Where the Action Is: How Drama Contributes to the Art of the Teaching and Learning of English

This paper looks at the way drama works to bring a model of an arts curriculum into reality. He also shows how drama is valuable when discussed as a separate, autonomous subject in the school curriculum as opposed to one subsumed within English. He argues for a view of the arts and gives an example of a sequence of work in an English GCSE class based around Arthur Miller's play View from the Bridge. From this he draws out several strands about the relationship of the drama curriculum to the individual students and teachers, the school, and to culture. He also emphasises the primacy of performance in drama education.     

学前教育专业教学法的课程理念与教学策略

教法课程是学生的必修课程,对教法课的课程理念与教学策略进行如下探索：教法课要与幼儿园课程相适应;突出实践性;体现整合性。在教学中采用案例教学、练习设计活动方案、运用小组合作研讨式学习、体验模拟教学、加强教法课的实习环节。     

“Don't Tell Me,I'll Find Out” Robert Karplus—A Science Education Pioneer

Robert Karplus (1927–90), who began his career as a brilliant theoretical physicist, switched to science education in the early 1960s. He made many substantial contributions to this field in addition to developing a complete K–6 hands-on science curriculum. Karplus provided his curriculum with a sound epistemological foundation, based on the work of Piaget. He developed an effective classroom teaching strategy, the learning cycle. He and his team used a scientific approach to curriculum development. They focused on teacher development. Karplus was committed to science for ALL students. Through science activities he sought to share the joy of discovery. A recent book collects some of his important papers and enables you to examine his work for yourself and see what you discover.     

Curriculum on the move: the role of English in a Year 7 Cultural Studies programme

This paper describes a curriculum experiment to integrate the English and humanities teaching to a year 7 (age 11) cohort through a pedagogy based on Dorothy Heathcote's work on drama in education. An integrated Cultural Studies programme was devised in order to help students engage with meaningful issues in what Heathcote (1980) terms ‘real and felt’ contexts. As part of the national Creative Partnerships programme, Debbie Kidd, a drama specialist from an Arts organisation, worked with teachers to develop curriculum and pedagogy. The paper describes the project from the perspective of the two outsiders closely involved with the work. Debbie Kidd sets the context and discusses some of the outcomes to date. In an Afterword, Elaine Millard discusses some of the barriers to curriculum integration and argues for greater flexibility in English teaching and it s modes of assessment to make room for more creative engagements.     

Yoga asanas as an effective form of experiential learning when teaching musculoskeletal anatomy of the lower limb

Physical movement as a conduit for experiential learning within the academic context of anatomy is a strategy currently used in university dance education. This same approach can be applied to other movement‐based practices, for example, yoga. The primary purpose of this study was to pilot a novel teaching curriculum to yoga practitioners, based on Bruner's Theory of Instruction, which incorporated the four adaptive modes of Kolb's Theory of Experiential Learning. The secondary purpose was to assess the applicability of anatomical knowledge within the participants' yoga practice. Following the development of a curriculum appropriate for a spectrum of academic backgrounds, participants were recruited to attend a 2‐hour learning session within the Department of Anatomy at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. The learning session guided participants through the bones and muscles of the lower limb pertaining to five specific yoga poses. Based on participant feedback, the sessions were positively received and consistent. In addition, learning session participants were able to apply the anatomical information they were taught to their yoga practice 1‐month later. Bruner and Kolb's independent theories on curriculum design and effective learning practice were successfully incorporated to create a 2‐hour learning session. The potential use of experiential learning to compliment and/or enhance traditional didactic teaching in the academic context of anatomy should be further explored. Anat Sci Educ. © 2012 American Association of Anatomists.     

Pedagogical Thinking in a Student's Mind: A conceptual clarification on the basis of self‐determination and volition theories

This article suggests that educational psychology should pay more attention to the role of the curriculum when the optimal motivation to learn in school is considered. The curriculum frames the teaching‐studying‐learning process in school. This fact has several implications on the motivation to learn in school. After the child starts school, his or her motivation to learn seems to change from an intrinsic motivation to an extrinsic motivation. To develop pedagogical thinking in a student's mind means that the student must become acquainted with the aims and goals of the curriculum, assimilate them into his or her integrated sense of self and, thus, fully accept them as their own. If this succeeds, it will have positive effects on the student's motivation at school and especially on the motivation to study and learn. The concept of pedagogical thinking in a student's mind is analogous to the concept of teacher's pedagogical thinking. Based on previous studies, this article provides an example of how joint‐planning can offer a learning environment that promotes students' pedagogical thinking and the internalisation of the aims and goals of the curriculum in school. This article calls for new theoretical syntheses and research programmes that better take into account the normative nature of learning and teaching in school.     

