Lecturers’ and students’ conceptions of authenticity in teaching and actual teacher actions and attributes students perceive as helpful

This study investigated an under-explored area in the field of academic practice: the meaning of the complex notion of authenticity in teaching. Combining conceptual with empirical investigation, data included philosophical texts, repertory grid interviews with fifty-five lecturers and students from Law, Physics and English Literature, and fourteen focus groups with forty-six students. Philosophical conceptions were compared to those held by students and lecturers. Qualitative and quantitative analyses of repertory grids revealed differences in experts’/philosophers’ and lay-people’s conceptions of authenticity and additionally showed how lecturers’ and students’ conceptions of authenticity in teaching differed from their conceptions of teaching effectiveness. Focus groups identified linkages between authenticity in teaching and actual teacher actions and attributes that students perceive as being conducive to their learning. The findings enhance the meaning of authenticity, show how it matters in university teaching and offer a hitherto lacking theoretical foundation for further research.     

University students’ and teachers’ conceptions of teaching and learning in the biosciences

In this study we compare university teachers’ and first-year students’ conceptions of teaching and learning at the Faculty of Environmental and Biological Sciences. The conceptions were analysed using data from open-ended questionnaires. The results showed that at the beginning of studies the gap between teachers’ and students’ conceptions of teaching and learning is substantial. This finding has important implications for the educational process. In order to enhance successful studying from the beginning of students’ university careers, it is important for teachers to become aware of the differences between students’ and teachers’ conceptions of learning.     

‘In-between’ Asia and Australia: on the politics of teaching English as the ‘Other’

This article mobilizes story-telling to narrate my lived experience of teaching English as a minority academic in one Australian university. Positioning myself as living ‘in-between’ two cultures and as an ‘Other’, I tell my story of how I have been ‘racialized’ and ‘Othered’ because I do not look White, and my spoken English is distinctly accented; hence, my legitimacy of teaching English is held suspect. My story contributes to the theorizing of the sociology of the in-between with the argument that while living in-between culture can be a space of negativity, it can also be a space of empowerment if one exercises choice and agency by forging new spaces. I end my story-telling with a happy ending by presenting a contrasting story of how my run-away from Australia to (a new space in) Hong Kong to teach English has reaffirmed my cultural capital as I morph into a different ‘Other’.     

Engineering students’ experiences of interactive teaching in calculus

This study reports on an educational development initiative where peer instruction was used instead of traditional lectures in a calculus course for first-year engineering students. The aim of the study was to explore students’ experiences of this method. Data were collected by means of an open-ended questionnaire on two occasions: early and late in the course. The data were analyzed with an inductive content analysis. The findings comprise three qualitatively different ways to experience the interactive teaching method in calculus: (1) enthusiasm, (2) nuanced skepticism and (3) aversion. The categories differed regarding emotional reactions to the teaching, experiences of learning, conceptions of teaching and learning, and experiences of meaningfulness. Many students expressed enthusiasm for learning with peer instruction and noted that the method gave both teachers and students feedback on what students have difficulties with. These students perceived that they were responsible for their own learning. Other students experienced that peer instruction had some advantages and disadvantages, and preferred a mix between traditional lectures and peer instruction sessions. They seemed to believe that teachers and students share responsibility for learning. Some students expressed an aversion for peer instruction and the method seemed to challenge their beliefs of how teaching and learning is best conducted. Our study illustrates that educational development initiatives, even though based on research on student learning, do not benefit all students. One of the major obstacles seems to be that students’ underlying beliefs regarding teaching and learning may be counterproductive to the ideas behind the educational initiative. We suggest that beliefs regarding teaching and learning need to be addressed when introducing new teaching and learning methods.     

Establishing ‘fields of care’: teaching settings as active participants in science education

In their article, “Space, relations, and the learning of science,” Wolff-Michael Roth and Pei-Ling Hsu draw our attention to the importance of field in the teaching and learning of science. While the Roth and Hsu study is focused on the scientific research laboratory as an internship setting for the teaching of science, this response to their paper expands the discussion of the settings where science is taught in order to bring to the fore some of the affordances and challenges associated with teaching science in specific fields. By extending our thinking about the settings where science is taught/learned and the active role these settings play in teaching our students, we can re-envision how to better utilize a variety of fields in the teaching of science. The notion of ‘field of care’ is explored as a way of both finding and building connections between students and the settings where science is experienced.     

