Godwin, Fénelon, and the disappearing teacher

The connection between Godwin and Fénelon has traditionally been restricted to the famous and controversial moment in the first edition of Political Justice (1793) in which Godwin presents an example of the interdependence of rationality and ethical action. This paper argues, however, that Fénelon, and particularly his political and educational treatise Telemachus (1699), plays a significant role in a number of Godwin's subsequent fictional works. Employing Telemachus to explore the theories of education presented by Godwin in the various editions of Political Justice and The Enquirer (1797), this paper explores the manner in which Godwin's version of the Enlightenment transcendence of pedagogical power comes up against its limits. Reading this issue in relation to Godwin's argument, in ‘Of Choice in Reading’, that literature remains outside of socio-ethical corruption, three of Godwin's major novels are shown to demonstrate that Telemachus provides the chance for meta-textual moments in which the appeal to reason (the reader's rational capacity or ‘private judgement’) is at once reflected upon and produced. Reading educational theories and problems into Godwin's major fiction in this fashion helps to clarify aspects of the Godwinian (or ‘Jacobin’) novel.

Learning to Teach and its Implications for the Continuum of Teacher Education: A Nine Country Cross-national Study.

The purpose of this Report is to inform discussions, policy formulation, and strategic planning on teacher education in Ireland. The research gives priority to initial teacher education (ITE) and induction, their interface, and implications for the continuum of teacher education, including continuing professional development (CPD). The study involved a two-pronged approach: a narrative review of recent and relevant literature and a cross-national review of teacher education policies in nine countries, namely, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland, England, Finland, USA, Poland, Singapore and New Zealand. Adopting a broad, balanced and comprehensive understanding of the role of the contemporary teacher, it provides a framework for developing quality teacher education in Ireland. The Report incorporates exemplars of good practice and notes their implementation challenges for the Irish context.  Chapter One provides a framework for conceptualising quality teacher education and the continuum. Key features that emerge from the literature are discussed: teachers¿ practice, quality teaching, the professional life-cycle, teacher learning and relationships. With more specific reference to the continuum, Chapter Two overviews initial teacher education, induction, learning outcomes and accreditation in the selected countries, including Ireland. Key features of policy in the various countries are summarised. Individual country profiles, incorporating descriptions of socio-political, teaching and teacher education contexts, are further detailed in Appendix A. Chapter Three analyses relevant literature on initial teacher education, induction, learning outcomes/professional standards and accreditation. Along with previous chapters it provides the basis for recommendations for teacher education that are presented in Chapter Four. Chapter Four draws together the findings emerging from the cross-national review in terms of the contemporary context of teacher education in Ireland and identifies key challenges and possible lines of policy development as well as recommendations for the Teaching Council and other teacher education stakeholders. Each generation has an opportunity to provide the vision and resources for renewing teacher education in light of ambitious social, economic and educational aspirations to meet perceived societal and education challenges (as occurred in the 1970s). Despite the publication of two key reviews of initial teacher education a number of years ago, there is considerable scope for further reform of teacher education. However, significant changes have occurred to teacher education course provision and content over the last 100 years. In this report, we have stressed the need for, and called for investment in, greater system and programme coherence, mentoring to support assisted practice, knowledge integration, critical reflective practice, inquiry and the development of vibrant partnerships between higher education institutions and schools as the basis for teacher education reform across the continuum. This Executive Summary presents the Report¿s context, key findings and recommendations emerging from the analysis.  

Understanding teacher collaboration in disadvantaged urban primary schools: uncovering practices that foster professional learning communities

This study is set in the context of disadvantaged urban primary schools in Ireland. It inquires into the collaborative practices of primary teachers exploring how class teachers and support teachers develop ways of working together in an effort to improve the literacy and numeracy levels of their student. Traditionally teachers have worked in isolation and therefore ‘collaboration’ as a practice has been slow to permeate the historically embedded assumption of how a teacher should work. This study aims to answer the following questions. 1). What are the dynamics of teacher collaboration in disadvantaged urban primary schools? 2). In what ways are teacher collaboration and teacher learning related? 3). In what ways does teacher collaboration influence students’ opportunities for learning? In answering these research questions, this study aims to contribute to the body of knowledge pertaining to teacher learning through collaboration. Though current policy and literature advocate and make a case for the development of collaborative teaching practices, key studies have identified gaps in the research literature in relation to the impact of teacher collaboration in schools. This study seeks to address some of those gaps by establishing how schools develop a collaborative environment and how teaching practices are enacted in such a setting. It seeks to determine what skills, relationships, structures and conditions are most important in developing collaborative environments that foster the development of professional learning communities (PLCs). This study uses a mixed method research design involving a postal survey, four snap-shot case studies and one in depth case study in an effort to establish if collaborative practice is a feasible practice resulting in worthwhile benefits for both teachers and students.

