Keeping an Eye on Learning Differences Between Expert and Novice Teachers’ Representations of Classroom Management Events

Classroom management represents an important skill and knowledge set for achieving student learning gains, but poses a considerable challenge for beginning teachers. Understanding how teachers’ cognition and conceptualizations differ between experts and novices is useful for enhancing beginning teac...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inJournal of teacher education Vol. 66; no. 1; pp. 68 - 85
Main Authors Wolff, Charlotte E., van den Bogert, Niek, Jarodzka, Halszka, Boshuizen, Henny P. A.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01.01.2015
Corwin Press, Inc
SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
Subjects
Beginning Teachers
Classroom management
Classroom Techniques
Coding
Cognitive Processes
Comparative Analysis
Discipline
Educational Attitudes
Experienced Teachers
Expertise
Foreign Countries
Grounded Theory
Kolmogorov Smirnov Two Sample Test
Learning
Mann Whitney U Test
Mixed Methods Research
Multivariate Analysis
Netherlands
Novices
Professional development
Teacher Attitudes
Teacher evaluation
Teachers, Rating of
Netherlands
United States
video analysis
teacher knowledge
professional development
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Summary:Classroom management represents an important skill and knowledge set for achieving student learning gains, but poses a considerable challenge for beginning teachers. Understanding how teachers’ cognition and conceptualizations differ between experts and novices is useful for enhancing beginning teachers’ expertise development. We created a coding scheme using grounded theory to analyze expert and novice teachers’ verbalizations describing classroom events and their relevance for classroom management. Four categories of codes emerged. These referred to perceptions/interpretations, thematic focus, temporality, and cognitive processing expressed. Mixed-method analysis of teachers’ verbalizations yielded a number of significant effects related to participants’ expertise levels. Notably, teachers’ cognitive processing diverged significantly based on expertise level. Differences in focus included themes such as student learning, student discipline, and teacher interaction and influence. Experts focused on learning in the classroom and the teacher’s ability to influence learning, whereas novices were more concerned with maintaining discipline and behavioral norms.
ISSN:0022-4871
1552-7816
DOI:10.1177/0022487114549810