The ability to learn and work in a multidisciplinary team is crucial to the delivery of healthcare that is ‘fit for purpose’ in the twenty-first century. Consequently, interprofessional education (IPE) is a mandatory requirement for pre-registration training in health and social care. However, the evidence base for the effectiveness of such programmes remains limited. This evaluative study aims to explore the potential influence of IPE at pre-registration level, using podiatry as an exemplar. In Phase One, key informant interviews were held with IPE curriculum developers from higher education institutions (HEIs) (n=8) in the United Kingdom. Verbatim transcripts of these interviews were analysed using elements of grounded theory. In Phase Two, using the qualitative results as the anchor, a survey was constructed and administered to pre-registration health and social work students in a number of parallel IPE initiatives (Sample 1: n=1151; Sample 2: n=1060), involving 6 and 5 HEIs respectively. The findings of the key informant interviews and SPSS survey analysis were subsequently combined to inform the results of the research. The findings revealed an absence of educational theory underpinning the IPE curriculum development process. In addition there were issues concerning institutional commitment to IPE, attitudes towards IPE, and inconsistencies in the approach to curriculum delivery, all of which militated against successful implementation. The results illuminated that students learn about other health and social care professions that are represented in their IPE group. An appropriate time to introduce IPE into pre-registration programmes was found to be the latter part of the academic year for students studying first year modules. Students’ readiness for interprofessional learning was found to be enhanced if they were inducted to a coherent IPE initiative with consistent approaches to learning, teaching, assessment and evaluation across programmes. However, attitude differences between professional groups emerged where students with a strong sense of professional identity and roles were less ready to engage in interprofessional learning. This study indicates that the current method of implementing IPE in pre-registration health and social care programmes is less than ideal. The development and delivery of the IPE curriculum appears to be flawed. Explanations for the findings are explored and the implications for practice and future research are considered.

This study seeks to explore the problems of genetics learning and to identify possible ways forward. The work was carried out at junior high school level in Taiwan. Genetics is often thought of as a subject or a topic in biology that is difficult to learn and understand, especially for novices. A review of literature on learning difficulties in genetics is provided to explore the nature of the difficulties, with likely explanations for the difficulties observed. Undoubtedly, many would acknowledge that genetics is an important subject to learn in these days and age where its applications are ubiquitous and even the cause of many debates. However, due to the nature of the subject matter and the way learning processes occur and, possibly, the way it is being taught, the understanding of genetics ideas of the majority of students is thought to be very poor and full of confusions and alternative views. Thus, the overall aim of this study is to explore learning difficulties and problems in genetics and then to develop and test ways by which the situation might be improved. The research for this thesis was carried out in three stages. In the first stage, the adolescent learners’ preconceptions about genetics were explored before they move to the formal course. The result indicated that the essential foundational concepts, such as structure and function of cells and its organelles, cell divisions (mitosis and meiosis), reproduction, and basic mathematical requirements and the concept of probability, are generally vague and misconceptions are widespread. In the second stage, factors that might affect the learning of genetics for adolescent learners were investigated. The factors were prior knowledge related to genetics and the effects of the limitation of learners’ psychological characteristics (namely, perceptual fields or the degree of field dependence and the working memory space). Results showed that students’ performance in genetics examination revealed a significant correlation with their prior knowledge, the working memory capacity and the degree of field dependence. Based on the findings from the first and second stage of the research, a set of teaching material of genetics course for the first year of junior high school students was developed in the third stage. The teaching material was deliberately constructed not only to minimise demands on the working memory, but also to encourage attitude development. The performance of students was found to be significantly better than for those who had been taught by the traditional approaches. Numerous comparisons of attitudes between the two groups revealed that attitudes of social awareness as well as attitudes towards aspects of the learning processes involved were more positive for those who had used the new materials It should be pointed out that all conclusions derived from this study must be treated tentatively. Inevitably, any new approach will have a novelty factor which may enhance performance. Nonetheless, the evidence taken together does support the hypothesis that learning arranged in line with information processing insights is more effective. In addition, the strategies used were designed in line with understandings of the ways attitudes develop and the effectiveness of these approaches has been demonstrated. Overall, the study has highlighted several problems and, on the basis of the evidence obtained, suggests possible ways forward for a better approach to genetics learning.

