Who am I? Why am I here? and Where do I come from? Responding to philosophical picturebooks

ABSTRACT

This article gives a brief overview of reader response theory before sharing the views of some nine-year-old children working collaboratively as part of a community of readers. Prior to responding to some philosophical picturebooks the children talked about what they thought philosophy was, they then shared their thoughts on some of the very questions of existence to include: Who am I? Why am I here? Where did I come from? and Where will I go to? Their initial thoughts and responses were followed by detailed reading, thinking and responding to one specific picturebook, Die Schopfung (The Creation) by F.K. Waechter.     

What was it like for you?

Abstract

As LEAs and schools develop their inclusive policies and practices, arguments about how to provide the most effective education for pupils with EBD continue. Is it possible to provide high quality education for this group in mainstream schools whilst not adversely affecting the education of the other pupils? What are the consequences of placing the most disturbed pupils in special schools? What do the pupils themselves think? This article draws on findings from 26 interviews with former pupils of an EBD residential school. We were interested in their opinions about the quality of education and care they received at the school and the impact of the placement on their experiences as young adults. Overall, despite some concerns, the former pupils have very positive memories of the school and felt that it had helped them to overcome their learning and behavioural difficulties. The findings have key implications for the development of policy and practice.     

Re/searching speaking and listening across difference: Exploring feminist coalition politics through participatory theatre

This article documents insights that emerged from a feminist community-based research project utilizing popular theatre principles and techniques to explore the politics of feminist coalitions. The embodied and relational aspects of speaking and listening across difference are examined, as are the contributions theatre can make to working creatively with conflict.     

The relation between perceptual development (as part of school readiness) and school success of Grade I learners

Abstract

Teacher-educators need to know and understand their roles in order to develop their competence and improve the quality of the service that they provide (Kwakman 1998, 57). The roles and functions of teacher-educators as spelt out in the policy document, ‘Norms and Standards for Educators, (1996)’, may be sufficient to enable them to develop their competence and improve service delivery, but do they (teacher-educators) know and understand these roles and consequently take advantage of them (teachereducator roles) as intended in the policy guidelines?

This article discusses educator roles and factors that influence the way in which these (roles) could be interpreted for teacher-educators. Knowing and understanding these roles and factors will help technology education teacher-educators in the interpretation of the policy guidelines about their roles.     

Analysis of leadership dynamics in educational settings during times of external and internal change

Background: The article concerns the tensions that can arise during demanding external, and consequential internal changes and considers how educational leadership is able to respond to them. Leadership is here understood as a collaborative endeavour, producing shared sense-making in situations of tension.

Purpose: The main research question was: what kinds of leadership dynamics underlie situations of tension brought about by external and internal change? The sub-question was: what kind of micro-level sense-making processes, argued to be the true source of change, assist in revealing these dynamics?

Programme: Educational organisations increasingly face demanding external changes, such as the two mergers described in this article. Tensions can easily be brought about during such external changes and the consequential internal changes, such as two pedagogical innovation projects in this article.

Sample: The study was conducted with three leadership teams within two organisations. The first organisation was a vocational education organisation with around 4000–5000 students and 500 staff members. The leadership team that was studied was followed for almost two years. The other organisation was a business school which comprised of around 7000 students, 150–200 professors and 500 staff members. There, two leadership teams were investigated and followed for almost three years.

Design and methods: The data for the sense-making process was selected by way of qualitative content analysis and an experimented model called TenKeys®. This data were analysed using a grounded theory approach to uncover the underlying leadership dynamics.

Results: Ten micro-procedural leadership dynamics were identified. Actions related to the pedagogical projects were then interpreted by means of these dynamics.

Conclusions: The findings suggest that understanding underlying leadership dynamics might help educational organisations respond to possible tensions brought about by external and internal change and, consequently, support learners’ learning processes, albeit indirectly.     

Performance power: the impact of neoliberalism on social justice educators’ ways of speaking about their educational practice

ABSTRACT

Few studies have attended to the specific influence of neoliberalism on education for social justice, despite the complex ways in which the competing discourses of neoliberalism and social justice work side by side in local educational settings. This article reports data derived from interviews with 28 educators committed to social justice education from across Ontario, Canada. Participants were asked how they perceived the impact of neoliberalism on education and on their teaching practice. Findings were interpreted through critical democratic theory and discourse analysis. An unanticipated finding is the influence of neoliberal discourse on the ways that educators spoke about their teaching practice for social justice. The study found that discourse of performance is one arena where competing discourses of neoliberalism and social justice not only coexist but also intersect. This finding has important implications for the transformative potential of social justice education through more concentrated attention to the power embedded in everyday speech acts. Attending more to the performative potential of neoliberal discourse toward social justice ends can be a mechanism for resistance and teacher agency.     

