1,720,983 research outputs found
The Orff approach in the professional lives and practices of teachers in the Aotearoa/New Zealand school context
No full textThis doctoral research investigated issues concerned with the application of the Orff approach to music education in the Aotearoa New Zealand school context. The author brought to the study an in-depth knowledge of the Orff approach as a result of engagement with both the practice and theory of the Orff approach over a 15-year span of teaching music in a state primary school. She noted the scarcity of contemporary studies that systematically investigate the potentialities and constraints of the Orff approach, particularly in the New Zealand context.
Drawing upon a praxial philosophy, this project considered from a scholarly perspective the way in which engagement with the Orff approach impacted on the professional lives of nine teachers, all of whom had adapted this approach to their respective school settings. Taking into account the widely acknowledged inconsistency in the quality, or even existence, of music programmes in the state school system, this study sought to investigate the impact of professional learning in the Orff approach upon the provision of music education programmes in schools.
In epistemological terms, this study was qualitative in its interest in the participants’ experiences and how they interpreted them. The nine participant teachers, had all undertaken, over a period of three or more years, a number of courses offered by Orff New Zealand Aotearoa (ONZA). Using multiple case studies, this project aimed to gain access to the wealth of knowledge and know-how that teachers develop in their everyday work lives. Mixed methods in the form of questionnaires, observations and interviews and a focus group discussion were used to gather data. Findings emerging from a quantitative analysis of the questionnaire responses were used to illuminate and triangulate with findings from other data, which were analysed thematically.
A recursive approach to analysis of the data produced findings which indicated that the Orff approach impacted upon how teachers thought about what it means to do music, to be a musician and to teach music. These findings are illustrated in individual case studies, which offer a richly textured description of the impact of the Orff approach upon these teachers and their respective classroom practices.
Although all participants described the approach as making an impact in broadly similar terms upon their thinking, the practices observed and reported on in their classroom settings were varied in terms of their choice of materials activities and purposes. Findings of a more generally thematic nature indicate that the professional learning that occurred for these teachers yielded significant sources of self-efficacy, which in turn impacted upon the formation of professional identity formation. The construction of teaching as an artistic endeavour emerged as a characteristic of the understanding and application of the Orff approach in the New Zealand setting.
This study contributes to the understanding of the impact of the Orff approach upon teachers’ lives and work. In particular it illustrates some of the consequences of the construction of music as a form of embodied behaviour available to all people and offers some examples of specific ways in which educational practices can reflect this belief.
This study engages respectfully with the work of teachers ‘on the ground’ at a time when calls for so called ‘accountability’, through ever-increasing bureaucratic systems of standards-based assessment and teacher monitoring. To a small extent it offers a voice for these teachers and the work they do in enabling success for all in music for their pupils.
For a greater understanding and to enable critical interrogation of music education in Aotearoa New Zealand, studies which are focused on classroom practice and ask the question: ‘What is the construction of music and of teaching and/or of education that lies beneath or pervades practice?’ needs to be asked in order to continue the debate regarding the role and efficacy of music education practices in New Zealand schools
Distributed forms of school leadership: A critical and sociological analysis
No full textDistributed leadership is a free-floating concept that has come to prominence in the education field. Policy-makers, researchers and practitioners alike tout it as the mode of leadership suitable for twenty-first century schools. The quantity of commentary, related typologies, research and recognition in education policy gives the impression that distributed leadership is a mature concept. Most writers appear to assume that distributed leadership is beyond controversy, contributes to official legitimised school improvement and so is in no need of any re-theorising. The thesis in this study provides an alternative view. It argues that it is time to reject the grand narrative of distributed leadership and replace it with a critical and sociological re-theorising of distributed forms of leadership that reveal how authority and symbolic power co-exist in hybrid configurations of day-to-day leadership practice. In other words, the conceptual development of distributed leadership is at a pivotal point.
