Peer Review

Five Standards for Effective Pedagogy

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Reviewed:: Mar 23, 2008 by Teacher Education

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Ratings

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Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

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Overview:: This is an online resource CREDE, a federally funded research and development program focused on improving the education of students whose ability to reach their potential is challenged by language or cultural barriers, race, geographic location, or poverty. The site contains standards for pedagogy proven to be effective in educating all students, especially at-risk students. The Five Standards for Effective Pedagogy (that are featured on the site, but not highlighted) do not endorse a specific curriculum but, rather, establish ideals for best teaching practices that can be used in any classroom environment for any grade level or group of students. Embedded in this multilayer, textbased resource are: -a few multi-media clips -newsletter -history of group -list of 5 standards for pedagogy -links to research -products -teams
Type of Material:: Collection; reference materials; learning object repository
Recommended Uses:: This material would be a valuable resource in graduate courses in curriculum and instruction. The research described would be particularly useful as illustrations of putting theory into practice. It is a great resource for examining effective teaching techniques for ESL/bilingual educators. CREDE's work could be the basis for professional development of individual teachers and groups of teachers working collaboratively in a school or school district. This could be used a resource site for practitioners, researchers, and parents. It targets those interested in "improving the education of students whose ability to reach their potential is challenged by language or cultural barriers, race, geographic location, or poverty" and would be a good site to send students to for related research.
Technical Requirements:: Internet browser; QuickTime Player
Identify Major Learning Goals:: Teachers will be able to identify and implement CREDEs five standards for effective pedagogy. Teachers will develop a deeper understanding of the research that supports the use of these standards. The community attached to the project and the conversations they have appear to be goal oriented.
Target Student Population:: K-12, undergraduate and graduate school teachers
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: none

Content Quality

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Strengths:: This material is an outstanding presentation of the CREDEs five standards. It is rich in detail providing teachers will a good platform from which to put these ideas into practice. The comprehensive research in many content areas is a rich resource for teachers and administrators. The peanut butter and jelly video clip is noteworthy. he resource presents significant: research based concepts models skills -The resources presents information that could be integrated into curriculumm for educators -The resource does not require advanced knowledge, but one would need to have good reading skills and vocabulary -Some students and teachers might have difficulty systhesizing the information on this web resource.
Concerns:: Galarzas five-minute demonstration contains serious science misconceptions. Seeds germinate, not grow. Seeds need water and heat, not sunlight. Since these are very effective teaching techniques these and other content misconceptions teachers hold will make it difficult for students to unlearn erroneous content. The peanut butter and jelly scenario is presented as an original idea when if fact it is the classic first lesson that was used in teaching fifth-eighth graders how to program: write a set of instructions to tell a robot how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Literature should have been cited to indicate the origins of this example. This is a highly-text-based site and while there was some activity in 2006, much of the information on this site is from late 90s and early 00s. This does not make it a poor site, but it may not get updated as frequently. It appears to be federally funded project that ran out of funds.

Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching Tool

Rating:
Strengths:: This material will be extremely effective in improving the education of students whose ability to reach their potential is challenged by language or cultural barriers, race, geographic location, or poverty.
Concerns:: The video clip with the science misconceptions needs to be removed.

Ease of Use for Both Students and Faculty

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Strengths:: This is basically a "point and click" site.
Concerns:: It is very easy for the user to get lost in the site. For instance, it is difficult to find the video clips of the lessons. The multimedia link keeps returning the user to the home page. The Lesson Lab link does not open. According to the newspaper article cited, this would be an incredible resources for the user. The five standards are referred to in three different ways. Although they are related, it does cause confusion when first using the site.

Other Issues and Comments:: Except for the Peanut Butter and Jelly video clip, all the other video clips that opened were heavily pixilated making it difficult to see much detail. Many of the related links are commercial sites that seem to have little to do with the mission of CREDE. Far too often the user ends up in the CalStore while trying to access information not products
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