Surveying theories and philosophies of mathematics education

Any theory of thinking or teaching or learning rests on an underlying philosophy of knowledge. Mathematics education is situated at the nexus of two fields of inquiry, namely mathematics and education. However, numerous other disciplines interact with these two fields which compound the complexity of developing theories that define mathematics education. We first address the issue of clarifying a philosophy of mathematics education before attempting to answer whether theories of mathematics education are constructible? In doing so we draw on the foundational writings of Lincoln and Guba (1994), in which they clearly posit that any discipline within education, in our case mathematics education, needs to clarify for itself the following questions: (1) What is reality? Or what is the nature of the world around us? (2) How do we go about knowing the world around us? [the methodological question, which presents possibilities to various disciplines to develop methodological paradigms] and, (3) How can we be certain in the “truth” of what we know? [the epistemological question]

Theoretical critique of the work of art : co-producers in research

The ways in which the "traditional" tension between words and artwork can be perceived has huge implications for understanding the relationship between critical or theoretical interpretation, art and practice, and research. Within the practice-led PhD this can generate a strange sense of disjuncture for the artist-researcher particularly when engaged in writing the exegesis. This paper aims to explore this tension through an introductory investigation of the work of the philosopher Andrew Benjamin. For Benjamin criticism completes the work of art. Criticism is, with the artwork, at the centre of our experience and theoretical understanding of art – in this way the work of art and criticism are co-productive. The reality of this co-productivity can be seen in three related articles on the work of American painter Marcia Hafif. In each of these articles there are critical negotiations of just how the work of art operates as art and theoretically, within the field of art. This focus has important ramifications for the writing and reading of the exegesis within the practice-led research higher degree. By including art as a significant part of the research reporting process the artist-researcher is also staking a claim as to the critical value of their work. Rather than resisting the tension between word and artwork the practice-led artist-researcher need to embrace the co-productive nature of critical word and creative work to more completely articulate their practice and its significance as research. The ideal venue and opportunity for this is the exegesis.

The 10% rule. Maximising learning through collaborative game design

This paper presents a retrospective view of a game design practice that recently switched from the development of complex learning games to the development of simple authoring tools for students to design their own learning games for each other. We introduce how our ‘10% Rule’, a premise that only 10% of what is learnt during a game design process is ultimately appreciated by the player, became a major contributor to the evolving practice. We use this rule primarily as an analytical and illustrative tool to discuss the learning involved in designing and playing learning games rather than as a scientifically and empirically proven rule. The 10% rule was promoted by our experience as designers and allows us to explore the often overlooked and valuable learning processes involved in designing learning games and mobile games in particular. This discussion highlights that in designing mobile learning games, students are not only reflecting on their own learning processes through setting up structures for others to enquire and investigate, they are also engaging in high-levels of independent inquiry and critical analysis in authentic learning settings. We conclude the paper with a discussion of the importance of these types of learning processes and skills of enquiry in 21st Century learning.

Alternate reality games and education innovation

An Alternate Reality Game (ARG) is a unique experience that blurs the edges between our everyday lives and imagined game worlds. Players are invited to interact with each other and fictional characters using familiar tools such as emails, websites, telephones, and sometimes newspapers, radio and television. ARGs come in all shapes and sizes, tell a variety of different stories and inspire all kinds of interactions between people, their networks and the very streets in which they live. Some ARGs simply immerse you in fictional scenarios and indulge you in quirky challenges. While others reveal hidden histories of a city and teach us about important political causes. But the most exciting thing about ARGs is that they have the potential to inspire participants to imagine their everyday tools and places as resources for their own creative endeavors. Deb Polson will be presenting some of the most inspiring ARGs of recent years and revealing some of the design techniques that were used to create them. Most significantly Deb will discuss ways in which educators can imagine using ARGs as rich teaching tools that inspire collaborative learning and motivate students to engage in all kinds of subject matter.

