Shawn Lennie, Ethical Complexities in the Virtual World: Teacher Perspectives of ICT Based Issues and Conflicts, Doctor of Philosophy, CTL, OISE, 2013. Using a qualitative research methodology, this study explores the perceptions that K-12 teachers have on the ethical issues they have experienced as a result of, or in relation to, ICT. Participants included 10 practicing teachers who had identified experience with ICT based issues in their teaching practice. Each participant engaged in two semi-structured interviews focused on the research topic. The first interview explored the perceptions and experiences that the participants had with ICT based issues in their practice, while the second involved an examination of eight vignettes involving ICT based issues that were ethical in nature. The use of this approach provides a descriptive account of the experiences and perceptions of the participants in the study. Results from the study highlight the impact that ethical issues involving technology have on the moral work of teachers and the challenges that emerge as teachers attempt to identify morally responsible ways to respond to the complex and dynamic challenges that they face. Participants demonstrate a heightened sensitivity to ethical issues involving technology that compromise the safety and well-being of children, such as cyber-bullying, as well as those that compromise professional and academic integrity, such as plagiarism. Results also reveal the predominant use of subjective moral judgment when evaluating the moral significance of ICT based issues and reluctance on the part of teachers to challenge the inappropriate use of technology by their colleagues. This contrasts with a strong belief that teachers play an important role as moral models for students who are developing an understanding of what constitutes responsible digital behaviour. These results are significant to scholarship on teacher professionalism, digital ethics and citizenship, and policy development relating to ICT based issues.

This dissertation reports a study exploring adult engagement with sustainability learning practices in EcoSchools-certified secondary schools in Canada, Lithuania and Sweden as a means towards shaping a liveable future. The study is situated in the area of education for sustainable development. The study design was initially based on an interest in revealing specific practices of sustainability education as a means of improving the relationship between environmental impact and wealth. While echoing findings in the existing literature, this research contributes to the development of the field through insight into the perspectives that adults bring to sustainability education. Primary data collected in the spring of 2006 were recorded (mostly single) semistructured interviews with 30 individuals (national coordinators, caretakers, teachers and administrators), including 10 Canadians from four schools, 14 Lithuanians from four schools, and six Swedes from two schools. Four phases of qualitative analysis were used on the data: initial transcript coding and trends; précis document trends; a six-stage model of interview responses allowing vertical (between question) and horizontal (between stage) comparisons; word maps of subthemes as a scaffold to detail participants’ four primary views (long, wide, deep, dynamic) regarding sustainability. Ultimately, the results of this study point less than expected to revealing specific transferable practices regarding success and challenge in EcoSchools. Rather, these findings provide some insight into a means of shaping a sustainable future through an individual’s sustainability perspective: a living responsiveness based on a sense of connection, supported by improved sustainability cognition, and realized through sustainability practice and considered engagement.

Children’s lifestyle has changed significantly during the recent decades, with an increasing prevalence of obesity as one outcome. Parents are usually the most influential people in young children’s lives. The overall aim of this thesis was to investigate parental perspectives on factors associated with 3-6 year-old children’s lifestyle, regarding eating habits and physical activity. Another objective was to compare different approaches to conducting postal questionnaires in terms of response rate, time consumption and cost-efficiency. The samples in the four studies were parents of 6-year-olds (n=158), parents of 3-year-olds (n=873), parents of 4-year-olds (n=30) and parents of 3-year-olds (n=353). In the first study, a questionnaire regarding practices and attitudes towards their child’s lifestyle, perceived obstacles and desired support was used. The second study included the Swedish Parenthood Stress Questionnaire (SPSQ), the Relationship Questionnaire (RQ) and the CFQ (Child Feeding Questionnaire). Parents also reported their child’s TV-viewing habits. The child’s measured height, weight and BMI were obtained from a register, BASTA. In the third study, focus group interviews were performed. The fourth study investigated three types of consent given for participation in a survey. The results showed that parents’ attitudes towards children’s lifestyle, in general, were “healthier” than their reports of their child’s daily practices. The practices differed depending on the parents’ educational background. Significant and dose-dependant associations were found between perceived maternal stress and children’s overweight, but also underweight. Parents felt that they were mainly responsible for their preschool child’s lifestyle. However, parents described challenges that limited and obstructed them from providing their child with a healthy lifestyle, citing the need to receive professional and peer support, while also requesting support from society. Allowing respondents to actively decline participation yielded a higher response rate and proved to be the most cost-efficient method for conducting a postal questionnaire.

