Juggling competing activities: academic staff as doctoral candidates

ABSTRACT

This article explores the experiences of a group of established academic staff in New Zealand and the UK, as they undertake a doctorate in their home institutions. Our interest is in how individuals negotiate this dual status from a cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) stance that explores how rules, tools, community and divisions of labour, and interacting activity systems, shape doctoral experiences. The focus in this article, having analysed their detailed narrative accounts, is on how academics experience three interdependent activity systems: those surrounding the thesis, the institutional context, and the home-life spheres. Issues related to time, workload and supervision issues, variability in collegial support and impact on personal priorities and time emerged. There is a range of particularities – from easy access to resources/supervisors to inflexible institutional regulations – applicable to this group of doctoral candidates. Negotiating life as an academic with concurrent doctoral candidature provides positive outcomes in terms of teaching, research confidence and general personal and professional development. However, a range of difficulties can also be encountered, particularly in relation to personal and professional relationships, and workload management.     

Expanding opportunities to learn to support inclusive education through drama‐enhanced literacy practices

This study examines how the Early Years Educators at Play (EYEPlay) professional development (PD) programme supported inclusive learning settings for all children, including English language learners and students with disabilities. The EYEPlay PD model is a year‐long programme that integrates drama strategies into literacy practices within real‐classroom contexts. Inclusive education refers to ensuring equal opportunities to access and participation in learning activities for all students. Cultural‐historical activity theory was used to understand and unpack the drama practices. Twelve semi‐structured focus group interviews were conducted with 19 preschool teachers. The data were analysed via constant‐comparative and interpretive methods. The study findings showed that EYEPlay PD practices enhanced inclusive learning settings for diverse groups of students by increasing access and expanding opportunities to learn, and supporting a positive learning environment.     

项目教学法在计算机应用基础教学中的应用探析

确保计算机应用基础教学效能得到有效发挥,已成为中职教育工作者关注的焦点。文章探讨项目教学法在计算机应用基础教学中的应用,指出教师要以学生兴趣为出发点,实现任务情境的创设;以实践探究为驱动点,注重学生技能的锻炼;以开放环境为切入点,倡导创新能力的培养。     

加强高职生职业化人才素质培养 提高就业能力

高职生要想在未来的市场竞争中拥有更大的竞争力,就必须要成为职业化人才。因此,要在学校的学习和企业的实习过程中,不断提高自己的职业素质和职业能力,成为应用技术性型人才。     

The impact of a professional development programme on teachers' attitudes towards inclusion

This article describes a study that aimed to answer the following question: ‘Will a programme of professional development in the area of special and inclusive education be effective in achieving attitudinal shift in teachers?’ Forty‐eight teachers who were enrolled on a Master's programme in Special and Inclusive Education were surveyed via a questionnaire at the beginning and end of a ten‐week introductory module. The results indicated overall attitudinal shift and attitudinal shift for four categories of inclusion to suggest more positive attitudes at the end of the module, compared with at the beginning. The implications for providers of pre‐ and in‐service education and training courses for teachers are discussed.     

近十年体育教师专业能力研究综述

通过对近十年我国体育教师专业能力的文献收集,将其分为中小学和大学两大类,并对每类文献做结构、现状、策略的综述。研究方法为文献资料法,逻辑分析法。研究结果:学者对体育教师专业能力结构的见解具有交叉性,但缺少统一的认识,研究范围较小,不足以代表合格教师所应具备的专业能力;现状和策略的研究较为陈旧,对提出的策略没有进一步跟进,策略缺乏创新,需要更深层次的研究。     

A review of parent–professional partnerships and some new obligations and concerns arising from the introduction of the SEND Code of Practice 2015

This article contributes a current thematic review of literature about the challenges of productive parent–professional partnership working relating to children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). It also reports on an empirical project which explored early experiences of professionals working under the newly statutory SEND Code of Practice 2015 and asks what new challenges have emerged for SEND parent‐partnerships. Particular consideration is given to the language of choice and preference in the Code, the new focus on outcomes in the place of specified provision, and the problematic construction of compliant partners.     

Unconscious and unnoticed professional practice within an outstanding school for children and young people with complex learning difficulties and disabilities

This article describes a three‐year project undertaken at Pear Tree School for children and young people with severe and multiple and profound learning difficulties. Lesley Sullivan, the school's head teacher, believed that much of the value within the work of this outstanding school went unidentified by existing approaches to planning, monitoring and evaluation. Richard Crombie, educational psychologist, was engaged to work on the project. Also involved were Kate Walker and Rebecca Warnock, deputy head teachers, as well as the whole staff, children and some parents. The project takes as its starting point that essential, but very often unnoticed and unconscious, professional practice is rooted in implicit processes learnt experientially. We set ourselves the task of finding meaningful frameworks for identifying and developing that practice. This meant close observation within and outside school coupled with feeding back to staff, and their subsequent engagement with and use of explanatory frameworks.     

Blended learning in higher education: professional development in a Hong Kong university

ABSTRACT

Online learning has become a ubiquitous part of the educational landscape and how teachers are supported in developing approaches to teaching online is a fundamental aspect of the students’ learning experience. Based on the implementation of a professional development course on becoming an online teacher offered in a blended learning mode at one university in Hong Kong, this article proposes that offering this type of professional development in a blended mode is very effective in facilitating enhanced usage of the university’s learning management system. In a blended mode, teachers are actively engaged with blended learning and were found to make more extensive use of features/tools in Blackboard after they attended the professional development course. Results support that offering professional development in a blended mode provides teachers with an authentic student perspective, at the same time as they take guided steps in the teacher’s role in blended learning.     

电机学精品在线开放课程校企合作初探

工程教育专业认证背景下,电机学省级精品在线开放课程注重校企合作,收集丰富的生产现场教学资源,聘请企业专家录制教学视频,开展网上讨论、网上直播课等。下阶段校企合作重点是编写理论和实践教材、共建电机科技活动实训室、企业专家指导网上PBL项目、指导学生选取企业真题申报大创项目。