Maritime expressions:a corpus based exploration of maritime metaphors

This study uses a purpose-built corpus to explore the linguistic legacy of Britain’s maritime history found in the form of hundreds of specialised ‘Maritime Expressions’ (MEs), such as TAKEN ABACK, ANCHOR and ALOOF, that permeate modern English. Selecting just those expressions commencing with ’A’, it analyses 61 MEs in detail and describes the processes by which these technical expressions, from a highly specialised occupational discourse community, have made their way into modern English. The Maritime Text Corpus (MTC) comprises 8.8 million words, encompassing a range of text types and registers, selected to provide a cross-section of ‘maritime’ writing. It is analysed using WordSmith analytical software (Scott, 2010), with the 100 million-word British National Corpus (BNC) as a reference corpus. Using the MTC, a list of keywords of specific salience within the maritime discourse has been compiled and, using frequency data, concordances and collocations, these MEs are described in detail and their use and form in the MTC and the BNC is compared. The study examines the transformation from ME to figurative use in the general discourse, in terms of form and metaphoricity. MEs are classified according to their metaphorical strength and their transference from maritime usage into new registers and domains such as those of business, politics, sports and reportage etc. A revised model of metaphoricity is developed and a new category of figurative expression, the ‘resonator’, is proposed. Additionally, developing the work of Lakov and Johnson, Kovesces and others on Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT), a number of Maritime Conceptual Metaphors are identified and their cultural significance is discussed.

Visualisation of bioinformatics datasets

Analysing the molecular polymorphism and interactions of DNA, RNA and proteins is of fundamental importance in biology. Predicting functions of polymorphic molecules is important in order to design more effective medicines. Analysing major histocompatibility complex (MHC) polymorphism is important for mate choice, epitope-based vaccine design and transplantation rejection etc. Most of the existing exploratory approaches cannot analyse these datasets because of the large number of molecules with a high number of descriptors per molecule. This thesis develops novel methods for data projection in order to explore high dimensional biological dataset by visualising them in a low-dimensional space. With increasing dimensionality, some existing data visualisation methods such as generative topographic mapping (GTM) become computationally intractable. We propose variants of these methods, where we use log-transformations at certain steps of expectation maximisation (EM) based parameter learning process, to make them tractable for high-dimensional datasets. We demonstrate these proposed variants both for synthetic and electrostatic potential dataset of MHC class-I. We also propose to extend a latent trait model (LTM), suitable for visualising high dimensional discrete data, to simultaneously estimate feature saliency as an integrated part of the parameter learning process of a visualisation model. This LTM variant not only gives better visualisation by modifying the project map based on feature relevance, but also helps users to assess the significance of each feature. Another problem which is not addressed much in the literature is the visualisation of mixed-type data. We propose to combine GTM and LTM in a principled way where appropriate noise models are used for each type of data in order to visualise mixed-type data in a single plot. We call this model a generalised GTM (GGTM). We also propose to extend GGTM model to estimate feature saliencies while training a visualisation model and this is called GGTM with feature saliency (GGTM-FS). We demonstrate effectiveness of these proposed models both for synthetic and real datasets. We evaluate visualisation quality using quality metrics such as distance distortion measure and rank based measures: trustworthiness, continuity, mean relative rank errors with respect to data space and latent space. In cases where the labels are known we also use quality metrics of KL divergence and nearest neighbour classifications error in order to determine the separation between classes. We demonstrate the efficacy of these proposed models both for synthetic and real biological datasets with a main focus on the MHC class-I dataset.

Teacher use of personal narratives in the Japanese university english language classroom

While storytelling in conversation has been extensively investigated, much less is known about storytelling in the English language classroom, particularly teachers telling their personal experience stories, termed teacher personal narratives in this study. Teacher personal narratives, a combination of the ancient art of human storytelling and the current practices of teaching, offer an innovative approach to language teaching and learning. This thesis examines teacher personal narrative use in Japanese university English language classrooms and is of relevance to both practicing classroom teachers and teacher educators because it explores the role, significance, and effectiveness of personal stories told by teachers. The pedagogical implications which the findings may have for language teaching and learning as well as for teacher education programs are also discussed. Four research questions were posed: 1. What are the characteristics of teacher personal narratives? 2. When, how, and why do language teachers use personal narratives in the classroom? 3. What is the reaction of learners to teacher personal narratives? 4. How do teacher personal narratives provide opportunities for student learning? A mixed methods approach using the tradition of multiple case studies provided an in-depth exploration of the personal narratives of four teachers. Data collection consisted of classroom observations and audio recordings, teacher and student semi-structured interviews, student diaries, and Japan-wide teacher questionnaires. Ninety-seven teacher personal narratives were analyzed for their structural and linguistic features. The findings showed that the narrative elements of orientation, complication, and evaluation are almost always present in these stories, and that discourse and tense markers may aid in student noticing of the input which can lead to eventual student output. The data also demonstrated that reasons for telling narratives mainly fall into two categories: affectiveoriented and pedagogical-oriented purposes. This study has shown that there are significant differences between conversational storytelling and educational storytelling.