Two forms of analysis led to this rejection and re-theorising. One was in the broader school and generic leadership fields, while the other was on research in schools. The discussion in the first part of this study reveals that existent theorising and research of distributed leadership is predominantly silent around power, micropolitics, and the performative policies that have created environments conducive to distributed leadership being recommended as a ‘vehicle’ for reform. Most of the research to date can be categorised as either descriptive, with a tendency to be apolitical, or normative, with a tendency to oversimplify complexity. However, a critical analysis of related typologies and research suggests that there is a recent acknowledgment that distributed leadership exists in differing forms and is more complex than originally thought.
The school-based research in part two of this study was a commitment to understand day-to-day leadership practice in situ over 20 months, in two New Zealand suburban secondary schools. This investigation confirmed that existing conceptualisations, normative research and commentary of distributed leadership tended to be over-simplified. The distributed forms of leadership that emerged in each school were unique, due to the different educative, social, political and historical contexts that shaped and re-shaped the differing forms over time. There was no one preferred way of understanding how leadership existed in distributed forms. Analysis of the case studies led to the development of an analytical framework that can help understand the complexity of distributed forms of leadership that schools rely on.
The third and final part focuses on the thesis of this study. It rejects the distributed leadership grand narrative and argues for a critical and sociological re-theorising, that incorporates symbolic capital, symbolic power and authority. The re-theorising illustrates how authoritative capital co-exists with human, cultural and social forms of capital to form organisational and emergent distributed forms of leadership in hybrid configurations. This leads to a satisfactory theorising of distributed forms of leadership that builds on the complexity recently acknowledged in the field and reflects the reality of day-to-day school leadership practice
Creating an Effective Learning Culture in a New School
No full textThe purpose of this study was to describe the experiences of the Principal and staff during the establishment of a new school, to understand the development of a learning culture and to examine the tensions for leadership.
This study is situated within an interpretive paradigm and uses two methodologies: self-study research and case study research. Methods of collecting information in this study were designed to capture the culture in the school as it developed. The combined documentation of my professional journal, the focus group and school documents allowed an insight into the realities of developing a learning culture in a new school.
The findings of this study highlight four themes:
• Stakeholders having ownership of touchstone documents to provide focus.
• The importance of relationship building.
• Focusing on learning for students, staff and the community.
• Leadership challenges for new schools.
The study concludes by making recommendations at policy level to support new school principals and at school level to offer suggestions for focus points
Meat in the sandwich: The impact of changing policy contexts and local management of schools on principals’ work in New Zealand 1989-2009
No full textThe impact of principal leadership on school outcomes, particularly student achievement, is assuming unprecedented attention internationally. Official discourses often assume that principals can be trained to achieve prescribed outcomes through the employment of learned strategies. Such claims are challenged by critical leadership scholars who insist on the significance of context. This paper explores the impact of policy contexts on the work of a small group of experienced principals in New Zealand over a period of 20 years. During that time, they often struggled to reconcile their own espoused educational principles with policy imperatives in a small country where Local Management of Schools (LMS) has been extreme. It argues that national policy discourse around competition, curriculum and achievement, together with formal accountability to local lay Boards of Trustees (BOTs), are sources of tension and moral ambiguity, which tempt principals to comply and play the game for the sake of their schools. Principals are also caught between local and national accountabilities. In spite of this, principals in the study maintained an educational vision encompassing the wider social context of New Zealand education and retained a sense of personal agency
The principal as learner: perceptions, beliefs and experiences of nineteen New Zealand principals
Get PDFThe research began with a personal question about how one learnt educational management. The research participants consisted of 19 principals who were selected on the basis of distribution between primary, secondary, male and female. Two questions guided the research. How did these principals perceive that they learnt to be principals? How did they perceive that their learning impacted on their practice? A self-study paralleled the study of the principals, as a study of an educational manager who was not a principal.
The qualitative methodology applied in the study was grounded theory. The methodology and the retrospective, biographical nature of the study through interview, meant that the research was phenomenological and interpretative. The main source of raw data was the transcripts of interviews, documents and literature.
These principals perceived that their critical learning related to educational management was learning of attitudes and values as well as knowledge and skills. This learning could be traced in the first instance to family and upbringing, to their own education and their careers in teaching and middle management. Because this learning was the foundation on which their learning as principals, was based, I called this foundational learning. The research indicated that foundational learning influenced the nature of the principalship.