The shaping of spatial structures at the urban, regional and national levels involves numerous kinds of actors and planning activities. In recent years, calls for crosssectoral coordination and integrated planning approaches echo extensively across different fields of planning. However, experiences from planning situations around Sweden and elsewhere reveal great challenges to such ambitions. This thesis explores key conditions for an integrated approach to urban and transport planning, focusing on the relationships between public professional actors and agencies involved in the interface between urban and transport planning and strategy making, at the local and national level in Sweden. The theoretical framework is based on communicative planning theory and theories on sensemaking. The empirical material emanates from the project The Livable City, a collaboration project between three Swedish municipalities and national authorities responsible for transport and urban planning in Sweden. The aim of The Livable City was to develop knowledge about integrated planning of the built environment and transport systems and to develop integrated processes for coordination of different interests, demands and needs. Case studies were conducted, based on document studies, interviews and observations. The results from this study illustrate various aspects of how plans and strategies in a multiperspective environment need to make sense to actors with different perspectives on what planning is all about. A sensemaking perspective on planning suggests that plans and strategies to promote an integrated approach to planning will always be partial and selective despite ambitions for these to be comprehensive or holistic. Commitment, reification and participation have in the cases proven to be useful concepts to understand the sensemaking aspect of planning practice. Interactive processes may inform the shaping of perspectives and can therefore be an element in efforts to promote integrated approaches to urban and transport planning, although the extent to which this may be achieved is highly dependent on contextual conditions and will vary from case to case. / QC 20111125

This research focused on the question, How do practitioners understand the transfer of competence (that is, what do they know and can do) accross different workplace contexts and how does it influence their practice? The research investigates the experiences and perceptions of 108 workers, who have changed jobs or whose jobs have changed, as to how they were able to adapt what they knew and could do at the time. The research is phenomological, using a methodology designed to collect and analyse data from the participants without decontextualising it. The methodology is customised and contextualised and uses activity theory, Engestrom's theory of expansive learning, grounded theory and discourse analysis to interrogate the research question. The collection of data occurred over a period of five years and was in two stages, with the second stage validating and building on the first stage. Minimally structured interviews and a questionnare were the main data collec tion tools used. Some descriptive statistics have been used but the research is qualitative in intent. The research draws on current theoretical positions of learning, transfer, experimental learning, workplace learning, activity theory, qualitative research and reflection on experience. The thesis has been written to foreground the voices of the participants and the insights their experience brings to the research. The research addresses a current gap in research work, carried out in Australia or overseas, which focuses on the transfer of competence across workplaces. The outcomes provide new perspectives on the ways in which practitioners understand transfer and integrate these interpretations into their generalisation without decontextualisation, and thus makes a contribution to our collective knowledge and understanding. The outcomes of the research are a metaphoric framework to guide the transfer of competence over different work contexts; a record of the application of new understandings of transfer as a sequence of consequential transitions (Beach 1999); generalisations derived from the embedding of contexts (Van Oers 1998); and an innovative research methodology. In addition, the participants have provided their perspectives on the preperation of, and on-going support for, people entering or crossing workplace contexts, and the consequential, necessary changes to institutional learning.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Wollongong, 2004. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references: leaf 316-336.

The preschool class was built in 1998 in an effort by the Swedish government to achieve a smooth transition for the children from preschool to compulsory school. This voluntary, one-year class was envisioned as a bridge between preschool and compulsory school, and the activities would be unlike those in preschool or school. Nevertheless, presently the role of the preschool class seems to be unclear to the preschool class teachers. This is all the more concerning given that in 2018 this class will become mandatory children. The aim of this qualitative study was to investigate how teachers understand preschool class and “preschool class pedagogy” as a distinct practice, that is “not preschool” and “not school”, and if and how in that case, mandatory attendance in preschool class will change their view. In this qualitative study, transition theories were applied to characterize teachers’ understanding of the preschool class meaning as a transition year, its preparatory role, and the teachers’ perspectives on this transition class. The sample consisted of four preschool class teachers who were either former or current preschool class teachers. The study data was based on semi-structured interviews, observations and document analysis. This study found that the preschool class teachers understand this class as a one-way bridge to primary school and emphasized the importance of the new policy of the mandatory attendance as a beneficial change for the children.

