Liu, Woon Chia

“This report identifies and synthesises findings from a total of 42 unique studies that are relevant to at least one of the SFEd Areas of Practice, as well as to teacher learning and PD (see Annex A for the full project list).”--Overview of the Synthesis.

Teachers’ Perceptions, Experience and Learning offers insightful views on the understanding of the role of teachers and the impact of their thinking and practice. The articles presented in this book illustrate the influence of teachers on student learning, school culture and their own professional identity and growth as well as highlighting challenges and constraints in preand in-service teacher education programmes that can impact teachers’ own learning. The first article examined teacher experiences in the use of “design thinking” by Retna. Next, Hong’s and Youngs’ article looks into contradictory effects of the new national curriculum in South Korea. Lu, Wang, Ma, Clarke and Collins explored Chinese teachers’ commitment to being a cooperating teacher for rural practicum placements. Kainzbauer and Hunt investigate foreign university teachers’ experiences and perceptions in teaching graduate schools in Thailand. On inclusive education in Singapore, Yeo, Chong, Neihart and Huan examined teachers’ first-hand experiences with inclusion; while Poon, Ng, Wong and Kaur study teachers’ perceptions of factors associated with inclusive education. The book ends with two articles on teacher preparation by Hardman, Stoff, Aung and Elliott who examined the pedagogical practices of mathematics teaching in primary schools in Myanmar, and Zein who focuses on teacher learning by examining the adequacy of preservice education in Indonesia for preparing primary school English teachers. The contributing authors’ rich perspectives in different educational, geographical and socio-cultural contexts would serve as a valuable resource for policy makers, educational leaders, individual researchers and practitioners who are involved in teacher education research and policy. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Asia Pacific Journal of Education.

Suzanne S. Choo, Woon Chia Liu, and Bee Leng Chua offer a dynamic look into the tripartite relationship between education research, policy, and practice that characterizes Singapore’s changing education landscape. Over the years, Singapore has garnered increasing attention internationally for its world-class education system. Pushing back against the stereotypical notions of exam- and teacher-centric education in Asia, the contributors to this volume discuss opportunities as well as challenges in Singapore’s innovation towards constructivist, critical, culturally responsive, and cosmopolitan forms of learning. Highlighting the pedagogical innovation and its context in Singapore’s teacher education and schools, the authors bridge theory and practice by providing an understanding of innovative practices informed by key shifts in Singapore's education policies and the key conceptual principles informing these practices. More importantly, it provides on-the-ground empirical insights into the ways these innovative pedagogical practices are enacted in the classroom and in teacher education programmes. Each chapter provides an in-depth understanding of how these pedagogies are applied across various subject disciplines, including guided problem-solving in Mathematics, games-based pedagogy in Science, multimodal literacies in language, ethical criticism in Literature, Nonlinear Pedagogy in Physical Education, multicultural approaches in music, and dialogic pedagogy in drama, among others. Balancing theoretical and empirical focus, this resourceful text will be of interest to students, researchers, and practitioners in educational development, pedagogy, and teacher education, as well as policymakers across international fields in education.

This study, undertaken in Singapore, investigates aspects of students' motivation in undertaking Project Work (PW), and explores the link between motivation and the quality of students' discourse during group discussions. It uses a Self-Determination framework to answer questions on students' perceived satisfaction ofbasic psychological needs, motivation and performance outcomes. Analysis of students' discourse during PW helped to substantiate survey findings, which showed that the participating students perceived satisfaction in the need for competence and relatedness, but less in autonomy support. Furthermore, many students were extrinsically motivated in PW, appreciating its value but not necessarily finding enjoyment in the process. Students' talk during PW group discussions tended to be of the practical (problem-solving) mode and cumulative (collaborative, non-critical) type. The findings suggest that, in order to enhance motivation and task engagement, students should be encouraged to share knowledge explicitly and to make their thinking visible through discourse.

