Packaging poetry? Pupils’ perspectives of their learning experience within the post‐primary poetry classroom

This paper explores the issue of educational commodification within the poetry class. Drawing from research conducted with 200 Leaving Certificate pupils, from eight post‐primary schools in Ireland, this paper investigates these pupils’ perspectives on their learning experiences against a backdrop of educational consumerism. The research identifies a number of areas of concern including limited potential for creative and aesthetic engagement in the classroom, a utilitarian approach to the teaching and learning of poetry, the marginalisation of pupil voice and subjective response and the prioritisation of exam performance. Drawing on the findings of this study, it is argued that the teaching and learning of poetry is vulnerable to becoming a packaged commodity. Recommendations for renewed teacher agency in countering pedagogical pragmatism beginning at pre‐service level are made.     

Re-focusing the Teaching of Poetry at Key Stage Two in Northern Ireland: Some Literary-critical and Pedagogical Explorations

This paper argues that there is scope for considerable change and improvement in the way in which Poetry is taught at Key Stage Two in Northern Ireland. In making this case for significant improvement, the paper has three interconnected parts. In the first part, a range of critical ideas highlight the richness of poetry as a literary genre. Secondly, a number of pedagogical ideas are presented, which emphasise the enjoyment of poetry as an end in itself. In the third part, there is firstly a comparative evaluation of the statutory requirements for teaching Key Stage Two poetry in Northern Ireland and England. Secondly, the results of a questionnaire, which was distributed to a reasonably representative selection of Literacy Coordinators in primary schools across Northern Ireland, are evaluated. The results suggest that there is Indeed considerable scope for improvement in the teaching of poetry at Key Stage Two in Northern Ireland.     

Student teachers’ attitudes to inclusion: implications for Initial Teacher Education in Northern Ireland

With the imminent passing of the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Act (SENDA) into law in Northern Ireland, along with changes to the curriculum and the planned move away from academic selection for post‐primary pupils in 2008, the education system in Northern Ireland is about to embrace radical change. Inclusion has now become one of the most pressing educational issues both nationally and internationally. As we move to address such change, there is a recognition that Initial Teacher Education (ITE) must review how new teachers are trained so they are equipped to teach effectively in classrooms that may be very different from their own learning experience. This paper focuses on a research project undertaken at the University of Ulster that considers student teachers’ attitudes to inclusion before their first teaching practice experience. While the findings reveal evidence of support for the philosophy of inclusion and for inclusive practices generally, they also show that many young teachers still show a strong attachment to, and belief in, traditional academic selection as a preferred education model     

Modern languages and special educational needs: a review of research

The Education Reform (Northern Ireland) Order 1989 requires that all pupils of secondary school age should have equal access to a broad and balanced curriculum. The inclusion of language studies within the statutory framework of the Northern Ireland curriculum has led to a significant expansion in the teaching of modern languages to pupils with special educational needs. Many teachers are now faced with the task of teaching pupils who hitherto would have been excluded from the language department and some teachers in special schools now have to teach a language with which they themselves are unfamiliar. This paper is the first stage of a research and development project funded by the Northern Ireland Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (NICCEA); it examines some research evidence relating to the challenge of teaching languages to pupils with special educational needs.     

A joyous lifeline in a target-driven job: teachers’ metaphors of teaching poetry writing

Drawing on Vygotsky’s notion, developed by Bruner, of learners growing into ‘the intellectual life of those around them’, this paper reports on a small-scale questionnaire survey of teachers’ thinking about poetry writing and their instructional practices of teaching it. Thirty-three teachers, with a range of teaching experience and service, took part in the study. This paper presents, analyses and evaluates the central metaphor of ‘freedom’ used by teachers. This presents poetry writing instruction in four contrasting ways: as freedom to explore personal creativity; as a site of integrated thinking; as a rejection of ‘formulaic writing’; and as freedom from curricular ‘directives’. The paper argues that these metaphors indicate considerable personal investment by teachers of poetry and that they consider the teaching of poetry writing to have impact as much on themselves as on pupils.     

