Changing Behaviors and Intrinsic Motivation Through Scenario‐Based Learning: A Case Study

When training occurs on the job over time, the collective wisdom of the organization becomes the norm. This knowledge or way of doing things is not always the best way and may cause problems elsewhere in the system. This article is a case study that looks at the order entry process of a midsized company and describes the motivational aspects of the performance intervention, as well as the systematic design and development of scenario‐based learning.     

‘I Wish We Could Make Books All Day!’ An Observational Study of Kindergarten Children During Writing Workshop

With the adoption of the Common Core Standards and a renewed emphasis on critical and higher-order thinking skills, exploring the relationship among writing development, self-efficacy beliefs, perseverance, and effort has become essential. The nature of writing workshop not only lends itself to differentiation among students but also provides opportunities to explore authentic texts and tasks. The purpose of this qualitative, multicase study was to explore the development of kindergarten writers within a writing workshop. Research questions focused on writer identity, writing self-efficacy, and growth as kindergarten writers. The participants, two female and one male, were randomly chosen for this study and attended an all-day, 3-days per-week kindergarten program at a public school in the upper Midwest. Student writing interviews, videotaped student–teacher conferences, and student written work served as data sources. The writing workshop framework provided a learning environment that was conducive to the formation of the three children’s writing identities. As students engaged in writing mini-lessons, text inquiries, writing, and sharing writing with peers, student writing stamina and engagement increased. Students utilized techniques and strategies of published writers. Students adopted these qualities in their views of themselves as writers. Suggestions for future research included exploring writing self-efficacy in relation to everyday kindergarten experiences, allowing for sharing and feedback, and addressing the ways in which writing workshop might provide for authentic and rigorous instruction and tasks in kindergarten classrooms.     

Learning Chinese characters via mobile technology in a primary school classroom

This paper describes a project, including the design, development, and use of a mobile application (referred to as application hereafter) for learning Chinese as a second language in a bilingual primary school. The application was designed for iPod Touch Apple technology with the purpose to facilitate learning of a fundamental set of 200 Chinese characters. The project was a coordinated effort of experts, including an instructional designer, a software engineer, a Chinese language expert, and classroom teachers to develop an experimental Chinese character learning application for the primary school classroom. This paper reports how the project team explored experiences of teachers and learners in a particular context, developed understanding of teaching and learning needs for Chinese language learning, and how these inform design of the educational application. The final outcomes of the project include a Chinese character learning application and recommendations for design and use of educational applications in Chinese language teaching and other similar contexts.     

Opening Teachers’ Minds to Philosophy: The crucial role of teacher education

Abstract

Why has the ‘Philosophy for Children’ movement failed to make significant educational inroads in Australia, given the commitment and ongoing efforts of philosophers and educators alike who have worked hard in recent decades to bring philosophy to our schools? In this article we single out one factor as having particular importance, namely, that, on the whole, teachers consider philosophical inquiry to be futile. We argue that the explanation rests with teachers’ underlying epistemological beliefs and that openness to philosophy depends upon teachers being disposed to engage in the practices of reason-giving and reason evaluation, being aware of the epistemic value of such practices and, concomitantly, having highly developed reasoning skills. Drawing on both anecdotal evidence and wide-ranging research from within cognitive psychology, we go on to make a case for change within teacher education programmes.     

Ethics,education policy and research: the phonics question reconsidered

This paper argues that direct control of the early years literacy curriculum recently exercised by politicians in England has made the boundaries between research, policy and practice increasingly fragile. It describes how policy came to focus most effort on the use of synthetic phonics programmes in the early years. It examines why the Clackmannanshire phonics intervention became the study most frequently cited to justify government policy and suggests a phonics research agenda that could more usefully inform teaching. It argues that, whilst academics cannot control how their research is eventually used by policy‐makers, learned societies can strengthen their ethics policies to set out clearer ground rules for academic researchers working across knowledge domains and with policy‐makers. A stronger framework to guide the ethical interpretation of research evidence in complex education investigations would allow more meaningful conversations to take place within and across research communities, and with research users. The paper suggests some features for such a framework.     

