NEA Research Reports on Best Practices
Practices That Promote Excellence in Learning for All
These research reports focus on changes in educational practices and policies that can revamp classrooms and schools to close achievement gaps and promote excellence in learning for all students.
Bound copies of the reports are available for purchase from NEA Professional Library.
Learning and Teaching
- Theories of Learning and Teaching: What Do They Mean for Educators (Report) (2006) (PDF, 489 KB, 34pp)
Suzanne M. Wilson and Penelope L. Peterson detail nine concepts of learning, knowledge, and teaching that emphasize active construction of meaning, individual and collaborative work, use of student diversity as a resource for learning, and emphasis on both basic and advanced knowledge and skills. - Learning and Teaching (Brief) (2006) (PDF, 419 KB, 6pp)
This summary brief outlines nine leading research-based concepts that have served as the basis for recent education reform.
Classroom Management
- Looking into Learning-Centered Classrooms: Implications for Classroom Management (Report) (2006) (PDF, 463 KB, 30pp)
Carolyn M. Evertson and Kristen W. Neal examine best practices that shift classroom management's emphasis from controlling students' behavior to creating "learning-centered" classrooms that foster their engagement, autonomy, and sense of community by giving them progressively more responsibility, under the teacher's careful guidance. The report illustrates these practices through the experiences of "Bill," a science and social studies teacher in an urban middle school, and "Patricia," a teacher in an elementary school on the border between city and suburb. - Classroom Management (Brief) (2006) (PDF, 285 KB, 6pp)
This summary brief describes classroom management in "learning-centered" classrooms.
Professional Development
- Professional Community and Professional Development in the Learning-Centered School (Report) (2006) (PDF, 540 KB, 34pp)
Judith Warren Little offers a strategic overview of best practices at the school level in professional development: content, areas for teacher learning that research suggests are most likely to have a positive impact on student learning, effective strategies for teacher learning, including support by professional communities within the school that are systematically connected to external professional development opportunities. - Professional Community & Professional Development (Brief) (2006) (PDF, 228 KB, 6pp)
This summary brief presents a research-based blueprint for teacher learning.
School Working Conditions
- The Workplace Matters: Teacher Quality, Retention, and Effectiveness (Report) (2006) (PDF, 517 KB, 34pp)
Susan Moore Johnson describes workplace conditions that support effective instruction and professional growth - including fair teaching assignments; opportunities for teachers to collaborate with colleagues; extra induction support, ongoing professional development, and expanded career opportunities; support for working with students, curricular support for high standards, adequate and safe facilities, and a supportive school leadership.
The report emphasizes the influence of substandard workplace conditions on the high rates at which teachers - especially new teachers - leave their schools or quit the profession altogether. It suggests ways to retain more teachers through improvements in workplace conditions, particularly at hard-to-staff schools. - Workplace Conditions (Brief) (2006) (PDF, 322 KB, 6pp)
This summary brief presents the conditions in learning-centered schools.
Video Resource Guide
- Teaching for Understanding: A Guide to Video Resources (Report) (2006) (PDF, 938 KB, 42pp)
Judith W. Segal, Elizabeth J. Demarest, and Andrea I. Prejean describe videos portraying teaching practices that are consistent with the most recent research on learning and teaching and with professional standards. A stand-alone resource or a companion to Theories of Learning and Teaching.
