Reflection is yet to be fully understood as a concept, practice and experience in many English language teacher education programmes. The calls for data-led studies to prove its benefits and to make the concept less vague continue against a new argument that academic presentations of reflective inquiry may be flawed because teachers perceive reflection differently. Studies suggest that many trainees, teachers and teacher educators still do not understand reflection, and that rejections or fleeting tolerance of reflection by teachers or trainees may be connected to top-down approaches to teaching reflective practice. In a two year exploratory, interpretive research study of Nigerian English language teachers, the Nigerian ELT context is explored for evidence of reflective inquiry. The study integrates classroom explorations, teacher group meetings, focus group and individual interviews that aim to project the voices of participants. Reflection is identified in the context in teachers who used it intuitively and through those who have participated in a formal reflective international teacher development course. Findings show that reflection is multifaceted, distinctively construed and used for specific purposes. Four types of reflection are identified: learner-centred reflection; teacher-centred reflection; skill-centred reflection and knowledge-centred reflection. By comparing the two groups of participants’ perspectives of reflection and their use of reflection, the benefit and potential of reflection to bring change and development in the context is highlighted. The study shows that as participants progress through the spectrum of reflection-in-use that was identified in the study, they make sense of teaching and learning and of themselves as teachers; moving from intuitive encounters of reflection-in-use to the more explicit zones of systematic reflection. The study concludes that because reflection is multifaceted and used in specific ways, teacher educators will need to develop specific and relevant learning tools to teach it in more teacher-centred ways.

This thesis investigates the introduction of The Technical and Vocational Education Initiative (TVEI) to schools and colleges. It examines how far, and in what ways, the Initiative was able to bring about changes in LEAs and institutions. The evaluation studies carried out by the Author in three Local Education Authorities are considered and, in addition to discussing the methodology which was used, the ways in which the research was affected by its association with a contractually arranged evaluation programme are analysed. Features of educational innovation are considered in relation to the main participants in TVEI, and the ways in which these groups and individuals attempted to implement change are reviewed. The research studies, which were conducted at local and national levels. are considered. and the evaluation data that was obtained is used to consider the ways in which one of the projects managed the Initiative. The change strategies that were employed are analysed, and the developments occurring in TVEI are set against the educational background of the Authority. The ways in which the policies of the LEA influenced individual institutions are evaluated. The outcomes of this particular case study are then compared with the approaches used to introduce and manage TVEI in two other LEAs. The main findings are that: (1) there was a shift of control from the MSC to the LEAs and institutions during the lifetime of TVEI which resulted partly from the centre/periphery change model employed. This shift enabled practitioners to gain a considerable degree of control over the ways in which the Initiative was implemented. (ii) many of the changes taking place were peripheral to the main aims of TVEI. and the available funding allowed the introduction of a number of long established ideas. (iii) TVEI had a considerable influence on other initiatives introduced during the 1980's. (iv) TVEI enabled changes to take place in those LEAs and institutions that were willing and prepared for innovations to occur. (v) the initiative was introduced rapidly, and many of the changes were partial and incomplete. (vi) the ways in which TVEI influenced practice in institutions was dependent upon the roles and attitudes of the headteachers, coordinators and other key staff involved. (vii) the relationship between an LEA and its institutions was critical to the ways in which changes were introduced.

The goal of this study is to investigate the area of young children’s preconceptions in science. The research focuses on teachers working in public and private kindergartens, and children attending these kindergartens, aged from three to five and a half years old. The area of the children’s preconceptions, has been extensively investigated by other researchers in the past but research focusing on early-years teachers and children’s preconceptions is still almost untouched, especially when talking about Cyprus. Inspired mostly by other countries’ literature and the importance of foreign research results, this study aims at identifying the Cypriot teachers’ appreciation of the children’s preconceptions by discovering whether teachers identify and take into account the children’s preconceptions when planning and teaching a Natural Sciences lesson. It also aims at giving suggestions and implications on how teachers can respond to the preconceptions that children might have. To do this, a case study has been applied to facilitate the utilization of a number of different methods, like questionnaires, interviews, focus groups, observations and a minor document analysis. The results indicate that teachers tend to avoid identifying the children’s preconceptions when teaching Natural Sciences. This indicates that there is lack of appreciation of the children’s preconceptions and their consequences when not acknowledged. It also indicates that teachers in Cyprus are not aware of the constructivist theory and its importance in children’s learning. As a result, teachers in Cyprus need to be better trained and informed in regard to the children’s preconceptions and to Natural Sciences in general. To help teachers respond to the children’s preconceptions, the study develops a list of children’s common preconceptions and a number of different ideas and suggestions for proper methods which can be used to help teachers identify the children’s preconceptions and guide children to overcoming them.