Not thinking straight? A critical discourse analysis of the 2006 Irish High Court ruling in Zappone and Gilligan v. Revenue Commissioners and Attorney General

The recognition and protection of constitutional rights is a fundamental precept. In Ireland, the right to marry is provided for in the equality provisions of Article 40 of the Irish Constitution (1937). However, lesbians and gay men are denied the right to marry in Ireland. The ‘last word’ on this issue came into being in the High Court in 2006, when Katherine Zappone and Ann Louise Gilligan sought, but failed, to have their Canadian marriage recognised in Ireland. My thesis centres on this constitutional court ruling. So as to contextualise the pursuit of marriage equality in Ireland, I provide details of the Irish trajectory vis-à-vis relationship and family recognition for same-sex couples. In Chapter One, I discuss the methodological orientation of my research, which derives from a critical perspective. Chapter Two denotes my theorisation of the principle of equality and the concept of difference. In Chapter Three, I discuss the history of the institution of marriage in the West with its legislative underpinning. Marriage also has a constitutional underpinning in Ireland, which derives from Article 41 of our Constitution. In Chapter Four, I discuss ways in which marriage and family were conceptualised in Ireland, by looking at historical controversies surrounding the legalisation of contraception and divorce. Chapter Five denotes a Critical Discourse Analysis of the High Court ruling in Zappone and Gilligan. In Chapter Six, I critique text from three genres of discourse, i.e. ‘Letters to the Editor’ regarding same-sex marriage in Ireland, communication from legislators vis-à-vis the 2004 legislative impediment to same-sex marriage in Ireland, and parliamentary debates surrounding the 2010 enactment of civil partnership legislation in Ireland. I conclude my research by reflecting on my methodological and theoretical considerations with a view to answering my research questions. Author’s Update: Following the outcome of the 2015 constitutional referendum vis-à-vis Article 41, marriage equality has been realised in Ireland.

Inclusive education policy, the general allocation model and dilemmas of practice in primary schools

Background: Inclusive education is central to contemporary discourse internationally reflecting societies’ wider commitment to social inclusion. Education has witnessed transforming approaches that have created differing distributions of power, resource allocation and accountability. Multiple actors are being forced to consider changes to how key services and supports are organised. This research constitutes a case study situated within this broader social service dilemma of how to distribute finite resources equitably to meet individual need, while advancing inclusion. It focuses on the national directive with regard to inclusive educational practice for primary schools, Department of Education and Science Special Education Circular 02/05, which introduced the General Allocation Model (GAM) within the legislative context of the Education of Persons with Special Educational Needs (EPSEN) Act (Government of Ireland, 2004). This research could help to inform policy with ‘facts about what is happening on the ground’ (Quinn, 2013). Research Aims: The research set out to unearth the assumptions and definitions embedded within the policy document, to analyse how those who are at the coalface of policy, and who interface with multiple interests in primary schools, understand the GAM and respond to it, and to investigate its effects on students and their education. It examines student outcomes in the primary schools where the GAM was investigated. Methods and Sample The post-structural study acknowledges the importance of policy analysis which explicitly links the ‘bigger worlds’ of global and national policy contexts to the ‘smaller worlds’ of policies and practices within schools and classrooms. This study insists upon taking the detail seriously (Ozga, 1990). A mixed methods approach to data collection and analysis is applied. In order to secure the perspectives of key stakeholders, semi-structured interviews were conducted with primary school principals, class teachers and learning support/resource teachers (n=14) in three distinct mainstream, non-DEIS schools. Data from the schools and their environs provided a profile of students. The researcher then used the Pobal Maps Facility (available at www.pobal.ie) to identify the Small Area (SA) in which each student resides, and to assign values to each address based on the Pobal HP Deprivation Index (Haase and Pratschke, 2012). Analysis of the datasets, guided by the conceptual framework of the policy cycle (Ball, 1994), revealed a number of significant themes. Results: Data illustrate that the main model to support student need is withdrawal from the classroom under policy that espouses inclusion. Quantitative data, in particular, highlighted an association between segregated practice and lower socioeconomic status (LSES) backgrounds of students. Up to 83% of the students in special education programmes are from lower socio-economic status (LSES) backgrounds. In some schools 94% of students from LSES backgrounds are withdrawn from classrooms daily for special education. While the internal processes of schooling are not solely to blame for class inequalities, this study reveals the power of professionals to order children in school, which has implications for segregated special education practice. Such agency on the part of key actors in the context of practice relates to ‘local constructions of dis/ability’, which is influenced by teacher habitus (Bourdieu, 1984). The researcher contends that inclusive education has not resulted in positive outcomes for students from LSES backgrounds because it is built on faulty assumptions that focus on a psycho-medical perspective of dis/ability, that is, placement decisions do not consider the intersectionality of dis/ability with class or culture. This study argues that the student need for support is better understood as ‘home/school discontinuity’ not ‘disability’. Moreover, the study unearths the power of some parents to use social and cultural capital to ensure eligibility to enhanced resources. Therefore, a hierarchical system has developed in mainstream schools as a result of funding models to support need in inclusive settings. Furthermore, all schools in the study are ‘ordinary’ schools yet participants acknowledged that some schools are more ‘advantaged’, which may suggest that ‘ordinary’ schools serve to ‘bury class’ (Reay, 2010) as a key marker in allocating resources. The research suggests that general allocation models of funding to meet the needs of students demands a systematic approach grounded in reallocating funds from where they have less benefit to where they have more. The calculation of the composite Haase Value in respect of the student cohort in receipt of special education support adopted for this study could be usefully applied at a national level to ensure that the greatest level of support is targeted at greatest need. Conclusion: In summary, the study reveals that existing structures constrain and enable agents, whose interactions produce intended and unintended consequences. The study suggests that policy should be viewed as a continuous and evolving cycle (Ball, 1994) where actors in each of the social contexts have a shared responsibility in the evolution of education that is equitable, excellent and inclusive.

