different faculties of Inonu University during the 2013-2014 academic year. A test battery containing demographic information, student trust scale and student engagement scale was administered to the participating students. Results showed that female students and students from earlier grades trust in professors and engage into classroom activities more. Regression analysis results, also, indicated that students' scores on trust in professors explained approximately 16% of the total variance in student engagement. This implies that when students trust in their professors they tend to engage in lessons more, which, in turn, brings about better learning. Öz Bu araştırma ile üniversite öğrencilerinin derse katılım ve öğretim elemanlarına güven düzeyleri, derse katılım ile öğretim elemanlarına güven güven arasındaki ilişkinin belirlenmesi amaçlanmıştır. Araştırmaya 2013-2014 eğitim öğretim yılında İnönü Üniversitesi bünyesinde bulunan yedi fakültede öğrenim gören 1840 öğrenci katıl-mıştır. Araştırmaya katılan öğrencilere Üniversite Öğrencileri İçin Derse Katılım Ölçeği ve Öğretim Elemanla-rına Güven Ölçeği uygulanmıştır. Bağımsız değişkenler açısından yapılan analizler sonucunda öğrencilerin derse katılım düzeyleri ve öğretim elemanlarına güven düzeyleri cinsiyet ve sınıf düzeyi değişkenlerine göre anlamlı şekilde farklılaştığı belirlenmiştir. Öğrencilerin öğretim elemanlarına güveninin derse katılımlarını anlamlı şekil-de yordayıp yordamadığını belirlemek amacıyla regresyon analizi yapılmıştır. Öğrencilerin öğretim elemanlarına duydukları güven onların derse katılımının anlamlı yordayıcısı olduğu ve derse katılım düzeyine ait toplam var-yansın yaklaşık %16'sını açıkladığı belirlenmiştir. Bu sonuç öğrencilerin öğretim elemanlarına güvendiklerinde derse daha fazla katıldıklarını ve bu sayede daha iyi öğrendikleri anlamına gelmektedir. Anahtar Kelimeler: Öğretim elemanlarına güven, derse katılım, öğrenci.

What are some primary concerns and priorities of preservice teachers as they craft, brand, and curate, or design, their digital self? How and why has the preservice teacher's digital self become a design problem? This paper reports on research with seven preservice teachers' insights into this problem. In a nutshell, through online platforms, one's private and public lives, or personal and professional images, risk collapsing or converging. Stakes are raised as students are given various cautions and warnings about this. What might raise a concern for a potential employer? What might generate concerns for young students' parents? How to professionalize the digital self? The problem is framed as a tension between the higher standard to which teachers are held and rising expectations that teachers be omnipresent in social media and technology. Findings emphasize that, for the participants, the design of the digital self is an ill-defined problem. Participants adopt fairly conventional means to design and manage their professional image. The conclusion begs a question of the higher standard in this era of SM and the intelligent web.