New Zealand Journal of Teachers' Work
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‘Maslow before Bloom’: Implementing a caring pedagogy during Covid-19
Full text linkThis article draws on interviews undertaken with 20 teachers as part of a larger study on the impact of Covid-19 on schools. Although the schools varied by location, level, and socio-economic status, teachers’ experiences were remarkably similar. Teachers found the sudden move to on-line learning stressful, and the constant demands of delivering a different style of pedagogy, maintaining contact with students and their families, and looking after their own family situations exhausting. Participants who worked in isolated or less advantaged communities were also attending to delivering learning devices, food and basic supplies to their families and communities. In this article, we present the data in in both thematic and poetic styles to highlight the nature of the caring pedagogy that they undertook as schools moved in and out of lockdowns, despite the toll that it took on them, personally and professionally
A Teacher
Full text linkThe government has become very fond of saying that the key factor in student underachievement is teacher expectations of students. It is true that teacher quality is the greatest internal school factor affecting student achievement but it is also true that external socio-economic factors have an even greater impact. Teachers themselves must become more political and just as we must have high expectations for our students we must also have high expectations on the government to delive
Teacher Effectiveness and the Explanation of Social Disparities in Educational Achievement
Full text linkThe belief that effective teaching can raise the performance of students to a marked extent seems to have become fixed in the contemporary discourse of educational policymakers. It is asserted that evidence-based research has demonstrated a causal relationship between better teaching and better learning. A critical examination will show, however, that the case is less secure than it might seem, even within the logic of quantitative modelling. The argument is based on an examination of Hatti
Book Review: Snook, I. (2003). The Ethical Teacher. Palmerston North: Dunmore Press.
Full text linkThis is a timely book in several respects
Whakaritea te pārekereke: Teacher preparedness to teach te reo Māori speaking children in mainstream education settings.
Full text linkIt is essential that teachers are prepared to teach te reo Māori speaking children so that Māori tamariki enjoy equal and equitable opportunities to succeed as Māori (Education & Training Act, 2020). This article draws on research undertaken for my master’s degree which investigated teacher preparedness to teach te reo Māori speaking children in mainstream primary schools. Key findings included an awareness of how language and culture impact on identity and educational outcomes. Although participants acknowledged the absolute necessity that te reo Māori and tikanga Māori are included in all aspects of the education setting, they also reported that tikanga Māori is a more comfortable space to be in than te reo Māori as there were clear connections to their own values. Four key themes emerged from the findings which I promote in this paper as key factors for teacher readiness to teach reo Māori speaking children. These are: Kia rite (be prepared), Kia hono (be connected); Kia tātatiako (be culturally competent and responsive) and, Kia whakauruuru (be integrative). This article discusses the four factors listed above and implications for tamariki, their whānau, teachers and Initial Teacher Education (ITE) providers
Teacher Education or Apprenticeship Training? Reflections on the Effects of Field-Based ITE on Teachers’ Work
Full text linkThe Initial Teacher Education (ITE) terrain in New Zealand is complex, varied, and populated by an increasing number of providers and options. Of interest here is field-based ITE or employment-based ITE, which has been a common practice in the ECE sector since the 1960s
20 Years Teachers’ Work – looking back and looking forward (Part 2)
Full text linkThis editorial celebrates the new, in the form of welcoming two new editors, and reflects on the old, in the form of 20 years of valuing teachers’ work, and resisting encroachments on the mana of teachers and the teaching profession
Art Rooms: Sites of Empowerment and Success
Full text linkStudents in low socio-economic schools are over-represented in the group of students who leave school without a qualification. This paper derives from a study of New Zealand secondary art teacher
Nailing Down an Identity – The Voices of Six Carpentry Educators
Full text linkThis paper reports on a small research study in which six carpentry tutors at an urban polytechnic were interviewed regarding their identity and perceptions of their work as trades educators. Some preliminary findings suggest that the ‘occupational identity’ (Seddon, 2008) of trades educators as ‘teachers’ is less problematic than suggested (see Haycock & Kelly, 2009). This paper argues that notions of good teaching within Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics (ITPs) may be driven by normative/singular notions of pedagogy that do not recognize specific or ‘signature pedagogies’ (Shulman, 2005) active within trades education. It is suggested that further work in the area of ‘signature pedagogies’ for the trades will legitimise trade educator practice. However, it may challenge professional developers, teacher trainers and educational administrators within institutions to reconsider their assumptions about what constitutes ‘good teaching’ in a trade related environment
Enjoyment and intentionality in early childhood education
Full text linkThis paper explores teacher enjoyment and the notion of the intentional teacher in early childhood education. The research is part of a wider interrogation challenging existing discourses associated with the intentional teacher. A mixed-method research design was used to gather perspectives from early childhood teachers in relation to their experiences of enjoyment in their teaching practices and the connection with being an intentional teacher. Findings from participant responses highlight important aspects associated with early childhood teacher enjoyment and intentionality. The connection between enjoyment and intentional teaching was reflected in reports of ways of doing or acting, as well as in ways of being associated with teacher identity. Connection was made between experiences of enjoyment and intentional teaching through contributing, adding value, and personal impact. Association was also made with promoting social justice. Whilst small in scale, the research highlights the importance of challenging existing and potentially limiting discourses of the intentional teacher by giving attention to how intentional teaching is generated, as an internal encounter associated with ways of being and becoming and the role that enjoyment plays within this process