Philosophical debates on curriculum,inequalities and social justice

Abstract

The paper provides an historical but critical context for examining the relation of the pursuit of greater equality in schooling to the development of curriculum. This requires a brief account of what one means by the principle of equality, before showing the different ways in which there have been curriculum responses underpinned by philosophical understandings which need to be examined closely. These different ways are explained in terms of: ? ‘rational curriculum planning’ with its detailed definition of ‘aims, objectives, methods and evaluation’—and thereby a ‘science of teaching’;

? ‘forms of knowledge’ or ‘realms of meaning’ to enable all pupils to have a basic understanding of the physical, social, and moral worlds they inhabit;

? the pursuit of enquiry through which, for all learners, understanding is enlarged;

? provision of common curriculum experience as a basis for citizenship;

? taking diversity seriously; and

? equalisation of opportunities through a common system of national standards and assessments.

However, in the light of greater government involvement in the minutiae of curriculum reform, mainly through changes in qualifications and examinations, there is clearly a need to ask what sort of evidence is relevant to ‘what works’.     

An Aboriginal way towards curriculum reconciliation

ABSTRACT

This paper introduces the context and design of an institutional educational development grants program, Jindaola, which reflects an Aboriginal way towards reconciling Indigenous and non-Indigenous Knowledges in the Australian higher education curriculum. The program is unique in two ways: it foregrounds the voice of Aboriginal local Knowledge Holders in the design and implementation of the program; and, rather than focussing on embedding predefined ‘packages’ of Indigenous Knowledges and pedagogies into curricula, the approach adheres to Aboriginal methods for conducting business and maintaining knowledge integrity, by taking interdisciplinary teams of academics on a journey towards what we are calling ‘curriculum reconciliation’.     

Exploring anomalies in Indigenous student engagement: findings from a national Australian survey of undergraduates

Increases in participation by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in higher education across Australia continue to be promising. However, it is also known that Indigenous students' attrition, retention and completion rates remain areas of concern. In this paper, we report our findings from an analysis of Indigenous student responses to the 2009 Australasian Survey of Student Engagement. Overall, Indigenous Australian students express positive responses in relation to engagement, but are more likely than non-Indigenous students to be planning to depart. We explore this somewhat unexpected anomaly, whilst also suggesting that much more needs to be known about our Indigenous students, including, for example, whom they may interact with at university; where they turn for support; and why they may decide to leave. Our findings strongly indicate that better national and institutional data are needed to address the current gaps in knowledge relating to Indigenous student populations in Australia and around the world.? In this paper, the term ‘Indigenous’ refers to Australian students who are of self-declared Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander background, while ‘non-Indigenous’ refers to all other Australians.     

Innovative universities

Abstract

Burton Clark, in Creating Entrepreneurial Universities, defined the characteristics of what he named ‘innovative universities’. The paper considers these characteristics ‐ particularly such universities' willingness to adapt to changing environments and how they seek to do so. It identifies the challenges facing universities and considers why universities need to adapt their research, teaching and learning, and knowledge transfer. Innovative universities do seek to escape history — they adapt to change.     

Inter‐disciplinary but not Undisciplined: Writing the history of Aboriginal “education”

The history of Australian Aboriginal peoples sits uneasily on the margins of Australian history in much the same way as Aboriginal peoples themselves exist on the borders and interstices of the society that has colonised them and dispossessed them of their lands and cultures. The history of education likewise, sits somewhat on the margins of the discipline of history. The history of Aboriginal education, therefore, has never been a large field of study, though a handful of individuals have made important contributions.

This article will consider some of the reasons for the current position of the study of how Aboriginal peoples have learned and been taught in the past and will suggest that there are a number of inter‐related reasons for the limitations of both research and analysis within the field. Some of these limitations stem from the discipline itself, others from the subject. They will be discussed using examples from research with Australian Aboriginal and Canadian First Nations peoples and with regard to some recent publications in Australia and New Zealand.     