The positioning of students in newly qualified secondary teachers’ images of their ‘best teaching’

Asking newly qualified teachers (NQTs) to provide images of their ‘best teaching’, and encouraging subsequent reflection on these images, has the potential to enhance their understanding of themselves as teachers as they explore their often unconsciously held assumptions about students and classrooms. This paper reports aspects of a study of 100 New Zealand secondary NQTs as they constructed and explained images of themselves when ‘teaching at their best’ at three points over the first 18 months of full-time teaching. The article shows how these images of ‘best teaching’ may represent the NQTs’ pedagogical creed, and explores the nature of relationships and ways of working with students described within this developing pedagogy. It concludes by indicating implications from this study for teacher education pedagogies and programmes.     

‘We’re as good as anybody else’: a comparative study of working-class university students’ experiences in England and Ireland

This article is based on a comparative study of working-class students’ experiences in English and Irish higher education. It highlights the lack of comparative studies on this topic based on qualitative research and why filling this gap is important in understanding access and widening participation. Drawing on biographical interviews with 139 people in a range of elite and non-elite institutions, the article discusses similarities as well as some differences between the data from the two countries in terms of class, identity and how working-class students view and value higher education. It maps out how the research relates to recent debates over social class and outlines the theoretical implications of these findings.     

Dialogic teaching and students’ discursive identity negotiation in the learning of science

This study sought to understand how dialogic teaching, as enacted in everyday classroom interaction, affords students opportunities for identity negotiation as learners of science. By drawing on sociocultural and sociolinguistic accounts, the study examined how students’ discursive identities were managed and recognized in the moment and over time during dialogic teaching and what consequences these negotiations had for their engagement in science learning. The study used video data of classroom interactions collected from an elementary science learning project and placed a specific analytic focus on four students in particular. The results reveal evidence of a rich variety of discursive identities exposed during dialogic teaching, thus demonstrating how the students’ identity negotiations were configured according to the social architecture of classroom discourse. Addressing the temporal dimension of dialogic teaching points out critical shifts in the students’ discursive identities, of which identification is argued to be pivotal when creating equitable science learning opportunities.     

Changing times in the classroom: teaching as a ‘crowded profession’

Abstract

This article reports on a study of teachers in New South Wales (Australia) and their practices surrounding outcomes assessment and reporting, which took place in 2003 and 2004 as a follow-up to a major study in 1995. The study explored whether the main focus of a teacher's work involves planning, teaching, assessing, rewarding and sharing in their classroom and with colleagues, and whether this focus suffered many distractions in the flurry of reforms of the past decade. One example of ‘changing times’ in the classroom has been the devolution of school management, which caused a number of diversions of energy and time away from teaching and learning. Yet even in the area of curriculum schools were struggling with a range of issues, many brought on by the advent of outcomes-based curricula. In seeking to change what happens in schools, teachers argued that they needed clear and well-argued reasons to change. This article thus provides an update on the relevant research, beginning with national and international experiences, before a discussion of workload, the place of parents and school organizational effects. One finding is that alongside a ‘crowded curriculum’, teaching has become a ‘crowded profession’. The article concludes with reflections on how changing times in the classroom mean social reform as well as educational reform, in which teaching and learning shape effects and consequences from educational events so that knowledge grows through experiences, measuring possibilities not outcomes.     

‘Selective cosmopolitans’: tutors’ and students’ experience of offshore higher education in Dubai

As the offshore mobility of higher education has increased in recent times, the question of how it interacts with the recipient cultures has become ever more significant. Using ethnographic methods, this empirical study examined the adaptation of the UK teacher education model – the Postgraduate Certificate in Education – to the context of Dubai. The study asks ‘how do students and tutors experience the adaptation of British education in the context of Dubai?’ This paper will argue that tutors and students in offshore Dubai teacher education are ‘selective cosmopolitans’ who negotiate cross-cultural influences pragmatically and ambivalently. The study addresses a significant gap in the literature, as there is little written on the internationalisation of higher education in the context of Gulf Cooperation Council countries. There is also an inadequate appreciation of the role of local culture and religion in offshore education and tutors and students’ role as active agents in negotiating cross-cultural dynamics in the offshore educational setting.     

