Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemUneasy lies the head : the repositioning of heads of English in independent schools in Victoria in the age of new learning technologies( 2004)This study explores the discursive practice of six Heads of English in Independent Schools in Victoria during a period of major cultural change. This change has been associated with huge public investment in New Learning Technologies and shifting perceptions and expectations of cultural agency in communities of practice such as English Departments in Schools. In this social milieu tensions exist between the societal rhetoric of school management and marketing of the efficacy of NLTs as educational realities and discursive practices at a departmental level, embodying and embedding academic values and attainments. In their conversations with the author, the Heads of English reveal much about themselves and the nature and distribution of their duties and responsibilities within the local moral order of their schools and with their individual communities of practice. A model is developed of the dual praxis of the Heads of the Heads of English, mediated by autobiography and historically available cultural resources in a community of practice. As agents concerned to both maintain and transform their local culture of English teaching, and consequently the whole school culture, the Heads of English account for themselves as responding to their own `sense of place' in their own community of practice, but also the `structure of feeling' of the period by which their achievements and standing are known. This study of the persons of the English co-ordinators draws upon both Positioning Theory and critical realism to reveal the dynamic nature of both their identity and the social organization of English teaching in schools.
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ItemExploring an appropriation of reader-response theory for teaching and learning English literature in Vietnam( 2016)While learner-centred approaches to literature in second/foreign language education have enjoyed wide empirical support, the teaching of English literature in Vietnam still focuses on transmitting an objectified interpretation of a text. This study explores the potential of appropriating reader-response theory (Rosenblatt, 1994), which locates the meaning of a literary text through the reader-text connection, with the following question: In what ways can reader-response theory make a contribution to the teaching and learning of English literature at the undergraduate level in Vietnam? This research was conducted through the implementation of an innovative teaching intervention based on reader-response theory. The teaching intervention appropriated reader-response theory to nurture students’ own experiences of and responses to English literature through interactive activities. This intervention was designed to work within an institutional syllabus at a university in Vietnam. The study used action research, in which the researcher participated as the teacher implementing the teaching intervention. Action research complements reader-response theory as both attend to interactive meaning making in context. Data were collected from 48 English-major students through pre-course and post-course questionnaires, class recordings, a teaching journal, after-class evaluations, online communications and reading logs. The data were analysed using three perspectives: those of the teacher and student participants, and a real-time view of class conversations and artefacts. This research found that appropriating reader-response theory in this context involved creating a transition from teacher-centred to student-centred learning, where dialogic teaching and interactive activities were used to evoke students’ own responses to the text. This transition required the teacher to adopt a dynamic role taking students’ learning styles into account. Through this approach, the students became dialogic and critical in developing their own responses to the texts they studied. However, they showed some contradictory attitudes to the unconventionality of the reader-response approach, which asked for and helped develop the students’ own responses to literature rather than giving them final answers. The mixed reaction indicated the complexity of creating a new learning paradigm in a traditional context. The students seemed to negotiate this complexity and become more critical about their own learning as a result. An important implication of this study is that it illustrates the potential of reader-response theory to contribute to teaching programs that seek to enable learners to experience literature in a second/foreign language individually and interactively. Based on the research findings, a model for appropriating reader-response theory is proposed that coalesces and balances active individual reading, collaborative exploration of responses, and language and literary scaffolding. In authority-abiding, exam-oriented institutional contexts such as in Vietnam, appropriating reader-response theory also requires mindfulness of a potential tension between the old and new practice, especially with regard to assessment issues.
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ItemLaptops and literature : a constructivist approach to teaching English through multimedia( 1999)Staff in the English faculty at Central College are part of a laptop program, but are reluctant to make use of the laptops for anything except word processing. In this thesis I propose that staff need models for using laptop computers in a Secondary English classroom. Using an Action Research (Kemmis and McTaggert 1982) approach, the author researched learning styles, multimedia and subject English to develop a model for use in a novel-based classroom. The first model was developed, created and used in class. Student reactions were collected and analysed, and a second model created in response to this data. Students' reactions were collected and the models, along with student responses were presented to staff. Conclusions and recommendations drawn from this project were two-fold: that multimedia resources for student laptops are best designed and created by classroom teachers; and that the development of these resources are time intensive, so schools should support staff in the development of these resources with time and training.
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ItemEngagement and autonomy: their relationship and impact on reading comprehension for junior-secondary English literature students( 2012)A qualitative, inductive design explored the effects of two differing approaches to teaching comprehension of narrative texts on students’ task engagement and text enjoyment, and comprehension. Using one junior-secondary, mixed ability English class in a suburb of Melbourne (Victoria) the study compared and contrasted an approach allowing considerable student autonomy with one that is teacher-directed. It considered for which students, and under what circumstances, one might be more constructive. A grounded theory approach (Charmaz, 2006) was used to derive analytic theories from the particular situational and social context. The results demonstrate a complex relationship between engagement and comprehension. They highlight that academically weaker students can be more engaged by increased autonomy, and academically more able students can be disengaged by greater autonomy and prefer the more ‘predictable-to-them’, authoritative approach to instruction. Furthermore, the students’ views of knowledge and their corresponding efficacy beliefs can contribute to the extent of their engagement and ensuing achievement. It is proposed that teachers consider, more explicitly, students’ attitudes toward instruction. Additionally, by diversifying and allowing choice of both the activities to assist comprehension and the ways comprehension is assessed, teachers may be better able to facilitate students’ potential.