Counting and accounting for social justice in the devolved school: How do indigenous students fare?

Abstract

How does a self‐managing school meet the needs and aspirations of the most disenfranchised members of its community? What responsibilities should reside with the state and the education system in the quest for more equitable schooling outcomes? In the neo‐liberal state, responsibility for addressing educational disadvantage has largely been devolved to schools within centrally determined curriculum frameworks and accountability mechanisms. But there are disturbing signs that these new arrangements are not working in the interests of the most marginalised students and their families. This article explores the nexus between school‐based management and educational equality with particular reference to Indigenous students in a disadvantaged Australian school community. It reaffirms the need for well‐resourced and vibrant education bureaucracies as an integral component of a responsible approach to school‐based management.     

Physical Education Curriculum Reform in Finland

The Finnish education system has received worldwide attention due to the top academic performance of Finnish school students. Physical education, as an integral part of the Finnish education curriculum, potentially contributes to the overall success. The purpose of this article is to summarize Finnish physical education reform during the past decades and to review and critique recent literature that has examined the effectiveness of Finnish physical education programs. This review concludes that physical education has a solid foundation in Finnish schools and that it enjoys strong support in Finnish society. Although physical education contact time has diminished across four decades, the current basic education reform has begun to allocate more time and funding for elementary and middle school physical education. The literature review, however, revealed limited evidence on the effectiveness of physical education programs. In the future, robust studies are needed to provide evidence of the effectiveness of physical education. It is likely that with rigorous research evidence, the current efforts to allocate more time for physical education should be more easily justified and supported.     

Keine Mythen, sondern fundierte Schulreformen

The Finnish education system has received much international attention because Finnish pupils have attained leading positions in the PISA studies. There are both historical and societal reasons for this, but the success is also a clear consequence of school reform and projects to develop school teaching. Following a historical overview, this essay will present the concrete reform initiatives at the educational system level (introduction of community schools) and at subject level (work on the curriculum, mathematics and natural science lessons, promotion of reading competencies, synergy effects and teacher training). The article will conclude with considerations for the future of the Finnish education system.     

Teaching,learning, and evaluating: handwriting in Uruguayan public elementary schools in the 1830s

Abstract

This article examines the Uruguayan state approach to the teaching of writing in public elementary education during the 1830s, and is an attempt to explain why state officials advanced new pedagogical methods aimed at increasing rationalisation and standardisation. While many different handwriting styles existed in the past, the school system simplified and standardised public education under a single cursive style, the English round-hand. Notwithstanding the state’s standardising directives, Uruguayan teachers combined the pedagogical innovations of Lancaster’s monitorial system with the calligraphic traditions of the old writing masters. According to personal preference and necessity, teachers devised a hybrid system, which implemented new dictation exercises and the use of the writing slate, but preserved the writing masters’ imitation of muestras, and the use of quill, ink, and paper. The government arranged an inventive procedure to accurately measure students’ handwriting performance. The planas, or samples of students’ handwriting, were useful tools in the standardisation and evaluation of public education. Elementary schools from all over the country forwarded handwriting samples to the central state, or exhibited them in public examination ceremonies, as teachers publicised pedagogical success, and state officials confirmed the general advancement of public education. This study is also an attempt to show that the teaching of writing was part of a greater pedagogical mission and nation-building project: the intentional departure from colonial corporate identities, and the construction of a national community conceived as the sum of its individual citizens.     

The Integrated Approach to Teaching Visual Art in After‐School Activity Classes

The present article discusses the possibilities of interdisciplinary integration for teaching art to primary‐school students in after‐school activities. Integrated teaching, as one of the ways for putting into practice the socioconstructivist approach to learning and the theory of the guided construction of knowledge, is used as a basis for conceiving and implementing the two projects described in the empirical part of the article. The research questions, addressed here, aim at finding out how a project‐based approach and the knowledge gained in school and through the students’ individual experiences can be applied pedagogically in after‐school art activities. To achieve the aims of the study a two‐cycle action research was conducted where the integrated teaching was viewed as a developmental spiral, in which the insights, experiences and results gained from the first project fed into the planning and realisation of the second one. The outcomes of the two projects suggest that the integrated presentation of teaching material enhances the students’ learning abilities to make associative connections between the different subjects, to transfer their skills from one project into another, and to apply their knowledge from one subject area to another by processing various sources of visual or verbal information in their creation of artworks. The two projects have proven empirically the validity and educational relevance of the integrated approach to teaching art, and the usefulness of the ideas in the New Finnish Core Curriculum for the holistic development of the child in the complexity of today's world.     

