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Penn Graduate School of Education

The Collaboratory for Teaching and Teacher Education at the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education

Previous Projects

    Previous Research Projects

    Exploring the Enabling Conditions for High Quality Project-Based Learning

    Building off of the work around core teaching practices of project-based learning, this study examines the conditions school and district leaders can facilitate within their contexts that will enable effective project-based learning to happen within classrooms. Key data sources will be leaders’ work products produced during a year-long PBL professional development experience, focusing on how conceptualizations of PBL and their role in supporting it evolve as the year progresses.

    Penn GSE Faculty: Sarah Schneider Kavanagh, Christopher Pupik-Dean, Zachary Herrmann, Dean Pam Grossman
    External Collaborators: Tyler Thigpen, Transcend Education

    Core Practices Consortium

    The Core Practice Consortium brings together teacher educators from across institutions, disciplines, and theoretical perspectives to grapple with questions about how better to prepare novice teachers. This cross-institutional group uses design-based research to investigate the implementation of teacher education pedagogies that can support the development of core practices among beginning teachers.

    Penn GSE Faculty: Dean Pam Grossman, Abby Reisman, Sarah Schneider Kavanagh, Christopher Pupik-Dean
    External Collaborators: See Core Practices Consortium website

    A Close Examination of Teachers' Transition into the Teaching Profession

    The aim of this project is to learn about and support first-year teachers as they transition into the teaching profession. To do so, the research team began by conducting focus groups with first- and second-year teachers in the three teacher education programs at Penn GSE. Based on the focus group findings, the research team developed a brief self-compassion intervention designed to cultivate supportive and adaptive beliefs in beginning teachers. To test the efficacy of the intervention, the researchers carried out a placebo-controlled longitudinal field experiment with first-year teachers in the three teacher education programs. A total of 121 teachers completed either the self-compassion intervention or a placebo control condition. Participants also completed a survey immediately following the intervention and six months later. Currently, the research team is analyzing study findings— assessing the effects of the intervention on teachers' motivational beliefs, orientation toward improving in teaching, well-being, burnout/stress, and commitment to the profession. Findings will be shared with the teacher education programs in the coming months with the hope of refining the intervention and identifying ways to incorporate learnings into teacher development efforts.

    Penn GSE Faculty: Rebecca Maynard
    Penn GSE Doctoral Students: Rebecca Baelen
    External Collaborators: Brian Galla, University of Pittsburgh
    Funded by the Mind and Life Institute

    Transitions to the First Year of Teaching in Urban Schools: Learning to Enact Dialogic Instruction in Mathematics

    In the Urban Teaching Apprenticeship Program (UTAP), we use the structured instructional activity, Number Talk, and a web-based video platform, to help novice teachers enact dialogic teaching practices in elementary mathematics, receive feedback, and reflect on their own progress. This qualitative study examines novice teachers’ use of dialogic practices in urban classrooms during their first year of teaching. Taking advantage of data collected through the video platform during the preservice year, we will explore changes in these practices across three different activity settings (methods course, student teaching, and first year of teaching), along with factors that support and constrain their use.

    Penn GSE Faculty: Janine Remillard, Caroline B. Ebby
    Penn GSE Doctoral Students: Lindsay Goldsmith-Markey

    Investigating Teachers’ Enactment of Core Practices of Project-Based Learning

    Project-based learning (PBL) is being adopted in an increasing number of schools and classrooms and has been linked to positive learning outcomes for students. While significant efforts have focused on building and researching curriculum materials for PBL, very little work has focused on how to prepare teachers to enact these curricula. This video-based study investigates whether a practice-based model of teacher development influences teachers to take up practice aligned with project-based instruction.

    Penn GSE Faculty: Sarah Schneider Kavanagh, Christopher Pupik-Dean, Zachary Herrmann, Dean Pam Grossman
    Advisory Team: Matthew Riggan, Co-Founder of The Workshop School; Meg Riordan, Director of External Research, EL Education; Chris Lehmann, CEO of Science Leadership Academy Schools; Shaquita Smith, Curriculum Specialist, School District of Philadelphia

    Understanding Conceptions of Mentoring Practice

    Research on the practice of mentoring tends to focus only on mentoring activity that occurs outside of instructional time (e.g. co-planning, coaching conversation, and analyzing student work). The research literature remains almost silent about how mentor teachers interact with novices when P-12 students are present. Through a qualitative analysis of interview data, researchers are investigating how mentors, novices, and teacher education faculty conceptualize the setting, timing, and practice of mentoring. Participants span three teacher education institutions.

    Penn GSE Faculty: Sarah Schneider Kavanagh
    External Collaborators: Sharon Feiman-Nemser, Brandeis University; Karen Hammerness, American Museum of Natural History; Kavita Kapadia Matsko, National Louis University; Jamie Wallace, American Museum of Natural History