Examining teachers’ early writing knowledge and practices

Reading and Writing - This study examined preschool teachers’ writing knowledge and how this knowledge relates to classroom writing practices. Head Start teachers (N?=?47) across...     

Education as humanisation: a theoretical review on the role of dialogic pedagogy in peacebuilding education

In this literature review, we explore the potential role of education in supporting peacebuilding and societal transformation after violent conflict. Following a critical analysis of the literature published by academics and practitioners, we identify the notion of humanisation (as in the seminal works of Paulo Freire and others) as a unifying conceptual core. Peacebuilding education as humanisation is realised by critical reflection and dialogue in most curricular initiatives reviewed, an approach aimed at overcoming the contextual educational constraints often rooted in societal division and segregation, strained community relations and past traumas. We argue that education as humanisation and critical dialogue can offer pedagogical strategies and provide a compelling conceptual framework for peacebuilding education. Such a conceptual framework can serve as a basis for research in the area, especially in contexts where educational institutions tend to be structured to dehumanise.     

Research on interventions for children and young people on the autistic spectrum: a critical perspective

Developing, implementing and evaluating programmes of intervention for children and young people on the autistic spectrum are challenging endeavours. In this paper, we adopt a critical approach to research in this area, and attempt to offer an alternative perspective for understanding and interpreting empirical evaluations. We outline and discuss theoretical, methodological and practical issues and limitations associated with the current research body, and provide illustrative examples of gaps in the current literature.     

Boys: Getting it right: The ‘New’ disadvantaged or ‘disadvantage’ redefined?

Over recent years there has been widespread concern for masculinity and the education of boys in Australia. In the policy arena, this has involved a federal parliamentary inquiry into the education of boys (Boys: Getting it Right: Report on the inquiry into the education of boys, October 2002) and a federal government response to this inquiry (June 2003). This was followed by a review of the current education policy directed at gender, the Gender Equity Framework, and the development of strategies to increase the number of men going into teacher training. The way in whichGetting it Right and the federal government talk about boys and disadvantage is important. This paper argues that there is a particular understanding of disadvantage at work in this policy arena. It is an understanding of disadvantage extracted from a wider gendered power order.     

Infant educators’ beliefs about infant language development in long day care settings

This study examined infant educators’ beliefs about infant language development in the context of early childhood classrooms. Participants were 59 educators who were employed to work directly with under-two-year-old children. Educators were interviewed to determine their understandings of infant language development and Grounded Theory qualitative techniques were used to develop a conceptual model which illustrates their perceptions of the relationships between contextual, personal and teaching and learning components of their classroom contexts. The model provides a means of conceptualising ‘insider’ practitioner voices on how, as a dynamic system, contextual, individual and pedagogical components mutually interact to bring about the kinds of experiences and interactions that can shape language development. Findings have implications for understanding educators’ perspectives on infant room quality, suggesting that issues related to educator-infant ratios, staff consistency, qualifications and professional knowledge about language development processes may impact efforts to provide intentional language development support.     

Information and communications technologies (ICT) in higher education teaching—a tale of gradualism rather than revolution

The widespread adoption of information and communications technologies (ICT) in higher education (HE) since the mid 1990s has failed to produce the radical changes in learning and teaching than many anticipated. Activity theory and Rogers’ model of the adoption of innovations provide analytic frameworks that help develop our understanding of the actual impact of ICT upon teaching practices. This paper draws on a series of large‐scale surveys carried out over a 10 year period with distance education tutors at the UK Open University to explore the changing role of ICT in the work of teachers. It investigates how HE teachers in one large distance learning university have, over time, appropriated ICT applications as teaching tools, and the gradual rather than revolutionary changes that have resulted.     

Assessing infant breastfeeding beliefs among low-income mexican americans

Focus groups were conducted with low-income, pregnant women and new mothers receiving services from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC program) along with their male partners and their mothers. All participants were Hispanics of Mexican American origin. The topics for the focus-group discussions were breastfeeding beliefs and perceptions. All participants were aware of the benefits of breastfeeding. Participants identified time, embarrassment, and pain as barriers to breastfeeding; discussed decision-making efforts regarding breastfeeding; identified cultural beliefs related to breastfeeding; and discussed the lack of care-provider support for breastfeeding.     

“The Soldiers Came to the House”: Young Children’s Responses to <Emphasis Type="Italic">The Colour of Home</Emphasis>

This article begins by reflecting on the present refugee crisis and its relevance to children in the UK. It identifies the need for teaching about the refugee experience to young children and argues that literature can provide a conduit for this. Since the millennium there has been a rapid increase in the number of books published for children which take this as their theme, aimed at ever-younger readers. Taking as a case study The Colour of Home by Mary Hoffman, a picturebook commonly used in lower primary classrooms, the article considers how this text promotes understanding and validates the circumstances of refugees. It closely examines the motivations and aims of the writer, how the book was mediated by teachers in the primary classroom, and how refugee and non-refugee children read and responded to it. Findings are presented from an interview with Mary Hoffman herself, juxtaposed with data from three classrooms suggesting that pupils gained valuable insight into a complicated and controversial issue. However the research concludes that viewing children through a refugee/non-refugee binary was reductive in not recognising the multi-layered nuances of meaning which were constructed by young readers who brought to bear a wide variety of individual life and family experiences. Furthermore, teachers in the study played a powerful role in mediating the texts when sharing them in the classroom, and devised a selection of stimulating resources to provoke reader response in terms of empathy, “social action”, and some critical literacy.     

Back to the future: A methodology for comparing old A-level and new AS standards

Curriculum 2000 has meant significant change for the post-16 sector. New qualifications have been introduced (e.g. the new Advanced Subsidiary examination) and the number of students involved in education and training post-16 has increased. In this scenario how can the standards of new qualifications, particularly the new Advanced Subsidiary examinations, be compared with those of previous qualifications? One method is to use the prior achievement of candidates (i.e. GCSE results) as a basis for comparison of their results on subsequent qualifications (i.e. A levels and AS). This method of comparability and its limitations will be explored using examples with actual data.