Beyond cultural competence: transforming teacher professional learning through Aboriginal community-controlled cultural immersion

ABSTRACT

This paper problematises the concept of cultural competence in teacher professional learning arguing instead for opportunities to develop critical reflexivity in the ongoing construction of a pedagogical cultural identity. In the Aboriginal context within Australia, this research study demonstrates how attaining cultural knowledge, understandings and skills is most effective when professional learning is delivered by local Aboriginal cultural knowledge holders. This research study analyses the New South Wales Aboriginal Education Consultative Group Connecting to Country cultural immersion programme for local communities and schools. A mixed methods approach, analysing quantitative and qualitative data from questionnaires and interviews, highlights the significant impact this experience has on teachers in building relationships with local Aboriginal community members. Teachers reported learning new knowledge about local Aboriginal people, culture, history and issues that challenged their assumptions, personal and collective positioning and pedagogical approaches to teaching Aboriginal students. Implications from the study identify the significance of privileging Indigenous ways of knowing, being and doing in order to realise culturally responsive schooling and empower teachers as critically reflective change agents in their schools. It further identifies the need for significant human and financial investment so that all teachers can engage with this authentic and potentially transformative professional learning experience.     

Competing knowledges in lifelong education

This is a discussion paper about access to, and participation in learning opportunities for Māori learners in New Zealand, and Indigenous learners in Australia. Teaching and learning practice in three separate institutional education programmes—one in New Zealand and two in Australia—highlight the problematic nature of inclusion based on competing knowledge systems and frameworks. These systems relate to differing worldviews about how knowledge is privileged and disseminated within society. One view is that whiteness behaviour, through a western worldview, is the erasure of inequality because it presents as the norm in many adult education teaching situations; quite often manifested as indulgent practice, but one that also reinforces the hegemony of normativity. In contrast, an Aboriginal/Indigenous worldview is one that places knowledge within a spiritual realm; constantly resituating the individual into the nexus between individual and cultural ties. The discussion here, is about ideas of whiteness behaviours being present in curriculum delivery, whereby mainstream ideals produce planes of engagement that encapsulate white subjectivities which are both visible and invisible, and represent just one chronology of whiteness. That is, consciously and unconsciously patterned behaviours of delivering curriculum, no matter what the discipline area, have the potential to produce accessibility and achievement, but many would argue that these same behaviours also reproduce inequalities. Ideas from the above theme, take on a whole new perspective with a focus on building workplace and academic skills to the exclusion of cultural identity development. Acquiring skills has the potential to provide another form of competence, yes, but may also undermine learner confidence in being able to transition successfully to further community or higher education programmes. For example, such development alone does little to improve and strengthen literacy, language and numeracy capability for learners to be able to access and undertake tertiary studies, but may do more to compound debates about whiteness behaviours implicit in the post-colonial criticism of ‘whose interest is being served’.     

Interviewing staff: A review of the Literature

Summary

It has been shown that the interview has an important role to play in selection provided that it has been adequately planned. If the interviewer has decided what he wants, what to look for, and how to find this, the interview procedure used can be adapted to suit the requirements of the employing organization.

Despite the criticisms of the interview, the critics have not as yet, in the author's opinion, offered any satisfactory alternatives. This they would be able to do, perhaps, when employers become willing to employ staff without face to face contact. ‘The value of the interview—of “the meeting face to face”—has’ in Oldfield's [28] opinion ‘grown rather than diminished’ because it provides a ‘contrast with a background of uncommunicative correspondence’.     

Pastoral Care and Teacher Stress

Charlton and David argue that counselling is not the only form of support available to pupils—and they in fact suggest that ‘counselling’ may be an overused term. They highlight pupils' need and right to be listened to. They go on to point out that in busy classrooms, teachers may not always find time to listen to and adequately support pupils. Alternative ‘listening’ facilities via peer support are discussed. Finally, the benefits of this peer resource are outlined for teachers as well as those administering and in receipt of help.     

