Faculty of Education - Research Publications
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ItemConceptualising multilingualism in higher education in Timor-Leste: the case of petroleum studies(ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD, 2022-05-19)In this paper I present a critical discussion of the ways that multilingualism is conceptualised in the context of higher education in Timor-Leste, a small, developing nation in South-East Asia. Drawing on a range of ethnographic data collected at multiple Timorese tertiary institutions from 2015 to 2018, I focus especially on the language-related beliefs and practices of a small group of petroleum studies lecturers, who are at the meeting point of diverse ideological forces that impact their teaching. I discuss their conceptualisations of both the ‘language problem’ facing them, and their own hybrid classroom communication practices, examining how these conceptualisations are shaped by wider political discourses favouring Portuguese, Indonesian and English. I argue that these discourses not only complicate due recognition of the considerable resourcefulness these lecturers display in communicating disciplinary knowledge to students, but also weigh heavily on their own perceptions of their everyday work as tertiary educators.
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ItemTetun akademiku: University lecturers' roles in the intellectualisation of Tetum(Springer, 2021-02)In this article I examine lecturers’ beliefs about the use of Tetum for academic, scientific and vocational communication at university in Timor-Leste and discuss the discursive and performative language planning roles that they play in the intellectualisation of the language. Drawing on analysis of recorded discussions among university lecturers from different disciplinary areas and distinct institutional settings, I identify a range of discursive and ideological forces being brought to bear on the use of Tetum to communicate disciplinary and professional knowledge. I focus especially on lecturers’ value-laden explanations for how and why they ‘mix’ Tetum with Portuguese, English and Indonesian in particular contexts of classroom communication. Lecturers’ statements about the limitations of Tetum for academic and scientific communication, while grounded in the real need for coordinated intellectualisation of the language, also mask lecturers’ individual preferences for (and greater confidence in) the use of more established ‘academic languages’, stemming from their own past experiences of language socialisation. I argue that these negative beliefs about the potential reach of Tetum reinforce hegemonic discourses that work against its coordinated intellectualisation. Meanwhile, significant individual efforts towards the intellectualisation of Tetum endure in the form of innovative translation and translanguaging work; efforts that I argue require greater attention and support. I conclude with a discussion about the need to recognise and value the expertise and contributions of multiple stakeholders in the development and intellectualisation of the Tetum language, including those who are not traditionally understood as ‘language experts’.
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ItemPencil or Keyboard? Boys’ Preferences in Writing(Nova Southeastern University, 2020)Handwriting is an important subject in primary schools, especially in the Early Years. The importance of writing skill is now seen as a debate with the increasing demand on children to learn technology skills to help them with 21st Century learning—how to write on the keyboard effectively. The topic is important because handwriting is an essential life skill to have with or without technology. In this study, I looked at the importance of both in the context of the qualitative case studies in three schools in Melbourne, Australia. The aim of the research is to explore how do students understand the learning of handwriting and keyboarding in schools? This qualitative case study employed a Thematic Analysis approach in which the central intention was to understand the lived experience of six Year 6 boys across three schools and their attitudes to writing and technology. In this article, I addressed the importance of teaching handwriting to primary school students, especially in the first four years of their school life from Foundation to Year 3. The findings suggest that teachers should continue explicitly teaching handwriting to their students despite the heavy reliance on technology in today’s lifestyle.
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ItemEthics in neoliberalism? Parental responsibility and education policy in Chile and Australia(SAGE PUBLICATIONS LTD, 2022-09)This article questions the diverse and, in some cases, contradictory ethical forms present in contemporary neoliberal policy frames. In particular, we analyse the demands of responsibility – as a form of ethical commitment – requested of parents by education policies in the contexts of Chile and Australia. Assuming neoliberalism as a contextualised and multivocal form of governing, we applied a policy sociology approach to study the ethical implications for parents of two recent educational reforms developed in the national contexts of this research. Our analyses show that the emerging demands on parents for responsibility in the educational field exceed univocal forms of individual responsibilisation, encompassing expressions of responsibility that respond to collective and public goals.
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ItemThe governing parent-citizen: dividing and valorising parent labour through school governance(Taylor and Francis Group, 2022-09-03)Internationally, major policy reforms seek to deepen parent and community engagement in schools. Whilst pervasive in policy documents, however, discourses surrounding ‘parent engagement’ are often elastic and imprecise, ultimately gaining meaning through the technologies of governance that shape policy enactments in schools. In this paper, we argue that contemporary schooling reforms are constructing a new ‘governing parent-citizen’ through which the parental labour of social reproduction is being extended, valorised and rearticulated. We examine how one major reform movement in Australia is articulating new roles for parents and community members in schools: the Independent Public Schools (IPS) initiative in Western Australia. Our analysis demonstrates the intensive policy intervention required to produce this new form of parental labour and the subsequent divisions of labour it is producing.
