What PISA and ASPIRES studies tell us about the nuanced influence of cultural capital on student learning: Construct complexity,student outcomes and contexts

This article juxtaposes the evolving scholarship investigating the influence of cultural capital on student learning and the developing trajectory of sociologists employing quantitative research methods. It critically reviews results from 34 studies analysing PISA or ASPIRES data to generate three key insights demonstrating complexities in relationships between cultural capital and student outcomes. First, cultural capital is a complex construct with many variables (different forms of cultural capital, highbrow/non-highbrow cultural capital) varying in their association with student literacy and parents’ cultural capital affecting student literacy both directly and indirectly. Second, the influence of cultural capital may vary with types of student outcomes measured. Specifically, there are cultural variables associated with student literacy in different subjects, some cultural capital variables are more important for student literacy for a subject, and cultural capital influences student aspirations in addition to their literacy. Third, the influence of cultural capital on student literacy may vary with educational and social contexts. Cultural capital is more important in decentralised education systems, in low-achieving schools within differentiated education systems, in higher-quality schools and in more unequal, developed societies. In contrast, it matters less in high-achieving and standardised education systems, and in societies valuing education. Given the complexity in cultural capital, future research can ascertain how each cultural capital variable contributes to student learning and compare their effectiveness. It is also important to identify which cultural capital variables matter for specific student outcomes. Lastly, these insights highlight the need to recognise contextual differences in studies of social inequality.     

Literacy and literary learning on BookTube through the lenses of Latina BookTubers

In this study, we examine various aspects of BookTubers' literacy practices, regarding the personal and social factors that lead readers to devote themselves to the BookTube community, the elements that BookTubers consider as they create and publish video book reviews and the sort of literary learning this digital literacy practice entails. For this purpose, narrative interviews were conducted with six BookTubers, five of them from Latin America and one from Spain. Their answers offer insights into the motivations and unique types of learning that come together in this literary practice. A qualitative analysis of the interviews shows that affective engagement with books is a singular feature of BookTubers' understanding of reading culture and that literary video reviews are created in a complex bricolage process where resources, skills and knowledge are mobilised and develop, both aspects also being associated with the development of an online social reading identity. In addition, an ecological approach to analysing literacy and literary learning in the BookTuber culture points to the importance of framing video book reviews as a didactic resource with considerable potential to bring new learning practices to in-school literary education.     

The alchemy of learning and work: negotiating learner knowledge in a global society

This article explores issues of literacy and identity of skilled migrants in an educational context in Australia as a learning society. First, it concentrates on forms of knowledge imposed on the learner and looks at how new discourses shape the self. Next, it tests the validity of the four pillars of education in the life of the learner. The paper then discusses the notion of lifelong learning and its appeal to (or existence for) the migrant learners. Finally, it poses important questions about Self–Other dichotomy, emergent voices and a sense of integration. The analysis suggests that further education and employability are closely linked to acquiring discourses set by the education policy designers and the workplace. Without mastering both, passports to further/higher education or professional and other jobs are not issued. The paper argues that literacy skills that incorporate new discourses penetrate and shape existing identities, giving them a sense of new selves, but do not necessarily empower the agency, as the self in control of one’s life. However, hope is not lost, as shown by the group of dedicated educators whose efforts to support the migrant‐learners lead to meeting their goals in work and education of their choice. When embraced by the society, these learners gain a genuine sense of belonging and move away from the position of being Self/Other marginalised. The article concludes by drawing together issues of literacy, identity, knowledge and lifelong learning that interconnected, if harnessed and used wisely, ultimately emancipate and give a decision‐making voice to migrant citizens. Thus they become knowledge workers whose acceptance and personal satisfaction, I firmly believe, contribute to a freer and happier global society.

At the boundary life blossoms.