‘Responsibility in mobility’: international students and social responsibility

Enhancing the educational experience and social connectedness for international students is the responsibility of different involved parties among whom international students themselves and host institutions play a key role. However, the question of how the condition of cross-border mobility has shaped and re-shaped international students’ responsibility towards the home and host country and other social relationships that have been formed via their mobility experiences is often neglected. This paper examines the social nature of international students’ responsibility. It is derived from a research project funded by the Australian Research Council that includes fieldwork and semi-structured interviews with 155 staff and international students from 25 institutions in Australia over 4 years. Using positioning theory as a conceptual framework, the study shows that it is important to take into account the tangible aspects of transnational mobility in understanding international student responsibility rather than merely locating their responsibility in simple cultural, personal or institutional parameters. The study suggests the important roles of host institutions and community in creating conducive conditions and opportunities for international students to exercise responsibility as social members and intercultural learners. Enhancing student social responsibility and capacity for enacting responsibility is essential for nurturing meaningful transnational citizenship.     

Graduate students’ conceptions of university teaching and learning: formation for change

The paper introduces a framework concerning conceptions of teaching and learning of advanced graduate students and the trajectory of change in their conceptions following a formal course on course design and teaching. Students were enrolled in six sections of this graduate course, two offered in a 6-week format and 4 in a 13-week format. The courses were taught by three different instructors. Data were obtained from 88 doctoral students before and after the course using four questions pertaining to the meaning of effective teaching, effective learning, role of the teacher, and role of the learner. Using an open coding procedure, four conceptions were identified. These were transmitting knowledge, preparing context/managing instruction, promoting course learning, and promoting life-long learning. The generalized linear model procedure was used to conduct within and between group pre and post course comparisons. Overall, there was a significant change in response frequency ratios in all four categories across all courses, indicating a decrease in the responses in the first two categories and an increase in the frequency of responses in the last two categories. No significant differences were attributed to course type or instructor.     

Interaction of the originality of peers’ ideas and students’ openness to experience in predicting creativity in online collaborative groups

There has been growing interest in the possibility that peers’ ideas can stimulate students’ creativity in group contexts. However, empirical research on this issue is limited. This study tested the hypothesis that peers’ ideas and students’ openness to experience would predict student creativity and attention to peers’ ideas. Undergraduate students (n = 60) completed creative tasks in an online collaborative group in which the ideas of “peers” were pre-programmed. Mixed ANOVAs showed support for the hypothesis. Specifically, students with higher (but not lower) openness, when exposed to a high (but not low) rate of peers’ original ideas, paid greater attention to those ideas and were more creative. The implication for education is that teachers should encourage students to share more of their original ideas and to pay more attention to peers’ ideas in online collaborative groups.     

Boys' ‘underachievement’ and the feminization of teaching

In England, Scotland and other countries, policy‐makers often depict the targeted recruitment of men to the teaching profession as a panacea for male underachievement and disaffection from school. It is commonly assumed that the gender gap in achievement stems from the dearth of male role models in teaching, especially at primary level. Giving particular attention to recent literature on the influence of teacher gender on classroom interaction and educational outcomes, the paper begins by scrutinizing the policy's evidence‐base. We move on to examine the findings of a qualitative study conducted in English primary schools. Drawing upon data from semi‐structured interviews with teachers of 7‐ to 8‐year‐olds (25 men, 26 women), an attempt is made to assess their responses to the policy of targeted male recruitment and perceptions of the benefits of same‐gender matching. The paper (an earlier version of which paper was presented at the European Educational Research Association's Annual Conference at the University of Ghent, September 2007) concludes by tentatively exploring the implications of this small‐scale study for policy and practice.