How school leaders search for and use evidence

Background: Often, a principal’s responsibilities include making decisions about the appropriateness of educational programmes to adopt in their school. Recommendations about programmes can be conflicting; so, a principal may need to search for evidence to inform their decision.

Purpose: The purpose of this small-scale study was to clarify how school leaders search for, and use, evidence to inform programme adoption. We sought to answer three research questions: (1) how do principals search for evidence, (2) how do they use common sources and (3) what sources do they consider most useful?

Sample: Twelve elementary school principals or vice-principals in Ontario, Canada participated in the study.

Design and methods: In telephone interviews, the participants described how they would respond to a fictional decision-making scenario and rated different sources of evidence. Responses were analysed in depth, using a mixed-method approach, which involved coding principals’ interview responses for themes and conducting a dual scaling analysis of their ratings of the usefulness of possible sources.

Results: Principals report valuing formal sources of evidence such as reports and articles. However, in practise, findings indicated that they would turn to people first.

Conclusions: School leaders prefer curated evidence from local educators to inform their decisions about the appropriateness of educational programmes for potential adoption.     

The relationship between tertiary-level students’ self-perceived presentation delivery and public speaking anxiety: A mixed-methods study

Abstract

Oral presentations are common in higher education worldwide. There is no shortage of evidence substantiating the association between oral presentations and anxiety. In the light of the close connection between self-perception and anxiety, and the under-researched nature of the delivery aspect of presentations (e.g. use of voice and body language), this study explored the relationship between tertiary-level learners’ (n?=?211) perceived delivery competence (23 areas) and their levels of public speaking anxiety. The data were collected via questionnaires and interviews. The questionnaire results revealed highly significant correlations between anxiety and 22 of these areas. The 23 areas overall also had a highly significant predictive power for anxiety levels, indicated by their explaining 45% of the variance. Follow-up in-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with six participants to shed light on these quantitative findings. This article ends with an argument for greater emphasis on presentation delivery skills in higher education, which can potentially mitigate learners’ public speaking anxiety.     

Memory and critical education: Approaches in the District Six Museum

Abstract

This article begins with the argument that education has become an important site of activity in museums around the world. This development has been of crucial significance for South Africa where many new museums have come into being and where old museums are now taking new courses. The challenge that these museums are having to confront is how to deal with the question of their public education responsibilities with respect to issues such as race, identity, nation and nation-building. How does the museum tell its story in ways that are inclusive and at the same time critical? How these challenges play themselves out in a museum such as the District Six Museum is important to talk about. What this discussion about the District Six Museum reveals is how little attention is paid to forms of public education in institutions outside of the school in South Africa. It is significant that the museum, which has come to play such a significant role in the reimagination of South Africa and is assuming in the intentions of the new government such a pivotal role in teaching South Africans about their pasts, is understood so poorly. The article uses the District Six Museum example to look critically at what a new museum educational practice might consist of.     

Worth Knowing: Talmud Study and the Intellectual Values of High School Students at Liberal Jewish Day Schools

ABSTRACT

What do Jewish day school students believe constitutes good understanding and worthwhile learning in the context of their encounter with rabbinic texts in the classroom? This article shares findings from an interview study of Jewish day school students in grades 9 through 12 regarding their attitudes toward the study of Talmud. I argue that high school students’ estimations of the value of Talmud study are shaped, not only by individually held tastes, talents, and commitments, but also by a set of shared intellectual values. These values, related to their beliefs about the purposes of learning and what good learning should accomplish for the learner, develop in the context of their schools and communities and frame how students set goals for and assess their own understanding of Talmud.     

“Darker than any prison,hotter than any human flame”: Punishment,choice, and culpability in A Clockwork Orange

Contemporary textbooks in criminal justice use A Clockwork Orange to illustrate issues of correctional and sentencing practices. This article challenges criminal justice faculty and students to use the film to explore the political and social realities of punishment, in particular the examination of the moral question of “voluntariness” and the implications for “treatment” as a mechanism of social control. This paper explores the moral questions of state sponsored social control and using the film satire invites the student to examine their beliefs about the political and social realities of punishment and rehabilitation.     

Investigating the relationships among students’ self-efficacy beliefs,their perceptions of classroom learning environment,gender, and chemistry achievement through structural equation modeling

Background: Investigating factors contributing to chemistry achievement is important since it enables us to make more concrete instructional decisions related to improving students? chemistry achievement.