James Gleick, Chaos

     

图书馆在大学生信息素养教育中的作用

信息素养是信息时代的人才特征,是知识经济时代大学生应具备的基本素质,图书馆在信息素养教育中具有举足轻重的地位与作用。加强对大学生信息素养的培养和提升,是社会对高等教育的要求,也是高等教育事业顺应社会发展,深化教育改革的需要。公共图书馆应发挥其资源优势、技术优势和专业人才优势,培养和提升大学生的信息素养。     

Capital and Knowledge Flows: Global higher education markets

Accelerating global flows of people and information have formed new communities and networks across social and political borders. Higher education is one such globalised knowledge community in which new patterns of knowledge, accreditation, research alliances, and social and professional relationships are emerging. In this paper I outline the push–pull dynamics of globalisation in higher education: the co-constitutive nature of local and global interests and educational formations; disjunctive flows of capital, information, people, and knowledge; and the new politics of knowledge capital as they affect academic research and the public archive of scholarly publishing and university libraries. I close with reflections on the differential consequences of globalisation on: the role of the nation state in higher education provision and reform; the role of education in nation building and national identity politics; and the governability of a global eduscape.     

The role of work-related learning in the identity transformation of Canadian workers with low literacy skills

Workplaces are settings where power, knowledge and self are brought together in a complex social environment which includes various forms of struggle related to identity, agency, socio-cultural norms, political structures and functional practices. The purpose of this article is to uncover how formal and informal work-related learning processes influence the identity transformation of workers with low literacy and essential skills. Drawing on two recent Canadian data bases which serve as cases in this study, the position taken by the authors is that the organisational context can both facilitate and impede worker subjectivity. Various conditions, approaches to learning and training pathways are examined as they contribute to social cognitive and transformative learning theories.     

Language and culture: Critical components of multicultural teacher education

This article identifies components of a course on multiculturalism in teacher education. The course proposes four stages of awareness: ethnic identity exploration; development of knowledge in language and literacy acquisition; refinement of a repertoire for cultural ways of teaching and learning; and selection of a teaching style. A variety of readings and activities for teacher education are proposed.     

Women,literacy and health: comparing health and education sectoral approaches in Nepal

Functional adult literacy interventions have been regarded for many decades by policy makers as an effective way of imparting health knowledge. Supported by research on the statistical relationships between women’s literacy rates and health indicators, this dominant policy discourse is based on assumptions that non-literate women lack understanding and confidence, and that formal programmes and institutions constitute the main sites of learning. Proposing a broader conceptualisation of literacy as a social practice and of health as connected with social justice, this article draws on policy analysis and the authors’ earlier research in Nepal to re-examine the relationship between gender, literacy and health. By comparing health and literacy approaches used within the education and health sectors and taking account of new and indigenous informal learning practices, the article points to ways of investigating the complex interaction of factors that influence inequalities in gender and health at community level.     

‘Education makes you have more say in the way your life goes’: Indian women and arranged marriages in the United Kingdom

This paper explores Indian women’s views on arranged marriages in the United Kingdom. It is based on research carried out with 32 Indian women studying at a university in the South East of England, UK. The article draws on Wenger’s social theory of learning to explore how Indian women’s participation in communities of practice in higher education contributes to their participation in arranged marriages. The concept of ‘social capital’ is used to discuss how women are able to negotiate their participation in arranged marriages, It is used to examine the knowledge and identity resources that women develop through their participation in higher education, which provides them with the means from which to develop the necessary ‘bridging ties’ leading to their active participation in the wider South Asian community.     

Literacy in a ‘broad and balanced’ primary school curriculum: the potential of a disciplinary approach in Irish classrooms

The prominence afforded to literacy in the Irish Primary School Curriculum has received considerable attention in recent years, spurred by Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) rankings, governmental priorities, public commentary and academic debate. At times, this discourse has presented literacy as a separate and distinct entity to the other areas of the curriculum, including the arts, social and scientific education. The current paper proposes a more integrated view of literacy’s role in the curriculum. Recent research on the teaching of literacy in the content areas has emphasised the potential of a disciplinary approach, which embraces the key skills, dispositions and forms of knowledge connected with reading, writing, speaking and listening in different disciplines. This paper examines some of the key features of disciplinary literacy, including its underpinning rationale and learning implications. It also highlights the potential for a disciplinary literacy lens in the review of the Primary School Curriculum, as well as associated opportunities and challenges.     

