Sexing the Subject: Teachers,pedagogies and sex education

This article analyses the relationship between sexual biography and pedagogic practice. It is based on life history interviews with sex education practitioners (teachers and a school nurse) that aimed to explore elements of these individuals' sexual biographies, their experiences of learning about sex and their pedagogic practice. The article considers why the sexuality of sex educators may be important, how this manifests itself in school and, finally, some of the implications for policy and practice.     

Re-envisioning Teacher Preparation: Lessons from China

Stereotypes of the 'Chinese learner' have been extensively investigated, leading to the conclusion that knowledge about the social, cultural and pedagogic origins of Chinese students' dispositions to learning should be incorporated into programs preparing teachers for China service. In this paper it is suggested that teacher education initiatives of this type should redress sociological blindness about the particularity of local pedagogic contexts. A case study of the production of 'obedient' students in the Chinese school system during the 1990s is presented, illustrating sociological tools that enable analysis of the origin of students' dispositions to learning in particular conditions. The recommendation is that such tools be incorporated into teacher education for domestic, as well as international contexts, given the critical insight that is required if teachers are to provide equitably for all students in conditions of increasing cultural diversification and re-traditionalisation of education.     

Teacher Agency in South African Education Policy Related to School Safety

Abstract

Safety in and around schools is an on-going concern in South Africa. Current education policy related to school safety institutes mechanisms to reduce violence as a measure of promoting safety. The highest rate of violence reported by learners occurs in the classroom. By implication, how teachers are either enabled or constrained to respond to violent incidents in classrooms is critical. With the aim to determine how education policy related to school safety either enables or constrains teacher agency in South African education policy related to school safety, the article reports on a study that examined the mechanisms of the National School Safety Framework (NSSF) together with the context at schools. The study found that the NSSF mechanisms and school context find little enabling teacher agentic action, where learning is concerned. Although the NSSF mechanisms require teachers to perform many roles as measures of reducing violence to promote school safety, none involve pedagogic strategies or techniques. Given that teachers’ greatest challenge in the context of violence is the disruption of teaching and learning, the NSSF mechanisms are inadequate as an education policy related to school safety within the current context of insecurity in South African schools.     

Digital literacy,fake news and education / Alfabetización digital,fake news y educación

Abstract

The role of digital literacy in strengthening citizens’ resilience to misinformation and ‘fake news’ has been the subject of research projects and networking and academic and policy discourses in recent years, given prominence by an escalation of the perceived crisis following election and referendum results in the US and UK respectively. This special issue sets out to take forward critical dialogue in the field of media and digital literacy education by publishing rigorous research on the subject. The research disseminated in this collection speaks to the political and economic contexts for ‘fake news’, the complex issue of trust and the risks of educational solutionism; questions of definition and policy implementation; teaching about specific subgenres such as YouTube and clickbait; international comparisons of pedagogic approaches and challenges for teachers in this changing ecosystem.     

Meritocracy in Singapore

Abstract

This article considers the role of meritocracy in the ruling ideology of Singapore. It argues that meritocracy, far from being a system for the management of scarce resources, is in fact the imposition of scarcity. It uses the example of the university in Singapore as the prime site for the production of meritocratic ideology and considers the consequences of meritocratic higher education as it articulates with meritocracy more generally in the Singapore polity.     

Changes and challenges in school-age childcare in Copenhagen

ABSTRACT

The social pedagogic tradition has been integral to the culture of early childhood education including School Age Childcare (SAC) in Denmark for decades. Drawing upon interviews with multiple stakeholders: lecturers, representatives of an Education Research Institute, union activists an SAC provider and a policy maker, in Copenhagen, Denmark, this paper builds upon previous work to explore a paradigm shift in how SAC is organised, governed and supported in Copenhagen. Findings point to a repositioning of SAC within the educational landscape, where the traditional emphasis upon leisure and recreation is being overshadowed by academic achievement and accountability. There is evidence of tensions between teachers and pedagogues as they negotiate how to work together within SAC. Findings are salient to Ireland, where recent reports and initiatives see a renewed focus on SAC, as the State examines how best to support this emerging sector.     

