Dumplings and the Spring Festival

SpringFestivalisoneofthemostimportanttraditionalfestivalsinChina.DuringtheSpringFestival,weofteneatdumplings.Butwheredodumplingscomefrom?Hereisastoryaboutit.IntheEasternHanDynasty,therewasaveryfamousdoctorcalledZhangJi(PeopleusuallycallhimZhangZhongjing)whowasborninNanyanginHenanprovince.Whenhewasyoung,helearnedhowtobeadoctor.Beforelong,hebecameawell-knowndoctor.ThenhelefthishometownandheldanofficialpositioninChangsha.Manyyearslater,whenZhangZhongjingbecameold,heretiredfromhisposition…     

Can media literacy education increase digital engagement in politics?

ABSTRACT

Online environments are now central to political life, especially for young people. They are prominent contexts for activities that include: fundraising, political debate, sharing political perspectives, mobilizing individuals and groups to act, and applying pressure to governments, corporations, and nonprofits. Much of this online politically focused activity occurs within a broader media ecology that can be characterized as a participatory culture (Jenkins, H., R. Purushotma, K. Clinton, M. Weigel, and A. J. Robison. [2009]. Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century. Occasional Paper on Digital Media and Learning. Chicago: John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation). Many have argued that media literacy efforts are needed for youth to fully leverage these digital opportunities, but rigorous studies of such educational efforts are just beginning to emerge. Drawing on an original panel survey, this paper examines whether efforts to promote digital engagement literacies increase youth online engagement in politics. We find that they do. Educators’ efforts to foster digital engagement literacies increase youth engagement in participatory politics and in applying targeted political pressure to government, corporations, and nonprofits.     

Dancing on the deck of the Titanic? Adult education, the nation-state and new social movements

This article begins with a discussion of the implications of CONFINTEA VI having been organised in Brazil ?C the author uses the term ??Brazilian effect?? ?C and the role of social movements challenging neoliberalism. Next, drawing from the experience of Latin America, this paper analyses the counter-hegemonic practice of the new social movements. The concluding section highlights the dilemmas faced by UNESCO in trying to create a democratic and efficient process of policy-making and institutional service in adult education in the nation-states. Furthermore, the proposal of popular education portrayed by the new social movements is described as a tool for empowerment. CONFINTEA VI??s recommendation of moving from rhetoric to action in adult education programmes, practices and policies demands that we take the agendas of the new social movements in the post-neoliberalism era seriously.     

Can Teachers’ Reflections on Digital and Curriculum Resources Generate Lessons?

This article presents a critical action research study of six participants who reflected on their experiences and practices of digital resources in teaching Grade 12 mathematics Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS). One-on-one semi-structured interviews, reflective activities, and journals were used for data generation to explore these reflections in order to encourage the teachers to reflect. Purposive with convenience sampling was used to select the teachers. The study reveals that ideological-ware (IW) resources and critical reflections are the main ingredients to ensure the success of CAPS implementation. When the teachers critically reflected on their practical use of the digital resources, they overcame the curriculum challenges that affected their teaching practice. This study recommends the promotion of IW resources and critical reflections in order to produce teachers’ reflective framework for teaching. This study consequently concludes that there were limited forms of reflections that were not compulsory to the teachers.     

What stories do I tell now? New times and new narratives for the adult educator

Globally, the world of adult education has been much transformed in recent years. While there has been an expansion in the provision made available to adults, the profile of that provision has shifted with a greater emphasis placed on work‐related and certificated education and training, and an increased diversity in learning settings. This has led to a sense of crisis over the meaning of adult education as a specific form of provision and what it means to be an adult educator.

This article examines the ways in which these changes have found expression in the narratives through which adult educators construct their practices and experiences as meaningful. We argue that there is an interaction between the impact of contestation and change in the field of adult education and learning, its narrative or story‐telling practices and the processes by which the identities of adult educators are formed. We examine the significance of this interaction by drawing on three inter‐related themes‐‐the so‐called turn to textuality, the changes taking place in the economy and the organisation of work including the work of adult educators, and contemporary debates over (post) modern identities. In this way, we demonstrate the significance of new theoretical perspectives in providing insights into the contemporary condition of adult educators.     