The learning of principals after appointment was conceptualised as experiential and intentional. Experiential learning occurred in the contexts of initiation, dealing with crises and problems, routine management, managing change, taking part in specific events, and through the process of being a principal for an extended period. Experiential learning appeared to consist of two main types, situational and emergent. The latter comprised new learning created by learning over time from a variety of experiences. Intentional learning aimed to meet learning needs and included all the deliberate formal and informal learning activities such as gaining qualifications, attending courses and conferences, visiting other institutions and reading professional literature. Barriers and limitations to learning constituted another relevant aspect of principals’ learning.
The principals perceived that their foundational learning had a major impact on practice as the source of values, attitudes, systemic knowledge of educational management and management skills. They perceived that their experiential learning had the most direct and significant impact on their practice because it was most likely to produce practical and relevant learning. Intentional learning had a subsidiary function, supporting and growing experiential learning. In this way, intentional learning impacted on practice. Personal, systemic and external learning barriers and limitations appeared to impact on practice in idiosyncratic ways.
Foundational, experiential and intentional learning was cumulative, contextualised within particular schools and situations and inter-related through impact on practice. Consequently each principal’s story was different and unique. I concluded that each principal was a unique product of learning, accumulated over a life time and developed within schools, each of which represented a unique environment. As a result, each particular combination of principal and school represented a unique configuration in terms of learning to be and being a principal. The self-study supported these conclusions. On the basis of the findings of the research, I drew out a number of professional development implications. If heeded, the professional development implications could reorient educational management education by focusing on the unique configuration of principal as sum of foundational, experiential and intentional learning, and his or her particular school or organisation as a particularised environment of educational problems. These problems may need to be defined uniquely to be resolved
Principals’ partnerships: an action research study on the professional development of New Zealand school leaders
Get PDFThis report describes an action research study conducted between 1992 and 1995 with 12 New Zealand primary school principals.
Prior to this study, major administrative changes in the education system in New Zealand had been introduced, to give schools more responsibility for their own management in conjunction with elected committees of parents. This research sought a model of professional development which would assist principals to implement new ideas and practices, deal effectively with the current issues and problems in their schools and provide skills, challenges and support.
This was a qualitative study in which an action researching community, consisting of the principals and an academic researcher, met regularly using peer partnerships and group meetings to provide observation, reflection and evaluative feedback on leadership practice.
The questions that guided the research study were:
1. Do partnerships assist in the professional development of primary school principals?
2. If so, in what ways?
This research was designed as a conscious effort to not only develop a theory of professional development for school leaders but in so doing, to provide professional development which would help the school leaders to understand and then change their situation. The underlying theoretical principle of praxis was embedded and interwoven throughout the researcher’s and principals’ actions. The research was practical and based on the needs and concerns of the principals involved. In this way it was both a research and development model.
The findings were analysed using grounded theory techniques within a structure of action research. Thus, the processes of action research in this research study became a method for the analysis process as well as for that of data collection. The community of researchers were jointly involved in the analysis of the findings in this research. There were 18 months of data gathering using methods of oral and written reflections, interactive interviewing, observations and examination of records.
The 12 primary school principals in this study testified that the partnerships’ programme assisted in their professional development. In the words of one principal:
This research has made me focus on my own educational leadership. It has led me through a series of processes which has enabled me to reflect on and analyse my own actions. The research has made me take an in-depth look at my own leadership style and has given me the opportunity to observe others.
The ways in which these principals believed they had gained from their involvement in the research fell into four major categories. The Partnerships’ programme assisted critical reflection on practice to occur; it increased professional interactions; it assisted in educational leadership development and finally, it established a structure for the principals to use processes of action research for school development. The vehicles for the principals to achieve praxis were reflection and alternative perspectives. Praxis led to emancipatory actions and feelings of agency. The principals’ partnerships, the involvement of the university researcher and the meetings of the community of action researchers, became integral parts of this process.
