The importance of comprehensive transition programs is increasingly being recognised. This exploratory study was designed to identify the transition practices and needs of primary schools across Victoria in metropolitan and non-metropolitan locations; and from government and non-government educational sectors. Staff from 155 schools completed a questionnaire involving multiple choice and open-ended response formats. Schools reported providing a wide range and number of activities to support children and their families during the transition to school. Variation across geographical locations and educational sectors were found, with some activities being more likely to be provided depending on whether schools: were located in a metropolitan or non-metropolitan area; or, belonged to the government or non-government educational sector. Of concern, were findings highlighting the relatively few numbers of schools specifically catering for children and families from diverse socio-cultural backgrounds (for example, single parent, low socio-economic status, immigrant and, families with language backgrounds other than English) or, engaging in transition activities with child care centres. / The need for schools to consider the needs of these groups of children and families is recommended. Teachers raised a number of concerns in relation to the transition to school and provided suggestions for improving the transition to school experience for children and their families. For example, specific ideas included: joint administrative responsibility for schools and prior to school settings; greater resources and release time for transition activities; more formalised and uniform information sharing processes/protocols, including the development of an assessment tool to capture relevant information on children’s prior learning and development; aligning curricula; developing clusters/networks; providing joint professional development/training; and, parenting support. Further research to investigate the types and use of transition activities employed by parents, prior to school setting staff, communities, and the influence of these activities on children’s adjustment to school is recommended.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S.)--Oregon State University, 2007. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 49-53). Also available on the World Wide Web.

This thesis analyzes the “home area” learning center in open-ended preschool classrooms to address the various forms of gendered learning and pedagogy elicited by its presence in geographies of early learning. I argue that the home and block areas spatially and symbolically mimic the traditional division of public and private spheres of sociality characteristic of the patriarchal social order. I suggest that the gendered enactments of space and place in open-ended classrooms function to socialize children into heteronormative forms of sex-role consciousness through what I identify as a spatial pedagogy of domestication. I suggest that this pedagogy is enforced by ideologically haunted landscapes like the domestic landscape of the home area. By outlining critical, feminist, and queer interventions in early learning I suggest that taking a spatial approach provides a more capacious explanatory frame for analyzing how, in a neo-Marxist sense, the ideo-culturally bound relations of production are reproduced through the socializing apparatus of the preschool.

This thesis analyzes the “home area” learning center in open-ended preschool classrooms to address the various forms of gendered learning and pedagogy elicited by its presence in geographies of early learning. I argue that the home and block areas spatially and symbolically mimic the traditional division of public and private spheres of sociality characteristic of the patriarchal social order. I suggest that the gendered enactments of space and place in open-ended classrooms function to socialize children into heteronormative forms of sex-role consciousness through what I identify as a spatial pedagogy of domestication. I suggest that this pedagogy is enforced by ideologically haunted landscapes like the domestic landscape of the home area. By outlining critical, feminist, and queer interventions in early learning I suggest that taking a spatial approach provides a more capacious explanatory frame for analyzing how, in a neo-Marxist sense, the ideo-culturally bound relations of production are reproduced through the socializing apparatus of the preschool.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2000. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 98-107). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Victoria University of Wellington, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M. Ed.)--York University, 2000. Graduate Programme in Education. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 96-100). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/yorku/fullcit?pMQ59200.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Open University. BLDSC no. DX81690. / 2 volumes.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2003. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.