Priorities for primary education? From subjects to life-skills and children's social and emotional development

To what needs and purposes should the primary curriculum be chiefly directed in the coming decades? In a first step towards revising the primary curriculum, the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) invited responses to an open online call to ‘have your say’ on priorities for primary education. Respondents were asked to share their views in 100 words or less. Six priorities for primary education were identified across the 960 responses. These focused on developing children's life-skills; communication skills; well-being; literacy and numeracy skills; motivation and engagement; and their sense of identity and belonging. Across the priorities, there is recognition that skills learned in the primary years are related to one another and the extent to which children develop these is likely to have wide-ranging effects on their future experience as learners. Findings call for a revision of traditional, content-based curriculum subjects towards a better alignment with the needs of today's primary school children beginning with a more explicit focus on life-skills, and children's social and emotional development. Finally, we note the common ground across early childhood, primary and post-primary sectors and highlight the potential to align our values and vision for children and young people's education from the earliest years through adulthood.     

Vocational education and training for development: A policy in need of a theory?

The current decade has seen a significant return of interest in vocational education and training (VET) amongst the international policy community. This rise in policy and programmatic interest in VET's role in development, however, stands in contrast to the state of the academic debate. Whilst there have continued to be both policy and academic developments in VET in OECD countries; in the South there has been a paucity of VET research and little in the way of theoretical exploration. Rather, the academic orthodoxy in the international education and development field is dismissive of VET's possible contribution. Given the return of the policy interest in VET for development, and the possibilities of a broader vision of education–development relations beyond 2015, when the MDGs end, it is time to revisit the role of VET in development from an explicitly theoretical stance. In this article, I argue that the current approach to VET is grounded in an outmoded model of development, whilst the academic critique of VET in developing countries is clearly long outdated. In contrast, I examine the implications for VET of recent trends in thinking about development through the exploration of three particular theoretical approaches: human rights, capabilities and integrated human development. I conclude by considering the purposes, natures and possibilities of VET as a means of human development.     

‘Won’t Somebody Think of the Children?’ Emotions,child poverty,and post-humanitarian possibilities for social justice education

Abstract

Under models of moral and global citizenship education, compassion and caring are emphasized as a counterpoint to pervasive, heartless, neo-liberal globalization. According to such views, these and related emotions such as empathy, sympathy, and pity, can cause people to act righteously to aid others who are disadvantaged through no fault of their own. When applied to the contemporary issue of alleviating child poverty, it seems such emotions are both appropriate and easily developed through education. However, emotional appeals increasing a sense of urgency regarding such a dire issue should not necessarily be prioritized in the face of competing possibilities. Emotions can be difficult to develop, regulate, and sustain. Their appropriate expression and application in global contexts can be problematic, as people’s valuation and understanding of feelings varies across societies. Additionally, there are tensions between discourses of emotional care and compassion and rational duty to social justice. This article examines competing views on education for understanding and responding to child poverty, and defends post-humanitarian imaginaries and the possibility of non-relational care ethics. Care, compassion, empathy, and emotion may be involved in learning about child poverty, but an a priori rational orientation is also essential in such grave matters of social injustice.     

Constructions of civic education: Hong Kong teachers’ perceptions of moral,civic and national education*

Various terms have been used to define civic education (CE) in Hong Kong since the colonial era. This has been particularly true since 2011, when CE has been given many names, causing confusion among educators. Mixed methods were employed to examine teachers’ perceptions of different conceptions of CE expressed as moral, civic and national education. The findings indicate that some teachers might not be able to differentiate among moral education, CE and national education. Most teachers contended that national education should be included in CE, while others believed the opposite. Teachers perceived that moral and civic education was more successful than moral and national education in cultivating students to become ‘good citizens’. Teachers’ comprehension of these terms has policy and pedagogical implications. While the study is set within the context of Hong Kong, the findings are valuable to policymakers and educators in other countries seeking to improve CE.     

