In Scotland, as in many countries, the relationship between research, policy and practice has been complicated, not least because of the multiple stakeholders involved in the change process. This interpretive study focuses on Assessment is for Learning (AifL), a centrally-funded development programme (2002-2008) established to address concerns raised in reviews of assessment practice and intended to create a coherent system of assessment for pupils aged 3-14 in Scottish schools. AifL’s central aspiration was to learn from previous experience of curriculum and assessment development and develop evidence-based national policy and practice in assessment which met the needs of all stakeholders. The study explores the policy messages communicated, and considers how policy communities can influence the relationship between national policy and practice in assessment. The design of the AifL programme was influenced by research on both assessment and transformational change. A crucial feature of the change process was the opportunity it provided for local contextualisation through the engagement of local education authorities, a group perceived as particularly important in ensuring the long term sustainability of the programme. AifL co-ordinators were appointed to take forward this important role in all 32 local authorities in Scotland but, although they shared a title, background experience and the nature of their appointment meant that this was not a homogenous group. Through analysis of interviews with AifL co-ordinators in seven Scottish local authorities, the study sought to explore the process of change and, in particular, what policy imperatives such as 'local contextualisation' actually mean in practice. It considered co-ordinators’ background experience, their perception of their role and the direction of assessment development within their local authority. The study has been conducted from an insider standpoint and the small-scale nature of the study allowed exploration of contextualization through narratives revealing individual perspectives. It raised several issues for, while the study had intended to explore approaches to building capacity and discern the impact of difference on national policy, the narratives themselves altered its direction. What emerged from this further illustrates the complexity of change for, although national assessment policy reinforced AifL, the study revealed that prevailing concerns with accountability had compromised its realisation. Whilst AifL had recognised that changing assessment practice required reform of the system as a whole, local contextualisation focused on formative assessment in classrooms to the comparative neglect of other functions of assessment. Other policy legislation had led to systems and structures for accountability in local authorities which placed persistent demands on teachers, so that identified tensions in assessment remained largely unresolved. To address conflicts between what are currently two separate streams of activity and improve the validity of the school evaluation process, assessment literacy generally and alignment of support and improvement roles specifically require further development. The study indicated that national reform initiatives dependent on local contextualisation must not only appreciate the multiple perspectives of stakeholders as AifL attempted to do, but also seek to expose and address competing priorities, underlying hierarchies and the influence of individuals with specific agendas. Policy messages should be clear and unambiguous taking account of relevant research findings and, crucially, must be reinforced in behaviours which reflect discourse and text. These conclusions may have implications for Curriculum for Excellence, a major reform of the Scottish curriculum. Much can be learned from what AifL managed to achieve - and more from what has been learned from the experience.

The aim of this study was to investigate the role of personal, social and citizenship education (PSCE) in fostering positive self-esteem in two instrumental case studies which took place in two classrooms of 7-10 year old children (N=40) in France during the 2007-2008 school year. The study used a mixture of quantitative and qualitative methodologies including a self-esteem survey administered to pupils in the two case-study classrooms as well as to students in two control classrooms (N=47) at the beginning and end of the school year. Throughout the course of the year a series of semi-structured interviews was also conducted with six focus children selected from each class (2 high, 2 medium and 2 low self-esteem children) as well as with the two class teachers and the parents/step-parents of the focus children. In addition, the study included non-participant observation which focussed on the participation and behaviour of the focus children during PSCE lessons and other lessons through the use of three separate observation schedules. The study found evidence of the important influence of significant others, in particular, parents, peers and teachers, on the focus children’s self-esteem. Although the quantitative analysis of the self-esteem questionnaires showed no statistically significant increase in self-esteem at the group level over time, the qualitative findings indicate that teachers’ relationship with their students, their promotion of responsibility and self-efficacy, and their careful implementation of PSCE practices contributed to increases in individual children’s self-esteem. There was also evidence that the implementation of PSCE activities contributed to improvements in children’s peer relations.

