Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemSocial competence and the core curriculum : a critical/empirical approach to the role of social education in the core curriculum( 1981)Through the reanalysis, reassessment, and reinterpretation of the data from the Essential Learning About Society study (Piper, 1977) from the point of view of current concerns about the core curriculum, this study develops an empirically-derived framework for a core curriculum in social education which takes into account the views of a substantial section of the Australian community. The study argues that social education is a necessary component of a core curriculum designed to meet the needs of both the individual student and the society as a whole; that the concept of social competence provides a valid basis for defining a core curriculum in social education; and that, in the absence of a definitive analysis of Australian society, community perceptions provide a practical alternative to the problems of defining an education for social competence. The developed framework provides a practical resource for incorporating community perceptions into core curriculum decision-making, and as such has potentially useful applications to educational policy and practice and to further research, as well as providing a body of empirical evidence in an area where such evidence is largely lacking.
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ItemInitiative and control : in the Disadvantaged Schools Program in Victorian government schools, 1973-80( 1985)The Disadvantaged Schools Program seemed a fertile field for the study of the relationship between initiative and control. While the need for organisational controls, in the interests of conformity, cohesion, security, co-ordination and effectiveness can hardly be disputed, neither can the urge of individuals to be themselves, and to act as they think best. While any group, organisation or society needs some pattern of regulation, both for its own sake and for the sake of its members, harmony is a heavenly rather than an earthly state. The intrinsic nature of man, the gap between prescribed and actual organisational goals, the effect of continual change in people, structures and external conditions, all serve to ensure that the interaction between people and organisations can never be smooth for long. The key problem awaiting solutions is the finding of the parameters of the optimal relation between the individual member of an organisation and it overall structure, between individual aims and organisational goals, between necessary mechanisms of delegation and control and individual needs and expectations.
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ItemDifficulties in maintenance of ethnic language and culture in a multicultural society: with particular reference to Italian families in Melbourne( 1981)The growing political awareness and acknowledgment of Australia's multicultural society produced in the seventies an increasing number of reports on the needs of the ethnic communities. The Government acknowledges that it is now essential to encourage the development of a multicultural attitude in Australian society to foster the maintenance of cultural heritage and promote intercultural understanding. The long-awaited signs of widespread implementation of stated policies and recommendations have been disappointingly slow in emerging. This is attributed to the slowness of a change in attitude throughout the community. Because the Australian school system is not in tune with the multicultural society of today, children of ethnic parents are not receiving equal education opportunities with their Australian peers. Through lack of recognition of their ethnic language and culture by schools, children of ethnic parents are rejecting their mother tongue. In a series of case studies of Italian families in Melbourne, the mother's attitude was seen as the most important factor in language maintenance at the present time. Attitudes were seen to differ, not according to social class, educational level or region of origin, but according to individual values and beliefs. The importance of maintenance of ethnic language and culture for the traditional cohesiveness of the Italian family ethos is stressed, but is seen as resting on a tenuous thread.
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ItemA comparative study of ten Victorian Protestant girls' school histories 1875 to 1920( 1985)In recent years a number of histories of independent girls' schools have been published and it now seems an appropriate time to draw together some aspects of this history. This thesis will trace some of the common features of these histories with a view to explaining the changes in the development of female education in Victoria during the period 1875 to 1920.(From Introduction)
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ItemEducational provisions for gifted and talented children in Victorian schools viewed from an Australian perspective( 1982)This thesis is concerned with the Educational Provisions for Gifted and Talented Children in Victorian Schools. A knowledge of historical developments both Australian and world wide is seen as a necessary prerequisite for an understanding of present practices in both government and non-government schools. An analysis of the major contemporary issues which face the designers of programmes for gifted and talented children is then presented. Once these issues have been identified a description of current educational provisions operating within Victorian schools is undertaken. Government and non-government schools are examined at both the primary and secondary levels, as well as teacher training courses for the teachers of the gifted and talented. In the conclusion, achievements both in Victoria and Australia in meeting the needs of gifted and talented children are discussed and the prospects for the future are considered.