社会资本对当代教育的影响

20世纪90年代以来,社会资本已经成为当今社会科学领域最前沿和最具影响力的概念之一。学术界从重视人力资本转向重视社会资本,这是理论上的超越和升华,对于教育而言,将打破人力资本理论在教育领域的霸权地位,给教育带来深远影响。对社会资本本身的研究将凸显教育者与受教育者之间关系的主体间交往的本质;社会资本使传统的智力观受到了挑战;促进了知识的新生产;知识传授过程既受社会资本的影响,同时本身也生产社会资本;学校、家庭、社会之间的网络以及学生、家长、教师之间的关系在学生学业成就和学校发展方面具有极其重要的作用。     

Child Education and Literacy Learning for Multicultural Societies: The case of the Brazilian National Curricular References for Child Education (NCRs)

The present paper discusses possible ways to promote a multicultural child education and literacy learning, focusing on identity building and language development. In the light of that framework, it critically analyses the Brazilian government's recently issued 'National Curricular References for Child Education'. It argues that the predominance of a monocultural, cognitive-based approach to child education and literacy learning, evidenced in the document, should be detrimental to children whose cultural and linguistic patterns are discontinuous with the school ones. It also highlights potentials of the multicultural thinking in reducing literacy learning discrepancies and promoting educational equity.     

Language Attitudes and Community Engagement: Diwan–The Breton Immersion High School Through the Eyes of Its Pupils

This article is based on long-term participant observation and interviews with pupils and graduates of the Diwan immersion high school in Brittany, France. With reference to the theory of communities of practice, this article shows how the education in the Breton immersion school can influence a knowledge of the minority language and the young peoples’ engagement with the protection of the Breton language. This article presents the social and cultural capital received through the learning of the Breton language; the distinction between Diwan pupils and people from outside the community; and the gradual formation of a collective new Breton-speakers identity. The sociolinguistic prognostic shows that in a few dozen years the only Breton speakers will be Breton learners. The use of Breton depends thus on having knowledge of it and on finding a community in which this language acts as the benchmark for the creation of a Breton identity.     

从数字素养到数字能力:概念流变、构成要素与整合模型

数字能力被视为数字时代重要的生存技能和知识资产,是指在工作、职业、学习、娱乐以及社会参与中自信及创造性地使用ICT的能力。数字能力包含工具性知识与技能、高级知识与技能、知识与技能的应用态度三个维度,这一概念框架聚合了从信息素养到数字素养等一系列相关子概念。通过知识、技能和态度三维度将数字能力概念框架映射至教育领域,重构其构成要素,从而建立起数字能力的整合模型。数字能力整合模型的建构为培养个体数字能力灵活考虑各种知识、技能和态度提供了基础,同时也勾勒了学习时代个人基本素养和教育目标的最新图景。     

普惠金融视域下西部地区农民金融素养水平及其影响因素

提升农民金融素养水平是构建农村普惠金融体系的重要内容。文章从金融意识、金融知识和金融能力3个维度,构建了由储蓄意识、信贷知识、财务计算能力等18个指标组成的金融素养测度指标体系及其维度指数和综合指数,基于908份调查问卷,实证分析了西部地区农民的金融素养水平及其影响因素。研究发现:西部地区农民金融素养水平相对较低,新型职业农民和创业农民的金融素养水平显著高于其他农民;教育程度、家庭收入、社会资本、金融发展、信息技术使用能力和使用程度对西部地区农民金融素养水平具有显著的正向影响,而年龄与金融机构网点距离的影响显著为负。据此应采取广泛开展"金融保险知识下乡"等金融知识与金融技能普及推广活动、加大农村地区金融机构网点建设、充实农民金融素养普及推广队伍等措施以提高西部地区农民的金融素养水平。     