Our students today face a knowledge-based economy, which requires the ability to learn independently, to be innovative in using and synthesizing knowledge, and to adapt fast to the changing world. Project Work (PW) is introduced as one of the instructional models for a more student-centered approach of learning in Singapore. The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of project work (PW) and study the motivational processes of PW using a self-determination theory (SDT) framework. A total of 435 students from Normal Academic stream (NA) and Normal Technical stream (NT) were recruited from four secondary schools in Singapore. Students‟ perceptions of the values of PW, basic psychological needs, relative autonomy, enjoyment, and grades were measured across three time points. Results showed that students valued the PW experience. However, their enjoyment, needs, and relative autonomy decreased significantly in the 10 to 12 weeks of PW experience. Multiple regression analyses revealed that post-PW enjoyment negatively predicted PW grades, while psychological needs, relative autonomy and pre-PW enjoyment positively predicted post-PW enjoyment. After 6-month PW, post-PW enjoyment emerged as a stronger predictor than grades in predicting the perceived skills learned from PW. The study applies self-determination theory to the PW context and highlights the importance of facilitating the three psychological needs in the PW context to enhance students‟ motivation and achievement in PW.

The present study focuses on the perspectives of teachers and students in Singapore schools after an autonomy-supportive classroom intervention. Nurturing of students to become motivated and self-regulated learners can be achieved by promoting an autonomy-supportive learning climate. This study examines the perspectives of teachers and students in an in-depth and meaningful manner after the classroom intervention. Through students' viewpoints, teachers can understand their structure of teaching style and students' expectations. Findings of semi-structured interviews with students and teachers were analyzed, with emerging themes discussed in the context of literature. Based on qualitative data, this preliminary study explores a rich and meaningful insight to students' expectations of their teachers and teachers' expectations towards their students. The qualitative data provided relevant and practical insights into the classroom intervention, suggesting that teachers should be aware of their instructional behaviors in class as such acts might have ramification on students' perception, motivation and learning. Limitations and implications are also discussed.

E-portfolios are increasingly seen as a promising tool for facilitating learning as students engage in the Problem-Based Learning (PBL) process. Research that evaluates e-portfolios in the context of PBL is, however, limited. In addition, advantages of the use of e-portfolios both generally as well as in the context of PBL have tended to be advanced from the researcher’s perspective. Studies that have evaluated student perceptions remain unclear with regard to the factors beyond specific features of the e- portfolio which are likely to affect the perceptions. The purpose of this study is to address these gaps from the perspective of self-determination theory (SDT). It seeks to examine how student teachers’ motivational profile and their experiences of value, enjoyment, and effort are related to their perceptions of the e-portfolio in a PBL environment. Participants in this study were 413 students teachers enrolled in the Diploma in Education programme at the National Institute of Education, Singapore. Results were consistent with SDT and suggest that students with more self-determined forms of motivation and who reported enjoying, valuing, and putting effort into the process were more likely to view e-portfolios in PBL in a positive light.

This study aims to examine the motivational profiles of Malay students in Singapore based self-regulated learning framework (Pintrich & De Groot, 1990) and self-determination theory (SDT; Deci & Ryan, 1985). The sample consisted of 740 secondary school Malay students (415 males, 325 females). Using cluster analysis, five different clusters of students were found based on their unique characteristics on self-regulation and learning strategies scores. The clusters were named from best to poor in numeric order. Cluster 1 is characterised by high scores on intrinsic value, self-efficacy, self-regulation, and lower scores on lack of learning strategies and anxiety compared to other clusters. On the other hand, cluster 5 has the lowest intrinsic values, self-efficacy, and self-regulation relative to their scores on other clustering variables. In addition, the more adaptive profiles were also found to score higher in enjoyment and effort, and lower in boredom, compared to other clusters. The findings suggest that intra-individual differences in self-regulated learning behaviour are associated with the expected differences in the type of motivation possessed, and learning outcome measures. Overall, the findings from the study shows that Malays students do possess adaptive qualities known to facilitate learning outcomes.