This inter-disciplinary study develops a group level approach to learning design and practice in the classroom. This is supported by the use of technology to support learners in their collaborative development of questions. General use of these technologies has tended to focus on tutors setting questions and students responding. This thesis explores a more sophisticated view of these technologies using a student-generated perspective. Five case studies are presented including induction, professional development and placement review. These cases are each in different contexts. This study also develops a group-level concept of learning design. This approach has a structural view of group learning which consists of different ways of organising interaction amongst the whole class. In addition, it also has a psychological view of group learning based around the psychological impact of group membership and different group-level perspectives. This is in contrast with conventional instructional design approaches to pedagogy which are based on representative individuals. In response to this group-level approach, this study reviews individual and socio-cultural theories of learning on order to understand the interaction between individual and whole-group perspectives which are a feature of this practice. Social Identity theory is added to this as a potential bridge between these different theoretical frameworks. Shared Thinking, the name given to this group-level practice, completes the design, theory and practice framework of this study. This practice points to the pedagogical complexity implied by new uses of classroom technologies discussed in this study. The combination of an instrumentalist and a social psychological aspect of pedagogy illustrate this complexity based around the development and manipulation of a shared sense of identity. The tutor’s role therefore combines management of the process with the curation of social identity.

The legacy of a colonialist, assimilationist educational system in countries such as Bolivia is the under-representation of the indigenous in the large sphere encompassed by the schools - knowledge, teachers, and modes of instruction. Many indigenous students feel alienated from schooling and experience limited academic success. The calculated intervention of transforming traditional knowledge into culturally-relevant curriculum material has been suggested as a way to fortify their identities. Once students are solidly grounded in their indigenous selves, they may have a greater chance to perform better in the academic indices of formal schooling. This thesis describes a pilot study aligned with the mandates of a UNICEF project (EIBAMAZ) to bring intercultural bilingual education to schools in the Bolivian Amazon. Applying the principles of Participatory Action Research and adopting an anti-colonial stance, I explored the traditional knowledge of the Movima indigenous people and codified some of this into culturally-relevant curriculum material. The material was trialed in schools and feedback was obtained from all the participants. Results, implications and reflections from the pilot serve as recommendations to a larger scale indigenous education project. The investigative stage of the pilot revealed story-telling by community elders to be a natural method for them to exchange information. They saw themselves recording the narratives for their children from whom they felt a widening generational gap. When creating curriculum material in the second stage of the project, the needs of both student and teacher were kept as the focal point. Accessing students' prior knowledge and catching their interest were of utmost importance. The culturally-relevant lessons were ‘put to the test' in classrooms in semi-urban and rural schools. Differences between the two groups with respect to participation structure and interaction were noted. Teachers discovered their need for more professional training and cultural congruence between teacher-student to be important in imparting such curriculum. The last stage of the project heard voices from different segments of the population on the topic of culture and culturally-relevant curriculum. The study concludes that it is not possible to create an idealised indigenous curriculum because the Movima people are no longer living in a way that makes it possible to identify a singular culture which is outside and separate from the dominant national culture of Bolivia. Traditional knowledge is difficult to characterise. Rather than being fixed, it is mutable. It derives not just from the knower but from the interaction of the knower and the inquirer. It is dialogic and the research has shown that bringing it into the curriculum might involve a process of dialogue. Indigenising curriculum is possible to do but it requires full community participation which is precisely what makes it difficult. It is not possible to have a place-based curriculum prescribed from the centre. Because it is context based on the locale, it becomes less the role of the Ministry and more the role of the teacher and the community. Though local epistemologies and culture are domains that influence the content and purpose of schooling, there are other complex relationships (political, cultural, religious, social and organizational) involved in educational development. Top-down and bottom-up cooperation and reinforcement are necessary for the provision and sustainment of a culturally-relevant indigenous education. The research suggests that the success of an indigenising project such as this would depend on the extent to which communities can be facilitated and enthused, whether it can offer sufficient development to teachers to reconceptualise their practice and whether these teachers would have the motivation to persist.

