Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemThe acquisition of goal-directed movement: developing and reporting a measure of learning readiness for use in classroom settings with students with motor performance needs( 2018)This thesis investigated how student movement difficulties might be related to motor learning opportunities in the classroom, and how classroom-related movement might be described as a learning progression and stage of learning assessed. At the time of this investigation, the movement aspects of classroom learning were not constituted as a curriculum domain, nor were classroom teachers equipped by their training to support motor learning advance for students experiencing difficulties. Consequently, a common practice was to recruit occupational therapy support via teacher-administered assessments developed by occupational therapists for this use. However, these were not underpinned by learning progressions enabling results to indicate stage of learning readiness – an important educational requirement. This study employed educational measurement methodology to design an assessment framework describing the progressive learning of goal-directed movement, including its dimensionality and learning levels, to support teachers’ instructional planning in this area. Drawing upon Vygotskian social constructivism, item response theory, and insights spanning over 60 years of motor behaviour research, movement was firstly defined accessibly as a goal-directed problem-solving strategy using the resources of the body one has. It was then operationalised as a judgement-based questionnaire, with items expressing five classroom-relevant aspects of postural control, transportation of self and objects, manipulation, communicative/ interactive skills, and performance sustainment. Empirical calibration of the item pool via assessment of 650 students with motor performance needs confirmed an acquisitional sequence with excellent measurement properties, following which standard setting by a Delphi panel of occupational therapy experts established 22 progressive learning levels for the dimensionalised scale and three possible report formats for different end-users. The result was an educational measure in-built with occupational therapy expertise that represented a new approach to occupational therapy assessment construction and provided a new way for allied health professionals and teachers to collaborate in support of classroom motor learning. Future research should undertake further collaboration with occupational therapists, to determine instructional strategies appropriate to each level of the scale.
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ItemRemaking the university curriculum: what counts as knowledge in new forms of online learning( 2017)The purposes of a university education and the knowledge it should seek to impart are today very much in question. Teaching within universities is becoming increasingly focused on generic instrumental and vocational agendas, and there are strong drives to improve teaching and make greater use of online technologies in response to a widening student body. The significance and implications of these trends for different aspects of university work have been widely debated, but there has been little attention to the changing dynamics of curriculum making and the assumptions at work in how subjects are being put together. Within this context, this thesis investigates the question ‘what counts as knowledge in new forms of online learning’. It focuses on the differences and similarities evident in the purposes, assumptions and constraints recognised by those working in different kinds of knowledge fields; and on the coherence of the conceptions of knowledge at work within the framing and development of new online initiatives and subjects. The thesis approaches these questions through a qualitative study of online initiatives developed at two Australian universities. The research draws on traditions of curriculum inquiry and policy sociology to focus on how those responsible for the development of the new online initiatives and subjects grapple with questions of knowledge and its teaching in their aims and practices. It considers the institutional policy framings informing the new online initiatives and undertakes case studies of the curriculum development of particular subjects, drawing on interviews with policy leaders and lecturers, and analyses of policy documentation and curriculum materials. For the policy leaders, the thesis shows that while their rhetoric is concerned with students’ own knowledge constructions, their approach positions curriculum content as settled and predefined. For the lecturers, it highlights significant differences in how those located in disciplinary and professional fields conceptualised knowledge and approached their curriculum development, but also that these orientations were undermined to an extent in the process of working with the new platforms. It shows the lecturers’ practices here led to more ‘instructivist’ rather than ‘constructivist’ teaching, and a greater emphasis on knowledge as a defined body of content to be taught. The thesis uncovers three problems arising in current university developments. One is the neglect of the differences between disciplines and professional knowledge fields, and the ways in which the different purposes and orientations of these fields shape curriculum development. A second is the neglect of the conditions required to encourage constructivist teaching practices online, including in relation to questions of substance. And a third is the neglect of the complex relations between curriculum and pedagogical form in building what counts as knowledge. The thesis explores the effects of these policy blindspots on lecturers’ practices of curriculum making and on the forms of education made possible as a result. In doing so, it opens up some new ways for researchers and institutional leaders to engage with questions of knowledge and curriculum within higher education.