Being taught to learn together: an ethnographic study of the curriculum in two Chinese kindergartens

This paper reports the findings of a pilot study which adopted an ethnographic approach to investigate the cultural features of the Chinese kindergarten curriculum by means of ‘semi‐participant’ observations, semi‐structured interviews, daily conversations and open‐ended questionnaires in two Chinese kindergartens. The paper first introduces the debate over teaching and learning in the early years in Western contexts. It then demonstrates that the curriculum in Chinese kindergartens is mainly implemented by means of teachers' formal collective teaching. Children seem to be taught to learn; their spontaneous learning interests are welcomed but seldom developed in depth. The preference among teachers for this formal collective teaching, coupled with their perception that this teaching is required in their particular situations, creates a tension between teaching and children's learning. The shift in parents' views of education, from an over‐emphasis on children's knowledge‐based study to support for children's harmonious overall development, also contributes to this tension.     

It takes two to tango: In dynamic inquiry,the self-directed student acts in association with the facilitating teacher

The current research presents a qualitative view of a teacher–student association within the context of dynamic inquiry, as encouraged by a new biology curriculum, “Biomind”. This curriculum enables open inquiry learning through teacher guidance. We characterized the various aspects of the student's functioning as a self-directed student during the open inquiry learning process. The student's functioning corresponds closely to the teacher's efforts to facilitate the student's scientific literacy, initiative, responsibility, and motivation. Dynamic inquiry does not separate teaching from learning, but creates a learning community of teachers and students that is crucial to the success of the inquiry process.     

Does classic school curriculum contribute to morality? Integrating school curriculum with moral and intellectual education

Phillip Cam recently published a study on the separation between the teaching and learning of classic school curriculum (CSC) on the one hand and morality on the other. He suggests an approach to integrate them. The goal of this article was to suggest a complementary alternative approach, to Cam’s. Based on a MacIntyrean paradigm, I argue that seeing the CSC (such as math, biology, literature and history) as ‘practices’ would also enable that integration. This approach differs from the one proposed by Cam, since it preserves the structure of the CSC. Nevertheless, I will demonstrate how this approach leads to a number of changes in the formation, teaching and learning of school curriculum. As background, I will briefly describe R.S. Peters’ attempt to find an internal justification for the teaching and learning of school curriculum and point to some weaknesses it contains. My proposal can be understood as deriving from the same principle, of another famous educational initiative, Mortimer Adler’s ‘Great Book Project’. Toward the end of the article, I will demonstrate why Adler’s project differs from mine, and why it does not meet the goal of integrating learning school curriculum with moral education.     

Positioning Stakeholders in Curriculum Leadership: How can teacher educators work with teachers to discover and create their place?

This article draws from research in an Australian Research Council (ARC) Collaborative Research Project involving personnel from Queensland University of Technology and Education Queensland. The focus was on theorising curriculum leadership for effective learning and teaching. As the project proceeded, it became evident that there are certain factors which contribute to curriculum leadership as a shared phenomenon at teaching/learning sites; and that among these factors, personal factors were important in shaping teachers' perceptions of their readiness to engage in curriculum leadership. This article also draws on some recent exploratory research which resulted from the project. In this research, the emphasis was on how space might be discovered and created for the voices of significant stakeholders in curriculum leadership. Both pieces of research raise a number of interesting questions about supporting and sustaining teachers in their engagement in curriculum leadership. These questions are explored within the context of the question posed in the article's title.     

真实问题解决：指向核心素养提升的教学策略——以人大附中通用技术课程建设为例

新课标明确了学生毕业应具有的正确价值观、应具备的品格特征和应掌握的关键技能,将核心素养作为学科建设的主要指标提出来。因此,在课堂教学中落实学科核心素养是教育质量提升的关键。该文构建了基于真实问题解决、指向学科核心素养的技术教育学习策略;提出了创设符合学习进阶的课程体系、创立多样化组织范式、探索"多样态"学习方式、丰富课型与教学方式、开展项目式教学评价研究等具体实施途径和方法;最后以中国人民大学附属中学(以下简称人大附中)在通用技术课程建设为例进行了说明。该教学策略在理论体系建设、教师专业发展、创新人才培养方面效果明显。     

A Cross-cultural Exploration of Children's Everyday Ideas: Implications for science teaching and learning

Children's everyday ideas form critical foundations for science learning yet little research has been conducted to understand and legitimize these ideas, particularly from an international perspective. This paper explores children's everyday ideas about the environment across the US, Singapore and China to understand what they reveal about children's relationship to the environment and discuss its implications for science teaching and learning. A social constructivist lens guides research, and a visual methodology is used to frame children's realities. Participants' ages range from elementary to middle school, and a total of 210 children comprized mainly of Asians and Asian Americans were sampled from urban settings. Drawings are used to elicit children's everyday ideas and analyzed inductively using open coding and categorizing of data. Several categories support existing literature about how children view the environment; however, novel categories such as affect also emerged and lend new insight into the role that language, socio-cultural norms and perhaps ethnicity play in shaping children's everyday ideas. The findings imply the need for (a) a change in the role of science teachers from knowledge providers to social developers, (b) a science curriculum that is specific to learners' experiences in different socio-cultural settings, and (c) a shift away from inter-country comparisons using international science test scores.     