Analysing meritocratic (in)equality in Singapore: ideology,curriculum and reproduction

In this article I first discuss how in Singapore the concept of meritocracy captures both elitist and egalitarian aspirations, and the ways in which its education policies have for a long time vacillated between these conflicting dimensions. I then argue that critical studies of meritocracy need to go beyond an understanding of the term as an inherently unstable concept instantiated problematically in policy and practice. Rather, as I develop the argument further, the dynamics of meritocracy needs to be appreciated as an ideology that is negotiated by dominant social groups as these seek to legitimize particular distributions of social resources. Such dominant ideologies, however, are not only produced in the education system; they are also reproduced through it, often in far more complex ways. To see how these ideologies and their tensions animate the very mechanism that sits at the centre of the reproduction of (in)equality, viz. the curriculum, the rest of the article provides an account of how one particular subject area is differently taught in an elite and a mainstream school.     

Describing the cognitive landscape in learning and teaching about forces

This study focuses on student and in-service primary teachers learning about balanced and unbalanced forces in a range of contexts and identifies significant features of the learning process from the learners' perspectives. It describes how students are able to apply key ideas about forces from their own learning about floating and sinking to a range of contexts including structures and aspects of motion. In exploring how understanding is constructed important implications are raised with respect to the pedagogic knowledge required of teachers in the Initial Teacher Training National Curriculum in the UK.     

Being in Authority,Being an Authority: Disrupting students'/teachers' practices in literacy education

This is the second case study situated within my teaching of two undergraduate courses in the college of education of a large American university. It interrogates social forms that construct pedagogic and literate authority relations between preservice English education students and their teachers. It illustrates how teachers and students can negotiate engagement in critical literacy practice by constructing instructional circumstances that allow preservice teachers to question the kinds of practices that thwart the various aims of critical literacy and pedagogy. This study narrates a "critical incident" as a form of "practice-as-inquiry research", using field-notes, tape recordings, and interviews to describe four moments within the span of an activity that takes its historical antecedent in the work of I.A. Richards. The interpretation and analysis is informed by Pierre Bourdieu's reflexive sociology. The paper argues that teachers' disciplinary and pedagogical knowledge should not be undervalued or denied because with this knowledge comes an ethical responsibility to shape educative experiences for students that open them up to reflection and critique.     

Curriculum policy reform in an era of technical accountability: ‘fixing’ curriculum,teachers and students in English schools

Abstract

Drawing on a Levinasian ethical perspective, the argument driving this paper is that the technical accountability movement currently dominating the educational system in England is less than adequate because it overlooks educators’ responsibility for ethical relations in responding to difference in respect of the other. Curriculum policy makes a significant contribution to the technical accountability culture through complicity in performativity, high-stakes testing and datafication, at the same time as constituting student and teacher subjectivities. I present two different conceptualizations of subjectivity and education, before engaging these in the analysis of data arising from an empirical study which investigated teachers’ and stakeholders’ experiences of curriculum policy reform in ‘disadvantaged’ English schools. The study’s findings demonstrate how a prescribed programme of technical curriculum regulation attempts to ‘fix’ or mend educational problems by ‘fixing’ or prescribing educational solutions. This not only denies ethical professional relations between students, teachers and parents, but also deflects responsibility for educational success from government to teachers and hastens the move from public to private educational provision. Complying with prescribed curriculum policy requirements shifts attention from broad philosophical and ethical questions about educational purpose as well as conferring a violence by assuming control over student and teacher subjectivities.     

7 Urban politics and state school finance in the 1980s 1

This chapter examines the effects of the major policy and political trends in lower education during the 1980s. Specifically, it assesses the programmatic and fiscal effects of the Reagan administration's fiscal federalism, the excellence agenda and the emerging state activism on urban school districts. The focus is on California as an illustrative case study, as the state represents an inchoate national trend toward fiscal centralization. The chapter argues that centralization has created a new politics of school finance. Not only do schools compete for funding with higher education, health, welfare, criminal justice and transportation, but students also compete with teachers over categorical funding. The chapter concludes that policies of categorical funding have changed dramatically. While symbolically they are rooted in equity, in reality they represent a new political spoils system.