Necessary but not sufficient: challenges to (implicit) theories of educational change: reform in Nepal’s primary education system

Educational quality reforms are undertaken in hopes that students in a higher quality education system will acquire more of the curriculum. However, the authors argue, there is no necessary connection between investments in educational quality and improved learning outcomes. A national assessment of grade 3 students in Nepal found few differences in learning competencies before and after a multi-year reform project involving improvements in classrooms, curriculum, textbook distribution, teacher training packages, administration and supervision system, school management, and community involvement in school management. The article explores the implications for educational reform initiatives and theories of educational change.     

From Desegregation to Privatization: A Critical Race Policy Analysis of School Choice and Educational Opportunity in North Carolina

ABSTRACT

School choice policies and the movement to privatize education have become the currently preferred school reform methods on both the state and federal levels under the guise they will provide equal educational opportunities and access for all students. The 1954 school desegregation decision in Brown v. Board of Education arguably paved the way for equal educational opportunities, including school choice; however, we contend that the present-day school choice and privatization movements may be a part of a larger social, political, and legal cycle of inequality that has established residence in the American educational system for more than a century. We conduct a critical race theory policy analysis using a framework that has been effective in previous work with examining cyclical inequalities, the convergence-divergence-reclamation cycle (or C-D-R cycle). In this article, we are focusing our analysis on the state of North Carolina due to its complex legal and political history with school desegregation and its recent support for various school choice options and privatizing public education. We assert that the push for school choice and privatizing public education in North Carolina demonstrates a broader, recurring problem in American public schools-–creating progressive education laws and policies appearing to promote educational equity and opportunity and then regressing to policies supporting White privilege while maintaining the status quo of inequitable educational opportunities for historically underserved and minoritized students.     

Project work in the graduate classroom: Teachers as students apply skills beyond the classroom

Abstract

Through the use of a long‐term project in a graduate teacher education course on the importance of play, students learned skills beyond those usually required in a graduate classroom. Students used their understanding and knowledge of play, constructive practice, and project work to develop a family play day at the university lab school. As part of the project, students helped to develop a play‐style instrument that served as a self‐study for their own classrooms as they observed the play among their own students. The project culminated with the students hosting the families of the lab school at a fun day and preparing a brochure that gave families information about the importance of play.     

New guiding principles in educational policy: the case of Germany

Pluralism, decentralization, deregulation, school autonomy, greater diversity and parent empowerment in education are among the new guiding principles in educational policy in numerous industrial countries. Whereas this paradigm shift reflects the advance of the market ideology into the education sector in other (particularly English‐speaking) countries, the driving force behind this movement in Germany is rather the political system's loss of legitimation and the conflict‐ridden state of educational policy. The first part of the article takes a retrospective view which links up to the analyses of Weiler. It shows that the former strategies for securing legitimation and regulating conflicts ‐ involving science in the educational reform process, legalization and judicialization ‐ have only been effective temporarily. Using the new Education Act of Hesse as example, the hypothesis is developed that the strategy of increasing parent empowerment and partially transferring regulatory powers and decision‐making competence to individual schools will also not bring about the expected effects since this will not solve the structural problems of the German school system. In the second part of the article this thesis is elaborated within the framework of a differentiated analysis of the consequences of the structural problems as manifested in individual school types on local educational markets.     

学生学业成绩评价改革研究

改革现有学生学业成绩评价制度,构建素质教育的评价模式在推进素质教育的过程中具有重大的理论和现实意义。文章就学生学业成绩评价改革提出几点建议。平时成绩与终结性考试成绩相统一构成升学成绩,作为招生录取的依据,建立考试诚信制度。建立学科档案袋,实施任务表现性评价,让学生更充分地表现自己。量性评价与质性评价相结合,使学生在原有基础上提高,促进学生的全面发展。学生学业成绩评价改革要求教育工作者转变传统教育观念,提高评价能力。学生学业成绩评价改革是一个系统工程,需要政府的政策保障以及家长、社会各界的参与和支持。     

高职教育改革在冲突理论视角下的策略调适分析

教育改革是社会发展的必然趋势,冲突理论认为冲突是社会的基本状态,具有社会整合的作用。在社会转型期内高校教育改革面临着很多矛盾与冲突,冲突理论为我们提供了一种框架进行分析。本文运用冲突理论分析高职学校教育改革中学校与教师、学校与学生、教师与学生、学生与学生之间的冲突,从而提出"以人为本"的教育模式,建立大学权利组织的多元化教育体制,完善制度化的教育协调机制,创立畅通的学校中介组织等调适机构。     

The Finnish Model of Special Education: a mixture of integration and segregation

Abstract

This article examines the development of special education in the Finnish compulsory education system in the 1980s. The main emphasis is on evaluating the extent to which the aim of integrating special education has been achieved. Special education is also evaluated in relation to school level and gender. The main result of this examination is that the aim of integrating special education has only partially been achieved. Integration has been achieved in the sense that part‐time special education is the major form of education. Nevertheless, the amount of pupils involved in traditional types of special education has also continued to increase substantially in the 1980s. Two out of three pupils in special education are still boys, but the proportion of girls has clearly grown in SMA teaching.     