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ItemTeaching the live: the pedagogies of performance analysis( 2016)Theatre as an artform is ephemeral in nature and offers a lived, aesthetic experience. Attending theatre and analysing theatre performance is a key component of the study of drama in senior secondary education systems in Australia, and in many international education systems. The senior secondary drama curriculum in Victoria offers a unique context for analysing live theatre performances. Lists of performances are prescribed for teachers and students to select from and attend. The year prior to the lists being created, theatre companies are invited to submit productions for consideration. The written curriculum determines that students write a written analysis of one production. This task assesses students’ knowledge, skills and understanding of what they experience at school level, and they are assessed again in an end-of-year‘ high-stakes’ examination, the results of which contributes to students’ overall graduating academic score. Methodologically, this study used case study methods to investigate the pedagogies of performance analysis, selecting four cases as a collective case study approach. Over a period of fourteen months the study investigated how the lists of performances were generated, how teachers and students selected a performance to attend, how teachers taught the analysis of live theatre performance to senior drama students in a high-stakes assessment environment, and critically examined the role of theatre companies within these processes. The data comprised document analysis, participant observation, field notes, semi-structured individual and focus group interviews, and researcher reflective journal. Specifically the study examined pedagogy and how teachers’ pedagogical choices moved the written curriculum towards enacted and experienced curriculum. It explored what influenced and impacted these pedagogies in order to consider what constitutes effective pedagogies for teaching the analysis of live theatre performance within the research context and, more broadly, wherever the analysis of theatre performance is included in senior drama curricula. The findings indicate that while the teachers who participated in the study sought to create rich educational experiences for their senior drama students, they needed to take a reductive approach and employ teaching strategies that reinforced capacities relevant to the exam rather than those that engaged with the live arts experience or recognised and incorporated the embodied practices of drama education. Consequently, the study questions the purpose of examining performance analysis. The study also revealed how theatre company practices impact the teaching of performance analysis. As a way to structure an effective pedagogy for teaching performance analysis the study recommends that a purposeful, structured and sustained community of practice be established between curriculum authorities, theatre companies and schools. It is one that acknowledges the four stages of pedagogy identified and is a model that has potential application in curriculum where performance analysis is part of studying drama and theatre.
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ItemThe alignment of valued performance types in assessment practices and curriculum in year 5 mathematics and science classrooms( 2014)Curricular alignment can be defined as the degree to which the performance types valued in curriculum statements (intended curriculum), instruction (enacted curriculum) and assessment (assessed curriculum) at all levels form a coherent system. This thesis reports on six key performance type categories that were used to examine the alignment of assessment practices with the intended and enacted curriculum. The six categories are knowing, performing, communicating, reasoning, non-routine problem solving and making connections. The research was undertaken as a comparative case study of two science and two mathematics primary classrooms. The methods employed were video-recorded lessons and interviews, questionnaires, document analysis and classroom observations. This study sought to determine the scope of practice (variety of performance types) evident in mathematics and science classrooms by examining the vertical and horizontal alignment of performance types. The vertical alignment analysis determined the correspondence among valued performance types in assessments at different levels of the schooling system (national, state and school levels). The horizontal alignment analysis consisted of making comparisons of performance types between classrooms at the same level and across two domains; mathematics and science. Ultimately, the classroom implementation of assessment of the curriculum is the responsibility of the teacher, so it can be argued that those performance types valued in the classroom are determined by the teacher. However, the teacher will inevitably be influenced by factors beyond the classroom, such as the state mandated curriculum, school curriculum requirements and high stakes testing. The major assertion of this study is that if performance types are not evident in classroom practice, then they are not available for formative assessment purposes and should not be summatively assessed. The findings show that in mathematics, ‘knowing’ and ‘performing procedures’ are consistently privileged in the national assessment program and through school-‐based assessment practices. These performance types were dominant in the enacted and assessed curriculum at the classroom level. The science data analysis showed that the scope of practice in the science classrooms consisted of all six performance type categories; knowing, performing, communicating, reasoning, non-routine problem solving and making connections. The relative diversity of science performance types could reflect the nature of the science curriculum at the school level and the fact that it is not subjected to the same testing, monitoring and auditing process as the mathematics curriculum. This provides teachers with the autonomy to select activities more frequently on the basis of their investigative appeal. Mathematics and English are the two domains that are assessed through the national standardised testing program and tend to dominate the primary school curriculum. Another key finding is that different school structures influence who has authoring responsibilities for the intended curriculum. The responsibility given to authorship of internal and external curriculum documents and assessment has significant implications for classroom practice and assessment. It is a recommendation of this study that monitoring programs, such as the national assessment program, are carefully aligned with the performance types valued in curriculum standards. The authority afforded to the intended curriculum and assessment documents, such as standardised testing, can be a restricting factor in the performance types that are evident in classroom practice.
