Melbourne Graduate School of Education - Theses
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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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ItemAn education to prayer: the establishment and development of a parochial school in the Catholic parish of St. Brendan's Flemington, Melbourne. 1887 -1947( 1990)�� the present system of Catholic Education in Australia developed not from any predetermined plan but as a result of the conflicting forces in educational development in the nineteenth century and the circumstances of the times." In the latter half of the nineteenth century �conflicting forces� and �the circumstances of the times� resulted in the establishing, in 1887, of a Catholic primary school in the inner Melbourne suburb of Flemington. (From Introduction)
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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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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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ItemIndependent schools and children of high intellectual potential( 1990)Independent Schools and Children of High Intellectual Potential In the current, rather volatile, educational climate, the community in Victoria is engaged in considerable debate about the putative merits and demerits of the proposed changes to post-compulsory schooling, the consequent flowback to curriculum and methodology in the P-10 years, and the consequences for the nature of our society. It is in this context, on the eve of the implementation of these changes, that this minor thesis proposes that teachers in non-systemic, independent schools continue to need to be made aware of the ways in which students of high intellectual potential might be identified and have their particular needs met within the constraints of the present system, so that the opportunities for the achievement of excellence might be explicitly realized. A survey has been conducted in order to establish, in a broad way, what is being done for children of high intellectual potential in non-systemic, independent schools within a 25-kilometre radius of the GPO, Melbourne. These schools have been surveyed by questionnaire. This questionnaire was designed to enquire about schools' entry policies, preliminary testing of students, the ways in which these tests are employed to group students and in which curriculum areas, at what levels any differential programs operate, the theory and research which informs the schools' policies, the oversight and implementation of these provisions or programs, and the nature of the schools' commitment to recognizing and meeting the needs of the highly able. The results of the questionnaire suggest that the single sex girls schools are more aware of and sensitive to the needs of able students and the ways in which the curriculum might be differentiated to meet those needs than either the single sex boys schools or the coeducational schools. While there is a general awareness of the issue of able students in many schools, there is, with a few notable exceptions, a lack of the firm knowledge and understanding of the ways in which those needs might be met by adopting specific identification measures, by modifying the traditional group structures employed in schools, and by systematically differentiating the curriculum for able students within and across particular learning domains. There is clearly a continuing need for the provision of further professional inservicing of all teachers to assist them in recognizing the needs and fostering the capacities of the intellectually able young in schools, that these students might be afforded the opportunities to realize their maximum potential.
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ItemThe changing role of the headmaster?: a study of two Ivanhoe Grammar School headmasters, 1915-1974( 1985)The organization of this study is straightforward. The first chapter discusses the origin of the Headmaster tradition and school management. The second chapter reviews the development of educational administration and its relationship to business administration. The third and fourth chapters deal with a study of two Ivanhoe Grammar School Headmasters, 1915 to 1974. The last chapter examines the different leadership styles of the headmasters and concludes that although these styles may vary, due to a variety of factors, the function of a headmaster remains basically the same.
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ItemSucceeding academically at a working-class school: some case studies( 1990)In this pilot study, I chose to interview only academically successful students because I wanted to identify as many as possible of the factors that might be unique to this group. In a larger study it would be necessary to interview the unsuccessful as well to establish whether the characteristics identified were in fact unique to the successful students. (From chapter 1)