Agents of aspiration: the (often unintended) benefits to university students working in outreach programmes

Background: Universities in many countries increasingly deliver outreach programmes to raise aspirations and encourage participation in higher education. At the University of Canberra in Australia, these programmes target schools that have been identified as having a large number of students from rural/regional, financially disadvantaged and/or Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander backgrounds – groups that continue to be underrepresented in higher education. Involved in the delivery of these programmes are current university students – at the University of Canberra termed ‘Aspiration Agents’ – many of whom come from similar backgrounds to the students with whom they work. Although not the focus of the outreach programmes, the Aspiration Agents themselves also derive benefits from the experience.

Purpose: This research aimed to explore the reasons why students choose to become Aspiration Agents, and the perceived benefits of the mentoring/ambassador role.

Sample, Design and Methods: The data collection comprised two small-scale exploratory questionnaire studies (N = 12; N = 20). Qualitative methods were used to investigate participants’ self-reported motivations for, and experiences of being Aspiration Agents.

Findings: Findings suggest that students perceived benefits in personal, student-related and future professional domains. Dominating all these areas, however, was the recurring theme that the students were both motivated to, and derived satisfaction from, helping others. These findings are discussed in terms of the specific role of the Aspiration Agent and how this form of employment can positively, rather than negatively, impact on the student’s own university experience.     

Listening to our Students: Understanding the factors that affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students' academic success

While the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in higher education in Australia has doubled in recent years, the gap between their attainment and the attainment of other Australians has remained consistent. It is essential to elucidate the factors that promote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students' academic success, not in order to justify the exclusion of these students from tertiary education, but to refine and develop curriculum and management strategies which promote their academic success. This study focuses on Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander students' experiences in a diploma program offered in block mode, in order to better understand the ‘on-’ and ‘off-’ campus experiences which are related to academic success and the factors which challenge or enhance students' study. The research yields important findings related to students' motivations to enrol and their definitions of academic success; the challenges they experience in making the transition to tertiary study; the vulnerability of our students' determination to succeed; the effects of being in a program for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students; and the ways in which minor challenges, if unresolved, can accumulate to interfere with students' study.     

International knowledge transfer in religious education: universal validity or regional practices? Backgrounds,considerations and open questions concerning a new debate

ABSTRACT

This article refers to the new European discussion on international knowledge transfer in religious education. Readers are introduced to the background of the recent manifesto ‘International Knowledge Transfer in Religious Education: A Manifesto for Discussion’ which was the outcome of a first international consultation of researchers in the field of religious education in October 2018. In a first step, the demand for international knowledge transfer in religious education is described. Furthermore, the question of the validity of knowledge in religious education is taken up and discussed in the sense of the presuppositions of international transfer and cooperation. Special attention is given to the relationship between universal and contextual elements or dimensions of knowledge in religious education and their epistemological implications which the authors consider a general and fruitful challenge for the discipline, in international as well as in national contexts. In conclusion, the authors set forth a number of perspectives for future research concerning international knowledge transfer in religious education.     

‘Educare’ in Australia: analysing policy mobility and transformation

Abstract

Background: Early childhood education and care has been an area of significant policy attention, public investment and private market activity in Australia over the past three decades. Australian educationists and policy-makers have looked to international examples for evidence, policy design and institutional models. However, this area is under-researched in Australia, with regard to how these knowledge flows are theorised, and how policy is implemented on the ground.

Purpose: The paper’s purpose was to contribute new Australian-focussed conceptual and empirical insights on the trajectories, development and implementation of evidence-based policy in the field of early childhood education and care.

Sources of evidence: The paper is based on three main sources of evidence: ? the critical literature on policy transfer and policy mobility

? policy statements, reports and planning documents produced by national- and state-level governments

? data from fieldwork analysis of new capital works and programmes in the early childhood field.