Developing sexual competence? Exploring strategies for the provision of effective sexualities and relationships education

School‐based sexualities and relationships education (SRE) offers one of the most promising means of improving young people's sexual health through developing ‘sexual competence’. In the absence of evidence on whether the term holds the same meanings for young people and adults (e.g. teachers, researchers, policy‐makers), the paper explores ‘adult’ notions of sexual competence as construed in research data and alluded to in UK Government guidance on SRE, then draws on empirical research with young people on factors that affect the contexts, motivations and outcomes of sexual encounters, and therefore have implications for sexual competence. These data from young people also challenge more traditional approaches to sexualities education in highlighting disjunctions between the content of school‐based input and their reported sexual experience. The paper concludes by considering the implications of these insights for developing a shared notion of what SRE is trying to achieve and suggestions for recognition in the content and approaches to SRE.     

Payback time? Discourses of lack,debt and the moral regulation of teacher education

This paper analyses recent policy and discourse in the UK lifelong learning sector to identify a tension in discourse which positions teacher educators as essential to the knowledge economy while simultaneously insisting on the deficits they represent. Drawing on critical analyses from Friedrich Nietzsche, Maurizio Lazzarato and Gilles Deleuze, I challenge altruistic views of professional motivation and situate individual professionalism under a construction of an indebted subject. Examining recent attempts to redefine professional standards in the sector, I argue that teachers are positioned as subject to homogenisation and ethically indebted to a higher ideal. Ethical commitments to adult learning, I suggest, are a cost-effective instrument of social control because of their imbrication in this discourse of irredeemable moral debt to the sector. Responses to this situation, I argue, are likely to include forms of professional mobility which undermine it.     

Do early care and education services improve language development for maltreated children? Evidence from a national child welfare sample

Young children under 6 years old are over-represented in the U.S. child welfare system (CWS). Due to their exposure to early deprivation and trauma, they are also highly vulnerable to developmental problems, including language delays. High quality early care and education (ECE) programs (e.g. preschool, Head Start) can improve children's development and so policymakers have begun calling for increased enrollment of CWS-supervised children in these programs. However, it is not a given that ECE will benefit all children who experience maltreatment. Some types of maltreatment may result in trauma-related learning and behavior challenges or developmental deficits that cause children to respond to ECE settings differently. The current study uses data from a nationally representative survey of children in the U.S. child welfare system, the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being II, to assess whether young CWS-supervised children (N = 1,652) who were enrolled in ECE had better language development outcomes 18 months later than those not enrolled in ECE. We also explore whether the type of maltreatment that brought children to the CWS’ attention moderates the relationship between ECE and children's language development. After controlling for children's initial scores on the Preschool Language Scale (PLS-3), type(s) of maltreatment experienced, and child and caregiver demographics, we found that ECE participation predicted better PLS-3 scores at follow-up, with a positive interaction between ECE participation and supervisory neglect. ECE seems to be beneficial for CWS-involved children's early language development, especially for children referred to the CWS because they lack appropriate parent supervision at home.     

Inclusive physical education? A study of the management of national curriculum physical education and unplanned outcomes in England

One key aspect of the growing policy emphasis on educational inclusion in England has been the tendency for physical education (PE) to be used as an important vehicle of social policy targeted at promoting the inclusion of young disabled people and those with special educational needs in mainstream schools. Drawing on aspects of figurational sociology, the central objective of this study is to examine the extent to which PE teachers have been able to achieve the government’s inclusion policy goals articulated in the 2000 National Curriculum for Physical Education (NCPE) for England. The findings indicate that using the NCPE as a means to pursue the government’s educational inclusion policy goals has had unplanned outcomes that have the effect of undermining the extent to which the government is able to use inclusion to make a greater contribution to the promotion of young people’s experiences of PE. It is also argued that these outcomes that no‐one had planned or intended may, for some of the groups involved, be seen as undesirable consequences that emanate from teachers’ attempts to manage the contradictory pressures brought about by pursuing the priorities of government.     

Social and emotional learning schemes as tools of cultural imperialism: a manifestation of the national and international child well-being agenda?

