Melbourne Graduate School 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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ItemTeacher's management of learning in small groups in science classes( 1993)Established curriculum documents in Victoria recommend group work as an effective teaching strategy but the implementation and management of such groups is poorly understood by many teachers. This study investigated two management strategies which differed in the degree of role attribution amongst group members and the effect of the strategies on communication, behaviour patterns and achievement on a problem solving investigation. Students in three parallel year eight science classes from one school were observed over an eight week period. A low level and a high level management strategy were randomly allocated to each of two classes and used to manage group work. After four weeks the management strategies were exchanged. The third class, which was used as the control, was managed in a way which was more typical of a traditional science class. Randomly selected groups of students from each class carried out a practical problem solving investigation as a pretest, then again at the completion of the first four weeks (phase 1) and again after the completion of the second four weeks (phase 2). Student conversations within groups were recorded and coded to identify levels of communication types. Students' written reports for each test were assessed and scores analysed. Teachers completed an observation schedule to identify styles of leadership and types of group behaviour within each class. It was found that the use of the low level management strategy, in particular, did increase the relative frequency of communication at higher cognitive levels, those of conceptualisations, as compared with the control treatment. Problem solving skills as measured by achievement on the written practical investigation improved over time and there was a significant effect in the area of "making measurements" when the management strategies were used as compared to the control treatment.
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ItemFrom the general to the particular : connecting international classroom research to four classrooms in Brunei Darussalam( 2009)This doctoral research project set out to investigate whether large-scale international classroom studies have the capacity to connect with and offer insights into the classroom practices of individual teachers in Brunei Darussalam (hereafter, referred to as Brunei). In this study, the categorising scheme and results of the 1998-2000 Third International Mathematics and Science Video Study (TIMSS-99 Video Study) were used to examine the practices of four Grade 8 mathematics classrooms in Brunei. The practices documented in the four Brunei classrooms were then compared with the practices identified in the seven countries that participated in the TIMSS-99 Video Study. The comparative analyses were made possible by the application of the analytical codes of the TIMSS-99 Video Study to the Brunei video data. Adapting the Learner's Perspective Study (LPS) data collection methods (lesson sequences, interviews and an additional questionnaire) in combination with the analytical framework of the TIMSS-99 Video Study, generated a substantial body of detailed data about each of those four classrooms, sufficient to characterise the practices of those classrooms using the TIMSS-99 Video Study coding scheme and to support comparison with the TIMSS-99 Video Study findings. Connecting the generality of the TIMSS-99 Video Study findings to the specificity of the four classrooms studied in Brunei revealed both similarities and differences between the patterns of practice evident in the international and local data sets. In addition, the study addresses the question of how these similarities and differences might be used to inform classroom practice among the four Brunei teachers. Certain characteristics were common to the 20 Brunei lessons analysed: (i) The consistent shortness of the Brunei lessons (about 22 minutes), (ii) The consistent use by the Brunei teachers and their students of short spoken public utterances (typically less than five words); and, (iii) The relatively high "connectedness" of the Brunei mathematics lessons in comparison with those lessons analysed in the TIMSS-99 Video Study. One reading of my findings is that between-teacher variations problematise the usefulness of national typifications of practice. On the other hand, studies such as the TIMSS-99 Video Study can offer us salient dimensions of practice that alert us to characteristics of familiar classrooms that might otherwise go unnoticed.
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ItemThe academic achievements of language centre students at a secondary college( 2001)What are the academic achievements of adolescent new-arrival English as a Second Language (ESL) students at secondary schools in Victoria, Australia? Research on Non-English Speaking Background (NESB) students in Australia has tended to neglect new arrival ESL students. To examine the academic achievements of this important subgroup of NESB students, the current study will highlight the academic achievements of a cohort of Victorian Language Centre students at a Secondary College over six years with interruption to schooling in their first language (L1) as the key variable linked to academic achievement in their second language (L2). Victorian Language Centres provide new-arrival ESL students with the English skills they need to start their secondary educations in L2. The current study examined the academic achievement of two groups of Language Centre students, those who completed their Victorian Certificate of Education (VCE) and those who left the Secondary College prior to completing VCE. Their academic results were summarised into spreadsheets for quantitative analysis. Subsequent to the quantitative analysis interviews were conducted with four ESL students from the Language Centre currently completing their VCE studies to provide further insight into the factors that enabled them to do their VCE. Results indicate that the academic achievements of this cohort of ESL Language Centre students are poor and that interruption to education in Ll had a major impact on the students' ability to achieve academically at the Secondary College. The study suggests that L1 education is the key variable influencing the student's ability to acquire the academic language skills necessary to meet the academic demands of secondary education, particularly the VCE. Other factors such as support for learning and strong motivation were found to help students overcome difficulties encountered in their secondary education. However, students who were unable to overcome these difficulties left the College prior to completing VCE. It was concluded that the majority of Language Centre students faced uncertain economic futures once they left the Secondary College. The results of the study suggest that Language Centre students need more support and assistance to enable them to complete VCE or to access educational alternatives to the VCE. This study also suggests that more research into the effect of L1 education on L2 education be conducted as this was found to be the key variable in the students' ability to acquire the academic language skills necessary to meet the academic demands of VCE.
