University of Regina Open Journals
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Time to Play: The Difference Between Knowing and Showing
No full textChildren’s play experiences demonstrate many benefits for learning, cognitive development, and self-awareness. Evidence reveals that children require regular amounts of play. Despite this evidence, play has been rapidly disappearing from the home, the neighbourhood, and the school over the last two decades. Curriculum reformers present empirical data to suggest that safety, health and fitness, and behaviour considerations compel a structured approach to playtime from Kindergarten through to Year 6 of primary school. In this article, I argue that one can know from personal experience that authentic play experiences are valuable and one can also show through personal experience that play is vital for learning. These two approaches defend play as a valuable learning experience for curriculum development. Keywords: childhood; play, curriculum development; knowing; showin
The Limits to Reform: A Critical Discussion of the Saskatoon Public School Board\u27s Assessment Controversy
No full textThis article presents a critical discussion of the controversy surrounding the perceived changes to the Saskatoon Public School Board’s assessment policy in September 2010. Utilizing Critical Discourse Analysis (Fairclough, 2005; Gee, 2005) and a critical framework of curriculum reform (Apple, 1996, 2000), an analysis of media representations, government statements, and curriculum documents suggests that the general public outcry, the Saskatoon Public School Board’s reaction to the controversy, and the government’s response exemplify a tacit understanding of the socialization purposes of school in preparing students for the world of labour. This article further examines the influence of "conservative modernization" (Apple, 1996; Lankshear & Gee, 1997; Gee, Hull, & Lankshear, 1996) on Saskatchewan educational policies and the capacity of Saskatchewan schools to innovate.Keywords: critical discourse analysis; critical framework; curriculum reform; socialization; educational policie
Insignificant Stories: The Burden of Feeling Unhinged and Uncanny in Detours of Teaching, Learning and Reading
No full textBy setting foot back in the space of school, teachers stage a return that is necessarily uncanny, encountering a strangeness that is nonetheless known, intimate and familiar. Through positing the notion of a "burden of feeling," this article theorizes the psychoanalytic concept of the uncanny, as a way to think through the narrative difficulties inherent in interpreting the variously psychical, historical and sensual influences of our personal educational experiences. Since we are here dealing—as in literature—with the inescapable singularity of experience, I intersperse a number of my own memories of teaching and schooling throughout this article, in the hopes of productively framing our understanding of educational spaces—spaces of reading and interpretation always—as necessarily unhinged and uncanny. In this framing, I also argue for the importance of telling insignificant stories, and that rather than insinuating a method that looks to the obviously memorable and notable, I propose a practice of looking instead to the trivial and the typically forgotten. As a methodological practice, this article employs—in part—a multimodal strategy of strange juxtaposition, drawing attention to the spaces between words, and upsetting the framings of traditional narrative. The images that are interspersed throughout this piece suggest the pursual of a reading that lets itself stray, and that requests of the reader an imaginative and a collaborative interpretive practice.Keywords: teaching; education and psychoanalysis; teacher identity; the uncanny; educational memorie
A Review of Handing One Another Along: Literature and Social Reflection by Robert Coles
No full textA Review of Handing One Another Along: Literature and Social Reflection by Robert Coles Coles, R. (2010). Handing one another along: Literature and social reflection (273 pages). T. Hall & V. Kennedy ( Eds.). New York: Random House
Aboriginal Identity: A Perspective on Hegemony and the Implications for Canadian Citizenship
No full textNational identity can be a difficult concept to define in Canada, a difficulty that may be particularly prevalent for Canada’s Aboriginal people. Identity, whether national or ethno-cultural, may be problematic to conceptualize for Aboriginal people because of dominant post-colonial influences that are reflected in everyday life. Identity, an individual\u27s collective understanding of themselves as a unique, separate entity is frequently associated with ethnic and racial affirmations of distinctness. Consequently, Canada’s national identity may be fragmented by its various ethnic and racial groups. Canada’s Aboriginal people, who have been impacted by a history of European influence through colonization, have consequently struggled with the notion of Canadian identity, a struggle that is prevalent in the field of education. The following will be an exploration of the issues associated with Canadian identity, and how Aboriginal identity relates to that conception of citizenship development for Aboriginal students in Canadian schools. To support this exploration, this article will explore: (a) identity development in a postcolonial and transcultural society, (b) identity negotiation in contemporary Canadian society, and (c) the implications for citizenship development in Canadian education.Keywords: Aboriginal identity; hegemony; postcolonial; transcultural; citizenshi
Redefining Learning and Assessment Practices Impacting Aboriginal Students: Considering Aboriginal Priorities Via Aboriginal and Western Worldviews
No full textAlthough there is momentum among Canadian educators to incorporate Aboriginal content and epistemology into pre-kindergarten to postsecondary education, the learning and assessment of Aboriginal students remains subjugated by a Western perspective. The purpose of this article is to explore ideal learning contexts for Aboriginal students and juxtapose these ideas with the predominant learning and assessment tactics used in a school. Data for this qualitative study were collected via five focus groups involving grandparents/caregivers, representatives from Aboriginal organizations, and educators of one Saskatchewan school. Analyzed through Aboriginal and Western epistemologies, results indicated that, for Aboriginal students, learning and assessment are holistic experiences, and educators need to balance students’ academic assessment with other physical, emotional, and spiritual forms of assessment. These findings suggest that educators need to depart from the zone of cognitive competence and move toward promoting an educational zone of trustful intuition.Keywords: Aboriginal content and epistemology; holistic; learning and assessmen
Is There a Need for Healing in the Classroom? Exploring Trauma-Informed Education for Aboriginal Mature Students
No full textIn this paper, we describe a perplexing pattern of behaviours in mature Aboriginal students in university studies who appear capable of being successful to complete course work, but fail due to incompletion of academic work. Despite numerous strategies to provide students with opportunities for success, these students\u27 behaviours remain perplexing. Considering the prevalence of trauma (accident, violence, suicide) in the Aboriginal population and the intergenerational trauma of the residential school experience, we examine trauma-informed care principles and their adaption to educational systems as a potential strategy to mitigate this problem. A conceptual framework based on an Indigenous knowledge perspective of Four Lodges guides the discussion of this issue.Keywords: mature students; Aboriginal students; intergenerational trauma; residential school; car
Administrators’ Lessons Learned: Considerations in Establishing Demonstration Classrooms
No full textThis paper presents the perspectives of some administrators whose school sites hosted demonstration classrooms that were implemented as part of a board-wide professional development initiative. Administrators highlighted the challenges of balancing the competing needs of their school system with those of their individual school communities and identified: (a) the need for advance planning; (b) the importance of consistency and communication; and (c) the complexities of acknowledging the dual roles and responsibilities held by demonstration classroom teachers. Demonstration classroom professional development programs may hold the potential to enhance teachers’ knowledge and skills. However, this study found that effective implementation of such programs requires skilled administrative collaboration and coordination.Keywords: educational administration, demonstration classroom professional development programs, implementation