The second chance school

Loughshore Educational Resource Centre is a religiously integrated, co‐educational, special needs and secondary school situated in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Loughshore works with a wide clientele of pupils across the spectrum of need and ability from the metropolitan area of Belfast. It plays a vital role as an educational base for a multiplicity of out‐of‐school children. The centre works in the backdrop of an emerging peace in the region as well as the significantly high levels of deprivation experienced across Northern Ireland’s capital. With places at the centre at a premium, a strict admission criterion exists. The centre aims to give a ‘second chance’ to its pupils, who are at risk of social exclusion, focusing on academic, personal and social development, providing skills which can be used to gain employment or continue to further education.     

Utilising creative methodologies to elicit the views of young learners with additional needs in literacy

The research described in this article aimed to explore and examine the dominant ‘assessment’ and ‘participation’ stories of upper‐primary pupils with long‐standing and marked literacy learning needs, their views on how their level of participation in the assessment and remediation of their additional needs might be increased and also how they perceive themselves as literacy learners. This qualitative small‐scale study adopted a case study approach and utilised creative methodologies in the context of focus groups to investigate sensitively the views and experiences of Key Stage 2 pupils with additional needs in literacy. The findings discussed here are based on the outcomes from the four Northern Irish schools that participated in the original cross‐border (Northern Ireland/Republic of Ireland) study. Findings are discussed in the context of strategies for promoting holistic and empowering pathways for learners with additional needs in literacy.     

Uniformity and diversity in religious education in Northern Ireland

This paper considers the tension that can exist in the aims of religious education between the desire to encourage open‐minded, critical thinking through exposure to diverse traditions, ideas and cultures and the encouragement, overt or otherwise, into uniformity whereby learners take on the values of a particular tradition, culture or ideology (say of a religion, family or school). The particular situation of teaching religious education to post‐primary school pupils in Northern Ireland is considered, and evidence cited to suggest that the Northern Ireland Core Syllabus in Religious Education has tried to impose a particular non‐denominational Christian uniformity on pupils and teachers through its use of religious language. This has contributed to a culture of ‘avoidance’ in relation to the teaching of broad Christian diversity. The article concludes that there is a need for an ongoing and meaningful dialogue to discover what kind of balance between uniformity and diversity is best in teaching religious education in Northern Ireland, and notes that this also requires the reassessment of fundamental issues such as the aims of education and the relationship between secular and religious values in publicly funded schools.     

Absolute effects of schooling as a reference for the interpretation of educational intervention effects

Knowledge of the absolute effects of schooling provides a useful reference for the interpretation of the effectiveness of educational interventions. We use discontinuities in test scores between the oldest pupils in one birth cohort and the youngest in the next to assess the absolute effects of schooling. Our study includes 90 % of all pupils in year-groups 4–6 of primary education (ages 7–10) in Northern Ireland. Assignment to year-groups is strictly determined by date of birth in Northern Ireland. This creates a situation which parallels randomized controlled experimentation. The findings support the view that the guidelines suggested by Cohen (in 1969) may be overly ambitious when evaluating the effectiveness of educational interventions.     

The attitudes of male student teachers towards a career in special education

This study considers the reasons why so few male student teachers are entering the special education sector. This comes as recent statistics reveal that the percentage of male teaching staff in special education in Northern Ireland is much lower than in England. The article first critically considers the international literature on male students’ perceptions of entering the teaching profession. The study then examines the opinions of the post‐primary student cohort at one major initial teacher education institution in Northern Ireland and contrasts male and female responses in terms of students’ confidence in their knowledge of special educational needs and their relative willingness to consider specialising in this area. The study reveals significant differences in the cohort between male and female students’ perceptions, and through individual interviews it explores further the reasons why male students are reluctant to specialise in special educational needs.     

