Smart girls : a deconstructive discourse analysis of smartness

This project is a deconstructive discourse analysis of smart girlhood. From a feminist post structural framework, with a focus on discourse and performative identity, I scrutinize three dominant discourses of smartness that are prevalent and academic and popular press. These constructions frame smart girls as being either Losers, Have-It-All Girls, or Imposters. By conducting semi-structured group interviews with six self-identified smart girls, I explore the question of how smart girls perform their smart girl identities in their current sociocultural context. After analyzing the data from the group interviews, I outline five themes that seem to be prevalent in the stories told by the smart girls in this thesis. Finally, I discuss how the performative identities of the smart girls in my thesis appear to be much more complex, multiple and rhizomatic than the discourses under review allow.

Teachers' professional learning within communities of mathematics-for-teaching practice

Ontario bansho is an emergent mathematics instructional strategy used by teachers working within communities of practice that has been deemed to have a transformational effect on teachers' professional learning of mathematics. This study sought to answer the following question: How does teachers' implementation of Ontario bansho within their communities of practice inform their professional learning process concerning mathematics-for-teaching? Two other key questions also guided the study: What processes support teachers' professional learning of content-for-teaching? What conditions support teachers' professional learning of content-for-teaching? The study followed an interpretive phenomenological approach to collect data using a purposive sampling of teachers as participants. The researcher conducted interviews and followed an interpretive approach to data analysis to investigate how teachers construct meaning and create interpretations through their social interactions. The study developed a model of professional learning made up of 3 processes, informing with resources, engaging with students, and visualizing and schematizing in which the participants engaged and 2 conditions, ownership and community that supported the 3 processes. The 3 processes occur in ways that are complex, recursive, nonpredictable, and contextual. This model provides a framework for facilitators and leaders to plan for effective, content-relevant professional learning by placing teachers, students, and their learning at the heart of professional learning.

Introduction to engineering : a case study of an interdisciplinary course in Mathematics, Science and Technology

This thesis research was a qualitative case study of a single class of Interdisciplinary Studies: Introduction to Engineering taught in a secondary school. The study endeavoured to explore students' experiences in and perceptions of the course, and to investigate the viability of engineering as an interdisciplinary theme at the secondary school level. Data were collected in the form of student questionnaires, the researcher's observations and reflections, and artefacts representative of students' work. Data analysis was performed by coding textual data and classifying text segments into common themes. The themes that emerged from the data were aligned with facets of interdisciplinary study, including making connections, project-based learning, and student engagement and affective outcomes. The findings of the study showed that students were positive about their experiences in the course, and enjoyed its project-driven nature. Content from mathematics, physics, and technological design was easily integrated under the umbrella of engineering. Students felt that the opportunity to develop problem solving and teamwork skills were two of the most important aspects of the course and could be relevant not only for engineering, but for other disciplines or their day-to-day lives after secondary school. The study concluded that engineering education in secondary school can be a worthwhile experience for a variety of students and not just those intending postsecondary study in engineering. This has implications for the inclusion of engineering in the secondary school curriculum and can inform the practice of curriculum planners at the school, school board, and provincial levels. Suggested directions for further research include classroom-based action research in the areas of technological education, engineering education in secondary school, and interdisciplinary education.

Ambivalent longings: Heim and its prefix : anxiety and the discourse of home

Please consult the paper edition of this thesis to read. It is available on the 5th Floor of the Library at Call Number: Z 9999 P55 N37 2005

In danger of jammed minds: A deconstructive discourse analysis of the criteria for early onset schizophrenia and imagination in children's literature

The purpose of this research is to expose and complicate those discourses of childhood imagination as demonstrated in the diagnostic criteria for early onset schizophrenia by using an antipsychiatry perspective. This will be done by evaluating those discourses alongside those found in popular children’s literature, specifically, Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone, Bridge to Terabithia, and A Wrinkle in Time. Once uncovered, the underlying power discourses were then exposed. This research will then employ a minor reading as provided by Deleuze and Guattari’s (1987) approach to minor literature to demonstrate the ways in which the child can subvert those dominant discourses. The potential of literature is evaluated for its ability to provide alternative modes of experience and lines of flight for the child subjected to the diagnostic criteria of schizophrenia.