The (mis)use of the Finnish teacher education model: ‘policy-based evidence-making’?

Abstract

Background: International achievement studies such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) have an increasing influence on education policy worldwide. The use of such data can provide a basis for evidence-based policy-making to initiate educational reform. Finland, a high performer in PISA, is often cited as an example of both efficient and equitable education. Finland’s teachers and teacher education have not only garnered much attention for their role in the country’s PISA successes, but have also influenced education policy change in England.

Main argument: This article argues that the Finnish model of teacher education has been borrowed uncritically by UK policy-makers. Finnish and English philosophies of teacher preparation differ greatly, and the borrowing of the Finnish teacher education model does not fit within the teacher training viewpoint of England. The borrowed policies, thus, were decontextualised from the wider values and underpinnings of Finnish education. This piecemeal, ‘pick “n” mix’ approach to education policy reform ignores the fact that educational policies and ‘practices exist in ecological relationships with one another and in whole ecosystems of interrelated practices’. Thus, these borrowed teacher preparation policies will not necessarily lead to the outcomes outlined by policy-makers in the reforms.

Sources of evidence: Two teacher preparation reforms in England, the University Training Schools (outlined in the UK Government’s 2010 Schools White Paper, The Importance of Teaching) and the Master’s in Teaching and Learning (MTL), are used to illustrate the problematic nature of uncritical policy borrowing. This article juxtaposes these policies with the Finnish model of teacher education, a research-based programme where all candidates are required to complete a Master’s degree. The contradictions exposed from this analysis further highlight the divergent practices of teacher preparation in England and Finland, or the disparate ‘ecosystems’. Evidence of educational policy borrowing in other settings is also considered.

Conclusions: Both the MTL and the White Paper reforms overlook the ‘ecosystem’ surrounding Finnish teacher education. The school-based MTL contrasts with the research-based Finnish teachers’ MA. Similarly, the University Training Schools scheme, based on Finnish university-affiliated, teaching practice schools, contrasts heavily with the rest of the White Paper reforms, which contradict the philosophies and ethos behind Finnish teacher education by proposing the move of English teacher preparation away from the universities. The analysis highlights the uncritical eye through which politicians may view international survey results, looking for ‘quick fix’ options instead of utilising academic evidence for investigation on education and education reform.     

Special support and neighbourhood school allocation in Finland: a study on parental school choice

Although freedom of parental school choice has expanded to the Finnish education system, the government has maintained the principle of neighbourhood school allocation. Moreover, the Finnish education system has recently undergone a reform of its special needs education; all pupils are entitled to receive support in three categories of general, intensified or special. The focus of this article is to examine parental positions on school choices in relation to the parents’ social class and their children’s support needs in basic education. The results of the study are based on a quantitative questionnaire, which collected responses from 208 participants drawn primarily from four different municipalities in Finland. The study found that the category of a child’s support, rather than the socio-economic class of the parents, determined the child’s school allocations. Furthermore, the more support the parents felt their children needed, the more importance they placed on special education practices and less on the neighbourhood school allocation. In addition, the parents’ opinions were found to differ based on social class, rather than category of support. In conclusion, we argue that the social segregation of students with special educational needs can be avoided, if the principle of neighbourhood school allocation is preserved.     

Towards inclusive education: the case of Finland

The article examines the Finnish system of basic education and the means it employs to support good learning and healthy growth and development for all students. The excellent learning outcomes of the Finnish comprehensive school indicate that it is possible to develop a system with both quality teaching and learning, and equity and equality for students. Throughout the article, special needs education is seen as an important, but not dominant, aspect of Finland’s inclusive policies. The article concludes with five theses central to a working model of inclusive education.     