The study deals with the abuse of schoolgoing girls as reported by both the electronic and print media. Educators ability to identify those learners in the classroom and the strategies the educators can use to help them cope with their school work. According to a correspondent of the Sunday Sun (2004:19), child abuse victims do not have to identify their attackers in court or even on the TV screen. The constitutional court secured this triumph for the right of abused children. It indirectly found that it would not be unconstitutional for abused children to testify in the absence of the accused. This report and others which refer to school going are a daily occurrence. Some men may spread sexual transmitted disease to girls because of a deep-rooted belief that sleeping with a virgin will heal them from HIV-AIDS. This comment was made by Stephen Lewis, United Nation Envoy on HIV- AIDS in Africa (Komane, 2004:14). Sexual violence and harassment in South African schools erect a discriminatory barrier for young women and girls seeking education. / Prof. C.P.H. Myburgh

In the 21st century, cosmopolitanism has become an ever emerging concept, as scholars turn to this worldview with the hope to address the unavoidable impacts of globalization. Simultaneously, the new educational trends in Europe in combination with the ongoing socio-political changes create new needs that demand a more cosmopolitan interference. With this in mind, the present research attempts to examine whether and how cosmopolitan ideals are promoted through education policies in Europe and to what extent these cosmopolitan ideals succeed to reach national policies and school practice in a country as Greece. To this end, the author conducts a qualitative multilevel study between Europe and Greece and bases her study on two research methods: interviews and document analysis.     The interview and document analysis that follows leads to a comparison not only between the European and the Greek context but also between the policy and practice level that spawns a better and deeper understanding of how education promotes and can promote cosmopolitanism. The findings of the research highlight that the dilemma of whether to employ an ethnocentric or cosmopolitan educational approach can be acute. Parallel to that, the conflicting conceptions of cosmopolitanism between Greece and the European Union tend to render the moral aspects of education quite numb. Finally, the research closes with some recommendations for the future and suggestions for further studies.

The research reported in this thesis examines the impact that Special Educational Needs Coordinators (SENCOs) have on the practices of their teacher colleagues. Since SENCOs are central to supporting children’s inclusion and achievement, the research centres around three research questions: whether SENCOs are able to motivate teachers to take the initiative in addressing the needs of children with SEN in their classrooms; whether SENCOs enhance teachers’ abilities to become effective teachers of children with SEN; and how the impact of SENCOs is currently being assessed within primary schools. The project was conducted within an interpretivist framework, and applied a mixed methods approach consisting of two phases: an exploratory questionnaire survey of 223 (responses n=42) primary school SENCOs from the ‘National Award for SEN Coordination’ Course; and semi-structured interviews of 18 SENCOs and 18 teachers, including head teachers. Document scrutiny of school SEN policies and other related documentation was also undertaken. Data triangulation aimed at ensuring the trustworthiness of data was accomplished through a multi-pronged methodological approach. The research was conducted in accordance with an Ethical Code informed by the British Educational Research Association (BERA) and University of Northampton guidelines. Results indicated that SENCOs have a complex role, impacting upon teachers’ practices by utilising a wide range of skills, knowledge and expertise across different contexts. This is influenced by whether or not they are members of their School Leadership Teams. Further, SENCOs’ time management is a constant concern in balancing competing priorities and demands, which include liaising with external agencies and keeping up to date with legislative changes which impact the requirements of the role. There is evidence that the degree to which SENCOs have a positive impact on teachers’ inclusive skills varies, as the SENCO-teacher dynamic is influenced by SENCOs’ training and skills and the dissemination to teachers; SENCOs’ and teachers’ professional identity; SENCO-teacher engagement and perceptions of inclusion; and the interventions and provision made for children with SEN. Implications for further possible research that were identified included the use of contact and non-contact time by SENCOs, the impact of the mandatory SENCO training and also the role of the SEN Governor as a crucial advocate for SEN at management level.

No description available.