Boys, Poetry and the Individual Talent

This article provides an explicit critique of existing poetry teaching practices which illustrates how adolescents, particularly boys, develop antipathy to this genre. Having established the need for alternative pedagogy, the theory and practice of ‘responsive teaching’ is described. The term ‘responsive teaching’ has been coined because it denotes teaching founded upon readers' responses which is informed by elements of reader‐response criticism. Selected findings are reported from a three‐year action research investigation examining how keen readers of pre‐twentieth‐century poetry can be fostered. Examples are given of dramatic improvements in certain boys' attitudes and attainment. It is suggested that such transformation can occur when the personal reading styles of pupils are allowed to flourish. The implications for teaching are considered.     

Teaching a Selection of Heaney’s Troubles Poetry to Upper Post-primary Pupils in Northern Ireland’s Divided Schools: Educational Contexts and Pedagogical Opportunities

Centred on a carefully chosen selection of Heaney’s Troubles poems, this paper explores pedagogical opportunities that the poems present in the context of upper post-primary classrooms in Northern Ireland’s divided schools. Five poems are evaluated in total. These are: ‘The Other Side’, ‘A Constable calls’, ‘The Toome Road’, ‘The Strand at Lough Beg’ and ‘An Ulster Twilight’. While these five poems represent only a small selection of Heaney’s Troubles poems, they nonetheless cover an interesting spectrum in terms of their politico-cultural perspectives. The analysis of the poems focuses on exploring how teachers could use the poems to enable pupils to examine their traditional identities and allegiances and perhaps re-evaluate them in the light of new insights provided by the poems. While suggestions for this pedagogical exploration is at the heart of the paper, the early section establishes some relevant theoretical and educational contexts and the concluding section situates the paper in the context of previous, related curricular initiatives with Northern Ireland. It is to be hoped, finally, that the curricular initiative proposed by the paper could contribute, if even in a small way, to the ongoing search for peace and reconciliation between Northern Ireland’s two main, and still divided, communities.     

Striving for social sensitivity: the impact of a social justice project on student teachers’ understanding of pupils from socially disadvantaged backgrounds

This paper considers the concerning issue of social disadvantage in N. Ireland schools and suggests that the majority of those entering the teaching profession are ill-equipped to empathise with pupils in disadvantaged areas and thus less enabled to offer effective pastoral care. It argues that this lack of preparedness stems from backgrounds very different to that of these pupils and also from an initial teacher education which does not provide a systematic practical experience in schools in ‘challenging’ areas. The paper briefly outlines a small-scale ITE social justice project undertaken at Stranmillis University College, Belfast designed to provide such experience and, citing specific evidence from data gathered in a recent evaluation, offers it as a model of preparing student-teachers to better understand the realities of their pupils’ lives through extended pre-service contact.     

Inclusion and deaf education: the perceptions and experiences of young deaf people in Northern Ireland and Sweden

The purpose of the present study is to examine what the concept of inclusion means and how it relates to children who are deaf. The paper begins with a background to deaf education, followed by specific reference to how inclusion is perceived in Northern Ireland and in Sweden. It investigates the experiences and opinions of deaf pupils in Schools for the deaf in both countries where different educational philosophies and forms of instruction prevail. A qualitative approach was adopted in which interviews were conducted with deaf pupils who were in their last school year, had left school recently or were in post-compulsory education. The results indicated that Swedish respondents described their experiences markedly more positively than those in Northern Ireland. The main reason for this was the encouragement of a deaf cultural environment where sign language was used by teachers and pupils for instruction and social interaction throughout the school. Although such a culture was not in evidence in Northern Ireland, positive experiences reported by respondents were associated with sign language and a deaf classroom assistant to facilitate comprehension between teachers and pupils. Implications are drawn for effective, inclusive practice in educational settings of deaf children.     

