My name is Peter Johnston and I am a professor at the University at Albany, the State University of New York.  My colleagues and I are trying to understand the ways in which elementary school educators in different situations and with different expertise make decisions. We want to understand how educators think about teaching, learning, and students, and the ways they make it possible for children to learn.  To begin we would like as many educators who work with kindergarten through sixth grade children as possible to answer a survey on these matters.

Just as most of our teaching requires us to respond in the immediate moment without time to overanalyze, we ask that you not deliberate long over each answer, just give your ‘gut reaction’ and move on.  Doing this will not only make the questionnaire take less time, it will add to the validity of our conclusions.  To help with this, the survey does not allow you to go back to previous pages. For some job titles (e.g., administrator, school psychologists), all of the questions may not apply.

The survey should take approximately 15 - 30 minutes.  It is voluntary and you can quit at any time. You can also choose not to answer particular questions, though of course we would prefer that you respond to all items since that will increase the usefulness of our conclusions. This survey is also completely anonymous.  We cannot know who responded to the survey.

If you have questions or would like to comment on aspects of the study, or if you would like to read the report we write when the study is complete, please email me at Johnstonnz@aol.com.   If you have any questions about your rights as a research participant or if you wish to report any concerns about the study you may contact the Office of Research Compliance at the University at Albany at (518) 437 4569 or 1-800-365-9139 or at orc@uamail.albany.edu.

Thank you for helping us with this research.  At the end of the survey, we will ask if you would be prepared to participate in additional parts of the study, which we will describe, and which we hope will lead to some very practical teaching suggestions. 

To begin the survey, click here or paste this link in your internet browser: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=_2f2muwVEDL30bcmbPzHTaVA_3d_3d