Learning with immigrant children,families and communities: the imperative of early childhood teacher education

Abstract

This article reports on a longitudinal study spanning over 5 years, involving the design and implementation of an early childhood teacher education program model that engages a critical-ecological theoretical approach, a funds of knowledge perspective, and design-based methodology. This project aimed to promote equitable education for all children, and especially for young immigrant children encountering situations of oppression within the national and local educational contexts in Arizona. In this teacher education program, families, community members, researchers, pre-service teachers and teachers worked together to develop new modes of curricular activity, new spaces, new relationships, and new forms of movement among participants, as well as new circulations of literacy artefacts.     

Secondary science students’ beliefs about class discussions: a case study comparing and contrasting academic tracks

The dialogue that occurs in science classrooms has been the subject of research for many decades. Most studies have focused on the actual discourse that occurs and the role of the teacher in guiding the discourse. This case study explored the neglected perspective of secondary science students and their beliefs about their role in class discussions. The study participants (N?=?45) were students in one of the three differentially tracked chemistry classes taught by the same teacher. Findings about the differences that exist among students from different academic tracks are reported. While it seems that epistemological beliefs focusing on content are common for the students in this study, the students' social framing in the different tracks is important to consider when teachers attempt to transition to more dialogic forms of discourse. Some key findings of this study are (a) students’ beliefs that science is a body of facts to be learned influenced the factors they deemed important for whole-class discussion, (b) students from the lower-level track who typically were associated with lower socioeconomic status were more likely to view their role as passive, and (c) students’ comfort level with the members of the class seemed to influence their decisions to participate in class discussions.     

Great expectations: a critical perspective on Open Educational Resources in Brazil

ABSTRACT

Nearly two decades have passed since the Open Educational Resources (OER) movement was launched. Its success in Brazil can be illustrated with the establishment of a UNESCO Chair in Open Education in 2014, in one of the country’s most prestigious universities. Crucially, OER were included in the 2014–2024 National Education Plan, a key piece of national educational legislation, as a category of educational technologies framed as tools. Assuming metaphors such as this play a key role in the ways we think, speak and act, this article presents a critical perspective on OER in Brazil. Examining the implications of the main metaphors used to construe OER in local media and academic sources, the text argues that these metaphors reflect hegemonic discourses on educational technology, concealing the non-neutrality of technological artefacts, obscuring issues concerning curriculum and pedagogy, and overlooking actual local needs. The article discusses issues concerning local OER advocacy, positioned in respect to specificities of a context where education, albeit a constitutionally established right, may be poised to undergo radical changes in the near future.     

Monitoring the ‘Enlaces’ educational computer network

The use of networks in education is experiencing world-wide growth. Many schools have taken advantage of the reduction of price in modems, the emergence of electronic bulletin boards and world-wide web pages with educational content, and the availability of software for public participation in networks. Nevertheless, little information is available about the quality and quantity of existing network traffic; information that would allow organizations, network project administrators and supporters, to evaluate its impact, know its usage, evolution and projections. This paper presents some of the traffic monitoring mechanisms presently in use in a Chilean educational network (the Enlaces Project), together with examples of the information collected through these mechanisms.     

AILEM Programme: a long‐term intervention to promote literacy learning in low‐performing primary schools in Chile

After one year of implementation, this paper describes a programme designed to support literacy learning in low performing schools from poor sectors in Santiago, Chile. School‐based intensive training on theory and practice of a literacy learning framework for classroom instruction and long‐term support were used to impact the achievement of students from disadvantaged families in 16 kindergarten classrooms and 16 1st‐grade classrooms in nine primary schools. Preliminary results showed an improvement in learning achievement positively related to level of implementation of the literacy instruction framework in the classrooms and teachers' perception of an improvement in their knowledge and classroom practices. Although findings from this study cannot support definite conclusions, because of the lack of experimental conditions, they provide relevant information for future experimental studies on how to meet the literacy learning needs of children from disadvantaged backgrounds.     

Career Dilemmas in Career Counseling Groups: Theoretical and Practical Issues

A career dilemma is a hypothetical or real situation in which a character is confronted with several career options each of which has advantages and disadvantages. The main purpose of presenting and discussing a dilemma in career counseling groups is to confront several appraisals of the situation in order to promote more complex thinking about career choices. Another important aim of this technique is to enhance interaction between group members and to analyze similar career dilemmas that the group participants have experienced in the past. The use of the discussion of career dilemmas is described, especially the role of the career counselor, and some suggestions for future research are presented.     

Peer Review in Education: Promoting Collaboration, Written Expression, Critical Thinking, and Professional Responsibility

This article discusses the application of the peer review process as a pedagogical instrument for the promotion of written expression, collaborative work, critical thinking, and professional responsibility among Informatics and Engineering majors. The approach is introduced with a motivation, followed by a discussion about common principles of current learning paradigms and the peer review process. This work is being conducted in Brazil, where we intend to promote a learning paradigm shift through the application of peer review in education. A framework for this application is outlined, together with an account of results from experiences and a discussion about the skills that this approach exercises, especially with regard to widely accepted curricula and codes of ethics and professional conduct. Further research and development efforts are conjectured.     

The process of internationalisation of higher education in Brazil: the impact of colonisation on south-south relations

ABSTRACT

This article presents a study that analyses interviews of African students participating in the PEC academic mobility programme, so to gain an understanding of the individual and corporate experience of living and studying in Brazil. However, our analysis also demonstrates a highly significant finding that the historical process of colonisation, experienced for centuries by the Great South, has impinged on the outlook held by individuals from the Great South, who tend to understand that the Great North is the desirable option. Consequently, this attitude has directly affected South-South relations and the cooperation between developing and emerging countries. The work of Franz Fanon, who is a pivotal figure in the process of decolonisation, serves as a framework for our analysis because it both conceptualises and demonstrates the symptoms of psychological violence in a colonised context. As it will become clear, this has ramifications for the process of internationalisation and globalisation of Higher Education.