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ItemStudents, computers and learning : a conversation with the cognitive apprentices and their learning tools( 1998)Wertsch (1991) asserts the mind "extends beyond the skin", that is, it is socially distributed and is a function of activity involving cultural tools. From this perspective the mind is unlimited in the sense that it is developed and inseparable from tools of mediation of which the computer is a corporeal thing that extends out into the material world. The computer as a means of mediation can be invisible yet powerfully influential in shaping thought and communication.. In this small-scale case study in an academic independent school a representative focus group of year 9 students suggests to the Author, their school's computer specialist, that their teachers are not to be providing mediated learning with computers. The students who are the metaphoric "cognitive apprentices" feel the school as an institution has not 'grasped the idea.' Bryson and De Castell (1994, 215) observed that " ... the divisive playing field of educational technology is populated by various teams who are telling altogether different 'true stories,' each having different settings, characters and plots ..." The new age believers and the non believers were not listening to the users. Hargreaves (1996) offered a parallel critical assessment, after Plummer (1983) and Wood (1991), of the use of "voice" in contemporary educational research. He stressed the need for active participant voices outside conventional conversations, from different contexts, different positions and particularly the marginalised. In both educational practice and research, student's voice has frequently been considered " a nuisance; literal noise in the instructional system" (Cazden 1986, 448). However, if teachers and schools as agents of parents and society are to embrace computers as cognitive tools, and accept them into the educational context as a means to gaining one or more educational ends, then there is need to research the voices of the cognitive apprentices on their learning with computers. The collaborative nature of the ethnographic research was grounded in the mutual regard of the researcher and the practitioners (students) as change agents in their own school. Central to the research was the development and exploration of a clue structure to understand how student practitioners saw computers being used in their classrooms. The initial core questionnaire asked the students to position their opinion of the school's , and their teachers' use of computers in the provision of the curriculum on a continuum between; "Are computers instructional tools used by teachers to impart knowledge to you", or, "Are computers used as cognitive tools to afford students' opportunities to construct representations of their knowledge and understandings of the concepts being taught ?
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ItemDoes hands-on experience promote autonomous use of computer pods in science teaching ?( 2009)We have ingrained into our teaching ideology that Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is an essential component of modern education. The computer pod was suggested in the early 2000's by the Department of Education, Employment and Training (DEET) as the means of providing students with access to ICT, but neither the method to harness nor how to direct innovation for best practice were indicated. A literature review by Hennessy and Osborne (2003) provided information on the available ICT tools for Science teaching and suggestions exist for the merits of using computer pods in Culbertson's (1999) reflections on nine studies and Owen's (2003) discussions of English teaching, but rarely was there a merger between the fields of computer pods and Science teaching. Professional development within a department where teachers create their own tasks provides a method of computer pod integration when slotting the tasks into the curriculum. This provides a future teaching document incorporating computer pod usage. The process of creating activities provides a training opportunity for developing accessible resources. The hands-on experience of Science teachers developing their own tasks for sharing aligns with self-help and effective resource management. Impediments exist for teachers in the form of time, equipment, availability, booking requirements, a philosophy that a 1:1 student: computer ratio is essential, comfort zone, student management and supervision. Incentives such as: students being keen, comfortable, suited to this learning style and capable users in this environment, who knowledge share with their teachers provide balance to the impediments. This artefact (the computer pod) is acknowledged as a rich component of learning, particularly in promoting group work, where students build their knowledge together. The results of interviewing five Year 8 Science teachers before and after the research year, where pro-noun analysis was used, generated the findings that Science teachers automatically expand their comfort zone in this environment and acquire the desire to experiment via a transition into the classroom with the activities they have specifically created. Individual teachers ventured further and used tasks developed by others for shared use, while others limited their involvement. This research provided a spectrum of responses, which exhibits variability of success and enhances the reliability of the results when presenting individuals as a range within a small sample. A broad picture even though it had a small focus group. The generated direction was an ownership component was generated in what an individual has created for themselves, which gives the incentive to test it out and simultaneously motivates autonomous integration into teaching strategies. This process has potential applications to others; whether it is other Science teachers, faculties within schools, individual teachers or more broadly, where ownership of the artefact enables the individual to confidently step forward with what becomes part of their skill acquisition and comfort zone.