‘What rough beast?’ Conceptualising the poetry teacher in Ireland through the eyes of the pupil

Pupils have a significant contribution to make in the construction of knowledge about teaching and learning in schools. Therefore, consultation with pupils should play a significant role in the pursuit of pedagogical advancement. This study explores pupils' conceptions of effective poetry teachers at Leaving Certificate level in Ireland. Taking a phenomenographic approach, this study draws on interviews conducted with 23 senior cycle pupils. Set against a transcontextual backdrop of pupil apathy and disengagement in the poetry classroom, this study identifies five significant categories of learning for pre-service teachers aiming to optimise student engagement within the poetry classroom. The imperative for action, specifically at pre-service level, is outlined and recommendations in the pursuit of pedagogical advancement in the poetry classroom are proposed.     

Classroom conditions to secure enjoyment and achievement: the pupils' voice. Listening to the voice of Every child matters

This paper argues that pupil voice and the active engagement of pupils in shaping their own educational experience are integral to the success of the ‘Enjoy and Achieve’ strand of the Every child matters: Change for children programme. Through accessing the voice of Key Stage 2 pupils, insight was gained into what pupils believe to be the ideal ‘classroom conditions’ which enable them to enjoy and achieve at school. Pupil voice was accessed using an innovative form of group interview incorporating an Ishikawa or fishbone tool. The data was collected from 180 pupils, from Years 3–6 (aged 7–11) in a UK Junior school. The findings identify eight ‘classroom conditions’ which pupils see as being critical for them to be able to enjoy and achieve at school. Two of these ‘classroom conditions’ do not appear to be supported by previous research.     

Creating the effective school : The role of evaluation

The concept of children's rights evolved during the 1980s giving prominence to the role of children as active participants in the construction of their lives. The rhetoric of children's rights has emerged as an important consideration in all policy and practice relating to children. Implementation of children's rights in practice is necessary to maximise their potential to improve the lives of children. This paper presents an argument for the importance of giving meaning to the implementation of children's rights in the Individual Education Plan (IEP) process for pupils with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) in Ireland. The study, on which this paper is based, was conducted in two stages using both qualitative and quantitative approaches. The first stage focused on the development of a set of indicators for the IEP process based on a children's rights framework and informed by the perspectives of children, parents and teachers, alongside the literature on best practice on IEPs. In the second stage, a survey questionnaire was designed, based on the children's rights indicators, to evaluate current IEP practice in Ireland for pupils with autistic spectrum disorder. This article outlines the development of a set of indicators for the IEP process. It also presents findings of the survey which evaluates current practice in relation to the IEP process for pupils with ASD in Ireland. The article focuses specifically on Article 3(1) of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) which stipulates that in all actions concerning children, ‘the best interests of the child shall be a primary consideration’.     

Learning from James: Lessons about Policy and Practice for Schools' Special Provision in the Area of Literacy Difficulties

Janice Wearmouth is a senior lecturer in the Faculty of Education and Language Studies at the Open University in the UK. She has many years' experience of teaching and research in mainstream secondary schools and of developing and leading postgraduate development courses for teachers in the area of special and inclusive education. In this article, she argues that successive Governments in England, Wales and Northern Ireland have adopted policies in relation to special educational provision that are essentially technicist in character. These policies proceed from assumptions that are made about the clear and unproblematic nature of the issues and the responses that need to be made. In this model, difficulties in learning can be 'fixed' by selecting the most appropriate 'tool' in the most efficient and cost-effective way. The current focus on competency-based teacher education can be seen as a corollary of this approach.
Drawing upon a personal account of the experience of having difficulties in literacy acquisition, this article presents a contrary view. Janice Wearmouth argues that the area of special educational needs in schools, including literacy difficulties, is fraught with uncertainty and conflicting viewpoints. Given this complex situation, the technicist responses of recent Governments in the UK seem inappropriate and inadequate, Janice Wearmouth suggests. She proposes that practice in relation to special educational needs in general, and literacy difficulties in particular, can be most effectively understood from the perspective of a reflective practitioner. Her article closes with a call for practitioner professional development to be reconceptualised in these terms.