This is an account of qualitative ethnographic case study research investigating the identity construction of English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers. This study was conducted at a higher education (HE) college, namely, Public High College (PHC) in Oman over a period of six months. In this study, I explore teacher identities in relation to the particular spatial locations of the teachers as well as the ways that networking and social capital and institutionalised cultural capital intersected with their nationalities and linguistic backgrounds to produce complex hierarchies. The thesis provides a rich exposition of teacher identity construction in Omani HE as theorised through the lens of Bourdieu, recognising the different educational practices, such as assessment and teacher evaluation, as well as the influence of space in the field of struggle within which teacher identities were implicated. The methodological approach and research design adopted in this study was dictated in part by the nature of the research questions and the theoretical framework adopted. Because I was interested in the embedded struggles in different educational practices between different groups and how these groups articulated and expressed these struggles, I positioned my research within a constructivist-interpretive paradigm. I adopted a case study approach and drew on ethnographic methods, such as semi-structured interviews, observation, and field notes. Over thirty-five local and non-local ESL teachers from western, Arab, African, and Asian contexts took part in this study. Furthermore, I kept a research diary to record my own experiences and decisions about my research. In addition, I analysed official documents from macro, meso, and micro levels. Both content analysis and thematic analysis were conducted to trace the tensions which were observed during my ethnography of teacher identity construction at Public High College in part produced by the emergence of new assessment procedures, and quality assurance agendas, and the Global North's influence on the Omani HE system. In the analysis chapters (Chapters Five to Seven), I problematise how educational practices were implicated in the production of hierarchical, spatial, and at times, male-female positioning of teachers. In the first analysis chapter, I conduct a documentary analysis of the national standards for the General Foundation Programmes to trace back potential tensions that were embedded in the new assessment processes and teacher appraisal procedures and the potential importance of these for teacher identity production. In Chapter Six, I examine the significance of space in producing hierarchical relations between local and non-local teachers and other hierarchies that cut across these groupings. My analysis shows that research respondents gained social capital from networking and highlights the complexity of this networking. In my final analysis chapter, I examine both assessment and teacher evaluation as the key processes through which teacher hierarchies at Public High College were produced. My analysis shows that assessment was one of the fields where struggle for positioning and legitimacy took place so that teacher identity production was bound up with assessment practices at Public High College. In addition, my analysis focuses on teacher evaluation processes in this chapter as another field where struggles for teacher positioning and legitimacy took place. My analysis interrogates both implicit and explicit teacher evaluation processes and the implications of such processes for the production of teacher identities. Through its ethnographic approach, the thesis shows the tensions, nuances, and power relations that pervade this HE institution, and examines how these were central in the production of teacher identities. It also shows the importance of taking teacher identity construction into account in the expansion and reform of Omani HE.

The present study focuses on the degree to which an innovative GCSE course (the OCR Pilot GCSE in Geography) acted as a basis for active and innovative learning. Using a holistic framework intertwining curriculum, learning and assessment, a collaborative action research approach was used to develop an active and innovative learning environment, focusing on the work of two groups of GCSE students following the Pilot GCSE course. A conscious adoption of personalised learning approaches, linked to a radical notion of the nature and content of geography and an alternative assessment regime, led to the development of a course founded on the integrated use of information and communication technology alongside independent learning approaches. These developments in active engagement were based on student perceptions of their own preferences with regards to learning and assessment. The action research took place over three cycles, and the results demonstrate that with the curriculum approach inherent in the Pilot GCSE specification, the development of active learning and authentic assessment opportunities were not only possible, but in keeping with the philosophy of the course. There is less evidence that the emerging classroom pedagogy allowed students to deepen their investigation of geography, although there is some qualitative evidence for this.

