Equal Opportunities – For Whom?

Peter Mittler, Visiting Professor of Special Needs Education, The University of Manchester, discusses the implications of recent evidence on the connections between social and economic deprivation and special educational needs.     

Special needs education or education for all: connective specialisation and ideological impurity

Brahm Norwich, Professor of Special Needs Education at the Institute of Education, University of London, is the first of the new professors to articulate his views on the future of Special Education as we approach the Millenium. He considers innovative approaches to the concept of human differences.     

The National Curriculum: Primary Issues

What are some of the likely effects of a national curriculum and national assessment procedures, particularly on primary schools? Norman Thomas, formerly Chief Inspector for Primary Education, Department of Education and Science, now Visiting Professor of Education, Warwick University, looks at the implications of some of the recent proposals.     

Domains and Levels of Pedagogical Innovation in Schools Using ICT: Ten Innovative Schools in Israel

The study reported here is based on the results of two international studies: IEA's Second Information Technology in Education Study (SITES) Module 2, focusing on innovative pedagogical practices at the classroom level, and OECD/CERI Case Studies of ICT and Organizational Innovation, focusing on ICT related innovations at the school system level. In the paper we analyze the data collected in ten innovative schools in Israel which have incorporated ICT in unique ways and have succeeded in devising innovative classroom pedagogies and school system changes. The major research questions addressed are: (a) What levels of innovation were observed in the participant schools, and in which domains? (b) How does the level of innovation in the various domains vary among and within schools? (c) What correlation patterns among levels of innovation in the various domains can be identified? The results of ten comprehensive case studies of exemplary schools in Israel were analyzed by mean of the innovation analysis schema developed by us for characterizing ICT-based educational innovations.     

Shaw on Education

For many Americans, citizenship and patriotism are associated with reciting the nation's Pledge of Allegiance. Therefore, this study asks the following questions: What do future teachers think about the concepts embedded in the Pledge, and what are their opinions on the usefulness of the Pledge in schools, as well as society in general? Results indicated that future or preservice teachers believed the loyalty and patriotic aspects of the Pledge to be useful for K–12 students, but did not find a personal value in their own recitation of the Pledge.     

The Connotation of Special Education Labels for Professionals in the Field

Brahm Norwich, Professor of Educational Psychology and Special Educational Needs at Exeter University (formerly Professor of Special Education, at the Institute of Education, University of London) discusses ways in which labelling can affect attitudes to, and provision for, pupils with special educational needs. He gives details of an in-depth study on the attitudes of experienced teachers, trainee teachers and trainee educational psychologists.     

Strategic planning: Evolution of a model

In the 1990s many institutions are faced with pressures to serve the needs of society while facing declining financial resources. This increases the need for institutions to properly plan for the future. The literature shows that many institutions have not embraced the need for strategic planning. This article reviews the systems approach to strategic planning as a method to enhance the planning processes. Planning models in the literature were examined, and a new model specifically oriented to institutions of higher education is presented. The model uses the concepts of the systems approach, combines elements of models in the literature, and shows the relationships and responsibilities of elements of the institution.Thomas S. Barker holds a B.S.B.A. from Christopher Newport University, an M.B.A. from Old Dominion University, and a Ph.D. in Higher Education from the University of North Texas. He is a principal in an educational consulting firm and has written on international education and technology transfer. Special interests include international education, developing countries, and cross-cultural ethics. Howard W. Smith is currently Professor of Higher Education and Interim Dean of the College of Education at the University of North Texas. He holds a B.S. in Education from Southwest Missouri State College and M.Ed. and Ed.D. degrees from the University of Missouri-Columbia. His current interests are higher education administration, planning, accreditation, and teacher education.     

RESEARCH SECTION: Examining the nature and perceived causes of indiscipline in Zimbabwean secondary schools

The problem of student indiscipline is an issue of concern for teachers and parents around the world. Teachers need to maintain student discipline and for them to do so it is important that they also understand the nature of discipline problems. This study, by Lawrence Kofi Ametepee, who is studying for a PhD in special education, Morgan Chitiyo, board certified behaviour analyst and Assistant Professor of Special Education, both at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, USA, and Susan Abu, who is currently a graduate student in the Department of Women's Studies at Texas Women's University, was designed to examine the nature and perceived causes of student indiscipline in Zimbabwean secondary schools. The authors anticipate that such an examination will promote teachers’, parents’ and policy makers’ understanding of student indiscipline, which will, in turn, enhance disciplinary policies and practices, making schools safer for all students and more effective in their role as educational and socialising agents.     

The New Look in Inservice Training

The government's new proposals for the planning and funding of inservice training are examined by Professor Peter Mittler, director, Centre for Educational Guidance and Special Needs, Manchester University.     

Reviews and Update

Jonathan Long suggests that current interpretations of values education are dominated by a number of ideas that appear to make attempts to achieve clarity and consensus extremely difficult. He argues that ‘essential to the successful development and promotion of values in a secular state educational system is a shifting of emphasis which enables us to see the context as an opportunity rather than a problem’. He goes on to suggest that schools should focus on what he describes as the ‘roots’ of values. In his view, these roots involve the questions ‘What is it to be human?’ and ‘What counts as human flourishing?’. Thus, schools must engage with issues of identity and direction.     