Embracing the UNCRC in Wales (UK): policy,pedagogy and prejudices

Most countries are signatories to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). In 1999, the Government of Wales was devolved from the UK, and in 2011 the “Children and Young Persons Rights Measure” put the UNCRC as the basis of all its work. Any programme introduced in schools should therefore promote the UNCRC. To address this, we implemented the Philosophy for Children (P4C) in Schools Project in 64 schools and monitored teacher and pupil responses. This paper reports on a meta-analysis of quantitative and qualitative data that suggests that the models of childhood held by teachers impacts on how they respond to the UNCRC. Teachers who held models of children as “innocent”, “evil”, “blank slates” or “developing” found it hard to embrace the UNCRC. Teachers who were authoritarian, punitive and epistemologically directive also questioned the UNCRC. In contrast, teachers who practised rational authority and restorative approaches to wrongdoing and held a social competency model of the child embraced P4C, a democratic, community of inquiry approach to learning that puts pupil voice centre stage. We argue that P4C can provide a practical pedagogic tool to support the implementation of the UNCRC and has the potential to address barriers that arise from widely held deficit models of childhood.     

Practising empathy: enacting alternative perspectives through imaginative play

This article reports on a collaborative study using an innovative methodology, based on ‘insiders’ who are Steiner practitioners knowledgeable and practised in Steiner philosophy and ‘outsiders’ from UK mainstream early years and primary perspectives. Although the study as a whole focused on assessment and observation used in Steiner kindergartens, it yielded a rich data source on imaginative play that offers practice in empathy. We contextualise the data presented from a Steiner perspective in the wider literature on the imagination and affect in order to theorise how such play develops empathy through its links to feelings and prosocial behaviour. We critically examine how empathy and the imagination are nurtured in the context of eight kindergarten classes in five Steiner schools in England in order to illustrate how these conditions might also help other early years and primary schooling to foster long-term benefits for ethical and fulfilling lives through encouraging empathic understanding.     

A critical analysis of problems with the LBOTE category on the NAPLaN test

The National Assessment Program: Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLaN) is an annual literacy and numeracy test for all Australian students, and results from the test are disaggregated into a number of categories including language background other than English (LBOTE). For this and other categories, results on each section of the test are aggregated into state, territory and national means and standard deviations enabling comparison of performance. The NAPLaN data indicate that since the test began, in 2008, at a national level there is little difference between the results of LBOTE and non-LBOTE students on all domains of the test. This is a national result, and there is greater variation at state and territory level. However, these results defy a logic which might suggest that the LBOTE category will reflect the influence of English as a second language on test performance, rather suggesting that a second language background is not associated with test performance. In this paper, I will interrogate the variation in the LBOTE category, using data provided by the Queensland state education department, focusing on year 9 students who participated in the 2010 test. Using multiple regression and focusing on variables which are specifically related to language background, I will show that within the LBOTE category there is a wide variation of performance, and the LBOTE data are in fact hiding some of our most disadvantaged students. I will suggest alternative ways in which language learners could be identified to better empower policy and pedagogical responses to student needs.     

Understanding students' use and value of technology for learning

Despite significant research in the field of educational technology, there is still much we do not fully understand about students' experiences with technology. This article proposes that research in the field of educational technology would benefit from a sociological framing that pays attention to the understandings and lives of learners. Within a broader study that aimed to investigate students' use and value of technologies guided by Bourdieu's sociological theory, this article reports on qualitative embedded case study data of 12 students in years 9 and 10 from two Australian secondary schools. The article provides detailed accounts of students' experiences with technologies in various contexts with consideration of the milieu in which technology use occurred, illustrating the heterogeneous and complex network of influencing factors on students' technology practices. The findings and discussion augment the application of Bourdieu's concepts of field, habitus and capital as a tool to view and understand students' varied and complex experiences and relationships with technology.