Abstract:
The somewhat pessimistic findings of classroom research prompted decisions to study a sample of "exemplary" teachers in Western Australian high schools, examine how they taught, and identify successful practices that might be generalizable to other teaching and learning contexts. This study was based on the premise that there are successful science and mathematics teachers from whom knowledge about teaching and learning can be derived. Three sections of the paper discuss the strategies used by teachers to facilitate higher cognitive level learning in science and mathematics, a comparison of exemplary and non- exemplary teachers, and the knowledge and beliefs of exemplary teachers.