Main argument: International research and evidence on the benefits of investment in early learning has had a significant impact on the framing of Australian policy. So too has a move in several countries to align early childhood institutions with schools. However, a dominant paradigm of policy transfer, reliant on pluralist and rationalist frameworks of policy-making, fails to account for the dynamics of policy development and implementation across and within jurisdictions and geographical space. Conceptualising a new alignment in Australia between children’s centres and schools as ‘educare’, this article employs the theoretical lens of policy mobility to account for the circulation and transformation of educare policy in Australian settings. Through an empirical analysis of a new educare centre in the growth corridor of western Melbourne, the article demonstrates the extent to which neoliberal policy settings outside the educational sphere, around public finance, partnership, place and infrastructure provision, influence the implementation of ‘educare’ policy.

Conclusions: The educare discourse in Australia addresses a complex and multiscalar set of policy problems that associate child development with concerns around human capital formation, economic efficiency and productivity, place making and community building, and the role of the public sector in neoliberal democracies. International circuits of knowledge, policy design and institutional models in the educare field have been significant in shaping recent Australian policy, despite well-publicised views expressed in Australia on the disconnection between academic research and policy. The strength of policy mobility as a theoretical lens to assist our understanding of these influences lies in its critique of formalism in policy-making and in its attention to fluidity and transformation. The mobility lens encourages new empirical research that focuses on spatial and institutional dynamics, assisting our reading of on-the-ground developments in Australia’s fastest growing city.     

More than canons: teacher knowledge and the literary domain of the secondary English curriculum

Background:?The matter of teacher knowledge in the curriculum subject of English is not simple. Certainly it is not easy to delineate what its ‘content knowledge’ should be and how this relates to other aspects of teacher knowledge. In the context of education policy in England, at a time of change when the nature of the subject and its pedagogy are under scrutiny, the issue acquires heightened relevance from an initial teacher preparation perspective.

Purpose:?This paper sets out to consider the following questions: how do teachers of English acquire their teacher knowledge? What is known about the nuanced process of teacher knowledge development in English? Curriculum content is one element of teacher knowledge, but in the literary domain of English it does not suffice to specify what and how much should be read. The questions are discussed from the perspective of the knowledge development of postgraduate English teachers during initial teacher preparation.

Sources of evidence:?Literature concerning the development of teacher knowledge and expertise both generally and in the curriculum subject of English is critically discussed. Within the literature, the notion of the mentor–novice dialogue is identified as an important way of developing teacher knowledge. Alongside the literature, three illustrative mentor accounts are presented, drawn from the experience of postgraduate students learning to teach English to secondary school pupils.

Main argument:?The mentor accounts suggest that the boundaries of English are not easily demarcated. They indicate that the knowledge developed is other than the ‘content’ knowledge that might be acquired through initial degree studies. It is argued that teacher education demands a conception of teaching that takes full account of this knowledge development. At the same time, specific dispositions that do not automatically follow from prior academic attainment appear to be relevant. It is suggested that how these are cultivated, and how they are distinctive to the subject discipline are important questions for initial teacher preparation.

Conclusions:?Whatever the new contexts for initial teacher preparation, understanding how teachers acquire and apply ‘teacherly’ knowledge deserves as much attention as the content of a subject or the prior attainment of entrants to the profession. Initial teacher preparation arrangements need to acknowledge the complexity of learning to teach English as a curriculum subject. Learning to teach is a nuanced process, requiring engagement with a dedicated pedagogical content knowledge. In literary English teaching, this comprises attention to micro and macro aspects concurrently, for example through attention to individual texts concurrent with consideration of conceptions of readers and reading.     

Driving change from ‘the middle’: middle leading for site based educational development

ABSTRACT

Educational researchers have invested much in isolating the specific ‘drivers’ that influence school change and teacher professional development. In this vein, this article draws attention to necessarily situated understandings of practice development through research into the nature of ‘middle leading’ for site based education development in one primary school district in regional Australia. Drawing on practice theory, the analysis reveals how developing and sustaining change in schools is contingent on middle leaders’ insider knowledge, shared responsibility and capacity to sustain and ‘drive’ teachers’ learning. The article argues more situated understandings of middle leading practices are essential for sustainable educational reform.     