The thesis that is presented rests on the principals’ perceptions that a model of professional development which involves principals in partnership, with the support and challenge from a university academic, can successfully provide the essential components of professional development programmes in which praxis is the desired outcome.
This thesis concludes that the Partnerships’ programme assisted in the professional development of these 12 school leaders. The principals, when working together in each other’s schools, created a mild disruption to everyday practice which led to opportunities for reflection on leadership practices. The university researcher also assisted in this intervention process. The combination of the two was effective to enable critical reflection on practice and subsequent change in practice to occur.
On the basis of these findings a grounded theory of professional development is offered and recommendations are made for further research in this area
Understanding Socio-Cultural and Organisational Constraints on Women's Leadership: A Case Study in Indonesian Higher Education
No full textIn Indonesia, especially in Java, in a range of time, the numbers of women occupying senior leadership positions in state higher institutions are low. My experiences working in such institutions supported this phenomenon. This caused my curiosity to find out why female lecturers did not occupy higher leadership positions. I also wanted to know about the nature of the institution operating towards this situation. I assumed that there were barriers from Javanese culture and from their workplaces. In order to find out whether my assumptions were the case, I conducted case study research in an engineering higher education institution in Indonesia to find out why this situation existed, given that one of the articles in the 1945 Constitution of Indonesia states that every citizen has the rights to work and earn money.
Data from this case study research were collected through interviewing sixteen senior teaching staff comprised 12 female lecturers, 6 of them were in the lower level of leadership positions, and four men in senior managerial positions. Data were also obtained through accessible documents of the institution, and also from direct observations.
The key findings revealed that the involvement and interactions of the research participants in their social fields, at macro, meso, and micro levels, influenced the way the participants made decisions and acted towards each level. Especially, it showed how habitus played out in their lives, affecting their thoughts, behaviour and actions, and leading to their perceptions and beliefs about who could be senior leaders in this institution. It revealed that there were tensions and contradictions the women participants experienced due to the expectations from each level of social field. In the meso level of social field, that is their workplace, the tensions and contradictions amplified
Young women and leadership development: Co-constructing leadership learning in a New Zealand secondary school.
No full textYoung women’s leadership is an area frequently overlooked in educational leadership development. When it is addressed, it is often done so from the perspective of adults resulting in planned learning opportunities being disconnected from the contexts in which young women lead. This thesis brings young women’s voices into educational leadership conversations and illustrates the importance of including their beliefs and understandings about leadership when developing an alternative approach to leadership development. This thesis describes a qualitative, collaborative action research study conducted between 2007 and 2008 with twelve Year Twelve female secondary school students from a Catholic Girls’ School. This research sought the perceptions and views these young women held about leadership in the secondary school context. The students were involved in co-constructing a leadership development programme (Revolution) with the researcher and participating in it. After the delivery of the leadership programme the students and the researcher evaluated both the programme and the process by which it came about. The questions that guided this research were: 1. What are young women’s beliefs about leadership and how are these influenced by contextual factors in their secondary school? 2. What would a leadership curriculum that was co-constructed through an adult/student partnership look like? 3. How effective is the process of co-construction in developing a youth leadership programme and how successful is the programme in developing leadership understanding? Within an action research framework youth-adult partnerships were formed that allowed the voices of the young women and the researcher to be included in the process of designing the leadership programme. The students and the researcher met regularly in the process of creating a collaborative learning community to share perceptions, create, participate in and reflect upon the leadership programme. Semi-structured interviews and focus groups were used to ascertain the young women’s beliefs and perceptions about leadership as well as their preferred ways of learning, what content should be included in the programme and how the programme should be structured, both prior to participating in the programme and after completing the leadership programme. First, the perceptions and understandings about leadership that the young women held about leadership were addressed. The findings indicated that the school was a site of significant influence on the young women’s beliefs and understandings of leadership and the opportunities to develop