The purpose of this qualitative action research was to explore how early primary children respond to the implementation of culturally relevant oracy practices in an inclusive classroom. This study, which took place over five months in an inner city school in Western Canada, focused on children’s oracy skills following four events facilitated by an Aboriginal Elder. Data consisted of an oral assessment, transcriptions of the four events, artefacts created by the students, photographs, and the teacher’s research journal. Data analysis consisted of a comparative assessment of the student’s oral language skills and a content and discourse analysis of the transcriptions. Data analysis revealed that children respond favourably to culturally responsive oracy practices, that they are able to meet the B.C. Ministry of Education prescribed learning outcomes, and such practices adhere to the Aboriginal Enhancement Agreement (2005). / Graduate / 0727 / 0524 / winona.waldron@shaw.ca

Syftet med denna uppsats var att ta reda på elevers och pedagogers erfarenheter och föreställningar kring klasstorlekens betydelse i arbetet med att skapa goda förutsättningar för lärande i grundskolans tidigare år. Detta gjorde jag genom kvalitativa intervjuer. Jag genomförde en gruppintervju med 3 pedagoger som alla är klasslärare i grundskolans tidigare år, samt 3 gruppintervjuer med elever från årskurs 2-4. Mitt resultat visar att eleverna och pedagogerna anser att gränsen för en liten/stor klass går vid tjugo elever, vilket alla tre involverade klasser överstiger. Det blir också tydligt att det är övervägande negativt att gå i en stor klass när det handlar om förutsättningar för lärande. Till största del så handlar det om pedagogers oförmåga att hinna med varje elev och elevers saknad av hjälp från pedagogen. Slutsatsen, dragen från resultatet och den litteratur jag tagit del utav, blir att lärandet skulle förbättras om elevantalet i en klass minskade. Detta både ur ett elev- och pedagogperspektiv. Eleverna säger bland annat att de koncentrerar sig bättre när de är färre elever i klassrummet och att de då dessutom får mer hjälp utav pedagogen, medan pedagogerna berättar hur de saknar tid att ägna åt varje elev under en skoldag. / The purpose of this study was to determine students' and educators' experiences and conceptions regarding the class size significance in the efforts to create good conditions for learning in the early primary school. I did this through qualitative interviews. I conducted a group interview with three teachers, all class teachers in primary education, and three group interviews with students from grades 2-4. Lyssna Läs fonetiskt   Ordbok - Visa detaljerad ordbok My results show that students and educators believe that the limit for a small / large class goes at twenty students, which all three involved classes exceed. It also becomes obvious that it is negative being apart of a large class when it comes to opportunities for learning. For the most part, it refers to educators' inability to keep up with each student and students' loss of support from the educator. The conclusion, drawn from the results and the literature I´ve read, is that learning would improve if the number of pupils in a class decreased. This is both a student and educator perspective. Students say, among other things, that they concentrate better when they are fewer students in the classroom and that they also get more help of the educator, while educators tell how they don´t have enough time to devote to each student during a school day.

This research focuses on a Knowledge Building pedagogical approach and investigates ways to boost students’ competencies in knowledge creation processes, specifically their ability to contribute productively to high-level explanation-seeking discourse. This study uses a design-based methodology to explore how pedagogical and technological innovations can enhance students’ ways of contributing to knowledge building discourse, and examines whether expanding students’ contribution repertoire helps them to advance community knowledge in general. Gains associated with a Knowledge Building approach for secondary and post-secondary students are widely documented. This research adds to this body of literature by showing how a Knowledge Building approach can be productively engaged at the early primary level. This work also contributes to studies exploring automated feedback and assessment tools that can help boost student capacities for building new knowledge. The research was conducted in three main phases. The first phase mapped the ways that students from Grades 1-6 (n = 102) contribute to their naturally occurring Knowledge Building discourse in order to provide baseline data for subsequent design experiments. The following two phases corresponded to two design iterations that involved work in Grade 2 science and that tested different types of formative feedback. Design Cycle 1 (n = 42) focused on testing supports to boost low-frequency contribution types. Design Cycle II (n = 43) aimed to reproduce and improve results from the first iteration. In both design cycles, pedagogical supports included whole-class metadiscourse sessions, while technological supports consisted of contribution and content-oriented feedback tools that offered students a meta-perspective on their own discourse, including Word Clouds (Cycle 1), Concept Clouds (Cycle 1-2), visualizations produced by the Metadiscourse Tool (Cycle 1-2), and verbal scaffolds (Cycle 1-2). Analyses of data revealed that these supports helped students to significantly increase their engagement with targeted contribution types, diversify their general contribution repertoire, and advance collective knowledge beyond that attained by their peers in prior years. This research provides empirical evidence that Knowledge Building inquiry can be effectively engaged at the primary level, and offers usable artifacts tested and shown to be conducive for helping young students raise the level of their Knowledge Building discourse.

Syftet med detta arbete är att få en kunskapsöversikt över hur högpresterande elever kan bli utmanade i matematikundervisningen främst i lågstadiet och hur arbetsmetoderna ser ut från lärarens perspektiv. I detta arbete vill vi få fram en slutsats om hur och varför lärare i svensk skola kan utmana högpresterande elever i lågstadieklass efter deras befintliga nivå. Informationssökningar baseras på vår frågeställning, för att kunna få fram en slutsats som är möjlig att applicera i dagens lågstadieklasser i matematik.  Resultaten visar att med hjälp av en differentierad undervisning i matematik kan elever oavsett vilken nivå de befinner sig på få chansen att utmanas och möjligheten att utveckla sina kunskaper. Genom andra resultat har det visat sig att lärarutbildningen runt om i världen har andra krav jämfört med här i Sverige.

Happiness should be a fundamental aim of education. This philosophical assertion raises the practical question of how teachers generate happiness in their classroom programs while operating under the current paradigm of educational accountability. The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the perspectives of early primary teachers, students, and parents on what makes a happy classroom. Data were collected through interviews of 12 teachers from public, independent, Waldorf, Froebel, and Montessori schools; over 72 hours of observation in eight early primary classrooms; interviews with 23 students (ages 3 to 8), drawing and photography with 64 students (ages 3 to 8); 66 parent surveys, and eight teacher exit interviews. Four cycles of analysis, including descriptive and conceptual approaches, resulted in the identification of five core conditions of happy classrooms: (a) relational pedagogy, (b) embodied learning, (c) pedagogical thoughtfulness (d) an ethos of happiness, and (e) an ethos of possibility. These five conditions were supported by 17 facets, which describe practical and conceptual ways to support pedagogical thinking and decision-making about children’s happiness in the complex worlds of busy classrooms. Five of the facets are spotlighted: (a) kids need to play, (b) stepping in stepping out, (c) sounds shape feelings and experience, (d) rhythms and routines, and (e) romancing children into delight. In addition, student and parent participants identified that play, positive friendships, time outdoors, experiences involving the arts, and experiences of positive feelings make children happy at school and when they are learning. The discussion centers on the role of teachers in establishing the tone of happy classrooms, considers the notion of strong pedagogy, discusses the generation of happiness in early primary classrooms in the form of lessons to be learned from different pedagogical traditions, and argues that, above all, children’s interests, needs, and development should be a teacher’s first point of consideration for all decisions about instruction and learning in the classroom. The discussion concludes with implications for teaching professionals and offers suggestions for future research. / Thesis (Ph.D, Education) -- Queen's University, 2013-08-02 11:13:05.998