Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemThe educational theory of G.H. Bantock in the context of British educational thought 1965-1975( 1990)The 1960s and early 1970s witnessed changes in many social values in Britain; the educational world was not immune to the turbulence of these years. The classifications of `traditionalist', `conservative', `progressive' and 'radical' were attributed indiscriminately to the wide spectrum of party affiliations. As a result, the characteristics of these `parties' became difficult to isolate amid the vague condemnatory generalisations and intense criticism of personalities which characterized the period. G.H. Bantock (b. 1914) was considered a prominent traditionalist of these times, and as such, attempted to swim against the tide of what he believed was an increasing, uncultured progressivism. This study attempts to present a summary of Bantock's principal concerns, and to offer a profile of the main thrusts of the arguments which he advanced in over eighty major publications. As a subsidiary theme, it considers the nomenclature of the period, particularly from the perspective of the traditionalist, and seeks to isolate the foundations of that philosophical stance. Part 1 is a summary of the main concerns which consumed Bantock's attention during his career. Part 2 considers the means by which Bantock believed the problems of contemporary education could be solved, and Part 3 presents the author's evaluation of the ideas outlined in the previous sections.
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ItemStudent expectations of the future( 1992)Specific aims of the study To investigate how present-day students view the future and their place in the workforce of the future. To establish whether or not students regard their present educational experiences as an adequate preparation for their future work. To investigate acceptance of unconventional futures scenarios as possible futures.
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ItemThe impact of the zone based professional development program, "Skill review and professional development", on knowledge, understanding and practice within selected school communities( 1995)While engaged in documenting a retrospective account of a zone based professional development program, Skill Review and Professional Development, which aimed to support school communities in the implementation of skill review and professional development according to the Tripartite Agreement on School Development Planning, I reflected on a statement by Harwayne (1992): 'We take courses. We attend workshops. We read books, We get lots of information. But the really important information comes later on. It comes when we take that seed information back to our classrooms, when we experiment and innovate and invent, when we make it our own. The story really is 'to be continued' (p.337 ). This reflection led to the following questions which drove my investigation: # has the 'seed information' collected during the program been taken back to the school level?; # have school communities been able to 'experiment', 'innovate' and 'invent' in order to make skill review and professional development their own?; and, # in what areas has the zone based professional development program, Skill Review and Professional Development, impacted at the school level? The information gathered to discover the answers to these questions was qualitative in nature and comes from those involved directly with the delivery and implementation of the program. The information draws on what happened at the zone level and what is now happening at the school level. The gathered data took the form of words: written and anecdotal; record and document observations; and transcripts of discussions and interviews, as words captured the spirit of the happenings. The writings of Joyce and Showers (1987), Joyce and Weil (1992), Fullan and Stiegelbauer (1991), Hargreaves (1992), Fullan (1993), Johnson (1993), Guskey (1994) and others have helped make sense of the impact of this program at the school level.
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ItemThe politics of curriculum( 1999)This thesis seeks to document the development, establishment and subsequent demise of Victoria's first independent regulatory body of senior secondary curriculum and assessment, the Victorian Institute of Secondary Education. Analysis of the origins of VISE helps reveal the implicit social conflicts at work within the senior secondary curriculum. The thesis investigates the response of policy makers to the shift in senior secondary education from an 'elite' system to a 'mass' system in light of this conflict. The thesis argues that these responses in general, and VISE's in particular, while significantly expanding school control over the curriculum and pedagogical autonomy, failed to moderate social patterns of success and failure by not challenging the implicit rationale behind the curriculum hierarchy - the needs of the university for selection - and by failing to base curriculum policy on a wider understanding of the origins of such patterns.