and practice leadership. There was a wide range of beliefs about leadership ranging from very basic to highly complex and this influenced the process of co-constructing the leadership programme. The changes to these understandings were later explored after participating in the Revolution leadership programme and this process served as a means of evaluating the effectiveness of the leadership programme. Second, the process of co-construction that created the content and structure for the created leadership programme was examined. The findings indicated that co-construction was an effective way to create a relevant and authentic leadership programme for young women. It was also a highly complex process that required significant efforts to balance input and share ownership between the researcher and the young women. The co-constructed programme was different from programmes constructed by adults, was influenced by the school context and challenged the young women’s existing views of teaching and learning. Overall, both the co-construction process and the leadership programme itself enhanced the young women’s leadership understandings and feelings of ownership towards the learning process, and was enjoyable. This study adds to the sparse literature on young women and leadership as it provides details of how young women perceive and practice leadership in the secondary school. This research suggests that involving young women in designing their leadership learning experiences can help ensure the experiences are meaningful and relevant to the contexts in which they practice leadership
School-based placement in a distance intial teacher education programme
No full textSchool-based experiences provide opportunities and challenges for student teachers and teacher-educators in initial teacher education (ITE). Researchers and ITE providers highlight school-based experiences as occasions for learning teaching in a supported environment, practising theory learned through study and theorising their own and others’ practice. School-based experiences in distance education require greater emphasis on the importance of partnerships and relationships. For students studying by distance effective communication, community building and professional agency are important in overcoming separation and enabling authentic experiences. This qualitative study uncovers new knowledge about distance school-based experiences using a combination of interpretive, naturalistic and case study methodologies. It offers a holistic view of the school-based experiences, seeking links and relationships between important factors. The individual and collective voices of nine student teachers, gathered through written narratives and focus group conversations, yielded rich data about their experiences and perspectives of placement in nine New Zealand primary schools. The multiple realities presented were collated to create four collective stories. The students’ collective stories were validated through semi-structured interviews with the coordinating teachers and university lecturers who worked with them. A conceptual framework, developed as a model, focused the analysis and interpretation of the data. While each school-based placement could have been a case study on its own, this investigation found six key factors common to the nine settings. Two findings were of particular significance. First, as earlier researchers reported, the relationship between student and the classroom teacher was critical, even more so for student teachers in a distance school-based experience. Second, student teachers who had the confidence and encouragement to engage with a wider range of professionals created more opportunities to learn teaching. For them the whole school became their ‘village’ for learning, where children and colleagues were an integral part of their learning community, creating opportunities to interact with a wider range of learners. This allowed them to view teaching and learning through various perspectives. Other findings were, third, that members of school-based communities who regarded students as committed, rewarded them with time, support and opportunities for teaching learning. Fourth, support and time provided to all partners in a school-based placement enabled them to better manage the demands of a placement. Fifth, being well-informed as placement leaders (teachers and lecturers) conveyed confidence and signified they understood relevant aspects of the placement, which enabled them to meet obligations in supporting the student teacher. Sixth, I uncovered mixed views on whether student teachers should be placed in a school where they had an earlier experience, for example as a teacher aide or parent helper. Most participants supported the idea of distance student teachers working in a familiar school, a significant issue for prospective student teachers living in small or remote communities in New Zealand. Finally, the conceptual framework was re-examined in light of the findings. It emerged as an appropriate theoretical model for the purpose of guiding review and development of school-based experiences, especially for those students studying by distance
The decentralisation of education in a developing country: the case of community high schools in Solomon Islands
Get PDFThis study was undertaken to investigate the decentralisation of education through the establishment of Community High Schools (CHSs) in a developing country - Solomon Islands. The study examines, in particular, the local and global forces which have influenced the establishment of CHSs and the factors which may be facilitating or impeding their development at the level of implementation.