Two voices : the marginalised body as a voice & Imperfect Offerings a novel

This thesis investigates the phenomenon of self-harm as a form of political protest using two different, but complementary, methods of inquiry: a theoretical research project and a novel. Through these two approaches, to the same research problem, I examine how we can re-position the body that self-harms in political protest from weapon to voice; and in doing so find a path towards ethical and equitable dialogue between marginalised and mainstream communities. The theoretical, or academic, portion of the thesis examines self-harm as protest, positing these acts as a form of tactical selfharm, and acknowledge its emergence as a voice for the otherwise silenced in the public sphere. Through the use of phenomenology and feminist theory I examine the body as site for political agency, the circumstances which surround the use of the body for protest, and the reaction to tactical self-harm by the individual and the state. Using Bakhtin’s concept of dialogism, and the dialogic space I propose that by ‘hearing’ the body engaged in tactical selfharm we come closer to entering into an ethical dialogue with the otherwise silenced in our communities (locally, nationally and globally). The novel, Imperfect Offerings, explores these ideas in a fictional world, and allows me to put faces, names and lives to those who are compelled to harm their bodies to be heard. Also using Bakhtin’s framework I encourage a dialogue between the critical and creative parts of the thesis, challenging the traditional paradigm of creative PhD projects as creative work and exegesis.

Making the most of MiLK : harnessing the contemporary culture and interests of natural born cyborg

MiLK is a mobile learning kit that allows students and teachers to author their own place-based learning events using simple web and mobile technologies. We will demonstrate how MiLK has been used by a number of teachers in various contexts to connect students, curriculum and everyday environments. This workshop will introduce participants to the various MiLK tools and processes; including mapping, designing, playing and reviewing events, group journals, discussion forums, student profiles, and class profiles. We will focus on the role of place as a potential resource for curriculum design and delivery. The MiLK Team are looking for enthusiastic mobile technology champions to join us. No previous experience or training in this area is needed. This workshop is designed to be relevant to all KLAs. During this session teachers will have an opportunity to experiment with simple tools to create dynamic resources for their own classrooms.

Methods and preliminary results for a data linkage project to determine long-term survival after intensive care unit admission

Aims: To describe a local data linkage project to match hospital data with the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) National Death Index (NDI) to assess longterm outcomes of intensive care unit patients. Methods: Data were obtained from hospital intensive care and cardiac surgery databases on all patients aged 18 years and over admitted to either of two intensive care units at a tertiary-referral hospital between 1 January 1994 and 31 December 2005. Date of death was obtained from the AIHW NDI by probabilistic software matching, in addition to manual checking through hospital databases and other sources. Survival was calculated from time of ICU admission, with a censoring date of 14 February 2007. Data for patients with multiple hospital admissions requiring intensive care were analysed only from the first admission. Summary and descriptive statistics were used for preliminary data analysis. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis was used to analyse factors determining long-term survival. Results: During the study period, 21 415 unique patients had 22 552 hospital admissions that included an ICU admission; 19 058 surgical procedures were performed with a total of 20 092 ICU admissions. There were 4936 deaths. Median follow-up was 6.2 years, totalling 134 203 patient years. The casemix was predominantly cardiac surgery (80%), followed by cardiac medical (6%), and other medical (4%). The unadjusted survival at 1, 5 and 10 years was 97%, 84% and 70%, respectively. The 1-year survival ranged from 97% for cardiac surgery to 36% for cardiac arrest. An APACHE II score was available for 16 877 patients. In those discharged alive from hospital, the 1, 5 and 10-year survival varied with discharge location. Conclusions: ICU-based linkage projects are feasible to determine long-term outcomes of ICU patients

Early childhood education for sustainability : why it matters, what it is, and how whole centre action research and systems thinking can help

The global financial crisis, global pandemics, global warming and peak oil are indicative of a world facing major environmental, social and economic problems. At the same time, world population continues to rise and global inequalities deepen. Children are the most vulnerable to the impacts of unsustainable living with specific harms arising because of their physical and cognitive vulnerabilities. Nevertheless, children do not have to be victims in the face of these challenges. Education, including early childhood education, has an important role to in building resilience and capabilities in children that equip them as active and informed citizens now and in the future and who are capable of contributing to healthy and sustainable ways of living. Drawing on educational change literature, action research, education for sustainability, health promotion and systems theory, this paper outlines three strategies that can help reorient early childhood education towards sustainability. One strategy is the adoption of whole centre approaches to sustainability and education for sustainability. This means working across the whole of a centre’s operations – curriculum and pedagogy, physical and social environments, its partnerships and community connections. The second strategy – applied in conjunction with the first – is the use of action research to investigate the early childhood setting and to create the desired changes. The third strategy is the adoption of systems thinking as a way of leveraging support and momentum for change so that education for sustainability goes beyond the initiatives of individual teachers and centres, and becomes a systems-wide imperative.

Will the Australian national curriculum up the intellectual ante in classrooms?