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ItemNo Preview AvailableThe mixed methods approach in a doctoral study about teaching for creativity and music education(Australian Society of Music Education Victoria, 2022-11-02)
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ItemOnline citizenship learning of Chinese young adults(SAGE PUBLICATIONS INC, 2022-07)This paper explores the citizenship learning of Chinese young adults through examining their participation on Weibo (the biggest micro-blogging service in China). Interview data collected from 31 young mainland Chinese adults contained their reflections on their everyday online participation on Weibo. Using the theory of communities of practice, this paper describes the citizenship learning that occurred in the context of their online participation in two intersecting dimensions. One dimension is their learning of digital citizenship in the Weibo community, manifested in their understanding and grasp of language, values, attitudes and shared commitment in this virtual space. The other is their learning of Chinese citizenship which is embodied in their understanding of Chinese society arising from their reflections of their internet-mediated social participation. This paper brings new insights into the concept of citizenship exhibited in the everyday online participation of Chinese young people, and the mutually constitutive relationship between their learning of citizenship and the forging of new citizenship. The implications of this informal learning for the content and pedagogy of formal citizenship education is discussed.
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ItemSupporting young people managing homelessness with access to trauma-informed education(Council to Homeless Persons, 2022)We support Victorian children and young people experiencing significantly disrupted education or are unable to access education as a direct result of family violence and accompanying homelessness. This article first discusses some of the links between these phenomena for young people. We then present a young person’s story to illustrate implications for practice. Finally, we suggest implications for schools and pathway supports which can bolster engagement through a trauma-informed education approach.
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ItemCentring Steiner education values, pedagogy and curriculum within trauma-informed positive education strategies in our schools(Steiner Education Australia, 2022)
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ItemDifferentiating phonological delay from phonological disorder: Executive function performance in preschoolers(WILEY, 2022-03)BACKGROUND: The conversational speech of most children can be understood by people outside the family by the time they reach 4 years. However, for some children, speech sound disorders (SSDs) persist into their early school years, and beyond, despite adequate hearing, oromotor function, and language learning opportunities. One explanation for children's SSDs are domain-general cognitive-linguistic deficits that impair the child's ability to correctly derive rules governing how speech sounds legally combine to form words in a specific language. AIMS: To explore whether there are differences in performance on executive function tasks between children who make speech errors characteristic of phonological delay and those who make speech errors characteristic of phonological disorder. METHODS & PROCEDURES: Twenty-six children aged from 3;6 to 5;2 (13 with phonological delay and 13 with phonological disorder), matched pairwise for age and sex (nine males), were assessed on tasks measuring cognitive flexibility (rule abstraction and cognitive shift) and phonological working memory. OUTCOME & RESULTS: For the cognitive flexibility tasks, the performance of children with phonological delay was significantly better than that for children with phonological disorder, but there were no group differences for the phonological working memory task. CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS: Children with phonological disorders might benefit from intervention programmes that incorporate training in cognitive flexibility. WHAT IS ALREADY KNOWN ON THE SUBJECT: Children with phonological delay and phonological disorder comprise the two largest SSD subgroups that present to speech-language therapy clinics. Evidence suggests domain-general cognitive processes (e.g., phonological working memory, ability to revise faulty underlying representations, rule abstraction, and cognitive shift) influence phonological development. Differences between the two subgroups in the types of speech errors, linguistic abilities, developmental trajectories, and responses to intervention have been reported, yet little is known about the underlying cognitive-linguistic deficits. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS TO EXISTING KNOWLEDGE: The results of this study suggest that children with phonological delay and phonological disorder have distinct patterns of performance on executive function tasks: Children with phonological disorder showed deficits in domain general rule-abstraction and cognitive shift when compared to children with phonological delay. WHAT ARE THE POTENTIAL OR ACTUAL CLINICAL IMPLICATIONS OF THIS WORK?: The findings draw attention to: (1) the importance of differential diagnosis of phonological delay and phonological disorder; (2) the role of domain-general cognitive processes in explaining why children make particular types of errors; and (3) the need to develop innovative and tailored intervention techniques that target specific underlying deficits.