Book reviews

SPEAKING CHICANA: VOICE, POWER, AND IDENTITY. Edited by D. Letticia Galindo & Maria Dolores Gonzales. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1999; pp. viii + 226. $45.00 cloth; $19.95 paper.

CULTURAL BOUNDARIES OF SCIENCE: CREDIBILITY ON THE LINE. By Thomas Gieryn. Chicago: University Press, 1999; xiv + 398. $58.00 cloth; $16.80 paper.

ILLNESS AND CULTURE IN THE POSTMODERN AGE. By David B. Morris. Berkeley CA: University of California Press, 1998. $19.25 cloth.

DANCING IN CHAINS: NARRATIVE AND MEMORY IN POLITICAL THEORY. By Joshua F. Dienstag, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1997; pp. 1–268. $45.00; $16.95 paper.

CIVIC WARS: DEMOCRACY AND PUBLIC LIFE IN THE AMERICAN CITY DURING THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. By Mary Ryan. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997. 376 pp. $40.00 cloth; $14.36 paper.

TELLING THE SUCCESS STORY: ACCLAIMING AND DISCLAIMING DISCOURSE. By P.J. Benoit. Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1997. $39.50 cloth; $12.95 paper.

BLOOD SACRIFICE AND THE NATION: TOTEM RITUALS AND THE AMERICAN FLAG. Carolyn Marvin and David W. Ingle. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1999; pp. 398. £50.00 hardback; £18.95.     

Book reviews

SPECTACULAR NATURE: CORPORATE CULTURE AND THE SEA WORLD EXPERIENCE. By Susan G. Davis. Berkeley: University of California Press. 1997; pp. xii + 313. paper $18.95.

FEMINISM AND DOCUMENTARY. By Diane Waldman and Janet Walker. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999; pp. xvi + 365. $49.95 cloth; $19.95 paper.

FASHIONABLE NONSENSE: POSTMODERN INTELLECTUAL'S ABUSE OF SCIENCE. By Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont. New York: Picador USA, 1998; pp. xiv + 300. $16.10 cloth; $11.20 paper.     

Book reviews

Bloomfield, Leonard, and Barnhart, Clarence L., Let's Read: A Linguistic Approach. Wayne State University Press, Detroit 2. l961, $7.50.

Gunderson, Robert Gray, Old Gentlemen's Convention: The Washington Peace Conference of 1861. The University of Wisconsin Press, Madison. 1961, $5.

Corrigan, Robert W., Chandler Editions in Drama. Chandler Publishing Company, 604 Madison Street, San Francisco 4. $.75, paper.

Plummer, Gail, The Business of Show Business. Harper and Brothers, 49 East 33 Street, New York 16. 1961, $5.25.

Babcock, Weston, Hamlet, a Tragedy of Errors. Purdue University Studies, Humanities Series. Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana. 1961, paper, $1.75.     

Book reviews

The Light That Shines: Chapel Hill, 1912–1916. Robert B. House. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1964. Pp. 216. $5.00.)

Psychology of Adolescence for Teachers. Glenn Myers Blair and R. Stewart Jones. (New York: Macmillan, 1964. Pp. 118. $1.50, paper.)

Psychology of the Child in the Classroom. Don C. Charles. (New York: Macmillan, 1964. Pp. 86. $1.25, paper.)

Reading Instruction for Today's Children. Nila Banton Smith. (Engle‐wood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice‐Hall, 1963. Pp. 594. $7.50.)

Religion and the Schools, The Great Controversy. Paul Blanchard. (Boston: Beacon Press, 1963. Pp. 265. $4.95.)

School Business Administration in the Smaller Community. Fredrick W. Hill and James W. Colmey. (Minneapolis: T. S. Denison and Company, 1964. Pp. 324. $7.95.)

Sociology of Childhood. Oscar W. Ritchie and Marvin R. Koller. (New York: Appleton‐Century‐Crofts, 1964. Pp. 333. $5.00.)

The Teaching of Mathematics. Roy Dubisch. (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1963. Pp. 124. $2.95, paper.)

Vignettes on the Theory and Practice of School Administration. Finis E. Engleman, Shirley Cooper, and William J. Ellena. (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1963. Pp. 237. $4.80.)     

Book reviews

The following books are reviewed.

Teaching Public Issues in the High School D. W. OLIVER & J. P. SHAVER (1966) Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

Professional Experience and the Investigative Imagination: the ART of reflective writing RICHARD WINTER, ALYSON BUCK & PAULA SOBIECHOWSKA (1999) London: Routledge. 240 pp. ISBN 0 415 19542 X (hb) £50.00, ISBN 0 415 19543 8 (pb) £ 16.99     

Book reviews

Background: To help equip students with 21^st century competencies, one popular strategy adopted by governments and schools worldwide is to move from less formal to more engaging school environments through School-Based Curriculum Development (SBCD). In Singapore, the governmental call to Teach Less and Learn More has galvanised SBCD in schools nationwide. Schools have been given more autonomy and greater flexibility to develop diverse approaches in innovating their own curriculum frameworks.

Purpose: This study aims to provide a nuanced, retrospective account of the enactment of SBCD via Information and Communication Technology (ICT)-integrated, theme-based programmes in a primary school in Singapore. The research questions that guide this study are: (1) How do the school stakeholders enact SBCD? (2) How does the enactment affect the school stakeholders?

Method: This study looked into curriculum innovation using a retrospective lens and employed a case study approach to examine the enactment of SBCD in the school. Five focus group discussions (FGDs) were conducted with the major stakeholders of the school, including two school leaders, ten key personnel and ten teachers across different subjects and grade levels. Thematic analysis of the data was undertaken.