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ItemUndergraduate course preferences of students with some previous tertiary education( 1982)The thesis is an examination of the factors which affect the course choice of applicants to tertiary institutions. The sample is taken from the 1977 applicant cohort registered with the Victorian Universities Admissions Committee. The applicants in the sample are those who had already been enrolled in tertiary educational institutions for at least one year, prior to their application in 1977. The aims of the study are to examine the effect of previous tertiary experience, employment experience, age and sex on the course choice of the applicants. The data used in the study were taken from:. application files held by the Victorian Universities Admissions Committee. The results of the analysis are compared with the results of studies carried out in Australia and overseas which described the vocational and educational choices of students entering tertiary institutions for the first time, and subsequently transferring to other institutions in some cases. The main difference between this study and those which preceded it is that the applicant sample in this study contains persons aged from seventeen years to more than sixty-five years, whilst previous analyses had been confined in the main to the young applicants. A comparison is made between the course choices of the young applicants, aged 22 years or less, and the older applicants, aged 23 years or more. The results of this study are similar to those already published. Nevertheless some new information about the effect of the Victorian tertiary education system - the number and nature of the institutions - on the choices of applicants is presented. In addition the study makes available a comparison of age groups which has not yet been attempted elsewhere. The study shows that applicants of all ages have two objectives: the first, to obtain a qualification which will enable them to find satisfying employment; the second, the study a course which provides them with interesting activity which enables them to find personal satisfaction. In the main students wish to undertake the second objective at a University, whilst vocational training is sought at. a variety of institutions. The prestige and academic standing of the institutions is an important factor in the determination of the applicants' choices, and as a result many are not satisfied in their application.
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ItemSome determinants of students' course selection in mathematics( 1984)In this study some determinants of students' course selection in mathematics. were investigated, with particular attention being given to those factors which may result in differential participation rates between boys and girls. The aim of the study was to assess the relative importance for student decisions of various psychological variables related to achievement attitudes. Such knowledge could then be used in the design of appropriate programs and techniques to increase the likelihood of students continuing to take maths. Questionnaires were administered to the 115 students in Year 9 and to the 107 students in Year 7 at a Melbourne inner-suburban .high school. Specific findings apply to those students in that particular school; without investigation of the effect of such variables as socioeconomic status, ethnic background., administrative structure, course-availability and class size they could not be extrapolated to other students in other schools. Students' estimates of their maths abilities and their expectations for maths performance, decreased with age, as did their perception of their parents' and teachers' beliefs about their ability and expectations for their success. Students' beliefs about the importance of success in maths and their declared interest in and liking'for the subject also decreased with age, while their estimates of the difficulty of maths increased with age. Year 9 boys had higher opinions of their maths ability and were more confident of success in future maths courses, than were Year 9 girls. These girls saw the subject as being more difficult and the cost of the effort required to do well to be higher than did their male classmates. At the Year 7 level, however, the only sex differences were in the stereotyping of the utility of maths for females and in the stereotyping of maths as a male domain. Plans to continue with maths were facilitated by high expectations, by firm beliefs in the value of maths and in one's own ability and by low estimates of the difficulty of maths. Sex differences favouring boys were found on these variables. On the basis of these findings, certain areas for intervention were identified. These areas included the encouragement of positive attitudes towards maths, the provision of career awareness programs, and the attempt to modify parents' and teachers' attitudes as to the maths, ability of girls and the importance of maths for them.
