Can the National Curriculum Help Reduce Working‐class Under‐ achievement?

This paper reviews some of the evidence which demonstrates under‐achievement in working‐class children together with important analyses and interpretations, and contemporary practical attempts to redress the problem. It is argued that practical innovations have not greatly influenced or improved the relationship between class and achievement. An attempt is made to discover to what extent the introduction of a National Curriculum as part of the Education Reform Act can be seen as a potential solution to the problem of working‐class under‐achievement. It is argued that the means of redressing working‐class under‐achievement in the National Curriculum must lie ultimately with individual teachers and their ability to present the National Curriculum in relevant forms to all children. In any mass education process there will be those for whom the given curriculum is removed from everyday experience. This does not invalidate the idea of “worthwhile’ knowledge but it means that we must be constantly questioning how we can transmit the curriculum while, as far as is possible, reducing the gap between everyday experience and classroom experience.     

Concordance Between Preservice Teachers' Personal Responsibilities and Intended Instructional Practices

During their education, preservice teachers begin to assume professional responsibilities and gain pedagogical knowledge. However, the question remains whether preservice teachers intend to use instructional practices that are effective in meeting their assumed responsibilities. Thus, we examined the concordance between preservice teachers' responsibilities and their intended instructional practices. At the start of the semester there was no concordance. At the end of the semester there was high concordance in two instances: Responsibility for student motivation negatively predicted performance goal-oriented practices; responsibility for teaching positively predicted rationales and negatively predicted extrinsic rewards. Instructional practices associated with responsibility for achievement and motivation were not concordant. We discuss how preservice teachers understand these responsibilities and their readiness to adopt evidence-based practices.     

Vygotskian Theory and Special Education Practice in Russia

This paper discusses tensions and dilemmas that arise in the implementation of Vygotskian psychology. It analyses the development of special educational needs (SEN) provision and practice in the former Soviet Union from this perspective and identifies similarities and differences with the changes in emphasis being witnessed in England and Wales. The analysis is illustrated via reference to interviews conducted during recent visits to Russian schools and the Moscow State University.     

Visual Displays as Tacit Relays of the Structure of Pedagogic Practice

This study considers the visual relay to pupils of aspects of their school's pedagogic practice. Two special schools, catering for pupils with moderate learning difficulties, were described in terms derived from a general model of cultural transmission. A representative sample of textual productions, in this case photographs of wall displays, was collected in each school. These pictures were then used as elements in Personal Construct Analysis interviews conducted with groups of pupils in each school. The results revealed evidence of the relay of aspects of the structure of pedagogic practice as described in terms of the general model. Pupils in the two schools revealed differences in their orientation to the meaning of the displays. Thus, the research suggests that the grammar of the pedagogic practice of the school is both revealed and relayed indirectly by visual representations of significant texts.     

Interval timing under a behavioral microscope: Dissociating motivational and timing processes in fixed-interval performance

The distribution of latencies and interresponse times (IRTs) of rats was compared between two fixed-interval (FI) schedules of food reinforcement (FI 30 s and FI 90 s), and between two levels of food deprivation. Computational modeling revealed that latencies and IRTs were well described by mixture probability distributions embodying two-state Markov chains. Analysis of these models revealed that only a subset of latencies is sensitive to the periodicity of reinforcement, and prefeeding only reduces the size of this subset. The distribution of IRTs suggests that behavior in FI schedules is organized in bouts that lengthen and ramp up in frequency with proximity to reinforcement. Prefeeding slowed down the lengthening of bouts and increased the time between bouts. When concatenated, latency and IRT models adequately reproduced sigmoidal FI response functions. These findings suggest that behavior in FI schedules fluctuates in and out of schedule control; an account of such fluctuation suggests that timing and motivation are dissociable components of FI performance. These mixture-distribution models also provide novel insights on the motivational, associative, and timing processes expressed in FI performance. These processes may be obscured, however, when performance in timing tasks is analyzed in terms of mean response rates.     

The Organic Intellectual Educator

Contrasting images of teachers' lives and work, from compliance with bureaucratic controls, disaffection and lack of critical reflection, on the one hand, to innovation, commitment and reflexive critique, on the other, set the context for this article. Gramsci's classification of teachers as 'professional intellectuals' who transmit stable, even stagnant, knowledge, as distinct from other 'organic intellectuals' who evolve knowledge and engage critically with personal and social issues, is set within that context. Both distinctions were taken as an incitement to political action in the work which is then reported, where principles derived from Maslow's concept of the Taoistic teacher were instituted in an in-service course explicitly framed to encourage self-originating and self-determining approaches to intellectual growth. Extracts from projects by six teachers are used as evidence of the range, methods, depth and quality of personal engagements in educational experiences.     

Sense of Challenge,Threat, Self-Efficacy,and Motivation of Students Learning in Virtual and Blended Courses

Feelings of threat, challenge, motivation, self-efficacy, and transactional distance reflect students’ struggles with the learning process. This study examined the relationship between students’ subjective feelings about the learning process in virtual and blended courses (VC and BC). This is a mixed-method study. The sample included 484 students from two academic institutions in Israel. The study found a connection between students’ subjective feelings about the learning process in VC and BC and feelings of threat/challenge, motivation, and self-efficacy. We found differences between students in different years of study and between those studying in various fields of study.     

Consistency and change in mothers' behavior toward young siblings

Siblings differ markedly in behavioral development, and it has been suggested that differential maternal treatment may contribute significantly to these differences. The question of how consistently mothers treat their different children was examined in a study of 45 sibling pairs from the Colorado Adoption Project, in which each child at 24 months of age was videotaped at home with the mother. The results showed mothers to be consistent in affection and verbal responsiveness but to differ in their controlling behavior toward the 2 siblings. Comparison of the same mother's behavior to the 2 siblings at 12 months and at 24 months showed little stability in maternal behavior to the same child over this age period.     

Cultural historical activity theory and professional learning

In this article I will discuss the route by which I came to work with Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT). The brief tracing of my own biography will highlight theoretical and methodological milestones. I will then discuss my current work, with colleagues, on approaches to investigating and improving the learning of professionals who are involved in interagency work, which intends to reduce the risks of social exclusion for marginal groups. In this case I will consider those young people who become excluded from school and whose needs are complex and rapidly fluctuating. This project is concerned with the learning of professionals in the creation of new forms of practice, which require joined‐up solutions to meet complex and diverse client needs. We study professional learning in services that aim to promote social inclusion through supporting clients as effective actors in their worlds. At any given time in their lives individuals may take part in particular configurations of several, diverse social practices. In this discussion I will draw on recent developments in CHAT and theories of learning at work.