published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Curriculum and Educational Studies / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / abstract / Education / Master / Master of Education

This study explores junior secondary students’ schemata on a line reflection construction task, the research of which was conducted in a secondary school in Hong Kong. The theories drawn on in this study come from the literature on theories of schemata and the corresponding knowledge embedded within, namely conceptual knowledge, manipulation and procedural knowledge. The research built on existing theories on schemata and attempted to categorize the different kinds of schemata as well as investigating the relationship between them among four junior secondary students in the construction of a line reflection task. The study also tried to find out how and why students manipulated in a line reflection construction task and the extent to which manipulation could lead learners to successfully tackle the task. This study researched on four junior secondary students, drawing mainly on qualitative data used in the analysis, including task-based interview with the employment of think aloud method in a designed line reflection construction task, as well as study of students’ drawings. The data analysis mainly focused on three areas. First, the analysis of each of the four cases was conducted by looking into the different kinds of schemata possessed by the student informants. Second, analysis of the different knowledge (conceptual knowledge, manipulation and procedural knowledge) embedded in the schema possessed by the student informants was done. Third, synthesis was drawn upon the analysis made in an attempt to answer the research questions posed in this study. Findings from the study confirmed the core role conceptual knowledge plays in the establishment of a learner’s schemata. Findings also revealed that different learners may possess different schemata towards the same concept such as the concept of same distance. When investigating the manipulative actions employed by student informants, it was found that there is a reciprocal relationship between a learner’s conceptual knowledge and his manipulation. This is also apparent in cases where there was a misconception in the learner’s schemata. The research also found that students exercised manipulation very differently and these manipulative actions were largely informed by their corresponding conceptual knowledge. With regard to why they manipulated, the research revealed reasons including manipulation for exploration, manipulation for representation and manipulation for verification. Based on the observation and analysis done in the four cases, it was found that manipulation helped students in the completion of the task to different extents. Learners with weaker conceptual knowledge in line reflection benefited more from the manipulation done in the construction task. These findings have implications for the teaching and learning of line reflection. Teachers are suggested to consider introducing using manipulative tools when approaching the teaching of line reflection, especially when they are dealing with students without rich conceptual knowledge in the area. The effectiveness of having hands-on experience implies that simply teaching definition and inviting learners to rote-learn does not necessarily lead to effective acquisition of knowledge in the Mathematics topic of line reflection. / published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Education

Education is an evolving process for teachers. In order to move away from the generally accepted face to face delivery method and adapt to upcoming trends in education, teachers are implementing the flipped classroom as a means to deliver curriculum content to their students. During this study a comparison between a flipped classroom and traditional lecture style teaching approaches was conducted within a Hong Kong based International School in order to gain insight into the effects on students attitude and academic attainment in science. The comparison was conducted using participants from two year 9 (13-14 year old) general science classes. One class conducted their science lessons for the academic year using the flipped classroom approach. Within this structure a Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) was used as the platform for delivering the lesson content. Students were tasked to produce questions and notes based on the online material. The second class, completed their science lessons using a traditional lecture based approach. In these lessons, the teacher delivered content via a lecture and question and answer sessions. Both classes completed investigations and practical activities during the lessons with the flipped classroom class expected to contribute to the design of investigations and the traditional class following provided instructions. In order to determine the effects of the teaching strategies employed during the study on the students attitude and attainment in science, pre and post course attitudinal surveys and pre and post topic tests were presented to the students. The quantitative data was analysed using ANOVA tests and qualitative data responses were interpreted for what the responses could infer or imply. This research has found that the implementation of a flipped learning teaching strategy can be a positive and useful instrument for teachers to use. This strategy is still relatively in its infancy and will continue to develop along with the ever changing world of technology. With the findings relating to the effects on attitude and attainment largely being positive but not necessarily significant, it would appear as though a mix of strategies needs to be employed by teachers in order to facilitate the variety of learner approaches that are experienced. / published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

This study identifies the academic vocabulary from the IGCSE science textbooks by using online software. Then compare the words identified with the new Academic Vocabulary List (AVL) (Gardner & Davies, 2013a) to generate 139 academic core vocabulary (ACV) from Chapter 1 of the science textbooks. A trial lesson is conducted to explore ways of teaching those ACV to a group of ESL/EFL students in an international high school programme in Mainland China, where English is the medium of instruction. The researcher utilizes an inductive, inquiry-based approach to teach the lesson, with visuals as the main teaching aids. The measurement instruments include a pre-test, an immediate post-test and a one-week delayed post-test. A questionnaire is employed after students’ participation of the trial lesson unit, in order to get students’ perspectives on and perceptions of such an academic vocabulary learning LAC programme. The results suggest that learning the meaning of ACV through pictures is effective to students. The majority of students (93.3%) believe that the learning of ACV will benefit them in academic study, although almost half of them (40%) think that participation of such an academic vocabulary learning programme is not necessary. Although students have shown improvement in the tests, the research result is very likely to be only applicable to this particular group of students at this specific time of the academic year. This is because these students are generally positive about learning and have very good interaction with the teacher and classmates in the classroom. They are from Class A, which consists of students of relatively higher English ability. Another important factor is that this study is taken at the end of an academic year for Year 10 students. One implication of the findings is that for future study of this type, it is important to test students’ vocabulary size with reference to the new AVL so that the research can be more focused on students’ real needs. The study implies that the time of the study (at the beginning of a new semester or at the end of an academic year), the students’ English proficiency level and the instructor of the lesson are crucial factors that might affect the study. The current study also indicates that the students’ own content teacher plays a vital role in their science key academic vocabulary learning, i.e., the content teacher seems to be in the best position to teach content vocabulary, as the study finds that students are more likely to learn academic vocabulary during class time, rather than spending extra time on vocabulary learning after class. / published_or_final_version / Education / Master / Master of Education

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