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ItemThe history of St. John's College Braybrook, 1958-1978: an illustration of the tensions between local initiative and centralization in the field of Catholic education( 1985)In 1958 a group of local priests from within the Sunshine/Braybrook region saw the need for the establishment of a school to cater for post-primary catholic boys and showed much initiative in their attempts to bring such a venture to fruition. Their initiative is demonstrated by their efforts not only to assure the central authorities that the project was feasible from the financial angle, but also by their extensive attempts to gain the services of a religious order to conduct the college. Having no success with the local orders, the priests turned to overseas for assistance. In 1964 the Brothers of the Sacred Heart arrived in Australia to open their first college. With the opening of the school at the commencement of 1965, the priests' venture had become a reality. As the sixties progressed changes to catholic secondary education within the archdiocese were taking place. The role of the laity within the Church became a more active one. This was translated into the life of the college by means of increased participation in decision-making processes by the laity. Further, the re-introduction of "state-aid" enabled the college, like many others, to survive financially. It did at the same time enable catholic central authorities to play a more dominant role in the operation of the college. The college continued to expand throughout the seventies. Co-education was introduced at the senior levels in 1972. This led to the establishment in 1975 of an Archbishop's Committee to investigate the possibility of establishing a separate senior college. Unlike the planning which took place in the fifties by the priests, this venture was undertaken by the central Catholic Education Office. Local initiative had to a great extent been replaced by centralization.
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ItemSenior school chemistry in Victoria: syllabus prescription and pressure for change( 1984)A few key ideas have dominated the senior school chemistry syllabuses in Victoria. Despite pressures for change, and disclaimers to the contrary at various times, the Victorian course developers have shown a constant commitment to chemistry as an academic discipline, to the exclusion of most if not all of the societal, cultural, historical and economic aspects of the subject. In this thesis, an understanding of present courses in terms of past practice has been sought through a study of the ideas which have influenced syllabus design at various times. Some purchase on the exercise of change in school syllabuses, on the possibilities and limits to change, was obtained, although no prediction of future directions could be attempted. At the outset a decision was taken to concentrate the investigation on materials published principally for the direction of teachers whose task it was to prepare their classes for an externally set and assessed examination in chemistry. Thus, in this thesis, attention has focussed on the expressed intentions of the course developers in Victoria, as outlined in syllabuses, Course of Study and Scope of Course statements, and commentary in Circulars to Schools. Data extracted from these documents was supplemented with material from the recommended textbooks and Reports of Examiners. The former provided an extended coverage of material prescribed in the syllabuses, offering more insight into teaching sequence and depth than could, at this remove, be fairly inferred from syllabus documents alone. Commentary in the Reports of Examiners revealed more of the expectations of examiners and course developers than was apparent from the syllabuses alone. The correctives suggested by the examiners for a range of perceived shortcomings gave an indication of what was seen at various times as appropriate in schools courses. The examination papers themselves were not analyzed except for a few specific items. Although examinations have without doubt served to direct and limit teaching practice, this has not been their primary function. Selection of content, and methods of teaching specific items of content, and trends in course changes, were compared with contemporary practice in England and the United States. Chemistry method textbooks proved useful here as those available were spread approximately evenly across the whole of the period of the survey. Journal articles, except for those few which reported historical material, tended to be concentrated in the latter quarter of the century, 1955 to 1980, thus affording a much better coverage of ideas extant during that period than was the case for the earlier years. The syllabus in action, in terms of classroom practice, facilities and management, was not considered as part of this study. These factors assumed significance only in so far as they imposed limitations on the course developers. Those decisions taken revealed, in the syllabus but more so in commentary documents, the rationalization of an idealized conception of the discipline of chemistry into a form fit for school use. The view taken in this thesis was neither strictly historical nor chronological. No attempt was made to fully document the development of chemistry as a school level subject in this state. Past practice, and current overseas practice, were used rather to construct a context in which the most recent course changes in Victoria could be explained. In commenting on syllabus change, it has proved easier to identify past shortcomings than to point to a direction for the future. Trends, even though well established, can be and have been reversed. An aim shared by course developers in different countries is susceptible to quite disparate interpretations, resulting in courses with little in common. Further, as this research has been limited to publicly expressed intentions in official documents, it allowed only indirect reflection on purposes and reasons for decisions. A study complementary to this thesis in which particular periods were dealt with in greater detail, could examine the hopes and frustrations of those individuals who assumed the responsibility for the development of school level chemistry courses in Victoria. From both sorts of consideration of the studies a society chooses to impose on its children, some insight into the nature of that society and its culture could be gained.