Faculty of Education - Research Publications
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ItemNo Preview AvailableNarrative Language and Literacy Education Research Within a Postcolonial Framework(Springer, 2017)This chapter explores the heuristic value of narrative as it might be applied to researching language and literacy education in postcolonial settings. We focus specifically on the importance of autobiographical writing as a means of enabling educators and researchers to engage with a ‘plurality of consciousnesses’ (Bakhtin MM, Problems of Dostoyevsky’s poetics (Emerson C, ed and trans). University of Minnesota Press, Minneaplois, 1984) and to explore the values and beliefs they bring to their work. In this way we challenge the pretensions to objectivity of the scientific research privileged by standards-based reforms. By locating autobiographical writing in a postcolonial framework, however, we also seek to differentiate our standpoint from the claims typically made on behalf of ‘narrative inquiry’ (Clandinin J, Connelly M, Narrative inquiry: experience and story in qualitative research. Jossey-Bass, San-Francisco, 2000). We argue that personal narratives should prompt analyses that investigate how our individual situations are mediated by larger social and historical contexts. This means combining storytelling with analytical writing in order to produce hybrid texts that challenge accepted forms of academic writing. Crucially, this also means embracing ‘trans-lingualism’ (Canagarajah S, Translingual practice: global English and cosmopolitan relations. Routledge, London/New York, 2013), working at the interface between English and other languages, and engaging with issues of language and socio-cultural identity vis-à-vis the globalization of English as the language of science.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableStepping Inside an English Classroom: Investigating the Everyday Experiences of an English Teacher(Taylor and Francis Group, 2018)This essay presents an English teacher’s inquiry into her professional practice in an institutional setting that is heavily regulated by standards-based reforms. Rather than something external to her, she sees those reforms as part of an internal conflict that affects her capacity to be fully responsive to her students. In dialogue with a colleague, she writes stories that reaffirm the deeply relational character of her work, both as an ethically responsive stance and as a means to understand the socially mediated character of her everyday world. She attempts to find alternative ways of seeing and accounting for her work than the reified mentality of standards-based reforms, positing a world that is relational, rather than compartmentalised, where our chief responsibility as teachers is to cultivate a sensitivity towards others around us, rather than continually being compelled to classify and judge them.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableEnhancing music integration through critical and creative thinking in Australian primary schools(International Society of Music Education, 2018-07-12)Extended Poster presentation
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ItemNo Preview AvailableThe problem with staffing rural schools: Attracting new teachers to country schools remains one of the biggest challenges in Australian education(University of Melbourne, 2018)Encouraging student teachers to complete placements in rural schools as a way to address the chronic shortage of teachers in the bush isn’t working. Our recent study found that, while pre-service teachers were keen to have a ‘rural’ experience, the reality of isolation and limited school resources makes teaching in these schools unattractive; particularly for students from metropolitan backgrounds.
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ItemExploring the Self through Songwriting: An Analysis of Songs Composed by People with Acquired Neurodisability in an Inpatient Rehabilitation Program(Oxford University Press, 2017-03-01)Background: Neurological trauma is associated with significant damage to people’s pre-injury self-concept. Therapeutic songwriting has been linked with changes in self-concept and improved psychological well-being. Objective: This study analyzed the lyrics of songs composed by inpatients with neurological injuries who participated in a targeted songwriting program. The aim of this study was to understand which of the subdomains of the self-concept were the most frequently expressed in songs. Methods: An independent, deductive content analysis of 36 songs composed by 12 adults with spinal cord injury or brain injury (11 males, mean age 41 years +/– 13) were undertaken by authors 1 and 2. Results: Deductive analysis indicated that when writing about the past self, people created songs that reflected a strong focus on family and descriptions of their personality. In contrast, there is a clear preoccupation with the physical self, on the personal self, and a tendency for spiritual and moral reflections to emerge during the active phase of rehabilitation (song about the present self). Statistical analyses confirmed a significant self-concept subdomain by song interaction, F(10, 110) = 5.98, p < .001, ηp2 = .35), which was primarily due to an increased focus on physical self-concept and a reduced focus on family self-concept in the present song, more than in either past or future songs. Conclusions: The analysis process confirmed that songwriting is a vehicle that allows for exploration of self-concept in individuals with neurological impairments. Songwriting may serve as a therapeutic tool to target the most prevalent areas of self-concept challenges for clients undergoing inpatient neurological rehabilitation programs.
