New verse or the same old chorus?: looking holistically at distance education research

While there continues to be a proliferation in the number of studies conducted on various aspects of distance education, we are often left with little understanding of the holistic planning and effects of it. This paper draws lessons learned from the literature on distance education over the past five years. This review did not seek to be exhaustive in presenting the findings of every study, but instead focuses on specific instruction we can take from past research at the institutional, faculty, and student levels.     

Changing practice in Malaysian primary schools: learning from student teachers’ reports of using action,reflection and modelling (ARM)

Curricular and pedagogical reforms are complex inter-linked processes such that curricular reform can only be enacted through teachers teaching differently. This article reports the perspective of emergent Malaysian primary teachers who were expected to implement a Government reform that promoted active learning. The 120 student teachers were members of a single cohort completing a new B.Ed. degree programme in Primary Mathematics designed by teacher educators from Malaysia and the UK. They were taught to use a tripartite pedagogical framework involving action or active learning, supported in practice through reflection and modelling. Drawing on findings from surveys carried out with the student teachers at the end of their first and final placements this article examines evidence for the premise that the student teachers were teaching differently; illustrates how they reported using active learning strategies; and identifies factors that enabled and constrained pedagogic change in the primary classroom. The students’ accounts of using action, reflection and modelling are critiqued in order to learn about changing learning and teaching practice and to contribute to understanding teacher education and early teacher development. The students’ reports suggest diversity of understanding that emphasises the need to challenge assumptions when working internationally and within national and local cultures.     

School principals and racism: responding to Aveling

This study responds to Nado Aveling's call in ‘Anti-racism in Schools: A question of leadership?’ (Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 2007, 28(1), 69–85) for further investigation into racism in Australian schools. Aveling's interview study concluded that an overwhelming number of school principals denied the presence of racism in their schools, and that there were no discernible differences in how principals in different schools constructed racism. In contrast, our research found that school principals' constructions of cultural racism are strongly influenced by their school contexts. We elucidate these differences examining the various intersections between race, class and religion deployed by principals in different sites, and argue for the utility of examining and theorising cultural racism using an intersectional approach. By bringing context into our analysis we provide a more nuanced insight into the different ways in which racism is constituted and understood by Australian school principals.     

Standards of practice to standards of evidence: developing assessment capable teachers

Abstract

Teacher education is a hotly debated policy area in higher education and schooling portfolios, with increasing emphasis on standards and accountability. It is in this environment that The Standards Project (2013–2015) presented in this article began. It has at its core a three-part commitment: first, to undertake a comprehensive audit and analysis of all teacher education programmes in the state of Queensland, Australia, to establish the approaches and practices Universities relied on to preparing beginning teachers as assessment capable; second, to take account of multiple perspectives and approaches in initial teacher education to integrating data into how beginning teachers are prepared to source and use evidence for improving learning and teaching; and further, to develop new principles, policy and practices for reviewing and moderating teacher education programmes against professional standards. The paper proposes a move beyond the discourse of professional standards of practice towards a complementary discourse of standards of evidence. In our collaboration we drew on two fields, namely the writing on teacher education including reviews, and the field of assessment, both considered within broader sociocultural theory applied to assessment.     

The nature and implications of the growing importance of research grants to Canadian universities and academics

This paper analyzes a significant but virtually unexplored recent development within Canadian higher education, namely the growing importance of research grants to universities and academics. It addresses three main questions. First, the paper examines why and how research grants are becoming more important to Canadian universities and academics, focusing in particular on the role played by federal higher education policy. Next, it explores how the growing importance of research grants is transforming relations between and among the key players in Canadian higher education and academic research, including university administrators, academics, government, and the broader community. The paper’s final section takes up some of the actual and potential implications of these changes and raises concerns about detrimental effects on Canada’s universities and citizens. Prospects and possibilities for reform are also addressed.     

Tensions for educational developers in the digital university: developing the person,developing the product

ABSTRACT

Digital education, now common in higher education, is particularly evident in the expansion of blended and fully online offerings at universities. Central to this expansion are educational developers, staff who support teaching and learning improvement in courses they do not themselves teach. Working closely with staff, students, and the curriculum, educational developers see first-hand how the digital learning agenda is both implemented and experienced. This article reports on findings from a national study of three educational development groups: academic developers, academic language and learning developers, and online educational designers, from 14 Australian universities. Although their institutional settings, roles, and work practices varied considerably, a central theme was the tension arising from a perceived shift in institutional priorities from ‘people development’ to ‘product development’: that is, from building human (educator) capacity towards curriculum resource development, particularly for the online environment. Participants reported a decline in autonomy, with institutional strategy and targeted projects increasingly directing both the work that gets done, and the skill sets required to do it. Their observations have implications for how universities conceptualise the development and support of the educational process.     

The genetic and environmental origins of learning abilities and disabilities in the early school years

Despite the importance of learning abilities and disabilities in education and child development, little is known about their genetic and environmental origins in the early school years. We report results for English (which includes reading, writing, and speaking), mathematics, and science as well as general cognitive ability in a large and representative sample of U.K. twins studied at 7, 9, and 10 years of age. Although preliminary reports of some of these data have been published, the purpose of this monograph is to present new univariate, multivariate, and longitudinal analyses that systematically examine genetic and environmental influences for the entire sample at all ages for all measures for both the low extremes (disabilities) and the entire sample (abilities). English, mathematics, and science yielded similarly high heritabilities and modest shared environmental influences at 7, 9, and 10 years despite major changes in content across these years. We draw three conclusions that go beyond estimating heritability. First, the abnormal is normal: Low performance is the quantitative extreme of the same genetic and environmental influences that operate throughout the normal distribution. Second, continuity is genetic and change is environmental: Longitudinal analyses suggest that age-to-age stability is primarily mediated genetically, whereas the environment contributes to change from age to age. Third, genes are generalists and environments are specialists: Multivariate analyses indicate that genes largely contribute to similarity in performance within and between the three domains--and with general cognitive ability--whereas the environment contributes to differences in performance. These conclusions have far-reaching implications for education and child development as well as for molecular genetics and neuroscience.     

Understanding pedagogical design capacity through teachers’ narratives

Teachers need to develop the ability to adapt curriculum materials. Two elementary teachers, Maggie and Catie, were asked to write narratives about their use of and changes to particular reform-oriented science lesson plans. Maggie drew on her knowledge of and experiences with students, as well as other knowledge, experiences, and resources, to make productive changes to account for her students’ prior knowledge and abilities. Catie based her curricular adaptations on her learning goals—but these were not aligned with the learning goals of the curriculum materials. The paper discusses implications for teacher education, professional development, and educative curriculum materials.     

Slippage and/or symbolism: gender,policy and educational governance in Scotland and Sweden

This article provides an overview and analysis of the relationship between gender, educational policy, and governance in Scotland and Sweden and the two countries’ response to European Union and global legislative and policy change. In Scotland, gender is mainly invisible in recent policies on inclusion, achievement beyond academic attainment, and the idealisation of the child. Gender is thus marginalised within a range of factors contributing to social in/equality. In Sweden, in contrast, gender has higher visibility in policy and governance as both an indicator of democracy and a means of preserving social democratic consensus and prosperity. However, recently its privileged position has come under attack. We draw on social capital, gender, and policy theory to analyse the range of influences on gender and educational governance in the two countries including that of the social capital of organised feminism.