This thesis explores the use of mobile phones to support English vocabulary learning in Malaysian schools and develops an implementation strategy which consists of the policy and procedure through an Educational Research and Development (ER&D) methodology (Borg and Gall, 1979) with the interview as the main research tool. The methodology consists of rigorous steps in developing, evaluating and disseminating the implementation strategy as well as exploring other issues associated with mobile learning implementation in Malaysian schools. Based on the respondent’s perspectives, it has been established that the implementation strategy developed in this study would have the potential to provide guidance in the implementation of mobile learning in Malaysian schools. There is also a potential to utilise mobile phones to complement the existing practices in Malaysian schools: adding value to the existing initiatives for teaching the English Language in Malaysian schools; complementing the ICT policy in the Malaysian Education System; complementing the Malaysian Smart School vision to utilise mobile technologies; and becoming an alternative teaching and learning tool. This study also explores emerging themes in the implementation of mobile learning. These are the opportunities of utilising mobile phones including: to support English Language subject; as an affordable device; as a common device among students; as a future teaching and learning tool; as an engaging and motivational learning device; to support various learning activities; and to prepare students for their future with digital literacy. The challenges identified are: misuse, current educational policy, management and maintenance, stakeholders’ attitude, digital divide and personal space invasion. The study sheds light on the situation regarding the utilisation of mobile phones including the challenges that need to be addressed to make it a reality. It is envisaged that the implementation strategy would help towards the realisation of mobile learning implementation in Malaysian schools.

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This thesis will illustrate the strong, significant and positive relationship between attendance at secondary schools in England and the role of the form tutor. The aim of this thesis is to use narrative methodology to show how this relationship is auto/biographical in nature and how it could potentially be critically important to understanding and raising attendance levels. Part I will provide evidence that school attendance is currently officially approached in a restricted, quantitative manner. This has led to inaccurate and ill-defined data and initiatives, with little success in raising attendance. Further, there is a lack of qualitative understanding surrounding the role of the form tutor. Thus, although students and form tutors recognise how their personal and qualitatively described interactions influence attendance, this is not identified by official publications. Part II will argue that a new epistemological approach is required to incorporate the qualitative, individual and auto/biographical elements already positively influencing attendance but currently unable to gain just recognition. Wittgenstein’s (1953) philosophical theories will be argued to include dialectic elements of meaning and therefore provide grounding for a new approach to attendance. In turn, this requires the structure and content of narrative time, identity and ethics, based upon Ricoeur (1955, 1965, 1969, 1975, 1984, 1985, 1986, 1988, 1990), to fully communicate the significant relationship between attendance, individuals and the role of the form tutor: ultimately enhancing the accuracy, definition and understanding of attendance. Part III will discuss the practical implications of this new epistemology and methodology, through an analysis of the methods used here to undertake research with a small group of form tutors within a secondary school in England. It will also be noted how narrative theory and my own auto/biographical experiences have affected this thesis. The content presented crosses multifarious boundaries, bringing together a passion for mathematics, philosophy, science and self-consciousness, with a personal experience of family love and professional experience of attendance. Consequently, this thesis auto/biographically brings together academic, practical, applied, theoretical, professional and personal concepts to gain a more meaningful understanding of secondary school attendance.

This thesis is principally concerned with the statutory assessment of design and technology at key stage 3 of the National Curriculum. Design and technology is a foundation subject of the National Curriculum for England and Wales introduced under the auspices of The Education Reform Act of 1988. To establish the context in which this research was undertaken, this chapter describes in outline the National Curriculum. In particular the role of The Task Group on Assessment and Testing is considered and discussed as its key recommendations had a direct influence on statutory testing. In particular issues relating to end of key stage 3 assessment in design and technology, the focus of this thesis, are detailed. The aims of this thesis are described in relation to the key questions which it seeks to answer. In brief these are concerned with the validity and reliability of national statutory tasks; the impact of adopting criterion referencing in design and technology; the effect of assessment activities on learning experiences and the relationship between the different modes of assessment. Each of these issues is reviewed in relation to the way in which they might effect statutory testing. In addition the aspects which will need to be considered in undertaking the research and development required are identified.