This study explored the development of subject knowledge by pre-service teachers of Design and Technology (D&T) in secondary schools in England. In doing so it aimed to throw light on their lived experience of developing subject knowledge whilst on placement in schools. It was anticipated that this would help to identify the factors that shape what is learned and the ways in which pre-service teachers may be better prepared and supported for placement in the future. The study made use of phenomenology as a methodological approach in order to capture the lived experience of developing knowledge through the eyes of pre-service teachers. This was framed against an exploration of subject knowledge in Design and Technology and the extensive experience of the researcher in the field. Empirical data was gathered through a process of interviewing 11 participants three times during the course of one academic year. Processes of data reduction and explication were undertaken to explore individual experiences and aspects that they had in common. Findings from the study highlight the inadequacy of the term subject knowledge in describing the processes that take place. They demonstrate that pre-service teachers drawn on cognitive, psychomotor and affective domains in developing their understanding of materials and processes in preparation for teaching. The findings also highlight the complex, and interrelated nature of factors that affect the development of subject knowledge and the significant influence that the placement school arena, and teachers, have on shaping the nature of what can be learned. They also indicate that learning new knowledge is a central part of the experience and that developing ‘skills of knowing’ is essential. Key recommendations from the study include the preparation of pre-service teachers for their placement experiences by enabling them to understand how they learn completely new things. It is also recommended that the responsibility for the development of subject knowledge should be more in the hands of placement schools. Further work is also needed in exploring alternative ways of representing the processes that take place when knowledge is acquired by individuals as they become the teachers of the future.

Introduction: CardioPulmonary Resuscitation (C.P.R.) is a critical clinical intervention widely recognised (Laws, 2001) to evoke stress in attending clinicians. Little is known about how junior clinicians (doctors) understand their early experiences in performing C.P.R., or whether their preparation could be improved. Problem: Undergraduate medical students have traditionally reported anxiety (Duns et al., 2008) at participating in CardioPulmonary Resuscitation. A recent systematic review of best practice in C.P.R. education focused on clinical knowledge and skills, but not emotional preparation (Mosley et al, 2012). No study has critiqued whether doctors’ pre-qualification anxieties align with their clinical reality. Less is known about the extent of their post hoc support needs. Methodology: Previous studies of doctors’ experience (Morgan and Westmoreland, 2002) have used exclusively quantitative data collection. Early qualitative data on young nurses’ experience of C.P.R (Ranse and Arbon, 2008), which used a focus group method, has identified: the experience of a chaotic environment; inadequate post-C.P.R. debrief; and unrealistic rehearsal in training. This qualitative study has used 1:1 interviewing and a Philosophical Hermeneutic (Gadamer 1975) lens to explicate how young doctors experience (and make sense of) their early attempts at C.P.R. The sociological framework of Symbolic Interactionism (Blumer, 1969, Charon, 2010, Mead, 1934) was deployed to offer a human interaction based interpretation of participants’ accounts. An experiential learning theory (Jarvis et al., 2003) offered further insights into the dimension of experiential learning. 3 Results: Eighteen participants were interviewed over 18 months. Using NVIVO 9 software, a thematic analysis technique, and a hierarchical analysis ladder (Spencer et al., 2003), four major themes were identified: 1. Current C.P.R. education is, at a skills and knowledge level, comprehensive and adequate. 2. Simulation rehearsal practises higher responsibilities than those clinically experienced, and usually fails to accommodate the “ambient” conditions of the real event. 3. C.P.R. offers novice clinicians a variety of experiential learning opportunities about leadership and about professional expectations of personal resilience (stoicism) as a doctor. 4. Participant support needs are usually unique, contextually generated, and largely unrecognised. Almost invariably unidentified, these needs reflect a variety of emotional states experienced during C.P.R.: surreality; exhilaration; satisfaction; or distress. Implications: This study has demonstrated the feasibility of 1:1 interviewing to generate deep, rich and granular accounts. Analysis through the lenses of Philosophical Hermeneutics, the sociological framework Symbolic Interactionism and the revised experiential learning theories of Jarvis offered unique perspectives and understandings of these experiences. The influence of “ambient” contextual conditions during C.P.R. has been partially, though not exhaustively, explicated. Whilst educational rehearsals should attempt simulation of reality, not all realities can be simulated. Post hoc support needs are unrecognised and educational responses unquantified. A modern duty of care to staff should require high quality interventions in three areas: pre hoc preparation; intra hoc conduct; and post hoc support.