A critical review of the current and potential impacts of the Australian National Curriculum on the enacted curriculum in primary schools, with specific attention to issues of equity and social justice.

Health, endogenous time preference, and inequality : a political economy perspective

We study an overlapping-generations model in which agents' mortality risks, and consequently impatience, are endogenously determined by private and public investment in health care. Revenues allocated for public health care arc determined by a voting process. We find that the degree of substitutability between public and private health expenditures matters for macroeconomic outcomes of the model. Higher substitutability implies a “crowding-out" effect, which in turn impacts adversely on morality risks and impatience leading to lower public expenditures on health care in the political equilibrium. Consequently, higher substitutability is associated with greater polarization in wealth, and long-run distributions that are bimodal.

A political economy perspective on persistent inequality, inflation, and redistribution

In this paper we examine the dynamics of the link between inequality and inflation from a political economy perspective. We consider a simple dynamic general equilibrium model in which agents vote over the desired inflation rate in each period, and inequality is persistent. Inflation in our model is a mechanism of redistribution, and we find that the link between inequality and inflation within any period or over time depends on institutional and preference related parameters. Furthermore, we find that differences in the initial distributions of wealth can yield a diverse set of patterns for the evolution of the inflation and inequality link. Relative to existing literature, our model leads to more precise predictions about the inflation-inequality correlation. To that end, results in the extant empirical literature on the inflation and inequality link need to be interpreted with caution.

A model for engaging and evaluating innovative cross-sectoral education reform : case studies from Queensland, Australia

This paper will explore how a general education can contribute successfully to vocational outcomes using both Participatory Action Research (PAR) and Program Theory methodology. The paper will focus on the development aspects of ‘marrying’ vocational and general education including engagement processes, student, teacher, institute and employer preparation and the pathway possibilities that emerge. Successful cases presented include the: Healthy Futures program (pathways into the Health and Allied industries); Accounting Pathways program (simultaneously studying a general Accounting subject and a Certificate III vocational qualification); and Sustainable Sciences initiative (development of a vocational qualification that focuses on the emerging renewable energy industry and is linked to school science programs). The case studies have been selected because they are unique in character and application and can be used as a basis for future program development in other settings or curriculum areas.

Curriculum evaluation : approaches and methodologies

Curriculum evaluation, as a field of study, is dynamic. For over the years it has been responsive to the developments in the conceptualization of curriculum and the associated processes of curriculum change. The concept of curriculum is integral to curriculum evaluation and can be defined in terms of what can and shall be taught to whom, when, where, how, and why. Much of the decision making relates to what knowledge is to be selected for inclusion in the curriculum.

The development of a "Good Practice Guide" for first year curriculum development, revision and evaluation : a moving feast

Since 2002 QUT has sponsored a range of first year-focussed initiatives, most recently the Transitions In Project (TIP) which was designed to complement the First Year Experience Program and be a capacity building initiative. A primary focus of TIP was The First Year Curriculum Project: the review, development, implementation and evaluation of first year curriculum which has culminated in the development of a “Good Practice Guide” for the management of large first year units. First year curriculum initiates staff-student relationships and provides the scaffolding for the learning experience and engagement. Good practice in first year curriculum is within the control of the institution and can be redesigned and reviewed to improve outcomes. This session will provide a context for the First Year Curriculum Project and a concise overview of the suite of resources developed that have culminated in the Good Practice Guide.

Transition pedagogy : a third generation approach to FYE : a case study of policy and practice for the higher education sector

Current research and practice related to the first year experience (FYE) of commencing higher education students are still mainly piecemeal rather than institution-wide with institutions struggling to achieve cross-institutional integration, coordination and coherence of FYE policy and practice. Drawing on a decade of FYE-related research including an ALTC Senior Fellowship and evidence at a large Australian metropolitan university, this paper explores how one institution has addressed that issue by tracing the evolution and maturation of strategies that ultimately conceptualize FYE as “everybody's business.” It is argued that, when first generation co-curricular and second generation curricular approaches are integrated and implemented through an intentionally designed curriculum by seamless partnerships of academic and professional staff in a whole-of-institution transformation, we have a third generation approach labelled here as transition pedagogy. It is suggested that transition pedagogy provides the optimal vehicle for dealing with the increasingly diverse commencing student cohorts by facilitating a sense of engagement, support and belonging. What is presented here is an example of transition pedagogy in action.