The central focus of the thesis is a sociological exploration of the lives and work of supply teachers who fill the temporal gaps whenever regular teachers are absent from school. Time permeates the thesis at three levels of analysis: the substantive, the theoretical, and the methodological. The interpretative, and to a lesser extent, the critical and normative traditions in sociology are applied to time in education. Time is used both as a parameter to explore links between educational structures and action as they relate to supply teachers and teaching, and to locate supply teachers' lives and work in time. The study is based upon qualitative research conducted in schools and domestic settings. Chapter 1 highlights the temporal strands which help to construct the chapters and underpin the thesis. In chapter 2 methodological issues are considered, in particular the embedding of diaries within the research process. Chapter 3 explores understandings about supply teachers and teaching in the wider context of educational change, and at the interface of local, institutional, and individual experience. Chapter 4 examines relationships between supply work, temporal commitment, and identities. In chapter 5, supply work is considered in relation to the substitute curriculum. Temporal connections in lives which move rapidly between private and public spheres are prioritised in chapter 6. The contribution of pupils to understandings about supply work is the theme pursued in chapter 7. The sociological and educational dimensions of the research are assessed in chapter 8. These have overlapping as well distinctive implications for sociologists with interests in time, school organizations, teaching, and in gendered occupations, and for educationalists with interests in the management of school systems, professional development and training, and importantly, for supply teachers themselves. Appendix 1 and 2 comprise interview and diary schedules, and Appendix 3 is a methodological note on the tracing and tracking of supply teachers.

Situated understandings of identity have gained prominence in the organisational studies litera-ture. Through the guiding works of Lefebvre and Ibarra this thesis explores the relationship be-tween organisational space and occupational identity through an empirical study of two schools in the UK. Narratives are collected using visual prompts to examine individuals’ lived experiences in the workplace. My rich data allow me to bring to the fore and unpack how physical changes form and transform occupational sense of self. In particular, my findings indicate that space is involved in the formation of occupational identity in different ways, namely, by giving a sense of continuity to employees, assisting in the development of a sense of belonging and upholding in-group identity, providing employees with a sense of expectations and idealised performances, and sustaining hi-erarchy by establishing a daily routine that excludes and isolates groups of workers. This study makes three main contributions. First, through Lefebvre’s lens, it discusses how identity is mediated through space and discusses the politicisation of space and shows that space can be used to emphasise or interrupt power relations in the workplace. Secondly, through application of Lefebvre’s work this study explains tensions created through spatial change and the implications that these have for the formation of occupational identity. Thirdly, this study takes Lefebvre’s con-cern with tensions one step further by unpacking the complications posed by these for the for-mation, reflection and modification of occupational identity. To make sense of this, Ibarra’s work has been introduced to argue that space is instrumental in reflecting and formulating new, some-times provisional, sometimes conflicting, occupational identities and this leads to ambivalence and ambiguity in the profession. This study highlights the importance of not treating space simply in terms of walls and physical ap-pearance. Space has a special meaning for employees and is a tool that allows them to express their sense of professional self by desiring, imagining and planning a physical space that corre-sponds to their professional role. When space is taken away from professionals, they create their own physical boundaries that send messages to outsiders that they have control of their profes-sion. They do this in order to protect their professional autonomy, feel noticed at the workplace and to imprint parts of their personality according to their professional needs.

Violence against students in the name of school discipline has led in many instances to hardship, and in extreme situations, the death of students in the Ghanaian secondary system (see myjoyonline.com, 2015). As a former secondary school teacher and now teacher educator, this presents an obvious motivation for examining the concept and actuality of school discipline in Ghana with the intention of finding potential for a change of approach in policy, teacher professionalism and practice. Behaviour management presents an established scope for educational research globally and has been researched for some years (Powel and Tod, 2004). The term Positive Behaviour Management (PBM) is used to denote forms of behaviour management in school that seeks to ensure that the dignity and self-esteem of students are safeguarded (e.g. Raths 1964; Wolfe 1991; Black and William 1998; Grundy & Blandford 2006; Brookfield 2006; Hayes et al. 2011). A qualitative case-study of four state Senior High Schools in Ghana was conducted using semi-structured interviews, observation and documents analysis. A sample of 28 respondents; 20 members of staff (headteachers or their assistants, senior house masters/mistress and subject teachers) and eight students, voluntarily participated in this research. Drawing on Foucault’s concepts of Normalisation, Surveillance and Regulation as tools of analysis and Ball’s (1987) theory on school micro-politics, an analysis of the data and policy documents was done. Findings suggest that physical and emotional abuses are widespread, propelled by teacher perceptions and school policy prescriptions that punishment must be painful, reformative and deterrent. In addition, they reveal negative consequences of physical and emotional abuses, rampant student suspensions from school and an obsolete policy on school discipline. The research therefore suggests an alternative approach to behaviour management which should be contained in policy reforms, changes in teacher training, general policy reforms, and professional practice.