Purpose: This study aimed to investigate how students? perceptions of learning environment, self-efficacy and gender are related to chemistry achievement.

Sample: Three hundred fifty six high school students with the age range of 14 and 19 from three different schools in the same district were the participants.

Design and methods: A structural equation model was designed and tested. Constructivist learning environment survey, self-efficacy scale were the instruments of the study. Information about students? gender and their chemistry grades belonging to the previous semester were also collected.

Results: The model testing showed that chemistry self-efficacy beliefs, students? perceptions of constructivist learning environment (through chemistry-self efficacy) and gender were significantly related to chemistry achievement. Moreover, the findings showed that students? chemistry self-efficacy beliefs mediated the relation of students? learning environment perceptions to their chemistry achievement.

Conclusions: The present study has some educational implications for teachers, teacher educators and curriculum developers. First of all, self-efficacy was found to have an effect on students? achievement. Therefore, teachers should consider students? self-efficacy beliefs and devise their instruction accordingly. Another implication of this study is the necessity of considering gender differences in designing teachers? instruction.     

The mourning of the health care professional: an important element in education about death and loss

This article explores the centrality of the mourning process in the education of developing health care professionals who are the survivors of complex and manifold losses. This was discussed in an elective seminar for senior medical students and graduate nurses. Learning about clinical responsibility often occurred in the context of loss and mourning. The outcome of mourning included for some a greater sensitivity to the impact of clinical interventions and a more accurate empathy for losses incurred by patients as a result of illness. Old and unresolved loss and mourning experiences were reawakened as a result of the seminar, which led to a sorting and mastering of these experiences. This is felt to be a common result of discussions about encounters with death and loss. Courses on death and dying for the health care professional, although important, are not sufficient by themselves for mastery of these topics. Clinical teachers must be aware of the student's response to loss and provide an atmosphere that legitimizes learning about these issues. The principles of awareness and open acknowledgement of loss and mourning are applicable to all health care settings.     

Thinking about Theorizing in Professional Development

This article describes two female beginning teachers from the same teacher education cohort. The two women had many experiences in common, but thought about these experiences quite differently. The article focuses on how their conceptions of students and of themselves as teachers changed over a 5-year period, and explores some of the interactions between their theorizing and their experiences. It also raises issues for teacher educators to consider.     

Trust and Mobile Media Use in Schools

Abstract

This article shares findings from a year-long study about social practices of high school youth with mobile devices during school time. In particular, this study found that students see their school time as fluidly social and academic. Educators and policy-makers need to carefully consider these social practices when preparing 21st century youth for engaging with technology in responsible and meaningful ways beyond their time in school.     

Majors and credits in public speaking

If politics is an art, then matters of style must be crucial to its practice. This essay considers how political actions are shaped by rhetorical practices that depend upon aesthetic perceptions. Modern assumptions of artistic autonomy are replaced by the classical concept of decorum, which offers a model for understanding how political life is styled for rhetorical effect. The role of decorousness in contemporary politics is illustrated by the extreme case of the courtly style, which constitutes power through propriety, is centered on the king's body, displaces speech with gesture, and ends in political paralysis.     

Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Box? Children and TV Advertising in four Countries

Abstract

To what extent are children influenced by television and, in particular, by advertising? The study discussed in this article was conducted in four countries with, in some cases, surprising results. Parents think that television influences their children, but children too have views on how adults are affected.     

Linguistic performance and minority groups

Abstract

Beginning with linguistic performance as currently defined, this article systematically pursues its implications to and through the notion of “successful communication.” The four divisions of the article attempt explorations of the following questions: What does linguistic performance do? What place does it have in a theory of communication? What are the practical implications of such a theory in connection with actual language use? How is all this relevant to problems of what we take to be “linguistically underprivileged” (minority) groups? The article concludes that the concept of linguistic performance, “scientifically” based, is not significant in successful communication, which is an art.     

Determining If Distance Education Is the Right Choice

Abstract

Making decisions about which technologies, if any, are appropriate for your classroom or educational institution has never been easy. These difficult decisions are, however, increasing in their complexity as new technologies continually enter the marketplace, expectations of parents and students rise for more technology in the classroom, budget constraints require institutions to do more with less, and the benefits of distance education place mounting pressures on educators to provide resources beyond the boundaries of the traditional classroom. So how do you as an educational leader make the challenging decisions related to distance education and other technologies in your school? This article provides a framework for results-focused decision making that can help you make complicated choices in even the most challenging of circumstances.