Developing Multicultural Counseling Competencies Through Experiential Learning

Counselor educators are challenged to prepare students for working with culturally diverse clients. The recent attention paid to multicultural counseling competencies has defined domains of learning; however, training methods to support the development of multicultural counseling competencies have received less emphasis. This article focuses on experiential learning as a teaching and learning methodology to increase students' multicultural counseling competencies. The authors outline ethical and practical suggestions for using experiential learning in multicultural counseling curriculum.     

Professional development in drama with learners with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND)

Educators usually recognise the value of drama-in-education, but hesitate to use it with unpredictable diverse groups that have limited communication and social understanding. This article evaluates a professional development initiative in an all-age special school (3–19 years) in eastern England as a whole-school improvement strategy to promote drama for enhancing children's communication through dialogic teaching. The project was the culmination of an action research cycle to refine an original constructivist five-staged professional developmental model for teaching inclusive groups with children with special educational needs and disabilities. Following a staff training session, the researcher supported each teacher in class once a week for 6 weeks, using collegial mentoring strategies. The model enabled their starting point and priority next step to be accurately identified towards them gradually taking over leading drama sessions. A pedagogical framework for early drama – Prescribed Drama Structures – proved pivotal, enhanced by a flexible model for exploring story and understanding social narrative.     

情境教学在环境生态课程中的运用

本文分别介绍了环境生态课程模式和情境教学 ,探讨了情境教学在环境生态课程实施中的运用 ,通过教学实例揭示特殊教育课程与教学在教学实践中的动态统一关系 ,指出情境教学可以作为环境生态课程教学中的有效教学方法。     

Single-sex Classes and Equal Opportunities for Girls and Boys: Perspectives through time from a mixed comprehensive school in England

The recent concern with the apparent 'under-achievement' of boys in England's comprehensive schools has led schools to review the potential of single-sex classes as a means of improving performance. This paper reviews the arguments for such a strategy, in the context of one school where such an approach has underpinned the organisation of the school through the last three decades. We examine the rationale behind the original decision to implement single-sex teaching, consider the evolution of the curriculum through time, and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of this mode of organisation from the varying perspectives of parents, students and teachers. We consider whether the strategy has contributed to an improvement in the achievement levels of girls, and discuss the extent to which single-sex teaching has the potential to have a positive impact in raising boys' performance. In reviewing the evidence, we conclude that the single-sex mode of teaching in the school is effective in contributing to high achievement levels, in many contexts providing a conducive and supportive environment for students' learning. We suggest that such groupings may offer more advantages for girls than for boys; we argue that the potential of the system will only be fully realised when it is explicitly recognised that girls and boys do respond differently, in certain contexts, to different teaching-learning styles.     

中学英语语法教学的反思与启示——语言环境与语法教学的有机结合

在新课程标准下重新审视语法教学，深入探讨语法教学的新策略势在必行。教师在课堂实践中通过不断探索和改革语法教学，激发学生学习的主动性、积极性和创造性，当教师将语法作为技能传授时，它就不再是枯燥的条条框框，而是同语言的其它要素一样，是一种学习能力的培养。     

Coteaching, as colearning, is praxis

In this study, we report on our learning as we engaged in a four-month experience of coteaching a water unit in a Grade 7 classroom. Working at each other's elbows, in praxis, provided many opportunities to learn together: teaching and about teaching. We use two examples, learning to ask productive questions and struggling to enact an orderly curriculum to show how coteaching affords colearning, and how the lack of coteaching leads to struggling. Our work also suggests that coteaching allows for a mode of learning that is not captured by Schön's notions of reflection-in-practice and reflection-on-practice. We conclude that coteaching, as colearning, is praxis.     

The conceptualisation and impact of a post-graduate course in lesson and learning study

ABSTRACT

This paper tells a story about the design, development and impact of a post-graduate Masters-level module aimed at (1) enabling groups of teachers within schools to develop innovative approaches to teaching and learning on the basis of their own Lesson Studies and (2) creating a school network of excellence for Lesson Study in the area as a context for building a cumulative evidence-base, which focuses on identifying and resolving enduring problems of teaching and learning in schools.

The first part of the paper outlines the curriculum for the module and sets the innovative conceptual framework that underpins its design . This framework is innovative because it connects and unifies a number of distinct pedagogical perspectives. It links the methodology of Japanese Lesson Study with Stenhouse’s idea of ‘the teacher as a researcher’ and his ‘process model’ of curriculum development as an alternative to the globally dominant ‘objectives model’. Then in turn, the framework incorporates Marton and Booth’s pedagogical theory of ‘variation’.

The paper argues that linking and fusing Lesson Study methodology with this wider context of pedagogical ideas unambiguously renders teacher research as learning study.