An investigation of Albanian EFL teachers' decision-making in their use of CLT-oriented textbooks

Against a backdrop of ongoing educational reforms that seek to introduce Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) in Albanian primary and secondary state schools, Albanian teachers, among others, are officially required to use communication-based textbooks in their classes. Authorities in a growing number of countries that are seeking to improve and westernise their educational systems are also using communication-based textbooks as agents of change. Behind these actions, there is the commonly held belief that textbooks can be used to support teacher learning as they provide a visible framework teachers can follow. Communication-based textbooks are used in thousands of EFL classrooms around the world to help teachers to “fully understand and routinize change” (Hutchinson and Torres, 1994:323). However, empirical research on the role materials play in the classroom, and in particular the role of textbook as an agent of change, is still very little, and what does exist is rather inconclusive. This study aims to fulfill this gap. It is predominately a qualitative investigation into how and why four Albanian EFL teachers use Western teaching resources in their classes. Aiming at investigating the decision-making processes that teachers go through in their teaching, and specifically at investigating the relationship between Western-published textbooks, teachers’ decision making, and teachers’ classroom delivery, the current study contributes to an extensive discussion on the development of communicative L2 teaching concepts and methods, teacher decision making, as well as a growing discussion on how best to make institutional reforms effective, particularly in East-European ex-communist countries and in other developing countries. Findings from this research indicate that, prompted by the content of Western-published textbooks, the four research participants, who had received little formal training in CLT teaching, accommodated some communicative teaching behaviours into their teaching. The use of communicative textbooks, however, does not seem to account for radical, methodological changes in teachers’ practices. Teacher cognitions based on teachers’ previous learning experience are likely to act as a lens through which teachers judge classroom realities. As such, they shape, to a great degree, the decisions teachers make regarding the use of Western-published textbooks in their classes.

Antecedents and consequences of percieved effective managerial coaching:an individual, team-level and cross-level examination

The major contribution of the study is the identification of a positive link between perceived effective managerial coaching (PEMC) and team task performance and also, the examination of PEMC adopting a multilevel research design and incorporating dual-source data. Specifically, drawing on social psychology, the thesis aims at developing and testing a comprehensive conceptual framework of the antecedents and consequences of PEMC for knowledge workers. The model takes into consideration intrapersonal, interpersonal and team-level characteristics, which relate to PEMC and, subsequently associate with important work outcomes. In this regard, the thesis identifies PEMC as a practice of dual nature in that it may be experienced not only as a one-on-one workplace developmental interaction, but also as a managerial practice that is experienced by each member of a team for co-ordination purposes. Adopting a cross-sectional survey research design, the hypotheses are tested in three organisations in Greece and the UK. In particular, hierarchical linear modelling of 191 employees nested in 60 teams yields that employees’ learning goal orientation (LGO) and high-quality exchanges between an employee and a manager (LMX) are positively related to effective MC, while a manager’s LGO moderates the relationship between employees’ LGO and PEMC. In turn, PEMC, as a one-on-one practice, is related to cognitive outcomes, such as information sharing, while as a shared team practice is related also to behavioural outcomes, including individual and team performance. Overall, the study contributes to a growing body of coaching and management literature that acknowledges PEMC as a core managerial practice.

modern foreign languages classroom:is inclusion of all exclusion in disguise?