abstract: Meeting state and federal standards is a consistent challenge for schools and their students. Although states were mandated under the No Child Left Behind Act to provide Supplemental Educational Services, such as tutoring, to underperforming schools, the current education policy under the Obama administration does not specifically address the issue of tutoring. Rather, the Recovery Act implemented in 2009, asks states to reform and improve their education systems and schools to increase success and achievement for all students. One method for increasing student achievement and decreasing the gap between groups--thereby meeting the standards mandated by local, state, and federal governments--is tutoring. Obtaining information about and seeking views on tutoring is crucial before it can be applied to school reform. The present study utilized an online poll about tutoring to obtain students' views and to examine meaningful outcomes with regard to demographic variables. Results indicated that the polls' response items had more significant relationships with the variables of age, grade, and school than with those of gender and ethnicity. The response rate for items exhibited the most differences within ethnic groups and age, grade, and school. Each question provided insights to help inform school decision-making and improvement plans; for example, students in younger grades needed more support in spelling and math, whereas adolescents in upper grades reported more difficulty with science and math. Using the results of the present study, schools and districts can tailor and implement changes accordingly; for example, they can develop the best method for a particular demographic group to relay information about tutoring. In this way, strategies can be created and applied for individualized subgroups, thereby maximizing success for all students. The insights gained about tutoring from the ones who have the most at stake--the students--will provide the basis for designing and implementing effective tutoring programs in the schools. Electronic polls are an effective method for gathering student perceptions, providing the foundation for successful school reform and student success, in addition to building a learning community for all stakeholders. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Educational Psychology 2010

The increased number of disabled students in Higher Education (HE) means that they have increased opportunities for study. This means that universities in many countries, including Thailand, must provide Disability Support Services (DSS) for such students. The experiences of disabled students with DSS have been the subject of international research for many years. Although DSS were founded in universities in Thailand over a decade ago, there is little research on DSS and most of this research has focused on large universities in the capital city. This thesis, therefore, seeks to address this gap in the research by investigating the experiences of disabled students in 21 universities in all of the regions of Thailand that have DSS for disabled students attending university. The aim of this study is to explore and analyse the perspectives of disabled students on their experiences with DSS in HE in Thailand. The research objectives include the examination of disabled students’ conceptualisations of DSS, the exploration of disabled students’ experiences of access to DSS, and the exploration of their views on the advantages and disadvantages of DSS. To achieve these objectives, the study uses a mixed-method research approach formed of two stages. In the first stage, a questionnaire was conducted online via a web survey for disabled students with over 203 responses. In the second stage, the study adopted a qualitative approach and data was collected by means of individual in-depth interviews with four disabled students. The research finds that disabled students know about DSS in HE. Some disabled students were familiar with DSS before commencing their studies at university and others only knew about DSS after having commenced their studies at university. In terms of disabled students’ experiences of access to DSS, the findings show that most disabled students use DSS. In particular, they use DSS for help with induction, registration, and enrolment services. In terms of the exploration of disabled students’ experiences of access to DSS, this research shows that the 2 students undertook different procedures for accessing DSS. There are also different time lines for providing services to the students. Additionally, there is dissimilarity between non-open universities and open universities in terms of the services provided by the DSS centre, the learning system, the method of providing services, and the means of the implementation of the services. Regarding the advantages and disadvantages of using DSS, disabled students identified the advantages of DSS in various ways, specifically which DSS are useful for helping them access financial support from their university and for helping them learn and enjoy university life. In addition, some of the students did not experience the advantages of DSS as they did not use the services. They are able to learn without such assistance.

abstract: Food security literature has a heavy emphasis on physical barriers, often employing spatial analysis or market-based approaches, but the human dimensions of food security remain unexplored. This has resulted in a disconnect between the understanding of the problem and proposed interventions, as the contextual factors and lived experiences of residents are not considered. There are many barriers and opportunities for food security that are not spatially fixed (e.g. family relations, social capital) that may be important but are unrepresented in these types of studies. In order to capture these barriers and opportunities, community stakeholders need to play a fundamental role in the problem analysis and visioning stages. This study utilized community-based participatory research methods to engage an important stakeholder in the future food environment, youth, to 1) understand how the youth of Canyon Corridor describe their food environment, and thus capture contextual aspects of food security 2) adapt CBPR methods to engage youth in a visioning session to elicit their ideal community food environment and 3) determine if these applications of CBPR can empower youth of Canyon Corridor to mobilize towards a more secure food environment. I found that while the youth did identify many barriers to food security (i.e. transportation, cost, availability), this community also had significant strengths, particularly social capital, that allowed them to overcome what would be food insecurity. Despite their conclusions on food security, youth did desire many changes for the future food environment and felt increased empowerment after the workshops. Thus this shows the need for incorporating methods that also acknowledge the role of social and individual factors and how they interrelate with the physical environment in relation to food security. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.A. Sustainability 2012