Using Bourdieu in education research: Theory and methods

This workshop will snapshot Bourdieu's sociology. In recognition of Bourdieu's work as a powerful theoretical instrument to speculate the reproduction of social orders and cultural values, the workshop will firstly discuss the core concepts of habitus, capital, and field – the foundational triad of Bourdieu's sociology. Although Bourdieu's original work was built on some quantitative studies, his sociology has been largely qualitatively used in education research. Different from the bulk of extant research, the workshop will secondly showcase some quantitative and mixed methods research that uses a Bourdieusian framework. Mindful of such a framework helping understand social practice at a macro level, the workshop will then make an attempt to think through the macro and the micro by weaving together Bourdieu's sociology with Garfinkel's ethnomethodology. The workshop will conclude with some reflections and communications in terms of how to better realise the full value of Bourdieu in education research.

Development and feasibility testing of an education program to improve knowledge and self-care among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander patients with heart failure

Background/Aim There is a 70% higher age-adjusted incidence of heart failure (HF) amongst Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, three times more hospitalisations and twice as many deaths than non-Aboriginal people. There is a need to develop holistic yet individualised approaches in accord with the values of Aboriginal community healthcare to support patient education and self-care. The aim of this study was to re-design an existing HF educational resource (Fluid Watchers-Pacific Rim©) to be culturally safe for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, working in collaboration with the local community, and to conduct feasibility testing. Methods This study was conducted in two phases and utilised a mixed methods approach (qualitative and quantitative). Phase 1 of this study used action research methods to develop a culturally safe electronic resource to be provided to Aboriginal HF patients via a tablet computer. A HF expert panel adapted the existing resource to ensure it was evidence-based and contained appropriate language and images that reflects Aboriginal culture. A stakeholder group (which included Aboriginal workers and HF patients, as well as researchers and clinicians) then reviewed the resources and changes were made accordingly. In Phase 2, the new resource was tested on a sample of Aboriginal HF patients to assess feasibility and acceptability. Patient knowledge, satisfaction and self-care behaviours were measured using a before and after design with validated questionnaires. As this was a pilot test to determine feasibility, no statistical comparisons were made. Results - Phase 1: Throughout the process of resource development, two main themes emerged from the stakeholder consultation. These were the importance of identity, meaning that it was important to ensure that the resource accurately reflected the local community, with the appropriate clothing, skin tone and voice. The resource was adapted to reflect this and of the local community voiced the recordings for the resource. The other theme was comprehension; images were important and all text was converted to the first person and used plain language. - Phase 2: Five Aboriginal participants, mean age 61.6 ± 10.0 years, with NYHA Class III and IV heart failure were enrolled. Participants reported a high level of satisfaction with the resource (83.0%). HF knowledge (percentage of correct responses) increased from 48.0 ± 6.7% to 58.0 ± 9.7%, a 20.8% increase and results of the self-care index indicated that the biggest change was in patient confidence for self-care with a 95% increase in confidence score (46.7 ± 16.0 to 91.1 ± 11.5). Changes in management and maintenance scores varied between9275 patients. Conclusion By working in collaboration with HF experts, Aboriginal researchers and patients, a culturally safe HF resource has been developed for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander patients. Engaging Aboriginal researchers, capacity-building, and being responsive to local systems and structures enabled this pilot study to be successfully completed with the Aboriginal community and positive participant feedback demonstrated that the methodology used in this study was appropriate and acceptable; participants were able to engage with willingness and confidence.

Theories of moral education and implementation in Indonesia: Re-energizing cultural identity and addressing future challenges

School is regarded as a site of moral training for the younger generation to encounter nation’s future challenges as well as to re-energize nation’s cultural identity. The more competitive global society led by free market trade in terms of ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), requires the school to adapt and change its curriculum more frequently. Like many other countries, Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture has introduced and nurtured universal values and traditional values respectively through school curriculum reforms to develop students’ ability to participating in global society. This paper will describe classical and contemporary theories related to moral education that have been implemented in Indonesia’s school curriculum and school activities. The theories developed by Durkheim, Alastair MacIntyre, and Basil Bernstein will be discussed. This includes explaining how far the theories have been adopted in Indonesia and how the approaches are currently being used in Indonesian schooling. This paper suggests despite the implementation of those theories in Indonesian schools, the government needs to optimise the operation of those theories to gain significant outcomes.

Inculcating character education through EFL teaching in Indonesian state schools

This paper describes how English as foreign language (EFL) teachers in Indonesia have implemented the recent character education policy within an era of school-based curriculum reform. The character education policy required all teachers, EFL teachers included, to instill certain values in every lesson whilst the school-based curriculum reform permitted teachers to develop locally responsive curriculum content. The design behind the reform seeks to sharpen education’s role as a site of moral inculcation in the face of growing social diversity that threatens social cohesion and the prolonged social problem of massive corruption. Drawing on Durkheim’s (1925) distinction between secular and religious morality, this paper considers how the Indonesian curriculum promoted rational or secular moral education and how the EFL teachers enacted religious moral education given religiosity is salient in both the community and schools of Indonesia. Bernstein’s concepts of pedagogic discourse, instructional and regulative discourses were adopted to analyse how EFL teachers have re-contextualized both curricular reforms in their micro pedagogic settings. The conclusion suggests that teachers’ implementation of moral education in their classes was dominated by their school communities’ and the teachers’ own preferred value of religiosity. Such values played out in their classes through both the regulative discourse and the instructional discourse.

Literacy, security, governmentality: Defining spaces, managing populations – How has education become part of whole of government security strategy?

In this paper I conduct a Foucauldian discourse analysis of a political speech given by Brendon Nelson in 2006 when the Australian Minister for Defence in the Howard Coalition Government. The speech connects conceptualisations of terror, globalization, education and literacy as part of a whole of government security strategy. The analysis examines this speech as an example of a liberal way of governing the conduct of diverse and unpredictable populations. My analysis suggests that the apparatus of government has been strategically used in order to biopolitically contain the rise of complex social forces and protect a set of homogenous cultural values. The purposes of education and uses of literacy are seen as instruments for the inscription of a coded set of values understood to be synonymous with civil society.

Inclusive values: Exploring the perspectives of pre-service teachers

Since the turn of the century there has been an increasing focus on inclusive education in Australian schools, and growing interest in understanding how the values of pre-service teachers impact on their willingness to implement inclusive principles in their future classrooms. The current qualitative study explored the values and views toward diversity and inclusion of pre-service teachers at one university in Queensland, Australia. Results showed that first and fourth year pre-service teachers held similar ideas about the values that teachers should have, and showed congruence between their own personal values and teacher values. Fourth year students who had undertaken an inclusive education minor placed greater emphasis on the importance of inclusion, and felt more confident about supporting this diversity in their future classrooms, than those fourth years who had not undertaken this minor. The findings from this study will inform future planning in preparing teachers for inclusive work in schools.

SAP-Related Education - Status-Quo and Experience

Integrating Enterprise Systems solutions in the curriculum of not only universities but all types of institutes of higher learning has been a major challenge for nearly ten years. Enterprise Systems education is surprisingly well documented in a number of papers on Information Systems education. However, most publications in this area report on the individual experiences of an institution or an academic. This paper focuses on the most popular Enterprise System - SAP - and summarizes the outcomes of a global survey on the status quo of SAP-related education. Based on feedback of 305 lecturers and more than 700 students, it reports on the main factors of Enterprise Systems education including, critical success factors, alternative hosting models, and students’ perceptions. The results show among others an overall increasing interest in advanced SAP solutions and international collaboration, and a high satisfaction with the concept of using Application Hosting Centers.