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ItemAnother world like here : futures studies and early childhood education( 1995)This thesis examines the discipline of futures studies and its potential for application in early childhood education. The need for an increased futures-orientation in education is established by a survey of the overwhelmingly negative commentaries of youths on the topic of the future. These comments, it is argued, point to a vacuum of understanding about the future which educators should seek to counterbalance. This task should be particularly emphasised by early childhood educators since they share a commitment to the central objective of laying foundations for life-long learning. Futures studies offers a useful methodology for this task. The thesis examines the major tenets of futures studies and its translation into primary and secondary educational settings. The applicability of futures studies to early childhood education is established by demonstrating the many principles which futures studies and early childhood education share in common. A futures-focused curriculum need not involve the educator in any radically new philosophical and educational frameworks. It, rather, provides a means of extending and re-articulating existing developmental objectives from the vantage point of new perspectives. The thesis resolves the issue of whether or not futures concerns are beyond the reach of four and five year olds by examining how pre-school children conceive time and the future. Young children are seen to possess many of the qualities which futures studies seek to re-instill in adults and older children. The educator should seek to capitalize on this by combining the positive aspects of children's innate perceptions of future time with the more abstract 'adult' understanding of time. A research project on pre-school children's attitudes towards the future sheds further light on their understandings of the future while also enabling their own opinions on the topic to be heard. The thesis then defines the principal objectives of a futures-focused curriculum and translates them into practical learning experiences. It concludes by exploring the implications of the findings contained in the thesis for early childhood education and by discussing some of the ways in which the educators themselves might come to terms with the issues articulated in this study.
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ItemCurricula skills valued by parents of students attending special developmental schools( 1999)This study was undertaken to investigate the values placed on specific curricula skills by parents of intellectually disabled children. The study also examined the relationship between these values and selected background variables. In addition, this study identified the parental preferred length of time that should be spent on particular skills each week in the educational programs of their children. A two part questionnaire was used to collect the data. It consisted of items relating to the background characteristics of the respondents and curriculum items that parents of children with intellectual disabilities were asked to rate. Eighty-six parents in the Northern Metropolitan Region of Victoria provided data for this study. Space was provided for parents to indicate other skills which they felt would be important for their children to learn. Items were spread across four curricula domains: functional life, academic, social/friendship and 'other' skills. T-tests and analysis of variance were employed to determine the significance of differences between means of ratings on the variables. Several findings emerged from the study. Parents were found to prefer independent functional life skills and integrating social/friendship skills throughout their child's school life, while academic skills were consistently rated last. Consistent with these ratings was the further observation that self-help or independent living skills, communication and social skills, were categories highly valued by parents. Significant difference was found related to the age and gender of the children of parents making the ratings. No significant differences were identified for parent age or parent educational level. Independent functional life skills were rated higher for older children, particularly for boys while integrating social/friendship skills rated higher for older girls than for older boys. Recommendations for parent involvement in curriculum decision-making are included.
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ItemIntegration : an investigation in post-primary schools( 1993)This study presents an account of integration policies and the integration of students with disabilities into mainstream post-primary schools in Italy and Victoria and other selected educational systems. A small number of case studies illustrates how some schools have reconciled their own policies to fall in line with their national educational policies. The organisational structures of secondary schooling and, within them, the provision of programs for the disabled and atypical students both overseas and in Victoria are examined and outlined. Comments are made about particular strengths and weaknesses of the various implementations of similar policies. The thesis concludes by providing a fist of areas which need to be addressed in planning further developments in integration.