     

The three-tiered support system and the special education teachers’ role in Swedish-speaking schools in Finland

ABSTRACT

In 2010, new amendments regarding special education were made to the Finnish Basic Education Act (642/2010), and they were officially adopted in 2011. The three-tiered support system that was introduced can be considered the Finnish approach to moving education toward a more inclusive system since it emphasises all teachers’ responsibility to deliver support within the regular educational setting, representing a new feature in the policy documents. This has brought about new expectations for special education teachers’ (SETs’) roles. Our research aims to contribute to knowledge about the implementation of the three-tiered support system and SETs’ roles in Swedish-speaking schools in Finland. The data were collected using a questionnaire (N = 158). The results indicate that the SETs have an important role in the three-tiered support system, both as those with the knowledge and those who share this knowledge. The SETs’ role is more evident when it comes to pupils receiving support on the second and third tiers. Although inclusive values are emphasised in the policy documents, the SETs still use most of their time teaching pupils in educational settings that are often relatively segregated (individual or small-group teaching), and for example, co-teaching seems to be a less frequent approach to collaboration.     

The school cluster system as an innovation: Perceptions of Zimbabwean teachers and school heads

Abstract

School clusters, that is, the grouping of schools within the same geographical location, for economic, pedagogic, administrative and political purposes (Bray, 1987), have arisen as one possible solution to developing countries’ battles to achieve both quantitative and qualitative advances in their education systems within the framework of financial austerity. However, there remain questions regarding how those tasked to implement this innovation perceive it. Through a multi-site case study of five schools using a questionnaire and interviews with teachers and school heads, findings suggest that both macro and micro problems prevented the cluster from achieving its capacity building goals. Key threats included the nature of the cluster model adopted, the centralisation tendency of the education system, the dual ownership of schools, resistance to change and the under-utilisation of resources.     

Making connections: a conference approach to developing transformative environmental and sustainability education within initial teacher education

Abstract

Children today face significant challenges in response to living in a globalised world and the predicted environmental threats to the planet. However, implementing environmental and sustainability education (ESE) within schools can be complex and is often ignored within initial teacher education (ITE). In response, this project aimed to evaluate pedagogies for developing transformative learning for ESE within the context of university-based ITE. We ran a conference for trainee teachers informed by critical, participatory and arts-based pedagogic approaches. Alongside this, we undertook an interpretive case study, collecting data through questionnaires, focus groups and in-conference spoken reflection. Findings suggest trainee teachers gained a more nuanced understanding of the value and nature of ESE, as well as more affective and informed engagement with it, across the conference. Implications for ESE within ITE focus around the potential of pedagogies which provide affective experiences, in particular participatory and arts-based pedagogical approaches, for inspiring and empowering trainee teachers to enter into schools and develop their own ESE practice as classroom teachers.     

Helping Teachers Support Pupils with Mental Health Problems Through Inter-professional Collaboration: A Qualitative Study of Teachers and School Principals

ABSTRACT

A qualitative study conducted in four lower secondary schools in Norway explored teachers’ and school principals’ experiences of collaboration with a variety of extended services (ES). Particular attention was directed to the ways (if any) they perceived collaboration to be relevant to helping teachers support pupils with mental health problems through their everyday social and pedagogic practices. Findings of the study indicated that teachers valued initiatives that could help develop mutual understandings of teachers’ and ES professionals’ roles and responsibilities. Initiatives to build inter-professional relationships were perceived as laying the foundation for more productive collaboration. However, to be able to provide coherent, sustained support in the classroom, teachers needed guidance from ES professionals. This required a shift in collaborative processes away from a focus on individualized pupil support towards helping teachers support pupils through their classroom-based social and pedagogical practices. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.     

Teaching,school management and the ideology of Pragmatism

With reference to Bernstein's theories concerning the pulls and tensions of competing pedagogic identities, this article draws on original research to suggest that a culture of pragmatism may be currently rooting itself in English schools. This culture is understood partly as an instrumental response to rapid and extensive educational reform, and partly as the internalization of a wider discourse of pragmatism in which pragmatism itself is conceived of as a virtue and takes on ideological significance. In addition to identifying a problematic relationship between the instrumental-pragmatic responses of head teachers and those of classroom teachers, the article considers the potential of 'ideological pragmatism' to act as a hidden context within which instrumental pragmatism may lead to the lasting demotion of teachers' and head teachers' core pedagogic values.     