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ItemPersonal identity narratives of therapeutic songwriting participants following Spinal Cord Injury: A case series analysis(Taylor & Francis, 2018-07-04)Context/Objective: Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) patients face unique identity challenges associated with physical limitations, higher comorbid depression, increased suicidality and reduced subjective well-being. Post-injury identity is often unaddressed in subacute rehabilitation environments where critical physical and functional rehabilitation goals are prioritized. Therapeutic songwriting has demonstrated prior efficacy in promoting healthy adjustment and as a means of expression for post-injury narratives. The current study sought to examine the identity narratives of therapeutic songwriting participants. Design: Case-series analysis of the individual identity trajectories of eight individuals. Setting: Subacute rehabilitation facility, Victoria, Australia. Participants: Eight individuals with an SCI; 7 males and 1 female. Intervention: Six-week therapeutic songwriting intervention facilitated by a music therapist to promote identity rehabilitation. Outcome Measures: Identity, subjective well-being and distress, emotional state. Results: Three participants demonstrated positive trajectories and a further three showed negative trajectories; remaining participants were ambiguous in their response. Injury severity differentiated those with positive trajectories from those with negative trajectories, with greater injury severity apparent for those showing negative trends. Self-concept also improved more in those with positive trajectories. Core demographic variables did not however meaningfully predict the direction of change in core identity or wellbeing indices. Conclusion: Identity-focused songwriting holds promise as a means of promoting healthy identity reintegration. Further research on benefits for those with less severe spinal injuries is warranted.
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ItemInclusion of LGBTIQ-parented Children in Early Childhood Settings: What Are the Lessons from the Literature?( 2018)The recent social and legislative understanding of diverse families has extended to include those headed by people of diverse gender and sexuality, but children and their lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer (LGBTIQ) parents are still experiencing stigma and not adequately catered for in early childhood education and care (ECEC). This paucity motivated the current study to explore factors influencing the ways that LGBTIQ-parented families are catered for in ECEC settings. Using an ecological model initially proposed by Bronfenbrenner as a conceptual framework, this study systematically reviewed contemporary scholarly discourse relating to the experiences of LGBTIQ-parented families when using ECEC services (2013 – 2018). A hypothesised ecological model for inclusion was developed based on preliminary reading and refined after a thorough assessment of twenty-three contemporary scholarly articles that focused exclusively on the ECEC context (birth to 5). By doing so, this review presented a synthesis of existing knowledge to identify stakeholders who should be influenced in making ECEC programs accountable for LGBTIQ-parented children. Despite some progress in this field of study, considerable gaps remain in current understanding. Missing or limited research areas are discussed to imply future research needs.
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ItemUnderstanding sustainability in school arts provision: stakeholder perspectives in Australian primary schools(Routledge - Taylor & Francis, 2018)Although the notion of sustainability is popular in rhetoric associated with arts programmes in Australian schools, shared meanings are lacking. References to sustainability may be rooted in any combination of pragmatic, economic and/or health bases. We chose to investigate what stakeholders involved in the provision of school-based arts practices understood about the notion of sustainability in the specific context of those programmes. To do this we interviewed a range of school professionals and asked them to explain how sustainability related to arts programmes in their schools. In this article we present the particular elements that stakeholders described as being sustainable. Five categories emerged through inductive analysis that included: benefits for students, benefits for the schools, the arts programmes themselves, physical artefacts, and the capacity for schools to provide arts experiences. Notable were descriptions of sustainability from several schools that saw ongoing programmes as less important than brief arts experiences that students could carry into other areas of their life. Results illustrate the diversity of understandings about what should be sustained from arts engagement for 27 professionals in Australian Catholic Primary Schools. An ‘exposure’ model of arts programmes is articulated that captures the sustainable benefits beyond sustained involvement in and provision of arts programmes in primary schools.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableePoster Mathematics and assessment in early childhood education( 2017)https://vimeo.com/230711323/44d98316b5
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ItemNo Preview AvailableSpatial reasoning and mathematics in early childhood education(Early Childhood Australia Inc, 2017)Spatial reasoning is a set of cognitive functions, processes and skills that enable us to understand and describe representations and spatial relationships between objects, ourselves and our environment—it is a life skill. Spatial reasoning is at the core of mathematical thinking. There are three key areas of spatial reasoning associated with mathematics ability in early childhood: perspective taking, mental rotation and spatial visualisation.