Educational Leadership: Exploring the Influence of Managed and Living Systems in Educational Leadership Discourse

A conceptual analysis of educational leadership explored the influence of managed and living systems on 21st century leadership discourse. Drawing on a detailed understanding of managed and living systems theory compiled from the work of Capra (2002), Morgan (1997), Mitchell and Sackney (2009), and Wheatley (2007), this study draws attention to the managed systems systemic concepts of efficiency, control, and standardization, and the living systems concepts of collaboration, shared meaning, change, and interconnection as markers of systems theory that find resonance within leadership literature. Using these systemic concepts as a framework, this study provides important insights into the espousal of managed and living systems concepts within the leadership discourse.

Using Effective Teaching Strategies and Personality Type to Enhance the Mathematics Classroom: A Handbook for Intermediate Math Teachers

This project addressed the need for more insightful, current, and applicable resources for intermediate math teachers in Canadian classrooms. A need for a handbook in this division seemed warranted by a lack of government resource support. Throughout an extensive review of the literature, themes and topics for the handbook emerged. The handbook was designed to not only provide educators with examples of effective teaching strategies within the mathematics classroom but to also inform them about the ways in which their personal characteristics and personality type could affect their students and their own pedagogical practices. Three teaching professionals who had each taught in an intermediate math class within the past year evaluated the handbook. The feedback received from these educators was directly applied to the first draft of the handbook in order to make it more accessible and applicable to other math teachers. Although the handbook was written with teachers in mind, the language and format used throughout the manual also make it accessible to parents, tutors, preservice education students, and educational administrators. Essentially, any individual who is hoping to inspire and educate intermediate math students could make use of the content within the handbook.

Investigating Formative Assessment: Exploring the Impact on the Self-Efficacy and Motivation of Mathematics Students

This is a study of the implementation and impact of formative assessment strategies on the motivation and self-efficacy of secondary school mathematics students. An explanatory sequential mixed methods design was implemented where quantitative and qualitative data were collected and analyzed sequentially in 2 different phases. The first phase involved quantitative data from student questionnaires and the second phase involved qualitative data from individual student and teacher interviews. The findings of the study suggest that formative assessment is implemented in practice in diverse ways and is a process where the strategies are interconnected. Teachers experience difficulty in incorporating peer and self-assessment and perceive a need for exemplars. Key factors described as influencing implementation include teaching philosophies, interpretation of ministry documents, teachers’ experiences, leadership in administration and department, teacher collaboration, misconceptions of teachers, and student understanding of formative assessment. Findings suggest that overall, formative assessment positively impacts student motivation and self-efficacy, because feedback is provided which offers encouragement and recognition by highlighting the progress that has been made and what steps need to be taken to improve. However, students are impacted differently with some considerations including how students perceive mistakes and if they fear judgement. Additionally, the impact of formative assessment is influenced by the connection between self-efficacy and motivation, namely how well a student is doing is a source of both concepts.

Diversity Discourse and the Ontario Educator: The Understandings of Race and Whiteness Among New White Ontario Teachers

As a recent teacher education graduate, I have been left with more questions than answers about how to create and maintain an equitable and antioppressive classroom. These complicated questions of equity laid the groundwork for this study, which explored how new teachers understood diversity, specifically whiteness, and how they connected these perceptions to their course-related experiences in their teacher education program. Using a qualitative approach, this study problematized the lack of critical discussions around diversity taking place in Ontario teacher education courses. Through purposive, homogenous sampling, 7 new Ontario educators participated in a semistructured interview that focused on their experiences as teacher candidates and new teachers and their understandings and ideas regarding diversity, race, and more specifically, whiteness. The findings suggest that the greater Canadian discourse surrounding multiculturalism impacts the everyday diversity talk of the participants, and that problematic ideas of acceptance and tolerance are common. The findings also show a strong discomfort and unfamiliarity among the participants with the terms whiteness and white privilege. Finally, the results also revealed that new teachers have limited experience in their teacher education to discuss and learn about diversity, particularly critical discussions about race and privilege. Through this investigation, I aimed to bring attention to the necessity of having these critical, albeit difficult, discussions around diversity and whiteness in order to support new, predominately white, teachers.