Transformative and emancipatory literacy to empower

ABSTRACT

This paper draws on sociological and critical educational frames, particularly Bourdieu’s concept of symbolic violence, in order to contest the dominant model of literacy education that is driven by the premise of a ‘knowledge economy’. Instead it foregrounds the political, social, and economic factors that marginalise learners. Data from two projects: an ethnographic study in a Further Education (FE) College in England and a study of community-based literacy programmes in Scotland, are probed to show how literacy classes can offer spaces to challenge symbolic violence and facilitate learners to reclaim identities of success. These changes are illustrated from the learners’ views of the contrasts between their experiences of school education and literacy programmes that use transformative and emancipatory approaches. Our research demonstrates how critical education can open up spaces for a more equitable approach based on the co-production of knowledge. It is argued that making changes to policy and practice could inform and shape the literacy curriculum and its pedagogy if adult literacy can disentangle itself from instrumental approaches driven by neoliberal fusion and instead create critical space for contextualised and emancipatory learning.     

Learner Identity in Chinese as a Foreign/Second Language Education: A Critical Review

This paper reports the results of a review of 33 journal articles chosen from 87 empirical studies on learner identity in Chinese as a foreign/second language (CFL/CSL) education, published during the years 2005–2019. By analyzing the co-occurrence of keywords in these Social Science Citation Index (SSCI) journal articles, this review identifies the theoretical perspectives and topical trends of CFL/CSL education research on learner identity. The review shows that while such post-structuralist theories and notions as capital, identity and investment model have continued to play a predominant role in CFL/CSL identity research, interdisciplinary perspectives seem to also demonstrate their theoretical value and interpretive power. Furthermore, the review found that researchers explored a wide array of topical issues in relation to learner identity involved in the complex linguistic and social ecology of Chinese language learning. The review concludes with suggestions for future projects to consider that expand the thematic and theoretical scope by exploring intersections between different social categories and learner identities in societal contexts.     

Adolescents' Agentic Work on Developing Personal Pedagogies on Social Media

While current research points out that young people are developing emerging culture of learning in informal spaces, less is known about such digital literacy practices in the Asian contexts where the notion of literacy tends to refer to school literacy. Research on young people's online participatory culture continues to suggest that social media offer affinity spaces where extensive knowledge is acquired, constructed and produced outside of schools. In this paper, we use two case studies on social media as illustrative examples to understand how adolescents shape their learning online. We aim to contribute to the ongoing dialectics on social media and learning by examining how adolescents exhibit agency online. We argue that social media such as Facebook offer high learner agency environments for adolescents to participate in self‐initiated enterprise and allow them to develop personal trajectories for learning. The case studies presented in this paper suggested that the adolescents' pursuit of their passions on online affinity spaces gave rise to intellectual friendships and the development of personal pedagogies.     

Using information and communication technologies to engage students in the later years of schooling in learning content and literacy: Case studies of three teachers

Literacy for a 21st century context is far more complex than reading and writing print. As society and information and communication technology (ICT) has changed, so what counts as literacy and how a person is deemed to be literate has changed. Students from low socio-economic backgrounds in the later years of schooling require access to multiple literacies mediated through ICT and to teachers who are willing to provide opportunities for them to be taught explicitly. ICT can promote the learning of the content as well as learning the literacies associated with specific subject areas. This paper will focus on how three teachers in the later years of schooling (years 9–12) used technology to enhance learning and engagement of students in learning the literacies associated with their subject. They challenged the hegemony of print literacy by providing opportunities to develop students understanding, critique and creation of multimodal texts, but also supported students in achieving more effective print literacy. These teachers provided appropriate teaching for students from low socio-economic backgrounds, engaging them in thinking, feeling and acting at high levels while simultaneously providing positive messages about their knowledge, ability, control, place and voice. Their pedagogical approach supported the development of cultural and social capital that will enhance their students’ life options.