Skillful Use of Imagery in Two Odes to Spring——Comment on The Soote Season and Spring,the Sueet Spring

The Soote Season and Spring,the sweet Spring are two lyrics that sing the praise of spring.The common feature of the two lyrics is that the two poets depict a series of pictures of the sweet spring by rich and varied imagery for readers.When these pictures are presented to readers,readers feel as if they are participating in them,and the enchanting beauty of spring makes readers feel intoxicated with happiness.The two poets express their different feelings toward nature.     

Changing Values? Early retirement and the new universities

Abstract

This article examines the potential impact of the recent changes to the Teachers Superannuation Scheme (TSS) and the resulting wave of early retirements, on the nature of academic work and cultures in the ‘new’ universities. In doing so it considers the potential for one externally driven initiative, implemented outside of the control of organisational managers, to have a quite extraordinary effect on workers across a whole occupational sector. It assesses the force of an early retirement programme as a catalyst for increased managerialism, relative to other recent pressures, drawing upon the literatures of organisation culture, strategy and labour process; and utilising new empirical research concerning academic careers, culture, change and security. Findings indicate that academic staff in new universities may be insulated from the effects of managerialism, albeit that this may vary between and within institutions. It speculates on whether the effects of large‐scale early retirement will have an impact on academic cultures through the ‘releasing’ of staff with old values and the ‘buying’ of replacements who have new values. Further, it argues that because the TSS changes affect only the new universities, the resultant changes may differentiate them from the pre‐1992 universities, making at least some of them more similar to the managerially focused further education sector, and reinforcing the binary divide within a supposedly unified university sector.     

What future for initial teacher education? New curriculum and new directions

This article analyses aspects of the implementation of the National Curriculum for initial teacher training (ITT). It focuses on the impact of the standards upon course design and structure and particularly the emphasis on the development of subject knowledge. The assessment of students in terms of subject knowledge and the standards for qualified teacher status (QTS) are explored alongside the development of partnership schools and mentoring programmes. The impact of external agencies such as OFSTED and the TTA is included in the discussion. Future implications for primary and secondary ITT programmes are considered.     

The digital university and the shifting time–space of the campus

This paper explores the concept of translocality, of being ‘simultaneously situated’ in more than one place, in the context of ‘distance’ education in the digital university. The author works with the concept of critical time to propose an additional term, transtemporality, to also recognise the multiple times and temporalities engaged and interwoven in digitally connected spaces of work and study. The paper draws on interview material from an institutional case study of expansion in digital education, paying particular attention to student locations in time and space, arguing that recognising the shifting time–space of the campus is essential to supporting and teaching growing numbers of distance and part-time students. The author proposes that, rather than digital connections being viewed as a form of ‘reaching out’ from the university campus to the wider world, the digital university might be considered, in its translocal and transtemporal form, as an opening up of the idea of the university; embodied and imagined through strong connections across multiple locations, times and temporalities.     

The new group: Notes on the New York theatre, 1964–1965

In 7890, two essays by John Muir greatly influenced the establishment of Yosemite National Park, and greatly advanced the movement for the preservation of wilderness reserves. Muir used two techniques, the sublime response and the persona of the mountaineer, to secure his readers’ action on behalf of natural scenery.     

Teachers’ work and the politics of time and space

This paper identifies and analyses different dimensions of time and their implications for teachers’ work. The theoretical analysis arises from a study of elementary principals’ and teachers’ perceptions and uses of preparation time. Five dimensions of time are identified and discussed: technical‐rational time, micropolitical time, phenomenological time, physical time, and sociopolitical time. From the point of view of the classroom, teachers and administrators have different perceptions of time. Driven by linear, technical‐rational time perspectives, administrators seek to speed the pace of change. Teachers operate in a phenomenological time‐frame where they seek to slow down change. As the gap between administration and teaching widens, so do the differences in time perspectives between teachers and administrators. The paper concludes with a set of questions about the strength of present divisions between administration and teaching.     

How Effective Are the New Auto-Instructional Materials and Devices?

This paper rapidly reviews 30 research articles and attempts to use the data derived from these studies to evaluate the effectiveness of auto-instructional materials. The instructional areas covered are: elementary school, high school, special education, armed forces, and industrial use. There is no attempt to evaluate the research designs used in the studies, as this vital point was not within the aims of the paper. The primary goal is to point out that effectiveness of auto-instructional materials means more than that they "teach better." Fifteen possible criteria of effectiveness are presented and the studies reporting data to each of these criteria are listed. The reader interested in doing research in this area is directed to a more detailed study of the particular research areas of interest. A 32 item bibliography is included.