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ItemThe structuring of knowledge for interdisciplinary teaching in higher education( 2011)This study investigates and compares teaching within both disciplinary and interdisciplinary subjects at the higher education level. Interdisciplinary subjects are increasingly being offered within university curricula in response to a range of stakeholders both internal and external to the university system (Holmwood, 2010). Seen to expose students to complex problems that cross disciplinary boundaries, they are also considered beneficial as it is believed they provide students with a range of skills necessary to succeed in society and in the workplace (Frodeman et al., 2010). Interdisciplinarity and disciplinarity are often presented as disparate (Moore, 2010) and so the introduction of interdisciplinary subjects is seen as an alternative to discipline–based subjects. However, there has been little research investigating the nature of knowledge that is taught in interdisciplinary subjects and whether this form of teaching differs from that in discipline–based subjects. This study explores the differences between teaching in these two contexts by investigating whether and how academics within a university structured around the disciplines change their teaching for the interdisciplinary context and in particular how they perceive knowledge in these two teaching environments. This research employs a qualitative case study approach, drawing on interviews with six experienced academics from The University of Melbourne, Australia, a university that has recently undergone major curriculum reform. The academics come from a range of disciplinary backgrounds allowing for diversity in the data. At the time the interviews were conducted, interdisciplinary subjects had been part of the university curriculum for one year. This study, therefore, presents a snapshot of interdisciplinary teaching for these academics after this first year. The theoretical framework for the research draws on Shulman’s (1986; 1987) idea of Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK), Bernstein’s theoretical ideas of the pedagogic device and knowledge structures (Bernstein, 2000) and Legitimation Code Theory (LCT) (Maton, 2000, 2007, 2009). This study reveals that there is a shift in academics’ teaching practice for the interdisciplinary context. Teaching in interdisciplinary subjects is shown to be influenced by a number of complex factors that are determined by the academics’ background, the setting in which interdisciplinary subjects occur and the nature of interdisciplinary knowledge itself. The most significant contribution this thesis makes to an understanding of interdisciplinary teaching is its discussion of the role of knowledge, knowledge structures and the knower in determining what is taught. Interdisciplinary studies that focus on a particular problem or context, such as climate change, place a stronger emphasis on developing a particular type of knower and ways of knowing while at the same time reducing the value placed on students developing an understanding of particular content knowledge. This is attributed to the manner in which the disciplines that make up an interdisciplinary subject contribute their knowledge. The study also shows that in translating knowledge for interdisciplinary teaching that some of the subtleties of disciplinary knowledge are lost and so the same topic taught in an interdisciplinary subject will not have the same depth as when taught in a discipline–based subject. These findings have a number of implications for universities incorporating interdisciplinary subjects in their curricula. While the content and skills that students are taught in interdisciplinary subjects can be seen as beneficial they are different to those in discipline–based subjects. It is argued here that in order to maintain the depth of knowledge that comes with discipline based teaching and the breadth that is associated with interdisciplinary teaching, interdisciplinary and disciplinary subjects need to be included within university curriculum for complimentary rather than opposing reasons.
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ItemPrimary teachers and the Information and Communications Technology domain: figuring worlds, identities, knowledge and practices( 2010)This study investigates the development of teacher professional practice in the context of government education policy in Victoria (Australia) that aims, through the education of its youth, to shape a successful economy that capitalises on information and communications technology (ICT). Specifically, the study examines how selected primary teachers from an ICT network conceptualise, articulate and develop a body of knowledge to teach and implement the Information and Communications Technology domain of the Victorian Essential Learning Standards (Victorian Government, 2005) curriculum framework. Through a constructivist grounded theory approach, the study investigates the practices of six female teachers in three government primary schools as they implement changes to curriculum in response to government reforms and local expectations. The three primary schools are within close proximity of each other in a residential growth corridor on the fringes of metropolitan Melbourne, and serve a diverse and multicultural community. Innovation with ICT is seen as necessary for addressing the challenges that arise from the social and economic context of the research sites, and is integral to improvement plans in each of these schools. The participating teachers are regarded as leaders with ICT within their schools and their efforts are deemed intrinsic to their school’s plan. Rich descriptive data of these six teachers and how they construct their worlds is utilised to develop a theory of how teachers learn to teach with ICT, with a view to understanding how they continue to learn in the context of these changes. Change efforts often focus on the importance of knowledge building to empower professionals for new directions, however while a critical component, knowledge is not the only factor in increasing capability. The study highlights that learning to teach the ICT domain is more complex than developing content knowledge, pedagogical repertoire and skills in the use of ICT. It involves networked learning where values, beliefs, vision, practice and identities are made and remade. In making changes, teachers consider new ideas in light of the old, and through the lens of their core values and beliefs, they figure a technologically rich world of vast imaginings that they can embody. They author identities to assert themselves in relation to imposed positioning and prior conceptualisations. Through changed activity related to ICT, they redefine their conception of teaching and inhabit it with their activity and energy.