A Window into the Rural Classroom: interactive television and problem‐based activity in Australian pre‐service teacher education

ABSTRACT

This project incorporated live broadcasts of teaching from small, multi‐graded, rural schools into university lecture halls where pre‐service teacher education students in the last semester of their programmes were able to observe ‘best practice’ in a learning context that they would eventually be responsible for during their final practicum session. Interactive observation sessions were immediately followed with opportunities for students to discuss various aspects of planning, classroom organisation and teaching strategies appropriate to multi‐graded contexts with the remote classroom teacher. These ‘reverse distance education’ sessions followed an intensive lecture and tutorial series centring upon topics relevant to teaching in small rural communities. Tutorial activities placed student teachers in small rural school scenarios containing everyday ‘problems’ requiring diagnosis and the generation and analysis of solutions. At the conclusion of scenario discussions, students had networked, collaborated with colleagues and applied current research findings in generating viable solutions and considered school community reactions to these proposed solutions.

The incorporation of interactive video technology with these problem situations consolidated the concept and skill development of student teachers and increased both their real time involvement in their chosen professions, and their access to best practice. This dual focus upon a problem solving approach to teaching immersed the student teacher in situations derived from real school environments, and so encouraged a collegial and open approach to teaching. Extensive evaluations revealed that pre‐service teachers were more thoroughly prepared for rural teaching experiences, displayed competence in effective multigrade teaching skills, and exhibited control during involvement     

网络社会和谐师生关系促进策略研究

现代教育技术伴随着网络技术的发展推动了现代学校教育内容、教育方法、教育手段及教育过程的改革与发展。在网络环境中,虚拟社区技术、视频点播系统、网络多媒体教室的广泛应用,使师生关系正在发生深刻变革,“和谐师生关系”作为网络社会中师生关系发展的终极目标和根本出发点,师生社会关系、师生教学关系和师生心理关系都在传统师生关系基础上发生了深刻变化,和谐师生关系促进策略是内化尊重教育理念、营建和谐教育文化、体验和谐网络课堂、寻求师生共同发展、坚持过程评价。     

‘I – from dreams to reality’: A Case Study of Developing Youngsters’ Self‐Efficacy and Social Skills through an Arts Educational Project in Schools

This is a case study of a one‐year arts educational project ‘I – from dreams to reality’ in which artists worked at school with teachers and learning at the school was planned through arts‐based, co‐operative teamwork during one extra school year of 10th grade students in Finnish basic education. The theme of the year was ‘I’, and so the project was designed to highlight everyone's own way of thinking and expressing art. The research task was to determine whether long‐term holistic arts pedagogy and artist co‐operation at school have any significant connection to students’ self‐efficacy and social skills. Data has been collected through students’ self‐evaluations before and after the school year. Altogether 40 students from 10th grade participated in this case study. Half of the pupils participated in an arts educational project called ‘I – from dreams to reality’ and half formed the control group. Artists worked with the test group weekly during a period of one school year (altogether nine months). Students’ self‐evaluations concerning their self‐efficacy and social behaviour were collected by e‐questionnaire. The measures used were Likert‐based evaluation scores of pupils’ self‐assessment of their self‐efficacy and social behaviour in everyday situations at school. According to the results, artist–teacher co‐operation and learning through the arts can be worthwhile experiences to develop students’ self‐efficacy and social skills.     

师范生就业问题探析

随着我国高等教育大众程度的不断提高,以及高校招生就业制度改革不断深化,大学生就业问题日益成为全社会关注的焦点。师范生是我国面向各级各类学校系统,特别是基础教育系统培养的具有一定学科专业知识并接受了教师职业技能训练的大学生,是我国大学生群体的重要组成部分。在＂自主择业,双向选择＂就业制度建立以后,特别是开放的教师教育体系与教师资格制度实施以后,师范生面临着与普通高校毕业生同样的就业问题,甚至要比普通大学生面临更加严峻的考验。     

‘If there's a dead rat,don't leave it’. Young children's understanding of their citizenship rights and responsibilities

Concerns about pupil disengagement from school and society have led to compulsory citizenship education in state schools in England. However, there is little evidence that the new citizenship education is meeting its goals. The research described here assesses a new approach to citizenship education that appears to overcome some of the identified obstacles in current practices. Hampshire's ‘Rights, respect and responsibility’ initiative is a rights‐based whole school reform of school policies and practices. Under this initiative the contemporaneous citizenship status of pupils is respected, pupils are taught about their rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and democratic participation is made meaningful in classroom and school functioning. Of particular interest is that the initiative starts in infant schools. This research indicates that young children can understand their rights and responsibilities in ways that are meaningful to their everyday behaviour and that rights‐based whole school reform has the capacity to improve pupil learning and citizenship behaviours.