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Thailand Rajabhat Initial Teacher Education project
No full textThe report draws on fieldwork and secondary data sources to review initial teacher education (ITE) in Thailand’s Rajabhat universities. The research team visited five Rajabhat universities spread geographically across Thailand to collect data from university leaders, middle managers, ITE staff and students. The report presented to Thailand’s Ministry of Education recommend policy consideration and possible reform in eight broad areas. These were:
the quality and quantity of initial teacher education students;
timing of the teaching practicum/internship: Student placement/internship;
the undergraduate ITE course length;
the importance of discipline knowledge (particularly for those students’ considering a career as a high school teacher);
a simplified framework of teaching standards;
curriculum alignment between school practice and university student instruction;
ITT faculty organisation, and,
a method to ensure greater collaborative working across the Rajabhats and Thailand’s other universities
Fostering inquiry and creativity in early years STEM education: policy recommendations from the Creative Little Scientists Project
No full textCreative Little Scientists was a 30-month (2011-2014) EU/FP7-funded research project focusing on the synergies between early years science and mathematics education and the development of children’s creativity, in response to increasing interest in these areas in European educational policy. Using a variety of methods, including desk research, a teacher survey and classroom-based fieldwork, the research provided insights into whether and how children’s creativity is fostered and appropriate learning outcomes, including children’s interest, emerge. Based on these and ongoing collaboration and dialogue with participants and other stakeholders the project proposed recommendations for policy and teacher education. This paper presents these recommendations and the research on which they were based. Throughout the study, mixed methods were employed, combining quantitative approaches used in surveys of policy and teachers’ views based on a list of factors, alongside qualitative approaches employed in case studies of classroom practice. A strong conceptual framework developed at the start of the project guided data collection and analysis, as well as the presentation of findings and the development of policy recommendations, thus ensuring the latter’s strong and consistent relationship with the relevant theoretical knowledge, the comparative research, analysis of classroom practices and the production of guidelines for teacher education
From Vampire to Apollo: William Blake's Ghosts of the Flea (c. 1819-20)
No full textVarley’s Zodiacal Physiognomy and Blake’s Visionary Heads are the two mainstays of a project which involved séance-like meetings at Varley’s house. While the lights were still on, Varley’s guests would have listened to the stories about the flea. With The Ghost of a Flea in front of them, the recitals of the flea’s pompous speeches, combined with the fact that it was just a ghost who leered after human blood, Varley’s guests may have laughed very heartily, if not in front of him then behind his back. Each evening followed the same protocol. When the lights were off, Varley would call out a name and Blake would look around, suddenly exclaiming ‘There he is!’ and start drawing. The flea is the most striking of the Visionary Heads, though it is not the only head which exists in different versions. If appearance is elemental to any kind of judgement of one human being of another, then Blake deliberately confused Varley. By working up the sketch, he played on Varley’s expectations; he presented him with an extraordinary and very puzzling painting, The Ghost of a Flea. But why, if Blake could have chosen any monster, did he settle on the ghost of a flea
Parents' perspectives on flexischooling their autistic children
No full textThe aim of this study was to explore the perceived advantages identified by parents who flexischool their autistic children. ‘Flexischooling’ is a term first used by Roland Meighan (1988) to describe ‘[the] notion of a part-time arrangement whereby school and family share responsibility in an agreed contract and partnership’. In this study it is used to describe an arrangement where autistic pupils undertake part of their full-time education at school, and part at home. In line with the National Autistic Society recommendations and research into the preferences of the autistic community (Kenny et al., 2016), ‘autistic person’ is used in preference to ‘person with autism’ in this article.
The research reported on five case studies of parents – all mothers – who have withdrawn their autistic child from school to homeschool for some of that child’s education, but who keep their children on school roll and continue to pursue active involvement for their children with school. Their motives were explored as to why they did not wish either full time at-school education or fulltime at-home education for their children. Semi-structured interviews were used to examines the mothers’ motivation. Results suggested that the mothers are responding to perceived challenges which face their individual autistic children in school. They are responding to a perceived value which they still feel exists for their children at school, and they are responding to perceived advantages of homeschooling and their involvement in their autistic children’s education. Implications for the education of children with autism are discussed
Girls to the front? Gender and alternative spaces
No full textFor some, gender remains a mechanism of marginalisation within mainstream popular culture because of expectations concerning what femininity and masculinity entail. This marginalisation refers both broadly to the way girls/women are marginalised as well as the marginalisation of those boys/men who fail to conform to societal gendered expectations. If alternativity is synonymous with resistance to this mainstream popular culture it would be logical to then assume that alternative spaces could provide opportunities for pursuing alternative understandings of gender. But to what extent does empirical work support this proposition? Are alternative spaces created or used in ways which envision gender differently to hegemonic discourses concerning femininity/masculinity? Or do normative gendered beliefs and practices prevail? This chapter will critically explore these questions through a number of alternative spaces, drawing out key themes and emerging gaps. This exploration will take the subcultural work of the BCCCS as its starting point, acknowledging the limitations of such work in theorising gender within alternative spaces, before exploring what empirical work across a number of subcultural spaces ‘offers’ in relation to gender. Before concluding the chapter will, more briefly, consider a relatively more recent consideration of online alternative spaces
The significance of further education for black males
No full textPurpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the lived educational realities of black male students studying in further education (FE) colleges to understand how these experiences compare to their experiences of statutory education. It describes the way in which students perceived and received education in both sectors and highlights the similarities and variations between the two. Design/methodology/approach: Ethnographic methods including focus groups, individual interviews and naturalistic observations were used to investigate black male students' perceptions of FE. These accounts were compared to their memories of compulsory schooling experiences to establish differences and similarities between sectors and to determine which educational approaches black male students identified as most useful. Findings: The research established black males perceived there were significant differences between the two sectors and these differences had impacted on their ability to learn. These findings provide a useful reference point for educators seeking to evaluate their organisation's education provision for black male students. Social implications: This paper provides suggestions on what sorts of educational opportunities are appropriate and accessible for black males and which approaches help to support their educational achievement. Originality/value: There are little research data which specifically discuss black male students? experience of the FE sector. This paper will help teachers and managers at all organisational levels in FE (and in schools) review their provision and consider adopting approaches that may help to enhance black students' educational journeys
BERA’s postgraduate symposium: A lifebelt in the methodological mire
No full textBlog related to methodological aspects of doctoral research
Women’s lived experience of embodied disenfranchised grief: Loss, betrayal and the double jeopardy
No full textThe experience of disenfranchised grief has many twists and turns. This is particularly the case in situations that have external cause for celebration, but, in fact, contain internal loss, embodied betrayal and double jeopardy. Focussing on a significant embodied experience, that of pregnancy after a previous pregnancy loss, we suggest that the lived experience can be vastly different from the normative experiences of joy, celebration and ‘moving on’. Drawing on existing literature, we find the lived experience of a subsequent pregnancy, instead reignites anxiety, guilt, grief and loss; a profound sense of betrayal by one’s body; and the liminality of the double jeopardy. Women maintain an inexpressible continuing bond to the lost baby amidst struggling with the paradox of a new pregnancy. The past seems to contradict the present, and even cloud the future. To understand such complexity, we then theorise these experiences from the Heideggerian perspectives of Being-toward-death; Angst and unheimlichkeit; and the authenticity of lived experience. We propose that phenomenological ways of seeing the world, can enrich our understanding of disenfranchised grief