The relationships of teachers' epistemological beliefs, motivation, and goal orientation to their instructional practices that foster student creativity were examined. Teachers' perceived instructional practices that facilitate the development of multiple perspectives in problem solving, transfer, task commitment, creative skill use, and collaboration were measured as indicators of their effort to foster creative thinking in students. Participants were 178 elementary-school teachers of third-, fourth-, and fifth-graders. Teachers' learning goal orientation was the most significant teacher attribute that demonstrated significant impacts on all five creativity-fostering instructional practices. Teachers with sophisticated beliefs about knowledge and with high intrinsic motivation for creative work also reported supporting student creativity through some of their instructional practices. However, teachers' motivation for challenging work, beliefs about learning, or performance goals did not significantly predict most of the creativityfostering instructional practices. Educational implications of the current findings are offered.

Teachers and educators often find it difficult to translate research-based knowledge into practical applications for the classroom. This article reviews the current literature regarding research to practice. A format for assisting teachers and educators in translating research into classroom interventions is recommended. n the final phases of this century, the educational literature has begun to focus on how to translate educational research into classroom practice are asking the question: Why does it take so long to incorporate results from educational research into classroom

Whether teachers in general education classrooms and in gifted programs differ in their cognitive and motivational characteristics was examined in 182 elementary school teachers. The teacher characteristics examined were epistemological beliefs (beliefs about the nature of knowledge and beliefs about the nature of learning), metacognition (planning, monitoring, and strategy selection), and motivation (self-efficacy, intrinsic motivation, and goal orientation). Teachers in gifted programs reported more sophisticated epistemological beliefs, higher learning-goal orientation, and lower performance-goal orientation than did teachers in general education classrooms. However, perceived use of metacognitive strategies, self-efficacy, and intrinsic motivation were not different between the two groups. Teachers in general reported epistemological sophistication more in the nature of learning than in the nature of knowledge, that they use cognitive strategies more so than planning and monitoring of their activities, and that they are more learning-goal oriented than performance-goal oriented. It is suggested that more courses and trainings are needed for preservice and in-service teachers so they have opportunities to learn and self-reflect on their own characteristics. Putting the Research to UseThis study compared trait-level cognitive and motivational characteristics between teachers in gifted programs and teachers in general education classrooms. The findings provide some evidence that teachers in gifted programs and teachers in general education classrooms have characteristic differences and that gifted students in pullout programs seem to be more likely to have teachers with certain favorable characteristics. The reality is that the majority of gifted children spend most of their hours in general education classrooms. Therefore, the focus should be whether teacher training can provide opportunities for preservice and in-service teachers in general education as well as in gifted education programs, to become aware of these characteristics evidenced as having strong relationships with student learning. Beyond teacher knowledge and skills, teacher attributes and beliefs about student learning are underscored as important areas in teacher preparation for differentiating instruction for gifted children in the general education classroom. Preservice and in-service teacher trainings should provide teachers with opportunities to learn and self-reflect on their own cognitive and motivational characteristics as they develop into effective teachers.

An instrument to measure teachers’ instructional practices, the Instructional Practice Questionnaire, was developed and validated in three phases. The questionnaires focused on three domains of instructional practices: cognitive, interpersonal, and intrapersonal. First, an initial questionnaire was developed for a pilot study, and data were gathered to analyze questionnaire items with 97 general education teachers. Second, the questionnaire was revised based on the findings of the first-phase data analysis. Third, the revised questionnaire was distributed to two new samples (144 general education teachers and 67 GATE resource room teachers) in an effort to provide reliability and validity evidence of the scores from the revised questionnaire. The questionnaire would be useful for educators and researchers who are interested in understanding instructional practices of classroom teachers and in improving classroom instruction for gifted and talented students.

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