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A response to the Ofsted Research Review for Science: guidance for primary schools
No full textOfsted’s Research Review for Science is welcomed by the sector and has stimulated much discussion, debate and collaboration. This guidance is designed for teachers, senior leaders and professionals with an interest in how the review relates to primary science practice in particular
A scoping review exploring whether a free ‘offer’ devalues or widens sport and physical activity participation amongst children and young adults aged 0-25?
Get PDFBackground: Socio-economic status continues to mediate physical activity engagement, despite a range of interventions aimed at reducing inequalities and widening sport and physical activity participation. As a result there has been increasing interest amongst policy makers, national governing bodies (NGB), county sports partnerships (CPS) and the sport and physical activity sector more broadly, in understanding how best to reduce inequalities and widen participation. The ‘price point’ of offers and whether a ‘free offer’ enables or devalues participation, has been a key area of interest. This scoping review aimed to explore this topic further by investigating whether “a free ‘offer’ devalues or widens sport and physical activity participation amongst children and young adults aged 0-25?”.
Methods: This scoping review searched three electronic bibliographic databases (MEDLINE, PsycINFO, SPORTDiscus) using a structured search strategy to identify articles published between 2017 and January 2022. Studies were included using the PICO criteria of; Population: children and young adults aged 0-25; Intervention: free ‘offer’ relating to physical activity; Context: areas of deprivation in the UK; Outcome: engagement, involvement, participation in sport and physical activity.
Results and Discussion: Five studies were eligible after screening 1301 titles and reviewing 14 full-text studies. Features reported included intervention design, outcomes, potential challenges and wider implications / future recommendations. Specifically, a narrative synthesis of the key themes of participation deprivation and cost effectiveness were outlined in more detail. A subsidised cost or free offer can improve participation generally and in attracting those from lower socio-economic backgrounds. However, the impact of such initiatives decrease with increasing deprivation highlighting that groups with the highest levels of deprivation have wider complexities affecting their participation. Competing priorities and potentially unrealistic expectations at stakeholders level was also identified.
Conclusion: Despite the paucity of current research exploring the impact of a ‘free offer’ in children and young adults, recommendations for future research, practice and policy included the need for longitudinal, more holistic and participant centric approaches. Further research is required to explore the impact of a ‘free offer’ from an individual, societal and policy-level perspective, in widening and increasing participation in sport and physical activity
Exploring public attitudes towards sex and grievous bodily harm offenders who have experienced childhood abuse
Get PDFSpelling predictors; investigating the role of phonological ability and rapid naming in a large cross-sectional British study
Get PDFThis study aimed to identify predictors of single word spelling performance in children using a novel test containing regular words, irregular words and pseudowords. We assessed reading ability, letter-sound knowledge, phonological awareness (PA) and rapid automatised naming (RAN) in children aged 4–12 years (N = 641). Mixed model analyses with hierarchical nested data were conducted with Year_group (Yr R to Yr 6) included as a factor, PA and RAN as predictors, and reading and letter-sound knowledge as covariates. For irregular word spelling, PA and RAN were significant predictors, but the associations were dependent upon the year the children attended. Interestingly, for regular words and pseudowords PA was not significantly related. For pseudowords, only RAN was a significant predictor and only in Yr 2. We argue that a better understanding of spelling development can be achieved using tools that distinguish between regular and irregular words and pseudowords, as different processes seem to be associated with the different types of letter string across the variable levels of spelling experience
Tomboys, 'Annedroids' and the new normal
No full textA myriad of children’s animations include a tomboy in their otherwise predictable character biographies, be it Mulan (Mulan 1998), Edith (Despicable Me 2010), Merida (Brave 2012), or Wyldstyle (The Lego Movie 2014) on the big screen; or Buttercup (The Powerpuff Girls 1998–2005, 2016–2019), Dora (Dora the Explorer 2000–2015) or Rainbow Dash (My Little Pony:
Friendship in Magic 2010–2020) in contemporary popular programming. However, these girls tend to be singled out for their sartorial efforts, mannerisms, and interests as they negotiate traditional codes of femininity and push the boundaries of acceptable girlhood to include strength and rebellion over and above coquettishness, pastel palettes, and subversive niceness. What these animated girls, be they anthropomorphic or otherwise, have in common, is that they stand out as exceptional . . . they are the tomboy amidst an otherwise predictable backdrop of gendered clothing, traits, and mannerisms. And although it is routinely animation that can push the boundaries of appropriate sex, gender, family, and social codes, this chapter will suggest that it is children’s live-action programming that presents the most progressive take on the contemporary tomboy. Building on its animated predecessors, the live-action Amazon original, Annedroids (2014–2017) presents the tomboy as a routine, accepted, and, indeed, ordinary iteration of girlhood. Eleven-year-old Anne/Addison Holley is the central protagonist, and, based
on appearance (dungarees and unkempt hair), interests (science, engineering, and making mechanical companions) and bedroom culture (robots alongside florals), she is presented as the show’s tomboy lead. Anne is a very smart girl in a junkyard world, taking a seat amidst a growing friendship group that carefully introduces the program’s young audience to different ways of
performing gender, removed from judgment or hierarchy.
