Teacher's professional knowledge and the teaching of reading in the early years

What are the sources of teachers’ professional knowledge for the teaching of reading? This paper reports findings from a study that investigated the role of teachers in the current Research-Policy-Praxis Nexus (RPPN). This was achieved by a specific focus upon constructions of reading in the early years in Victoria, Australia. All of the teacher participants either implemented or coordinated the Victorian Early Years Literacy Program (EYLP) in the primary school setting. These teachers were interviewed in order to hear their views on reading development and reading pedagogy and to identify the sources of this professional knowledge. The findings from this study are important for all teachers and teacher educators as they have implications for teaching practise, teacher education and teacher professional development programs.

Separating the contributions of hearing, lexical knowledge and speech production to speech perception scores in children with hearing impairments.

Open-set word and sentence speech-perception test scores are commonly used as a measure of hearing abilities in children and adults using cochlear implants and/or hearing aids. These tests are usually presented auditorily with a verbal response. In the case of children, scores are typically lower and more variable than for adults with hearing impairments using similar devices. It is difficult to interpret children's speech-perception scores without considering the effects of lexical knowledge and speech-production abilities on their responses. This study postulated a simple mathematical model to describe the effects of hearing, lexical knowledge, and speech production on the perception test scores for monosyllabic words by children with impaired hearing. Thirty-three primary-school children with impaired hearing, fitted with hearing aids and/or cochlear implants, were evaluated using speech-perception, reading-aloud, speech-production, and language measures. These various measures were incorporated in the mathematical model, which revealed that performance in an open-set word-perception test in the auditory-alone mode is strongly dependent on residual hearing levels, lexical knowledge, and speech-production abilities. Further applications of the model provided an estimate of the effect of each component on the overall speech-perception score for each child.

How values in education affect children's environmental knowledge

In this study we analysed the familiarity and understanding of 10 environmental concepts amongst Mexican and English school children (aged 7 to 9). The investigation considered the impact of the educational system and the school ethos on the formation of environmental concepts. Results reveal that in general, children of this age have a low to moderate level of environmental literacy. The educational system and pedagogical approach affect the way children learn environmental concepts. Schools with a strong orientation towards the environment seem more capable of helping children with their understanding of environmental concepts. School and television were the major sources of environmental information, but this varied with school ethos. The development of effective environmental policies in schools needs to be considered in order to promote environmental knowledge in the school population.

Inclusive policy action : exploring the realities and knowledge of teachers implementing inclusive education

Inclusive Policy Action recognizes the complexity of inclusive policy for teachers. However, the author presents a strong view that a constructive approach for future action can be accomplished by drawing on teachers' own accounts of the significant characteristics contributing to effective inclusion. Accordingly, teachers' work is recognized as a vital contributing factor to successful inclusion, despite the often over-powering emphasis on additional funding. For this reason the finer structures of changed pedagogy, the development of teacher knowledge and the vision of quality education for all students are explored using teachers' own voice to theorize and analyze the actuality of successful inclusive practice. The emergent characteristics relate to the importance of communicative infrastructures promoting knowledge within learning communities rather than political directives associated with inclusive education policy. These characteristics draw attention to the need to reconsider and revalue the knowledge and expertise generated by education policy actors, namely the teachers and school administrators involved in institutional planning and practice.

Knowledge discovery in multi-databases by analyzing local instances

Multi-databases mining is an urgent task. This thesis solves 4 key problems in multi-databases mining: Application-independent database classification - Local instance analysis model - Useful pattern discovery - Pattern synthesis.

