Teachers’ journeys towards critical use of ICT

Teachers have a central role in developing new learning models in schools. This paper describes a study that explored teachers’ confidence and competence in using Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) as they participated in an ICT development project conducted by an Australian education system in 12 primary schools. The project aimed to develop ICT integrated teaching practices by providing in‐class equipment and teacher professional development in ICT use, curriculum development and teaching strategies. The study used qualitative data from teacher records of Professional Development and Action Learning to identify three of four stages proposed to describe teachers’ ICT learning. Teachers moved from gaining basic ICT skills, to conducting ICT‐focused lessons and eventually appropriate ICT integration. Teachers who progressed to the third stage were able to exploit additional learning opportunities and begin to make fundamental changes to their pedagogy, but needed more time to reach the final stage of challenging existing pedagogical structures.     

Selection of mathematically talented students

This paper reports a study concerned with the selection of mathematically talented students at the beginning of secondary school in Australia using a version of the College Board's Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT). Some young students achieved scores comparable with older mathematically able students and with college-bound students in USA. Teacher nomination of students as talented resulted in the selection of considerably different groups of students to those selected using the SAT. Marked sex differences, in favour of boys, are noted and discussed. Three different procedures for comparing item responses of younger and older groups are employed, leading to the conclusion that younger and older students respond to SAT items in qualitatively different ways. Comparison procedures based on the Rasch model for measurement are favoured.     

The consequences of fading instructional guidance on delayed performance: the case of financial services training

Empirical studies within a cognitive load framework have determined that for novice learners, worked examples provide appropriate levels of instructional guidance. As learners advance in specific subject domains, worked examples should be gradually replaced by practice problems with limited guidance. This study compared performance, both immediately post‐instruction and delayed, following instruction under different conditions: using example–problem pairs, using gradual fading of worked examples, and using pure problem‐solving. The study was conducted with employees of a financial services company in a classroom environment. Results indicated that the fading condition consistently outperformed the example–problem and problem‐solving conditions, and the advantage of this condition was enhanced, with statistically significant differences in performance, in delayed and transfer posttest performance.     

History education in transit: where to for Kazakhstan?

This study examines the post‐socialist transition in the secondary education history programme in Kazakhstan from 1990 to the present. The article examines the influence of policy talk and action upon official educational policy, and how the deployment of a new national narrative is being used to construct a de‐Sovietized‐re‐Kazakhified national identity. Educational objectives in calling for de‐Russification and de‐Sovietization are considered in the light of two other objectives: to de‐politicize and de‐ideologize the curriculum following the break‐up of the Soviet Union. I argue that there are two parallel projects at work that both support a more Kazakhified history curriculum and counter‐balance an ethno‐nationalizing programme by developing the World History programme. This study is based on 10 months of in‐country fieldwork encompassing document review, interviews and classroom observations in Kazakh and Russian medium of instruction schools.     

Education: the untapped resource in oil rich countries

This article raises the question of whether having a high value primary product resource, such as petroleum, makes a constructive contribution to economic and social development, and specifically to education. Although many scholars study the political and economic impact of oil on different societies, the impact on education remains an under‐explored area of comparative educational research. It first summarizes the general issues, then it discusses the educational case of Kazakhstan following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The article provides information about Kazakh history and development as a newly independent republic in Central Asia. The article argues the importance of bringing education into the center of the oil and natural resource rich development debate.