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ItemThe evolution of concepts of decimals in primary and secondary students( 1994)This thesis studies children's conceptions about ordering decimals. It builds upon previous work which established three commonly used systematic errors in children's understanding as they encounter decimal notation. Students were categorised according to erroneous rule usage. This work includes a small longitudinal study which showed little change over twelve months in rule usage by an Australian sample of 50 secondary students. The categorising tests were redeveloped to make them suitable for primary students and to have increased reliability. The main study traced the use of rules from Year Four to Year Ten in a sample of 379 students and showed how students with different rules performed on other decimal tasks. It was found that one of the rules, called the whole number rule (in comparing two decimals that with more decimal places is chosen as the larger) was important in earlier years but disappeared with time. The second rule, called the fraction rule (the decimal with fewer decimal places is chosen as the larger), persisted in worrying proportions well into the secondary years and it was shown that significant gaps in knowledge of decimal notation existed which had not corrected themselves with time. The third rule was shown to be not important. Further investigation of a longitudinal nature to examine how individuals actually make the transition to mastery of decimal notation is encouraged by this study.
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ItemThe morning after : a novella based on a study of a drama performance exploring young people's views of teenage pregnancy( 2004)This thesis is in two parts. Firstly I describe my research, which centred on a Drama performance devised for the 2002 Monash Schools Drama Festival. The performance project was coordinated by myself, as the school Drama teacher, and involved twelve students from Years 9 and 10. The performance focused on the theme of teenage pregnancy and explored some of the difficulties a young girl encounters when faced with an unplanned pregnancy. The story created for the performance project then became the basis for the second part of this thesis, a novella - 'The Morning After'. As a practitioner teacher-researcher, I collected data through interviews with my students and observations of their work in drama as they created the storyline and constructed the performance for the Monash Drama Festival. Through the process of discussion and improvisation, students revealed their perceptions, life experiences, questions and concerns around the issue of teenage pregnancy. These insights were reflected in the play and then this data was analyzed, organized into themes, interpreted and transformed into the novella - The Morning After'. This study reveals a need for more effective forums for discussing sex education and teenage relationships and pregnancy with young people in schools. The Morning After' aims to preserve the story at the heart of the students' play by offering it in fictional form to other young people.
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ItemThe ideas of covariation and rate of change in introductory calculus( 1996)This thesis is a formative evaluation of a new curriculum which has evolved at a Victorian secondary school, with the aim of better preparing students for introductory calculus than has traditionally been the case. The new curriculum focuses on the ideas of the rate of change of the dependent variable and the covariation of the variables using tables of values to examine and emphasise the way that the function changes, before moving to the graphical and algebraic representations. This approach is in contrast to the more traditional curriculum where families of functions are introduced using the algebraic representation, and where the central ideas of change and covariation may be obscured. Because of inherent limitations of this study, it was not possible to produce conclusive evidence; however, the results gave a strong indication that the new approach shows promise for an improved understanding of students studying introductory calculus.
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ItemArticulating the theatre experience : ways in which students respond to the theatre experience, individually, collectively & within the context of the curriculum( 2005)This thesis investigates how a class of senior Drama students experience the event that is theatre performance. The theatre experience is at the very heart of this study, both as a personal one, and as it is framed within the parameters of the Victorian Certificate of Education (VCE) Drama Curriculum. Five themes emerge from the study: the role of cultural contexts; the role of prior experience; knowing versus not knowing measuring the theatre experience; and the impact of curriculum and assessment criteria on student responses. The findings of the study suggest that the subject of Drama provides entry into an aesthetic world that is not necessarily accessible through other subjects. It indicates that a range of cultural contexts and prior experiences create a frame through which students experience new theatre performances. The study indicates that the immediate and transient nature of a performance text is inherently difficult to measure but rather, relies on the measuring of the memory of that experience. Finally, the study suggests that there is a gap between the process through which students make meaning from their experiences, and the process by which the curriculum asks them to respond to the aesthetic experience that is theatre. The implications of this investigation are that the teaching of theatre text and the design of curriculum documents needs to more carefully acknowledge the cultural framing, prior experiences, and personal aesthetics that students bring to that experience. Further, it asks Drama educators to consider whether aesthetic experiences are indeed assessable and, if so, how that can be achieved in ways that acknowledge the complex nature of responses to a text that exists only in the memory of those who have seen it.