Annedroids presents the tomboy, not as the exception that proves the more predictable feminine rule, but as a mainstream depiction of contemporary girlhood. The characters, be they girls, boys, men, women, or robotic creations, play with science, gender, and sartorial choices. Annedroids has perhaps unsurprisingly won the Parents Choice Gold Award and received eleven daytime Emmy nominations. After all, the program presents a variety of warm and welcoming family units, gives valuable screen time to a diverse multi-generational cast, and brings STEM subjects into popular children’s entertainment. Such diversity provides the backdrop to the show’s mainstream tomboy. The Annedroids tomboy is rarely singled out or asked to justify her gendered self, and as such, the program can be seen to be presenting its whip-smart and tech-savvy tomboy as just another way of experiencing girlhood: as the new normal
Applying cognitive science principles to primary science
Get PDFConsideration of cognitive science cognitive load and retrieval practice in primary science and the TAPS project
Engaging curators: curator perspectives on audiences and developing postcolonial ethics in the small museum
Get PDFThe roots of UK museum traditions have been identified and exposed through museological scholarship and practice and have been subject to developing postcolonial and decolonial critiques over the past fifty years: museums are primed for revisiting themselves and rethinking how they respond to twenty-first century concerns. This study investigates how the curators of small museums in the South West of England are navigating their obligations towards a postcolonial public. Set against a backdrop of conflicting views from sector discourse and guidance, the pressures and expectations for museum professionals to meet audience-related demands are increasingly complex.
Shedding light on how curators, whose decisions are often seen as representing a museum's voice of authority (Chandler, 2009; Procopio, 2019), the thesis examines how some curators are navigating their responsibilities in small museums in a regional context and provides a discussion of the internal and external factors contributing to their respective approaches to practice. Scholarship regarding small museum practices in the UK is scarce, therefore this study supports the development of curatorial work and research for, and about, small museums.
After observing the trajectory of museum studies literature and a noticeable 'turn' in attention in scholarship towards the social impact in museum displays, the study provides a discussion of the ways in which museological developments relate to theories located in postcolonialism. This research thus sits within an emerging area of discourse, following postcolonial theory and pushing beyond new museology. In this space, literary theory, museum criticism, historic traditions and contemporary debate collide, revealing the tensions between traditional and contemporary audience engagement concerns in curatorial practice, in the words of curators.
Through qualitative interviews and grounded theory methods, the study adopts postcolonial theory as an interpretive framework to interrogate and analyse how the curators operate their choice and control in an environment replete with nuanced dynamics of power, hierarchy, expectations, and limitations. Theoretical models are presented to 'map' the interpreted behaviours, experiences and curatorial approaches identified and demonstrate the impact of perceptions, influences and museological traditions on practical, curatorial, approaches to audiences. The models, such as the 'Spectrum of Curatorial Practice', are presented as the result of 'aggregated hypotheses' based on the qualitative data generated (Glaser and Strauss, 1965) and are positioned within the context of an emerging paradigm of museum practices and museological discourse observed at the time of this study.
As a result, this research provides a discussion of the complicated relationships involved with individuals, objects, custodians, society, knowledge, ethics in curating, and the manifestations of 'race' within such dynamics and identifies a need for change in both internal and external perceptions of museum curatorial practice and its functions. In additional to highlighting the restraints some curators experience concerning audience-related practices, it further examines how-and whether-small museum curators can respond to contemporary museum contexts through taking opportunities to support post-and de-colonial developments in curatorial practice.
The 'Engaging Curators' study contributes to furthering our understanding of the ways cultural organisations, such as small museums, and their decision-makers, such as curators, in peripheral areas of the West are responding to a postcolonial world, and explores how contemporary social concerns, old assumptions and inherited notions continue to leave physical and metaphysical marks. Finally, through engaging with postcolonial scholarship and by navigating concepts of minority research and diasporic history in England, this research recognises the potential for developing more social, ethically engaged, and 'racially reflexive' curatorial practices
How does a PGCE English programme challenge students’ preconceptions of writing and how writing is taught in primary classrooms?
Get PDFOur research paper is prompted by our
experiences of student teachers’ embedded preconceptions towards writing:
the teaching of writing; and perceiving
themselves as writers. Some students
had expressed negative experiences
learning to write which could consequently
influence their attitude towards writing
(Draper, Barksdale-Ladd and Radencich,
2000), and their confidence and enjoyment in teaching writing to children
(Morgan, 2010). Therefore, our aim was
to ascertain student teachers’ preconceptions towards both writing, and the
teaching of writing, in order to address
any negative attitudes and hopefully
boost student teachers' confidence and
enjoyment in the teaching of writing. To
assist us in this, we used Warford’s
(2010) model of the ‘zone of proximal
teacher development’ by constructing a
three way conversation between student
teachers’ prior experiences as writers;
their current tacit beliefs towards writing
and the teaching of writing; and their
experiences of these on placement. This
was achieved through a large-scale survey
that was completed at different stages
of the PGCE course. We positioned these surveys at different points across the
course because we hoped to identify
any shifts in their preconceptions. We also conducted focus groups with students to further reveal the tacit beliefs
behind these preconceptions and how
their experiences in university seminars
and primary classrooms might have
challenged, or perhaps reinforced, their
held preconceptions. In collecting and
analysing the data, we wanted to see
what impact our programme has had in
supporting student teachers to reflect on
their preconceptions and develop their
confidence and enjoyment in
teaching writing
Creative activism, experimental pedagogy
No full textThis chapter draws on collaborative and creative research with House of Imagination and Bath Spa University, working alongside children and young people, artists and educators. 'School Without Walls' is an ongoing research project with a focus on creative activism as an experimental site of pedagogical innovation