ABSTRACT

The need for improved well-being of children in Britain has been highlighted in a raft of reports both nationally and internationally. In this paper, I aim to explore some of the practicalities experienced by schools that, in response, have implemented social and emotional learning (SEL) interventions as a means to improve child well-being. I make the case that the discourses of emotions inherent within such schemes, and the various supranational publications, are susceptible to exploitation and manifestation. The study employed a mixed methodological approach, utilising a combination of quantitative and qualitative strategies with primary school staff members including head teachers, teachers, teaching assistants, welfare staff, other support staff, etc. Three phases of study – questionnaires, focus groups and individual interviews – were administered as a means of creating an insight into the interpretation and use of SEL in these settings. The findings demonstrate a propensity for staff to conflate social and emotional aspects of self with more moralistic constructs of identity, revealing how SEL schemes have the potential to act as tools of cultural imperialism by marginalising and/or endorsing certain values, norms and behaviours. After maintaining that such realisations of these schemes may impede rather than improve the lived experiences of children, that are fundamental to their social and emotional well-being and mental health, I make the case for alternative approaches to SEL in schools.     

What factors influence the decisions of parents of children with special educational needs when choosing a secondary educational provision for their child at change of phase from primary to secondary education? A review of the literature

This review presents the results of a literature scoping exercise looking at the decisions parents of children with special educational needs (SEN) make when choosing a secondary placement to send their child at change of phase. The review reports on studies that were conducted in England and other areas of the UK as well as in Australia and the USA because there has been only a limited amount of research into this area conducted in an English context. In addition, some of the papers do not discuss school choice specifically but cover related themes. The study identifies a number of broad factors that impact on parents' decision‐making: the age of the child, the nature and degree of the SEN; the socio‐economic status of the parents; the child's experience of inclusion in the primary phase; the secondary schools philosophy, capacity and perceived commitment to SEN; beliefs about teacher's skills, knowledge, capacity and attitudes; and the influence of other people, for example family, friends and professionals.     

Self and the other in the Confucian cultural context: Implications of China’s higher education development for comparative studies

International Review of Education - The central purpose of China’s modern higher education has been to combine Chinese and Western elements at all levels including institutional arrangements,...     

Self and the other in the Confucian cultural context: Implications of China’s higher education development for comparative studies

The central purpose of China’s modern higher education has been to combine Chinese and Western elements at all levels including institutional arrangements, research methodologies, educational ideals and cultural spirit, a combination that brings together aspects of Chinese and Western philosophical heritages. This, however, has not been achieved. There is an urgent need for critical examination of the long-term consequences of grafting American academic practices onto a Chinese base. This article examines the tensions in the interactions in higher education between the traditional Chinese and the imposed Western modes of thinking. Borrowing a definition of the structure of culture, this paper reveals the various extents to which layers of Chinese higher education have achieved any degree of success. It finds that with a strong catch-up mentality, China’s contemporary higher education policies are responsive to Western influences. These are however only applied as panic-stricken and expedient band-aid remedies, rather than as strategies based on systematic understanding of cultural contexts. Accordingly, Chinese universities are uncritical towards the European-American model and its variants. This article warns that without an infusion of traditional education values, universities in China risk losing touch with their cultural contexts in their quest for world-class status.     

Dancing on the deck of the Titanic? Adult education, the nation-state and new social movements

This article begins with a discussion of the implications of CONFINTEA VI having been organised in Brazil ?C the author uses the term ??Brazilian effect?? ?C and the role of social movements challenging neoliberalism. Next, drawing from the experience of Latin America, this paper analyses the counter-hegemonic practice of the new social movements. The concluding section highlights the dilemmas faced by UNESCO in trying to create a democratic and efficient process of policy-making and institutional service in adult education in the nation-states. Furthermore, the proposal of popular education portrayed by the new social movements is described as a tool for empowerment. CONFINTEA VI??s recommendation of moving from rhetoric to action in adult education programmes, practices and policies demands that we take the agendas of the new social movements in the post-neoliberalism era seriously.