Storytelling Dramas as a Community Building Activity in an Early Childhood Classroom

Healthy social-emotional development is promoted by building a safe, secure and respectful environment in an early childhood setting with positive and consistent relationships among adults, children, and their peers. This study explored storytelling dramas as an opportunity to build community within the context of one early childhood classroom. The study was a qualitative, interpretive analysis of 20 videotaped storytelling drama sessions containing approximately 100 stories told by children in one preschool classroom over a 6-month period. Videotapes of the 20 storytelling sessions were analyzed for patterns and themes that may represent community building within the context of one preschool classroom. Qualitative methods were used to identify themes that emerged from the videotaped data. Triangulation across investigators, time, and methods enhanced trustworthiness of interpretations. Results showed that the storytelling drama activity provided opportunities to promote community building through four emerging themes: (1) individual roles, (2) group membership, (3) inclusion, and (4) relationship building. Storytelling dramas provide teachers with an easy to implement teaching strategy that builds community and aligns with current early childhood education quality standards and child development theory.     

Staff support through supervision

Abstract

The article is based on a paper delivered to the AWCEBD KEYWORDS Conference at Cirencester in 1999, where the focus was upon staff emotional support. The article proposes that some of the causes of teacher and intelligence; worker stress are organizational factors and perceptual bias, and that staff support; stress is an inevitable consequence of working in an environment supervision where human relationships are critical for the successful management of young people with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties.The author suggests that one way of alleviating this stress is through the introduction of supervision to the educational field. Supervision in other helping professions has been successful in providing support, changing perceptions, managing emotions and coping with stressful situations, and in so doing has improved relationships with others and work performance.     

The association between mathematics pedagogy and learners’ dispositions for university study

We address the current concerns about teaching‐to‐the‐test and its association with declining dispositions towards further study of mathematics and the consequences for choice of STEM subjects at university. In particular, through a mixed study including a large survey sample of over 1000 students and their teachers, and focussed qualitative case studies, we explored the impact of ‘transmissionist’ pedagogic practices on learning outcomes. We report on the construction and validation of a scale to measure teachers’ self‐reported pedagogy. We then use this measure in combination with the students’ survey data and through regression modelling we illustrate significant associations between the pedagogic measure and students’ mathematics dispositions. Finally, we discuss the potential implications of these results for mathematics education and the STEM agenda.     

Performance Indicators and Widening Participation in UK Higher Education

We investigate the relationship between the widening participation performance indicators adopted in UK higher education (HE) and the government's objective of increasing overall HE participation rates. We critically assess the development of performance monitoring in HE and identify weaknesses in the current performance indicators from the perspective of the main stakeholders. We suggest the development of internal indicators and benchmarks by HE institutions together with extensions to the current national performance indicators that could improve their usefulness.