WHAT COUNTS AS TEACHING?

AID — the acronym stands for Assessment for Instructional Development — is a behaviourally referenced class questionnaire developed by the author from a data base drawn from 12 institutions of HE (Polytechnics and Universities). It is intended to help the user locate

• objectives in their own progress towards which his students report they lack confidence

• teaching behaviours that seem to bear on these objectives

• changes of teaching strategy that may therefore help the students

AID is focussed on the individual class and subject discipline — it is not suitable for ‘accountability’ uses.

The paper describes the rationale for choosing a behaviourally referenced system (focussed on what teachers and students do or feel, and how often) rather than a ‘satisfaction scale’ (focussed on ‘do my students like me?'), and the way AID was developed from earlier, mainly North American behaviourally referenced systems, such as IDEA. Crucial changes in research methodology are explained and justified. The characteristics and capabilities of the developed system are then outlined, and how to use it is explained. Finally, illustrations are given of three typical uses of the system — a comparison of three elements in a part‐time course for use by the course team in a course review, and two analyses of particular teaching programmes for individual lecturers.     

Peirce’s Rhetorical Turn: Conceptualizing education as semiosis

Abstract

The later works of Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1913) offer an extended metaphor of mind and a rich conception of the dynamics of knowledge and learning. After a ‘rhetorical turn’ Peirce develops his early ‘semiotics’ into a more general theory of sign and sign use,while integrating his pragmatism, phenomenology, and semiotics. Therefore, in this article I bring Peirce’s notion of semiosis—the sign’s action—to the forefront. In doing so, I hope to disclose how Peirce’s rhetorical turn not only opens up towards a richer conception of the dynamics of knowledge and learning, but also invites a shift of perspective from the psychological processes of learning to the semeiotic processes that characterizes the very dynamics of knowledge production.     

What are the personal attributes a teacher needs to engage Indigenous students effectively in the learning process? Re-viewing the literature

ABSTRACT

Background: Teachers have the potential to make an enormous positive impact on the lives of their students, and may enter the classroom with a deep-set belief that education is, fundamentally, benevolent and good. However, such an uncritical stance may fail to account for the negative experiences of Indigenous students in Australia, where teachers are often cited as the primary reason Indigenous students leave school or refuse to go to school. Despite this, Aboriginal communities remain strong advocates of education and continue to lobby for a genuine and meaningful role in decision making.

Purpose: Given teachers’ critical influence, a collaboration was formed between the two authors: a Gamilaroi (Aboriginal) woman and a non-Indigenous Canadian woman, to conduct a review of the research. We asked: ‘What are the personal (non-academic) attributes a teacher needs to engage Indigenous students effectively in the learning process?’

Method: The literature review focused primarily on the Australian context and used a framework-based synthesis approach, whereby a decolonising ‘Relationally Responsive Standpoint’ framework was identified a priori. This provided the structure for extracting and synthesising the literature.

Findings and Discussion: The themes arising from the literature review were organised and considered through the framework, which foregrounds awareness through Respecting (self/motivations), Connecting (interpersonal) and Reflecting (knowledge) before concluding by Directing (future role). In Directing, the implications of the findings are discussed through yarning, a dialogical and dynamic approach with a strong future focus regarding the next steps of research and action.

Conclusions: Reviewing the literature in this way offers teachers, researchers, teacher educators and, arguably, policy-makers an opportunity to consider the personal attributes necessary to engage Indigenous students. It highlights the importance of critical self-reflection to being a relationally responsive teacher. We believe that the findings span international and professional boundaries and could impact on Indigenous Peoples globally, if all professions engage with an understanding of their own axiology and ontology.