Nowadays, the growing number of software tools to support e-learning and the data they rely upon are valuable resources, supporting different aspects of the complex learning and teaching processes, including designing learning content, delivering learning activities, and evaluating students’ learning performance. However, sharing these educational resources efficiently and effectively is a challenge: there are many resources, these have not been described accurately and in general they do not interoperate, and it is common for the tools to rely on different technologies. This thesis explores a solution – a novel educational services framework – to improve the sharing of current e-resources, by applying the latest service technologies in the context of higher education. Our findings suggest that the proposed framework is effective to deal with the technical and educational issues in resource discovery, interoperability and reusability, however, there are still technical challenges remaining for implementing this service framework. This research is divided into 3 phases. The first phase investigates the sharing of elearning resources through a literature survey, and identifies limitations on current developments. In the second phase, the current problems relating to resource sharing are addressed by a proposed educational service framework, which contains both educational and technical components. Through a case study, nine e-learning services and their dataflows are identified. To determine the technical components of the framework, a novel Educational Service Architecture is proposed, which allows resources to be better described, structured and connected, by following the principles of discoverability, interoperability and reusability in service technologies. In the third phase, part of the framework is implemented and evaluated by two studies. In the first study, users’ experiences were collected via a simulation experiment, to compare the effectiveness of a service prototype with that of the use of current technologies. During the second part of the evaluation, technical challenges for implementing the services framework were identified via a case study, involving the implementation of another service prototype.

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published_or_final_version / Business Administration / Master / Master of Business Administration

The thesis focuses on changing medical beliefs and practices in Bani Ghazl, a village of 631 inhabitants in the ~ugariyya district of North Yemen. The analysis of medicine is first placed in a broad ethnographic context, with a presentation of the economic and political experience of the Hugariyya in this century. The medical data suggest that traditionally, great emphasis was put on personal responsibility for the prevention of illness and promotion of health. This orientation remains but is supplemented by simultaneous use of western medicine, which does not emphasize personal responsibility but rather reliance on the extra-household cures of specialists. That one set of symptoms can have many explanations in the community is discussed. Finally, the influence of a new economic and religious elite on village medical practice is discussed.

The purpose of this study is to explore crowdsourcing as a research paradigm for creating evidence-based practice research in the field of speech pathology. Using an Internet survey, respondents provided de-identified information about one patient with aphasia they had treated in the previous year. The respondents were then asked to rate the success of treatment. Analysis and grading of the responses was performed to identify which responses were usable for the purpose of planning a treatment for a patient with similar demographics and diagnostic make-up. Results showed that crowdsourcing is a viable research method; however, further refinements to the collection and analysis are required before it can be an effectively used. / text

The present thesis aims to discuss the concept of competence in teacher education concerned with the preparation of teachers to deal with cultural diversity. It will focus particularly on the roles of educational theory and school experience in the development of that concept. The literature review discusses these roles as different paradigms in education, so as to locate the study with reference to them. Emphasis is given to a critical theory approach, in which the concept of intercultural perspective is understood in the scope of the study. A parallel between two countries - Brazil and the UK - attempts to contextualise the theoretical framework developed in the preceding chapter. It will be argued that, despite considerable differences, Brazil and the UK share the challenges imposed on their educational systems by the multicultural nature of their societies. The evidence of the role of teachers' perceptions and assumptions in the perpetration of education inequality in both countries is presented, and the contributions of the intercultural approach to change the situation is discussed. A case study undertaken in a higher teacher education institution in the UK highlighted the nature of some of the constraints for the development of intercultural sensitivity in the delivery of educational theory and in the school experience component. It will be argued that the persisting net of misconceptions associated with the intercultural approach, as well as the hierarchical culture in the institution in question, represented relevant factors detrimental to the development of competence in an intercultural perspective.

This thesis explores ‘social inclusion’ as a political construction of the New Labour government between 1997 and 2007. The process of construction is frequently situated within policy from the Further Education (FE) sector. A critical discourse analysis of government documents, and interviews conducted with key policy makers, exposes the underlying ideologies and politics which were involved in the process of constructing social inclusion. The analysis reveals three dominant constructions of social inclusion that have emerged between 1997 and 2007. Most significant as a result of its recent emergence and pervasive impact, is the analysis of a psychological construction of social inclusion. This model constructs those labelled socially excluded as psychologically vulnerable; perhaps as a result of learning difficulties; a lack of self-esteem or selfconfidence; or low aspirations. FE is presented as bringing about social inclusion through offering young people guidance and support as well as raising the aspirations and self-esteem of students. A social model constructs inclusion as the development of social capital between individuals and communities, primarily through participation in FE. This thesis does not seek to laud the social model as a more positive alternative to educational instrumentalism but instead examines how a focus upon the act of participation allows for FE to become a process of social modification, which results in subject specific content being replaced with participation in any activity. An instrumental model equates social exclusion with unemployment and social inclusion with getting people re-engaged with the labour market. FE comes to be concerned with meeting the needs of the economy and providing unemployed people with the skills for employability they need to enter the workplace. This construction continues to dominate FE discourse and practice. Paradoxically, attempts to enhance employability skills, build social capital or to raise levels of self-esteem primarily through “pre-vocational” learning and training may reinforce social exclusion as those attending FE receive little in the way of high level knowledge or technical skills.