The teaching of computing, like all subjects, requires a range of strategies to take the curriculum content (skills, knowledge, understanding and attitudes) and put it in a form that is more easily digested by learners. Metaphor has a particular rôle in the world of computing in that: it is embedded in the design of computer hardware and software; it is part of human computer interface and it underpins important facilities such as icons, pointer actions and window displays. It is proposed that metaphor plays an important rôle in the pedagogic content knowledge (PCK) of computing teachers. The research adopts a grounded theory approach using text analysis software to record and process a range of documents, statements, interview transcripts and text book analyses. The study is underpinned by consideration of pedagogic content knowledge. The major data source are reflections and reports of experienced and successful computer teachers working at post-16 level (grades 12-13) in 20 south-of-England schools and colleges. It is proposed that metaphor usage can be divided into many distinct forms. The most easily recognised metaphor is the narrative theme where an object, function or system is described in the clothes of another, more familiar object, function or system. The other approaches with a metaphoric nature identified are algorithm, model, rôle play and diagram. In contrast to metaphoric, it has been identified that approaches are also based upon literal teaching. The outcomes of the research reveal a new perspective upon the pedagogic content knowledge with respect to the teaching of computing in post-compulsory education. A model of approaches that identifies the key areas and emphasises the rôle metaphor plays in both the teaching strategies and the subject knowledge of computing, is presented. Different practices are described, compared and presented in a form that will help practising and pre-service teachers identify their own preferred approach or approaches. Future research is proposed to determine the effectiveness and efficiency of particular metaphoric strategies. In particular, the rôle non-literal teaching approaches can make in enabling younger pupils to understand the principles of computing and how non-literal approaches can be used to ensure students are more motivated in their studies will be made.

This thesis follows the natural history of the research which gave rise to it. Working as an evaluator on a Social and Environmental Studies curriculum development project in the Republic of Ireland the author was surprised by some of the reactions to his evaluation reports. After consideration he came to the conclusion that these products of his evaluation had of themselves some sort of socio-political role. Moving to Northern Ireland he came into contact with a number of other evaluators some of international repute, who convinced him that his experiences were not unique but were shared by other evaluators. He was helped to formulate and flesh out an Aggregate Pathology Model of reactions to evaluation products. This model represented a cumulative but not necessarily complete schema of possible negative reactions to evaluation products and included; co-option and collusion between the evaluation and the project, restrictive renegotiation of the evaluator's contract, rhetorical acceptance of the product divorced from political action, rejection of the evaluator or his product, distancing from the evaluation, a counter denunciation in which dossiers of evidence are produced to discredit the evaluation, the use of human sensitivity as an instrument of human control over the evaluation, and a 'rival product' developed as an internal counter-thrust to the independent evaluation. Visiting this model with members of the evaluation community the author received qualified approval of its contents as a valid and useful map of many of their own evaluative experiences. In endeavouring to ascertain what might be the cause of the pathological reactions to evaluative products Concomitant Variation Method was used to compare contrasting between-case evaluation outcomes. This enabled the establishment of constants and independent and dependent variables, in evaluation cases where typicality had been established. As a result of its application to evaluation cases three explanations are advanced as causes of pathological reactions to evaluation products. These are (1) that the products are not 'practical' in the sense identified by Schwab(2) that the pathology represents reactions to evaluation perceived as a degradation exercise (3) that evaluation products appear at nodes or decisive cusps in project activity where sensitivity is heightened. These explanations are offered as decisive in a final case study of a curriculum evaluation this time conducted in the political and social sensitivities of Northern Ireland. The thesis ends with a methodological appendix and a summary of the conclusions. A review of the literature covers the history of the evaluation problem of the thesis from its beginnings as a substantive critique of the testing movement and as a partial expansion from curriculum development, to the use of ethnography and other metaphors from the sciences and arts in the evaluation of curricula. The problem itself, aspects of which are covered in the literature, is next dealt with and some pertinent explanatory concepts from the social sciences are given. Finally, some published material concerning the principal evaluation cases studied in the thesis are given.