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 AvailableEnlivening STEM education through school-community partnerships(Springer Singapore, 2017-08-09)A major response to the growing concern with diminishing engagement and participation of students in STEM pathways, in Australia and internationally, has been the involvement of the STEM community in school outreach activities. In Australia there has been a proliferation of links between scientists and schools, with the aim of engaging students in authentic activities and providing models of what STEM work pathways might entail. This chapter will draw on a series of projects studying partnerships between the professional science/mathematics communities and schools, to explore a range of partnership models, the experience and outcomes for students and teachers, and challenges for crossing the boundary between school and STEM professional communities. Such school/STEM community partnerships are particularly suited to studies related to environmental and sustainability issues, a focus explored in the chapter. Further, we will draw on a recent evaluation of the Australia-wide, CSIRO-led Scientists and Mathematicians in Schools (SMiS) program. That study provided insight into the use and outcomes of the SMiS model. We will explore some of the challenges of working across the school-STEM professional practice boundary, implications for curriculum, and differences in partnerships for mathematics compared to science.
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ItemTopic Study Group No. 27: Learning and Cognition in Mathematics(Springer International Publishing, 2017)
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ItemClinical Praxis exams: Linking academic study with professional practice knowledge(Springer Singapore, 2017-01-01)One of the more salient challenges facing teacher educators and curriculum leaders in schools is how to assist beginning teachers to link their academic studies with professional practice knowledge. Solutions from within the university frequently emphasise links between theory and practice through university based tasks requiring pre-service teachers (teacher candidates) to trial an idea in the classroom and report back in university classes. This approach can be seen as intrusive by classroom teachers or as decontextualised by teacher candidates and students in schools. On occasions, teacher candidates have reported complaints about this approach, as well as feeling the need to “take sides” in a perceived debate between academic studies and professional practice knowledge; however, the relationship between the two is more nuanced, complex, and multidimensional than a simple theory practice divide might suggest. In this chapter, we review literature that examines the complex and multidimensional nature of the challenge of linking academic studies with professional practice learning both in schools and within the university. This provides a context for our discussion of an innovative pedagogical and assessment practice, the Clinical Praxis Exam (CPE), which is a key feature of all Master of Teaching programs at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education. The CPE is described and the theoretical basis for the innovation is outlined. Particular attention is paid to the way in which the content of each CPE is drawn from the classroom practice of individual teacher candidates and their negotiations with students, mentor teachers, and school based university staff. The chapter then outlines responses from teacher candidates, mentor teachers, teaching fellows and university teachers who participated in two qualitative research projects examining the efficacy and impact of the CPE. Findings are then summarised and the next steps in the on-going refinement of the CPE are outlined.
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ItemClinical Practice in Education: Towards a Conceptual Framework(Springer, 2017)Clinical practice has recently emerged as a promising approach that is being applied to teaching and teacher education. Despite this growing interest, however, conceptual and practical ambiguities continue to surround the term. This chapter provides a critical and comprehensive review of how clinical practice is being conceptualised in education by: (a) identifying the core components that characterise clinical practice in education; and (b) discussing the complexities and possibilities of clinical practice in theory and practice. The chapter begins by forging a conceptual framework for understanding clinical practice by identifying three core components that are central to characterising teaching as a clinical practice profession: (1) a focus on student learning and development; (2) evidence-informed practice; and (3) processes of reasoning that lead to decision-making. In summary, we argue that clinical practice offers important possibilities for deepening the theoretical and practical aspects of teaching and teacher education, but that several cautions need to be born in mind in order for it to continue to develop into a meaningful and sustainable concept. While adapting a medical model to teaching should be done with caution and a number of caveats, on balance it offers an approach that has the capacity to strengthen teaching and teacher education.