Interrupted cadence : the mismatch of the school music curriculum and the intercultural understandings of pre-service teachers in Victoria, Australia

In Victoria, Australia, the curriculum framework for schools, Victorian Essential Learning Standards (VELS) stipulates multiculturalism as an integral part of the education of students. This encompasses knowledge, skills, values and behaviours (Victorian Curriculum Assessment Authority, 2009). In this curriculum framework, teachers must consider ‘intercultural understanding’. It seems logical that, to teach this, preservice teacher education students should be able to embrace this idea. VELS addresses multicultural understanding and the development of thinking skills. The Arts domain specifically provides diverse opportunities for students to “develop aesthetic and critical awareness … of arts works from different social, historical and cultural contexts”. In this research, undertaken between 2005 and 2008, semi-structured interviews were completed with final year pre-service music education students about their intercultural understandings in music education. Interpretative phenomenological analysis of the data showed that, although many feel confident including music of other cultures, having had some experience in their tertiary education, some have pursued other ways to inform themselves about music of other cultures. There appears to be a mismatch between curricular expectations and the limited time and resources available in tertiary education programs for music. The disparity between the school music curriculum framework and the preparation of teachers requires attention and resolution.

Paradigmatic approach to managing complexity in knowledge-driven marketing

This research develops a measure of Customer Lifetime Value, extending existing measures, that provides organisations having large customer databases the means to place a financial value on customers. Using this measure, new models are developed that provide a framework to use knowledge to drive marketing decisions.

Mixed transfer function neural networks for generalization and knowledge extraction

This thesis develops a novel framework of nonlinear modelling to adaptively fit the complexity of the model to the problem domain resulting in a better modelling capability and a straightforward knowledge acquisition. The developed framework also permits increased comprehensibility and user acceptability of modelling results.

Knowledge transfer in enterprise IT support provision using web-based self-service

This research identified critical success factors and a staged model of knowledge transfer in the provision of after-sales information technology support to enterprise customers when Web-based Self-service systems are used. The research highlights the need for a relational, stakeholder-oriented approach that considers stakeholder interactions, knowledge flows, needs and capabilities.

Communities constructing knowledge

The research consisted of narrative writing and reflective practice to promote the construction of new understandings between the Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples of Australia. The research findings propose exemplars of knowledge and practice and approaches to learning that are community centred, immersed in social practices and which include systematic narrative formation.

Cognitive aspects of knowledge management

The thesis addresses the issue of a limited success of knowledge management systems in spite of substantial investments in their development and implementation. Through the research, core reasons for this situation were identified and an innovative user-centered solution that focuses knowledge management on supporting professional activities is presented.

Dynamic knowledge modelling

The integration of knowledge from various modelling paradigms has posed great difficulty to knowledge engineers due to the inability to re-use knowledge from diverse domains. This research has identified novel processes, which collectively provide the basis for dynamic knowledge modelling, as the key step in knowledge integration. These processes required prototypical knowledge structures derived from abstractions of reasoning processes and have been shown to provide a knowledge modelling solution to complex knowledge management tasks.

Reproduction, resistance and transformation at Marantha High School

The focus of this thesis is the attempt by the Seventh-day Adventist Church to reproduce SDA culture in students attending one of its schools, Maranatha High School. As a 'critical ethnography', it adopts a theoretical perspective from critical social theory to examine problems associated with this attempt. These problems are reflected in data gathered by a range of ethnographic techniques. The study first portrays the socio-political dynamics underlying the historical creation of Adventist culture generally, its embodiment in institutional forms, and the development of a substantial educational structure intended to transmit that culture to succeeding generations.

The study then focuses on current SDA educational philosophy, and the assumptions underlying the principles of selection, organisation, transmission and evaluation of knowledge considered to be valid. It then examines how Maranatha High School itself seeks to implement those principles. In this context, the study also reflects on the political implications of the modes of management and institutional control adopted at various levels of the organisation and in the school.

As a dialectical study, the thesis views the school as a social setting in which knowledgeable humans engage in communicative interaction. Rather than promoting smooth reproduction, the school is portrayed as a site of struggle, negotiation and potential transformation as participants resist forces that they perceive to be constraining and oppressing them. Consequently the thesis examines the perceptions of the various groups of participants, and the nature and impact of their interaction. In as much as teachers are official 'managers' of SDA culture and knowledge, this examination focuses especially on their personal definitions of the situation, the dilemmas that confront them from internal and external sources, the development of their own cultural forms in response, and the implications this action has for cultural reproduction and continuity.