Imagining a different life in school: educating student teachers about ‘looked after’ children and young people

The research described in this paper concerns the acquaintance of student teachers with the educational and wider pastoral experiences of children and young people who are or have been ‘looked after’ and who they may well teach at some point, together with the familiarisation of student teachers with the ‘looked after’ system in the UK. We discuss an exploratory awareness‐raising curriculum project within a Teacher Education Department at a University in the UK that utilises digital multimedia to develop a ‘community of awareness’ of young people and student teachers. As a result of this work, the student teachers were able to reflect on their pedagogical knowledge and practices related to teaching and wider pupil pastoral care. Further, those involved in the project therefore not only learned how to use technology, but to apply it in meaningful, productive ways, which were potentially transforming in terms of appreciation and knowledge of diversity. Benefits for the participants – the young people involved and the student teachers, as well as implications for both student teachers’ understanding of diversity and limitations of the technology – are discussed.     

Changing literacies,changing formations: the role of elicitation in teacher action research with new technologies

As new technologies promise to be an enduring feature of the landscape of teachers’ work, we consider how teachers implicitly bring stories forward into their classroom explorations with new media as a part of their ‘informal learning’. By ‘stories’ is meant specific classroom texts as well as preferred teacher practices with those texts. The article represents a reflection on the methodological role that ‘elicitation’ can play in drawing out teacher thinking during a time of professional change, thinking that would otherwise likely remain embedded, particularly when teachers’ attention is focused forward on innovation in practice. The methodological use of ‘elicitation’ emerged in the first year of an ongoing teacher action research study, in which seven teachers have been involved in a professional development initiative that actively engages teachers in examining changing literacy formations, beginning with the teachers’ own literacy formations. The methodological practice of elicitation borrows from phenomenology, ethnomethodology, narrative research, reader response theories, curriculum theory and psychoanalysis, and emerged as a way to acknowledge the life histories that teachers were bringing to their professional development with new media. We suggest that elicitation can potentially draw out deep and sustaining sources of a teacher’s commitment, as well as resistance, to change. It can help disclose the tensions between commitment and resistance that even teachers who voluntarily undertake to incorporate new technologies into their practice may experience. Within a teacher action research framework, elicitation can also serve to remind teachers (and others) of the value of what they know and are learning, thus contributing to teachers developing a ‘scholarship of practice’ in response to any actual or perceived ‘intensification’ of their work.     

How Will They Understand if We Don’t Teach Them? The Status of Criminal Justice Education on Gay and Lesbian Issues

Inclusion of race and gender in criminal justice education has, to some degree, been prompted as a result of perceived bias by criminal justice system professionals. Utilizing the race and gender experience as a template, interactions between the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered (GLBT) community and the criminal justice system are explored. This study surveyed criminal justice undergraduate degree programs to ascertain course content on gay and lesbian issues. Results indicate that an extremely small number of programs have such a course or alternatively incorporate GLBT issues within existing race and gender courses. Implications for criminal justice education are discussed.     

Model Switching in a Learning Environment based on Multiple Models

The introduction of qualitative modelling techniques into learning environments, and intelligent training systems, requires not just the development of tools and techniques for modelling and simulation but also some guidance on how to use qualitative models in learning environments. This paper describes the rationale behind the design of a simulation based learning environment, the Model Switching PROcess rig Demonstration System (MS‐PRODS). Three qualitative and three quantitative simulations of the behavior of the physical system have been implemented using the ITSIE tools (Scott et al, 1990). The design of the learning environment is presented from the point of view of instruction and how the models are to be used to promote learning, in particular examining the model switching mechanism. This mechanism determines how to select and sequence the presentation of models to the learner during guided explorations of the domain. A knowledge based an alysis of the domain knowledge is combined with principles derived from Cognitive Flexibility Theory (Spiro 6 Jehng, 1990) to produce a generic design for a learning environment based on multiple models. The design and implementation of the learning environment is illustrated and a sample sequence of models presented. Finally, related work such as White & Frederiksen (1990) on model progression is discussed.     

An Evaluation of a Pilot Service‐Learning Course for Criminal Justice Undergraduate Students*

This article focuses on a pilot service‐learning program implemented with undergraduate students enrolled in a juvenile delinquency course. An evaluation of the service‐learning program on students’ attitudes toward diversity, interpersonal skills, personal and intellectual development, and citizenship behavior using qualitative analysis is presented. The results indicate that the majority of students came to view the youth in a positive light, reported learning how to work with youth, experienced a reduction in stereotypes, gained career insights, learned how to apply academic theory to real‐life experiences and developed attitudes about how society addresses delinquency that were sympathetic to the youths’ condition.     

THE PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT SCHOOL EARLY CHILDHOOD INTERNSHIP EXPERIENCE: A CATALYST FOR REFLECTIVE TEACHING AND PRACTICE

This paper describes the incorporation of online psychological consultation regarding child behavior in an early childhood teacher education program. The authors discuss psychological consultation in terms of current theory and philosophy in early childhood teacher education in general, and in terms of the professional objectives of this specific program. The experiences and thinking that eventually resulted in the choice of an online vehicle for the delivery of psychological consultation are also discussed. Specific psychological education objectives addressed through this consultation are illustrated in excerpts from actual interchanges between the consulting clinical psychologist and student teachers. The paper concludes with reactions regarding this seminar addition from supervisors and student teachers.