A major interest of the study is to examine the extent to which the establishment of CHSs have reflected local concerns or international influences in the light of involvement by the World Bank and other international aid donors. Specific research questions were posed to investigate the efficacy of educational decentralisation through the establishment, development and operation of CHSs in Solomon Islands, and the role played by the people responsible at four levels namely; the central government, church and provincial education authorities, schools, and communities during the implementation process. The study participants at these four levels were asked to describe what they perceived as the goals or reasons for establishing CHSs, where they saw the forces or factors for establishing CHSs were coming from, and to identify any tensions which they may have created. Participants were also asked to comment on the consultation procedure used by concerned parties when establishing CHSs, their views on whether the CHSs have achieved their goals or aims and how have these been monitored or evaluated. The additional benefits to be gained from establishing CHSs were then elucidated from participants before inquiring about the financial and other inputs from local and international sources for establishing CHSs and the impact of the involvement and contributions from parents and communities. Research questions were also posed to determine how CHSs were being managed, the provision of relevant training for those responsible, any plans in place to establish more CHSs, and any moves to decentralise more control of CHSs to the school, and parents and community levels in future. Finally the study sought responses from study participants on the major forces or factors they perceive as impeding the establishment development and operation of CHSs.
A qualitative-oriented methodology was used to collect the data in order to answer these questions. The techniques used include: interviews, questionnaire, content analysis and observation study. The major data gathering was carried out during two intensive rounds of fieldwork in Solomon Islands during January - March 2000 and November - December 2000.
The study found that participants from the four levels strongly supported the original aims for establishing CHSs as determined by the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development (MEHRD) and the World Bank. The study also revealed that these goals or aims formed part of the local forces or factors for establishing CHSs besides other factors regarding the demographical, geographical, socio-cultural, and political nature of the country. Participants also indicated the influence of external forces or factors for establishing CHSs, particularly those being exerted by the World Bank, sectoral studies commissioned by the MEHRD through bilateral donor funding and other publications, and similar decentralisation moves being undertaken in other countries. These external forces have been found to create some tensions between the World Bank and bilateral donors, and MEHRD officials, while the local factors have exacerbated on-going conflicts at the national and community levels.
The study also revealed that there was insufficient consultation between all the concerned parties concerned in the process of establishing CHSs, resulting in the neglect of proper procedures and the seemingly unrestrained establishment of CHSs. Nonetheless, study participants felt that CHSs had achieved their goals. The study was unable to identify any proper mechanism in place to demonstrate how the MEHRD has or is going to effectively monitor or evaluate the aims it had set for CHSs to accomplish.
It was apparent from the data that respondents considered CHSs as having additional benefits beyond those expressed by the MEHRD and the World Bank. Seeing that CHSs are being located within the communities, there was strong support for them to include in their curriculum the teaching of the local language and cultures, and for local participation in the development of materials for such use. Respondents felt that these have not been emphasised well enough in boarding NSSs and PSSs because of their heterogeneous student intake. The use by the community of CHSs facilities for adult education and vocational training courses after school hours or during the holidays was also seen as an advantage.
Apart from the five World Bank funded CHSs, the study found that funding for the other CHSs from external sources have been minimal whilst the payment of annual grants from the central government or church and provincial education authorities was either sporadic or non-existent. On the other hand, the data showed that the involvement and contributions from parents and communities has been the foundation of the CHS success story. It was also revealed that the overwhelming support displayed by parents and communities for school committees, principals and teachers in the establishment, and ongoing operation and management of their respective CHSs has instilled an overall sense of pride and ownership for the school. This led to the central, and church and provincial education authorities being content to leave an increasing share of management matters to the schools and their school committees. Nevertheless, the data pointed to the fact that relevant training had not been provided for school level managers and members of the school committees to prepare them for their new roles. Study participants suggested that such training must be developed and immediately embarked upon by the MEHRD in view of existing plans to establish more CHSs as well as the planned moves to decentralise more control to the lower levels. Furthermore, respondents saw financial, logistical, supervision, staffing, land, politics, management, and geography as some of the forces or factors as important in impeding the establishment and operation of CHSs.
Based on the study objectives and findings identified from the data, recommendations were made on how to improve the management and operation of CHSs in order to make them more responsive to the demands and challenges facing the decentralised education system in Solomon Islands. Educational decentralisation, in its wake, has made heavy demands on the very limited financial and human resources, and services of the government. The study highlighted that a reformation of education is desperately needed and ownership by, and participation and partnership with the parents and local communities must be at the core of how well the government responds to the problem areas that exist within the education sector
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