In 1997, New Labour introduced a national ICT strategy for schools and went on to spend over £3.54 billion on educational technology. This exploratory study examines whether changes to government funding for educational technology has altered the view of the role of ICT in the thinking of senior leaders. It contrasts views of the role of ICT in the classroom from those in the ‘Edutopian’ school (Chen and Armstrong, 2002) who see it as transformational, innovative and an essential part of preparing children for modern life, with those who adopt a more cautious ‘Dystopian’ narrative as found across the work of a range of academics, such as, Cuban (2001), Selwyn (1999, 2002, 2004, 2008, 2011, 2014) and Facer (2011). This exploratory study draws on a small sample of interviews with key decision makers based in different schools that are all located within a single county in the North of England. The findings suggest that ICT remains one of the top five spending priorities for schools who explain this with the use of the Edutopian globalisation and economic arguments. In the study, a minority of key decision makers for ICT had formal training and this was reflected in the range of processes and procedures they adopted. The movement by government away from a centralised planning approach was welcomed across the sample and the loss of some ring-fenced funds was deemed by the ‘rural schools’ to have improved outcomes and created solutions more attuned to local requirements. Edutopian arguments were used by all participants to explain their planning and vision for the future with some desiring to move to ubiquitous or 1:1 tablet teaching solutions.

The notion of ‘authenticity’ has been revisited and discussed by the researchers and practitioners in the field of English language teaching (ELT) over recent years. However, it is usually described within a limited framework that focuses on the quality of texts used in ELT, often without paying attention to the ways and contexts in which those texts are used by language learners and teachers. Following van Lier’s definition of authenticity as ‘the result of acts of authentication, by students and their teacher, of the learning process and the language used in it’ (1996, p.128), this study focuses on the dynamic and multi-dimensional nature of authenticity in the language classroom. In ELT literature, there are a limited number of studies on this issue and the majority of them have provided prescriptive or theoretical discussion or focused on ‘text authenticity’ and the ‘correspondence account’ of authenticity rather than encompassing different dimensions and accounts of authenticity in a more holistic way. The present study addresses this gap and explores the relationships between different dimensions of authenticity in four 9th grade classrooms in two Anatolian High Schools in Ankara, Turkey. This study adopts the qualitative research tradition and is tailored as an embedded multiple-case design with multiple data collection methods such as classroom observations, semi-structured interviews and documents (e.g. textbook extracts). The data was analysed separately for each unit of analysis (i.e. classroom) and themes were developed inductively. The findings revealed that authenticity should be seen as a phenomenon (co)constructed through human actors’ engagement and validation in the classroom context rather than as an inherent quality of materials or activities. The main characteristics of this process were discussed under the key themes that emerged from cross-case comparison. These themes were listed as Spontaneity, Discrepancy, Personalisation, Humour, Didacticity (genesis and accommodation) and Localisation.

There has been concern for more than a decade that pupils do not have sufficient knowledge, skills and understanding of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) at the end of compulsory schooling. This research investigates approaches to the organisation of the ICT curriculum, teaching and learning, management, staffing and resources that are associated with high levels of ICT capability among 14-16 year olds in four secondary schools, each of which organised the delivery of the ICT curriculum in different ways. These were discrete or ‘centralised’ ICT, cross curricular ICT; and hybrids of these, the ‘skills core’ and ‘kick start’ models (NCET, 1996, p7). There are detailed case studies of each school, and a comparative analysis, which includes an assessment of the relative ICT capability of their pupils. The more and less successful schools are characterised, and there is discussion of the issues arising and those areas requiring further research. Features associated with high levels of ICT capability included: • ICT was taught as a discrete subject throughout key stages 3 and 4, and pupils were entered for GCSE ICT at the end of key stage 4 • There were well planned programmes of study for discrete ICT but the use of ICT across the curriculum was not planned in detail • ICT teachers were more aware of the differences between teaching ICT and other subjects • There was strong leadership by senior management; the HoD ICT was enthusiastic and approachable; and there were opportunities for all teachers to be involved in decision making • There was a management committee that included senior managers, the HoD ICT and ICT teachers; and a user group with representatives from other subject departments • Teachers of other subjects could not avoid using ICT in the classroom and for aspects of school administration • Schools valued their investment in ICT resources • There were significantly more specialist ICT teachers employed by the school • There was an adequate quantity of modern ICT resources • Higher levels of bid based funding were acquired