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ItemHuman capital : a case study of the AMEP( 1995)This study is an investigation of the Human Capital Approach to education in Australia. It examines whether or not the Commonwealth Government is steering education towards the incorporation of policies that invest greater emphasis and resources into human beings as contributors to economic productivity than it invests in their cultural and aesthetic value. The study incorporates the philosophies of the Human Capitalists and how successive Commonwealth and State Governments apply these philosophies in education policy formulation - particularly the provision of English language to adult migrants through the Adult Migrant Education Program in Victoria. The methodology used is a questionnaire of closed and open-ended questions distributed to AMEP teachers. The researcher duly followed up the questionnaire with interviews of four AMEP teachers in an endeavour to shed more light on the reasons behind the responses given by teachers in the questionnaire. The researcher undertook an analysis of the responses in order to investigate whether or not the Commonwealth Government gives primacy to economic objectives of the migration program over its social, cultural and linguistic objectives. The findings are that the AMEP teachers surveyed believe that the Commonwealth Government does emphasize economic objectives over all other objectives of the migration program. A Human Capital approach to education, reflected in the application of Economic Rationalism, is apparent in Australia's education system according to AMEP teachers surveyed and that such has been the case since the late 1970s. The literary works of Schultz, Smith, Dawkins, Piore, Crittenden, Benovat, Green, Pusey, Kennedy, Marginson and Grubb are included in this study. These works form the literature review of the Human Capital approach. As well, the Reports chaired by Karmel, Williams, Kirby, Fitzgerald and Campbell, and a variety of Commonwealth Reports and Working Party Papers into various aspects of education in Australia are represented in an investigation of the application of the Human Capital approach to education in Australia's main education policies. The findings of this research are that the Human Capital approach to education is influencing the AMEP and that this has wider implications for the national education system in Australia. Almost all AMEP teachers surveyed believe the AMEP no longer follows its own National Plan, in which it spells out its aims and objectives, but pursues the Commonwealth Government's primary objective of pursuing the economic aims and benefits of the migration program.
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ItemCurriculum and programme provisions for gifted and talented children in Victorian J.S.H.A.A. schools( 1992)This study has surveyed the provision of programmes for Children with High Intellectual Potential (C.H.I.P.) in Victorian member schools of the Junior Schools Heads Association Australia. Fifty-nine schools were surveyed; fifty-four responded, representing some 19,000 junior school children. The survey was divided into six sections covering staffing provisions, curriculum and programmes, definition of gifted children, identification procedures, changing perspectives and importance of C.H.I.P., and subscriptions to journals. The literature search was divided into two distinct sections. Within the Australian context the review was historical, marking the modern beginnings of education for C.H.I.P.. There is a dearth of literature with Australian origins on gifted and talented children. The late seventies and early eighties uncover some material, basically funded and inspired by the Commonwealth Schools Commission. The emphasis is on surveys of programmes. The conclusion is clear that what programmes were operating were ad hoc in nature. This was inevitable, as teacher training for C.H.I.P. was non-existent. In the early eighties, promising programmes in the Victorian Education Department and the Catholic Education system were quickly quashed by a change of government. Major writers such as Gallagher, Maker and Van Tassel-Bash identify three distinct curriculum models, the Content, the Process/Product and the Epistemological. There is no evidence at this stage to suggest that the Victorian C.H.I.P. programmes are anything more than ad hoc. They do not fit into the three identified curriculum models. In-class provision is the main methodology, with programmes based on Bloom's Taxonomy or the Sato/Kaplan Differentiated Curriculum. Many schools are not yet operating strongly founded theoretical based programmes, and are clearly moving without direction. There is lack of understanding of the concept of C.H.I.P., even though identification procedures are quite sophisticated. Interest in teacher in-service appears to be growing rapidly. There is clearly a crucial need to provide pre-service courses at teacher training institutions. The major need for C.H.I.P. is for the Commonwealth government and the Ministry of Education in Victoria to develop and implement a policy on gifted and talented children.
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ItemSociological aspects of service provision for people with intellectual disabilities in Victoria( 1993)This study examines relevant principles within the context of changing values and social structures, that underline the policy initiatives to support people with intellectual disabilities. It contains information about the system of service delivery in Victoria, its history, functions, developments, strengths and weaknesses. It investigates the effectiveness of service delivery to adults with intellectual disabilities by Adult Training Support Services (ATSS) within both the private and government sectors. Differences are drawn in the approach and understanding of normalisation and integration principles between the three selected ATSSs. The study measures the degree of success made by the implementation and outcomes of their respective programmes. This reflects the way the whole service system operates. Finally the service provision system was examined in terms of the minimum conditions necessary for a social system to function.