Beginning primary teachers’ perspectives on becoming a teacher in the workplace: Contextual, emotional, and temporo-spatial dimensions of identity shaping

The issue, with international and national overtones, of direct relevance to the present study, relates to the shaping of beginning teachers’ identities in the workplace. As the shift from an initial teacher education programme into initial practice in schools is a period of identity change worthy of investigation, this study focuses on the transformative search by nine beginning primary teachers for their teaching identities, throughout the course of their initial year of occupational experience, post-graduation. The nine beginning teacher participants work in a variety of primary school settings, thus strengthening the representativeness of the research cohort. Privileging ‘insider’ perspectives, the research goal is to understand the complexities of lived experience from the viewpoints of the participating informants. The shaping of identity is conceived of in dimensional terms. Accordingly, a framework composed of three dimensions of beginning teacher experience is devised, namely: contextual; emotional; temporo-spatial. Data collection and analysis is informed by principles derived from sociocultural theories; activity theory; figured worlds theory; and, dialogical self theory. Individual, face-to-face semi-structured interviews, and the maintenance of solicited digital diaries, are the principal methods of data collection employed. The use of a dimensional model fragments the integrated learning experiences of beginning teachers into constituent parts for the purpose of analysis. While acknowledging that the actual journey articulated by each participant is a more complex whole than the sum of its parts, key empirically-based claims are presented as per the dimensional framework employed: contextuality; emotionality; temporo-spatiality. As a result of applying the foci of an international literature to an under-researched aspect of Irish education, this study is offered as a context-specific contribution to the knowledge base on beginning teaching. As the developmental needs of beginning teachers constitute an emerging area of intense policy focus in Ireland, this research undertaking is both relevant and timely.

The role of transformative thinking and practice in a property entrepreneur's response to the funding crisis since 2008

This portfolio of exploration explores the role of transformative thinking and practice in a property entrepreneur’s response to the financial crisis which swept over Ireland from 2008. The complexity of this challenge and the mental capacity to meet its demands is at the core of the exploration. This inquiry emerged from the challenges the financial crisis presented to my values, beliefs, assumptions, and theories, i.e. the interpretive lens through which I make meaning of my experiences. Given the issue identified, this inquiry is grounded in aspects of theories of constructive developmental psychology, applied developmental science, and philosophy. Integrating and linking these elements to business practice is the applied element of the Portfolio. As the 2008 crisis unfolded I realised I was at the limits of my way of knowing. I came to understand that the underlying structure of a way of knowing is the ‘subject-object relationship’ i.e. what a way of knowing can reflect upon, look at, have perspective on, in other words, make object, as against what is it embedded in, attached to, identified within, or subject to. My goal became enhancing my awareness of how I made meaning and how new insights, which would transform a way of knowing, are created. The focus was on enhancing my practice. This Portfolio is structured into three essays. Essay One reported on my self-reflection and external evaluation out of which emerged my developmental goals. In Essay Two I undertake a reading for change programme in which different meaning making systems were confronted in order to challenge me as a meaning maker. Essay Three reported on my experiment which concerned the question whether it was possible for me as a property entrepreneur, and for others alike, to retain bank finance in the face of the overwhelming objective of the bank to deleverage their balance sheet of property loans. The output of my research can be grouped into General Developmental and Specific Business Implications. Firstly I address those who are interested in a transformational-based response to the challenges of operating in the property sector in Ireland during a crisis. I outline the apparatus of thought that I used to create insight, and thus transform how I thought, these are Awareness, Subject-object separation, Exploring other’s perspectives from the position of incompleteness, Dialectical thinking and Collingwood’s Questioning activity. Secondly I set out my learnings from the crisis and their impact on entrepreneurial behaviour and the business of property development. I identify ten key insights that have emerged from leading a property company through the crisis. Many of these are grounded in common sense, however, in my experience these were, to borrow Shakespeare’s words, “More honor'd in the breach than the observance” in pre Crisis Ireland. Finally I set out a four-step approach for forging a strategy. This requires my peer practitioners to identify (i) what they are subject to, (ii) Assess the Opportunity or challenge in a Systemic Context, (iii) Explore Multiple Perspectives on the opportunity or Challenge with an Orientation to change how you know and (iv) Using the Questioning Activity to create Knowledge. Based on my experience I conclude that transformative thinking and practice is a key enabler for a property entrepreneur, in responding to a major collapse of traditional (bank debt) funding.