Awkward Practice: Teaching media in English

The Models of Media Education research project in England explored major issues about the aims and methods of media teaching amongst teachers of English. Its central research question was 'What are teachers of English doing when they say they are doing media education at Key Stage 4 (ages 14–16) in secondary schools?' This article begins with a brief contextualisation of the current curriculum for media teaching within English. It then examines, through a detailed case study, the work of one teacher in the classroom and relates this to the wider picture in secondary schools. This is followed by a discussion of the project's general findings. It concludes that the study of media production and institutions is frequently avoided by teachers of English and that teaching methods often repress essential aspects of social learning in relation to the media, privileging limited teacher knowledge over young people's own cultural experience. Finally, it suggests a new focus for research in the future that will encompass these neglected learning areas, teaching methods and new media technologies.     

高效学习与理解性教学——对话《高效学习》作者Linda Darling-Hammond教授

琳达·达林一哈蒙德（Linda Darling—Hammond）,美国斯坦福大学教育学教授,教育学博士,美国当代教育改革分析家,美国教师专业化改革取向的领军人物,奥巴马政府现行教育政策改革团队领导人．斯坦福教育领导研究所和斯坦福教育机会政策中心联席主任。她和她的团队自20世纪90年代开始聚焦于教育教学改革及实践研究。2008年出版了《高效学习：我们所知道的理解性教学》一书,该书是琳达·达林一哈蒙德（Linda Darling—Hammond）与布里基·巴伦（Brigid Barron）等7位知名学者花了10多年进行学习研究的成果。作者基于人是如何学习的理论观点,聚焦于阅读与素养、数学、科学这三大主要学科领域,从理论和实践层面探索了“理解性教学”的教学形式：基于项目学习、设计的学习问题的学习,阐释了在新技术的强大支持下,革新课堂学习环境,促进高效学习的策略以及影响这些策略有效性的因素与条件。作者还提出了变革学校体系,为理解性教学重构学校的主张。2009年华东师范大学学习科学研究团队翻译了琳达·达林-哈蒙德的这部著作,并就该书中的高效学习与理解性教学的教育思想与作者进行了深度交流。琳达·达林-哈蒙德教授的思考给人们提供了认识21世纪学习的新视角,也会对21世纪学校体系变革带来启示。     

Charter Schools and Urban Education Improvement: A Comparison of Newark’s District and Charter Schools

This article compares student achievement of fourth graders in charter schools and district public schools in Newark, New Jersey. We find that Newark and New Jersey’s charter schools mirror the educational inequalities of the state as a whole, as well as its Abbott Districts. The data indicate that charter schools are similar to district urban public schools, with pockets of excellence and mediocrity. We measure school performance based on two criteria: actual test score performance, and the difference between actual and predicted performance. We find that some charter schools are able to achieve performance above predicted, given their school and student characteristics, while other schools do worse than predicted. Thus charter schools are not simply a magic bullet, but rather they warrant further investigation to see which practices work and which don’t, especially in a challenging urban setting such as Newark.Jason M. Barr is an Assistant Professor of Economics, Department of Economics, Rutgers University-Newark, Newark, NJ, USA. Louisa Visconti is a Research Associate, Department of Urban Education, Rutgers University-Newark, Newark, New Jersey, USA. Address correspondence to Alan R. Sadovnik who is a Professor of Education, Sociology and Public Affairs and Associate Director, Institute on Education Law and Policy, Department of Urban Education, Rutgers University-Newark, 165 Bradley Hall, Newark, NJ 07102, USA; e-mail: sadovnik@andromeda.rutgers.edu     

Creating Our Future in an Age of Transformation Originally published in 1994, PIQ 7.3

There is a growing realization that many of our social systems and organizations are out-of-sync with the new realities of the recently emerged post-industrial, information/knowledge age. These new realities are touching the lives of every individual, every family and community, the host of organizations of our public and private sectors, and our overall society. They affect the future of humanity as a whole. Questions arise. What are these new realities? What are the meanings of societal transformations? What is our role in facing the massive changes that confront us today? Are we only spectators of these changes? Are we their victims? Are we at the mercy of others who control these changes and the experts who design systems for us? Or is it up to us to shape our future and create and recreate the systems to which we belong? What kind of capacities and capabilities should we develop that will allow us to design our own lives, shape our systems, and give direction to the evolution of our communities, our organizations, and our society? I have struggled and worked with these questions over the last three decades. They have been the focus of my research and teaching. I explore these questions in this paper in order to define an approach—the systems design approach—by which we can individually and collectively create a better future for ourselves, our families, our communities and our society while enhancing human performance, adding value to our organizations, and most importantly, creating just and ethical systems for future generations.     

Inclusion: on the move?