Findings: Four themes and twelve associated sub-themes were identified from the analysis of the FGDs. The four themes include experimentation, support, growth and challenges. This whole-school approach to curriculum innovation had a clear focus on mobilizing the school community to tackle the uncertainties of implementing an innovative curriculum. The stakeholders played diverse but intertwined roles throughout different stages of the enactment process, producing strong collegiality amongst the stakeholders. This prevailing collegiality, as embedded in the active participation of the stakeholders in a multiplicity of collective sharing and learning practices, seems likely to help the school achieved desired outcomes.

Conclusions: The whole-school approach to curriculum innovation in the case school is promising from the perspectives of teaching-learning and student outcomes, but cannot provide a panacea for all the challenges encountered in the enactment process.     

Book reviews

Adult continuing education research has acquired growing policy significance in a number of European countries. We provide an analytical overview of current adult continuing education research in the UK, where organizational structures, funding sources, topics and disciplinary parameters are all currently in a process of change. The policy significance of the field is exemplified by a major research council programme on The Learning Society; interest in this national programme of studies extends far beyond the traditional academic departments of adult education. Research in the field in universities is characterized by eclecticism and inter‐disciplinarity, within a broad social science framework. The paper summarizes the main trends and focuses in published research. One significant development is in the growth of comparative and international research.

     

Book reviews

The role of information and communications technology (ICT) in widening participation in lifelong learning, and thereby establishing the UK as a bona fide ‘learning society’, is now enshrined in a series of multi-million pound government initiatives such as the University for Industry, learndirect and UK Online. Although politicians and educationalists have been quick to herald such initiatives as revolutionizing post-compulsory education and extending learning opportunities to ‘anyone’ on an ‘anytime, anywhere’ basis, there has been little empirical analysis of how ICT is actually impacting on patterns of lifelong learning in the UK. With this in mind, the present paper presents an analysis of data from the 2002 National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) survey of 5885 households, focusing on learners' access to technology and the role that technology is playing in facilitating learning.     

Book reviews

Distributed Learning: social and cultural approaches to practiceEdited by Mary R. Lea and Kathy Nicoll, 2002 RoutledgeFalmer 214 pp., £19.99 ISBN 0 415 26809 5Distributed Learning: social and cultural approaches to practice, edited by Mary R. Lea and Kathy Nicoll, is published as part of the Open University UK course Understanding Distributed and Flexible Learning within the Postgraduate Programme in Open and Distance Education. The book comprises of 12 chapters written by authors from different academic backgrounds. They draw on their extensive practical experiences to present and reflect on a number of conceptual models and describe best practices in distributed learning. The volume is aimed at practitioners who intend to use technology in a higher education setting and also helps those who may have been using it for a few years to rethink their approaches to online learning and teaching. The reader is introduced to several theoretical concepts based on different disciplines and perspectives, e.g. anthropology, psychology, sociology, philosophy, economics and pedagogy. The specific focus is on the social and cultural aspects of learning. What does the term distributed learning mean? It describes practices on the continuum between traditional distance education and campus-based face-to-face education (cf. flexible learning, blended learning). With the proliferation of information and communications technology (ICT) in campus-based educational settings the boundaries between distance education and face-to-face education are fading. More and more traditional campus-based universities are providing access to higher education in a distance learning format. In fact, ICTs facilitate contact over a distance. Some authors even speak of a convergence between the two forms of education (Mills &;Tait, 1999). Campus-based institutions cannot deny their tradition: they insist that contact sessions are essential for successful internet-based independent learning, although distance education with its high quality pre-prepared study materials and tutorial (online) support has proven otherwise. This is what models for blended learning try to illuminate: the appropriate mix of face-to-face and distance teaching approaches. A strength of the book is that the authors come from both distance teaching as well as campus-based institutions and thus different views on the continuum are presented.     

Book reviews

David Warner and Charles Leonard. The Income Generation Handbook, Second Edition: A Practical Guide for Educational Institutions, Buckingham, UK: The Society for Research into Higher Education (SRHE) and Open University Press, 1997. ISBN 0–335–19858–9 (hard); 0–335–19862–7 (paper)

Henry D.R. Miller. The Management of Change in Universities: Universities, State and Economy in Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom, Buckingham, UK: The Society for Research into Higher Education and Open University Press, 1995. ISBN 0–33.5–19089–8 Price £50.00. 183 pp     

Book reviews

When designing lessons to meet the needs of our increasingly diverse population of students, educators need to rethink planning and structuring lessons so that all students achieve better results. Therefore, teacher preparation programmes need to prepare pre‐service teachers accordingly. Within this paper, a new lesson planning template is unveiled that builds on many of the foundational concepts of inclusive education. This template is meant for teacher educators to use with pre‐service teachers across the curriculum to guide the design of inclusive lessons. This paper discusses the foundations, unique features, and applications of this student‐centred lesson design template to create creative and active learning for students in inclusive classrooms.     

Book reviews

Acting as the mentor for a cohort of post-baccalaureate teacher certification students was a learning experience. Working as interns in an urban middle school over the course of a year, the students learned about the culture of a struggling school, the needs of the young adolescents they were teaching, and what it means to be a teacher in such a school. Not all of their lessons were positive ones, however, as socialization into the culture often prevailed over critique. As a result of reflecting on the year, I saw how I also was socialized by the culture, and guilty of some of the same attitudes myself and my students criticized in the school. My reflections point to some necessary components of the kind of partnerships sought by public schools and universities.