Educating pre-service teachers: towards a critical inquiry workforce

ABSTRACT

The Australian Professional Standards for Teachers identify a range of supposedly demonstrable capabilities for graduate teachers. Elaborations privilege the realization of Standards through mentoring, and feedback from senior colleagues. As manifestations of the logic of neo-liberalism they operate as audit technologies for pre-service teachers and their learning. In this paper, we argue for the preparation of graduate teachers who can engage in critical inquiry as means for expanding professional learning, developing pedagogical practices and improving student learning. We report on the preparation of 4th year pre-service teachers to undertake critical inquiry into an aspect of pedagogic practice during their final practicum placement. We first address instrumental framings of teacher preparation. A case is then made for critical practitioner inquiry as an alternative. Empirical data is drawn from the ‘practice architectures’ of an Australian teacher education program as these relate to developing pre-service teacher inquiry designs. We present inquiry questions, abstracts and reflections developed by pre-service teachers over a seven-year period in two discipline groupings, Health and Physical Education and Mathematics and Science, as evidence of possibilities for preparing graduates for a critical inquiry workforce. We conclude in arguing that these possibilities are vital in times framed by a narrowing technical and standardized educational environment.     

Improving teacher quality: lessons from America's No Child Left Behind

How developed countries train, recruit and retain their schoolteachers is an area of considerable interest in education today. In this paper we consider how the US is addressing the issue of teacher quality by holding schools and school districts accountable for ensuring that all teachers of core subjects are ‘highly qualified’ by the end of the 2005–2006 school year. Part of the hugely important No Child Left Behind Act, this ‘highly qualified’ teacher requirement links billions of dollars of Federal funding to ensuring that schools and school districts develop strategies to meet these targets. We consider how successful this policy has been in two case study states: Wisconsin and California. What emerges is a mandate for change which emphasizes teachers' content knowledge over pedagogic skills, which reveals discrepancies in the certification, training and administration of the profession across different states, and which sharply reminds us of the difficulties faced by even the apparently simple policy of requiring high quality teachers by law.     

Analyses Of “Teaching”

Abstract

This article aims to critically examine how misrecognition is conceived as a challenge for pedagogic action.Krassimir Stojanov’s notion of the pathological behaviour patterns of teachers and Charles Bingham’s ‘pitfalls of recognition’ introduce how misrecognition may appear in schools, and offer advice to teachers and students on responding to the challenges of misrecognition.Their ideas elicit the problems embedded in the theory of recognition and the problems resulting from understanding misrecognition as a challenge for pedagogic action.This article concludes that recognition theory offers pedagogic action a problematic challenge: it is as problematic to follow Honneth’s original ideas as it is to invent new directions in understanding misrecognition as a pedagogical challenge.     

Innovative learning environments and new materialism: A conjunctural analysis of pedagogic spaces

Abstract

An Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development research priority, innovative learning environments (ILEs) have been translated into policy and practice in 25 countries around the world. In Aotearoa/New Zealand, learning spaces are being reconceptualised in relation to this policy work by school leaders who are confronted by an impetus to lead pedagogic change. The article contributes a conjunctural analysis of the milieu around the redesign of these education facilities. Recognising that bodies and objects entwine in pedagogic spaces, we contribute a new materialism reading of ILEs as these are instantiated in New Zealand. New materialism recognises the agential nature of matter and questions the anthropocentric narrative that frames the post-enlightenment conception of what it means to be human. The decentring of human subjects through a materialist ontology facilitates a consideration of the power of objects to affect the spatial politics of learning environments. The article traces a relationship between the New Zealand strategic plan for Education 2015–2021 and principal conceptions of ILE as the lived spaces of this policy actualisation and the disciplinary/control society conjuncture. Informed by theories of spatial practice, we argue that principals’ understandings of ‘space’ are integral to pedagogic approaches within open-plan spaces. A conjunctural analysis can expand the capacity to act politically. By examining the complex conditions of a political intervention, in this case ILEs, we trace the displacements and condensations of different sorts of contradictions, and thus open up possibilities for action.