Mike Gordon is an ex-president of the former National Association for Remedial Education (NARE), now NASEN. He began his teaching career in 1958 in a boys' secondary modern school in Hull. Following national service (1960–62) and a posting in Malaya, he was given responsibility for an ‘Opportunity Class’ in a co-educational secondary modern. He was fortunate to be seconded in 1966–7 to do Alec William's (great guru) Diploma in the Education of Handicapped Children course. He was then appointed Head of Remedial Studies in a new comprehensive school in Hull. From 1970–73 Mike was a lecturer in Hull College of Education but left to teach in a social priority primary school for five years. He then moved to Scarborough to lead the area learning support service team before becoming North Yorkshire's Head of Special Teaching Support Services. In the early 1970s he obtained a Diploma in Education and an M.Ed. After retiring in 1997 he was NASEN's media officer and was then appointed as the Association's first Executive Secretary in 1999.     

Music Education for Pupils with Severe or Profound and Multiple Difficulties — Current Provision and Future Need

There is a general agreement about the important role that music can play in the education and daily lives of children with severe or profound and multiple learning difficulties. But what are the distinctions and relationships between music education, music therapy and music as a vehicle for other forms of learning, occupation, development or engagement? To what extent are professionals in schools aware of these issues and prepared to explore them from an informed perspective? In this article, Dr Adam Ockelford, Deputy Director of Education and Employment for the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB), Sally Zimmermann, Music Education and Employment Advisor (RNIB); and Professor Graham Welch, Chair of Music Education and Head of the School of Arts and Humanities, Institute of Education, University of London, present and expand on the key findings from their recent research project, 'PROMISE', which examined the Provision of Music in Special Education and specifically in schools for pupils with severe or profound and multiple difficulties. The authors conclude their paper with an acknowledgement that a great deal of significant work takes place in these contexts at present but that further research, leading to the provision of new resources for curriculum and staff development, is crucial to the realisation of music's full potential in the lives of pupils with severe and profound and multiple learning difficulties.     

Improving study skills for distance students

What does research tell us about the best ways to encourage students to adopt the most sensible approaches to learning, and what do we know about designing distance teaching so that it brings about the deepest understanding and active learning? Professor Börje Holmberg was Director General of Hermods, the famous Swedish Correspondence College, before joining the FernUniversitat at Hagen in West Germany where he is head of the Central Institute for Research in Distance Education.     

Creating Our Future in an Age of Transformation

There is a growing realization that many of our social systems and organizations are out-of-syne with the new realities of the recently emerged post-industrial, information/knowledge age. These new realities are touching the lives of every individual, every family and community, the host of organizations of our public and private sectors. and our overall society. They affect the future of humanity as a whole. Questions arise. What are these new realities? What are the meanings of societal transformations? What is our role in facing the massive changes that confront us today? Are we only spectators of these changes? Are we their victims? Are we at the mercy of others who control these changes and the experts who design systems for us? Or is it up to us to shape; our future and create and recreate the systems to which we belong? What kind of capacities and capabilities should we develop that will allow us to design our own lives, shape our systems, and give direction to the evolution of our communities. our organizations, and our society? I have struggled and worked with these questions over the last three decades. They have been the focus of my research and teaching. I explore these questions in this paper in order to define an approach–the systems design approach–by which we can individually and collectively create a better future for ourselves, our families, our communities and our society while enhancing human performance, adding value to our organizations, and most importantly, creating just and ethical systems for future generations.     

Does the Code of Practice help secondary school SENCos to improve learning?

Tony Lingard is special educational needs co-ordinator (SENCo) in a large comprehensive secondary school. He believes that the requirements of the Code of Practice detract from his capacity to support pupils with special educational needs. Anticipating the introduction of a revised, but still significant, bureaucratic burden in the new Code, he reports his use of a questionnaire to gather the views of other secondary SENCos in his LEA. The results are challenging but compelling. Do individual education plans (IEPs) help subject teachers to address individual pupils' special educational needs? Do targets help pupils and parents to engage with priorities for learning? Would whole-school strategies for meeting special educational needs be more effective, efficient and inclusive than the current individualised system? Tony Lingard's article will prompt reflection in schools around the country as SENCos await the launch of the revised Code.     

Khatami,political reform and education in Iran

Khatami was elected President of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1997. He came to power with the promise of creating an Islamic civil society and bringing about political reform, rule of law, freedom, and religious democracy. He advocated such values as tolerance, moderation, respect for diversity, and dialogue at the domestic and international arenas. Khatami assigned schools the task of creating pious, moral, politicised, and empowered individuals with a strong Iranian-Islamic identity, capable of maintaining a balanced relationship with the West. This article seeks to identify the pillars of Khatami's thoughts and assess whether his reformist agenda is reflected in formal schooling. An analysis of the prevailing educational goals and values illustrates that although some of Khatami's ideals are reflected, schools are still parochial, separating ‘us’ from ‘them’, with no attempt to prepare the young for global citizenship. Iranian schools continue to remain bastions of conservatism and ideology.