This thesis offers the first and most comprehensive re-evaluation of the UK government’s Creative Partnerships education policy (2002-11) by drawing together my seven contemporaneous evaluation reports about Creative Partnerships and applying a retrospective and reflexive commentary to them. The term of reference explicitly named or implied in all seven evaluation briefs was to measure the ‘impact,’ of the policy. The principal contribution to new understanding in the thesis is the deconstruction and conceptual analysis of impact in the context of Creative Partnerships, drawing on hermeneutics, critical linguistics and policy analysis (Ozga, 2000; Fairclough, 1989). This clarifies and illustrates the ways in which impact was interpreted by those enacting Creative Partnerships, and proposes a fuller understanding of the term. I identify two contrasting approaches to impact adopted by Creative Partnerships’ national leadership: the politically motivated public relations approach and the substantive approach. I argue that the former approach was driven by the zeitgeist of its time: the political party in power (Ward, 2010; Buckingham and Jones, 2001), the recession after 2010 and the contemporary preference for evidence-based practice (Hargreaves, 2007). Research into ‘logical frameworks’ (Harley, 2005; Rosenthal, 2000) reveals them to be an essential corollary to the latter, substantive approach and shows how the lack of a full logical framework for planning and evaluating Creative Partnerships, impoverished the extent to which its impact was recognised and monitored by those enacting the policy. The thesis shows how the imperatives of the political cycle demanded evidence of the policy’s impact well before more valid and reliable longitudinal impact studies could, in principle, be completed. As a possible solution to this conundrum, the thesis argues that my ‘predictive impact model’ offered plausible predictions about the legacy of Creative Partnerships (Wood and Whitehead, 2012). I suggest that this could be further investigated and applied to similar education policies.

This thesis "Creating images of fraction at the elementary school" is divided into theoretical and practical part. The theoretical part defines the subject matter of fractions in curriculum, deals with a mathematical literacy concept and introduces basic conceptions related to fractions and propaedeutic of fractions at the Primary School. The practical part consists of a preparatory research and a consequential research. The goal of the preparatory research is fractions knowledge mapping on Primary School pupils comparing to an expert knowledge acquired in the theoretical part. The consequential research focuses on confirming results of the preparatory research, respectively preferring the circle model off other models. It also checks if pupils get acquainted with other models (line segment, rectangle, and set of discrete objects). Key words Fraction, propaedeutic, models, representation, primary education, curricula.

M.Ed.

As Metodologias Ativas de Aprendizagem são estratégias de ensino que visam a mobilizar o aluno para a construção do próprio conhecimento de forma proativa e menos receptora. A presente pesquisa, de abordagem qualitativa, propôs-se investigar a aplicação da metodologia ativa Think Pair Share no Ensino Fundamental I. Para tanto, foi desenvolvida uma sequência de atividades com o tema astronomia com ênfase para o tópico lua, em que os alunos tiveram que pensar em conjunto, discutir em pares e efetuar relações com a mediação do professor. O desenvolvimento desta estratégia foi considerado positivo, pois os alunos se mostraram engajados nas atividades e responderam satisfatoriamente a ela. Foi constatada escassez de material de pesquisa sobre metodologias ativas aplicada ao Ensino Fundamental I no Brasil, o que sinaliza a necessidade de aprofundar as práticas e efetuar um registro reflexivo sistemático sobre as mesmas. / Learning Active Methodologies are teaching strategies to mobilize students to build knowledge through a more proactive and less receptive way. This research, of a qualitative approach, has proposed to investigate the application of active methodology Think Pair Share in Primary Education. Therefore, a sequence of activities was developed with the theme of astronomy with emphasis on the topic moon; students should think together, discuss in pairs and build relations with the mediation of the teacher. The development of this strategy has been positive because students were engaged in activities and responded satisfactorily. There is a shortage of Active Methodologies research material applied to Primary Education in Brazil, this shows the need of deepening the practices and create a systematic reflective record on them.