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ItemHealing and growth in the classroom: A positive education for trauma-affected and disengaging students(Springer International Publishing, 2017-06-16)Although there is limited international data regarding trauma frequency and student achievement, we know that up to 40% of all students in the United States are compromised by the impacts of trauma and chronic stressors (National Child Traumatic Stress Network. Empirically Supported Treatments and Promising Practices. Author, Los Angeles/Durham. Retrieved on March 10, 2014, from http:// www.nctsnet.org/resources/topics/treatments-that-work/promising-practices, 2005). To address their needs, positive education needs to be woven into trauma- informed approaches. Together with Professor Lea Waters and Associate Professor Helen Stokes, I have developed the trauma-informed positive education (TIPE) approach (Brunzell T, Stokes H, Waters L. Contemp Sch Psychol, 2015). This model is being tested through research at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne. Preliminary evidence from schools working with the TIPE approach shows that teachers have enlarged their understanding about the developmental needs of children whose lives are compromised by trauma resulting from family and community destabilization. This chapter describes our research in positive education and comments on early data from classroom interventions with trauma-affected students. It concludes with recommendations for future research about the extent to which positive education can meet the healing and growth needs of trauma-affected students. My colleagues and I believe that when teachers are assisted to respond to the unmet needs of their most vulnerable students, then classrooms are better prepared to realize the academic and well-being goals of all students.
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ItemBilingual Education in Australia(Springer International Publishing, 2017)The Australian experience of bilingual education is composed of three separate audiences: Indigenous groups and their languages, immigrant groups and their languages (both of these groups seeking language maintenance and intergenerational vitality), and mainstream English speakers seeking additive language study. All these interests share a common aim of lobbying for more serious and substantial language education programs, but differ significantly in the purposes and context of their promotion of bilingual education. This chapter provides an overview of historical, political, and educational influences on forms of bilingual education that have emerged, in the context of state and national language policy and practices, to meet the needs of Indigenous Australians, migrant communities, and Anglophones.
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ItemLanguage policy and education in Australia(Springer International Publishing, 2017)Australia’s language policy history reflects the country’s complex linguistic demography and multiple policy needs and interests. Languages and language policy have played an important and evolving role in the formation of Australia as a postcolonial, immigrant, and trading nation, moving from the suppression of Indigenous languages and a preference for British English norms through colonization, to greater assertion of language rights for Indigenous and immigrant languages, and onto economically motivated language planning. The policy landscape has been intermittently shaped by decisive policies for language policy and language education policy, as well as educational interventions such as the prioritization of English literacy. This chapter provides an overview of the historical, political, and educational influences on the language policy landscape in Australia, including achievements in addressing Indigenous and community language needs, along with supporting second language acquisition more broadly in the education system. However, the absence of a national language policy contributes to a weak language policy environment, where language rights are highly politicized and the loss of collaborative language policy processes has led to fragmented and fragile language program provision.
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ItemSpecific Mathematics Assessments that Reveal Thinking: An Online Tool to Build Teachers’ Diagnostic Competence and Support Teaching(Springer, 2018)In this chapter, we describe the design of an online system for the formative assessment of students’ understanding of mathematics and discuss how it develops diagnostic competence and influences teaching. The smart-test system covers many mathematics topics studied by students between about 10 and 16 years of age. It is programmed to provide teachers with an automated diagnosis of their own students’ stages of development in specific topics and to report on an individual’s errors and misconceptions, in order to inform teaching. Our claim is that teachers’ diagnostic competence increases when they have easy access to information about their own students’ thinking. In turn, this can further improve teaching, and hence learning. By drawing together evaluative data from four sources, we highlight aspects of teachers’ initial responses to formative assessment and the effect of using this system on their knowledge for teaching and the subsequent changes to teaching practice. Overall, teachers report that using the smart-tests has improved their knowledge of the thinking of individual students as well as of students in general (i.e., their pedagogical content knowledge), and that they can use this information in several ways to adjust their teaching. Paradoxically, using smart-tests reduces the demand for teachers to have specific knowledge for diagnosis and at the same time increases this knowledge and so improves their diagnostic competence.