Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemThe public examination of English in Victoria : a study of one external influence on the secondary school English curriculum( 1980)The secondary school English curriculum was determined by groups outside schools during the period 1944-1974. External domination of teaching content and methodology was ensured by a system of Public and Matriculation Examinations which empowered agents of the universities to prescribe courses and to assess students' performance in those courses. The University of Melbourne exercised these functions through its Professorial Board and the Schools Board before relinquishing its powers to the Victorian Universities and Schools Examination Board in 1965. Statute and tradition allowed these bodies to establish themselves as a centre apart from schools, and to legitimise their authority through the institutionalised processes of prescription, examination and review of performance. The effect of these processes was to subordinate schools, teachers and pupils. There was immense inertia in the Victorian system of external prescription and examination. Courses and examination papers remained essentially unmodified for long periods. Significant development in the conception and content of English courses occurred, effectively, only at Year 12 in response to social and educational pressures which had previously led to the withdrawal of Public Intermediate and Leaving Examinations. Broadening the goals of H.S.C. English did not, however, signal diminished control over curriculum from the centre. The fact of competitive examinations at the end of secondary schooling continued to shape content and methodology in the earlier years. Competitive examinations engendered in schools, teachers and pupils a narrow conformity, the results of which can most clearly be seen in the failure of the Class A system to produce school-based curriculum initiatives of any substance. The effect of external prescription and examination of English courses was profound. Relationships between teachers and pupils were strongly mediated by the system, reducing the autonomy of both by subjugating their intentions to the instrumental demands of evaluation. So much of a student's 'life chance' depended upon examination success that teachers and taught were continually constrained to focus their attention on the tasks expected in examinations. Fragmentation, in line with the different sections of examination papers, rather than integration became, therefore, the organising principle for teaching aimed at developing those techniques believed to be essential for success in the examination game. External examinations dictated that the English classroom was a place where pupils met to prepare for their encounters with examinations rather than to explore the nature and richness of experience through literature and their own use of language for real ends. The system of Public and Matriculation Examinations established in 1944 was a potent influence on the secondary school English curriculum. The system rested upon a powerful, conservative centre whose legitimacy was so thoroughly entrenched that it was able to admit reform only on its own terms. Thus, it was possible after twenty-five years of relative stasis to negotiate evolution in the details of the school English curriculum without alteration to the essential power relationships. After thirty years, English teachers were still without autonomy. Year 12 English courses continued to exert the pressures and to exact the dependence which had constrained mother tongue studies throughout secondary schools since 1944.
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ItemThe social role of the English teacher( 1978)The concern of this thesis has been to probe the various expectations of those involved in the teaching and learning processes of English. This has been done in part through questionnaires, surveys, discussions, reports, and the writings done by teachers and students. The comments of educationists, psychologists, sociologists, and the media, have been related to the material wherever possible. Factors such as the socio-economic status of students, their ethnicity, different levels of motivation, occupational aspirations, and their beliefs and values, were also noted for their relevance to the acquiring of language skills. These and similar factors were seen to determine to a large extent the educational environment that is needed to generate in students a motivation to learn, to think critically, and to develop defensible ideas about themselves and society. For this reason, it has been suggested that the inter-disciplinary approach to English and English Literature through psychology, sociology and philosophy, may be seen as relevant to students in their study of the individual and society. Consciously or unconsciously, teachers impart norms of the individual's role in society. It may seem logical then to expect that teachers become familiar both with the substantive content of certain topics and issues that help them to define the role of the individual in society, and with the role of the school in dealing effectively with emerging social problems. Remedial and migrant students form part of the social problems that have caused the teaching of English to be criticised by the media and by concerned educationists. An examination of the problems of illiteracy, and solutions suggested by many writers on the subject, is compared with the experiences of those who are involved in remedial and migrant English teaching. Overall, an attempt has been made to define the role of the teacher of English in such a way as to encompass the varied needs of students in an increasingly complex society. The sixth form students in their replies to the HSC questionnaire, showed a desire to study the psychological, sociological and philosophical aspects of the literature read, and to relate it to their own lives, and to society in general. Literature was thus used for increasing self-awareness. This seems to suggest that teachers may need to re-evaluate their approach to the teaching of English in order to accommodate all students at all levels who desire to use English as an instrument of communication in its fullest sense.