The past decade has seen a drive to give all pupils the opportunity to study a Modern Foreign Language (MFL) in schools in England, making the teaching and learning of foreign languages part of the primary school curriculum. The Languages for All: Languages for Life (DfES, 2002) policy was introduced through the National Languages Strategy with an objective to increase the nation’s language capability. Raising the educational standard for all pupils is another government initiative with a strong emphasis on inclusion. As the Languages for All policy stresses the importance and benefits of language learning, and inclusion suggests equality and provision for all, this study examines the inclusion of all key stage 2 pupils in foreign language learning and describes perceptions and experiences of pupils, particularly those identified as having special educational needs (SEN) in their performances and negotiations in learning French. As a small scale, qualitative and ethnographically informed, this research is based on participant observation and semi-structured interviews with pupils, teachers of French, teaching assistants and parents. This study draws upon Nussbaum’s capabilities approach and Bourdieu’s concepts as theoretical foundations to analyse the ‘inclusive’ French classroom. As the capabilities approach takes people as ends not means, and goes beyond a focus on resources, it lends itself to critical thinking on issues around inclusion in education. In this context, this researcher investigates the experiences of pupils who struggle with foreign language learning because of their abilities or disabilities, and frames the discussion around the capabilities approach. The study also focuses on motivation and identity in foreign language learning, and draws upon Bourdieu’s concepts of capital, habitus and field to analyse how the participants make sense of and respond to their own circumstances in relation to their performances in the language learning process. This research thus considers Bourdieu’s concepts for a deeper understanding of issues of inequality in learning French and takes up Nussbaum’s insight that pupils may differ in what learning French means to them, and it is not how they differ, but the difference between their capability to choose and achieve what they value that should matter. The findings indicate that although, initially, the French classroom appears ‘inclusive’ due to the provision and practices of inclusion, a closer look shows it to be exclusionary. In addition, responses from the participants on the usefulness and benefits of foreign language learning are contradictory to the objectives of the Languages for All policy, illustrating the complexity of the ‘inclusive’ MFL classroom. This research concludes that structural and interpersonal practices of inclusion contribute to the disguising of exclusion in a classroom deemed ‘inclusive’. Implications are that an understanding and consideration of other aspect of life such as well-being, interests, needs and values should form a necessary part of the language policy.

Probabilistic topographic information visualisation

The focus of this thesis is the extension of topographic visualisation mappings to allow for the incorporation of uncertainty. Few visualisation algorithms in the literature are capable of mapping uncertain data with fewer able to represent observation uncertainties in visualisations. As such, modifications are made to NeuroScale, Locally Linear Embedding, Isomap and Laplacian Eigenmaps to incorporate uncertainty in the observation and visualisation spaces. The proposed mappings are then called Normally-distributed NeuroScale (N-NS), T-distributed NeuroScale (T-NS), Probabilistic LLE (PLLE), Probabilistic Isomap (PIso) and Probabilistic Weighted Neighbourhood Mapping (PWNM). These algorithms generate a probabilistic visualisation space with each latent visualised point transformed to a multivariate Gaussian or T-distribution, using a feed-forward RBF network. Two types of uncertainty are then characterised dependent on the data and mapping procedure. Data dependent uncertainty is the inherent observation uncertainty. Whereas, mapping uncertainty is defined by the Fisher Information of a visualised distribution. This indicates how well the data has been interpolated, offering a level of ‘surprise’ for each observation. These new probabilistic mappings are tested on three datasets of vectorial observations and three datasets of real world time series observations for anomaly detection. In order to visualise the time series data, a method for analysing observed signals and noise distributions, Residual Modelling, is introduced. The performance of the new algorithms on the tested datasets is compared qualitatively with the latent space generated by the Gaussian Process Latent Variable Model (GPLVM). A quantitative comparison using existing evaluation measures from the literature allows performance of each mapping function to be compared. Finally, the mapping uncertainty measure is combined with NeuroScale to build a deep learning classifier, the Cascading RBF. This new structure is tested on the MNist dataset achieving world record performance whilst avoiding the flaws seen in other Deep Learning Machines.

Learner support and discovery in a virtual non-judgmental environment

This thesis is a qualitative case study that draws upon a grounded genre analysis approach situated within the social constructivist paradigm. The study describes the various obligatory, desired, and optional moves used by post-graduate students as they interacted within an online, non-judgmental environment in order to seek solutions to issues they were experiencing with their research projects or teaching. The postgraduate students or case participants met individually online with me at pre-arranged times to take part in Instant Messenger Cooperative Development (IMCD) (Boon, 2005) 30-minute to one hour sessions via the text-chat function of Skype. Participants took on the role of ‘Explorer’ in order to articulate their thoughts and ideas about their research. I took on the role of ‘Understander’ to provide support to each Explorer by reflecting my understanding of the ongoing articulations as the Explorers investigated their specific issues, determined possible ways to overcome them, made new discoveries, and formulated plans of action regarding the best way for them to move forward. The description of generic moves covers 32 IMCD sessions collected over a threeyear period (2009-2012) from 10 different participants (A-J). Data collected is drawn from live IMCD sessions, field notes, and post-session email feedback from participants. In particular, the thesis focuses on describing the specific generic moves of Explorers within IMCD sessions as they seek satisfactory resolutions to particular research or pedagogic puzzles. It also provides a detailed description of a longitudinal case (Participant A – four sessions), a one-session case (Participant B – one session), and an outlier case in which the Explorer underwent a negative IMCD experience. The thesis concludes by arguing that IMCD is a highly effective tool that helps facilitate the research process for both distance-learning and on-campus students and has the potential to be utilized across all disciplines at the tertiary level.

Firm-level productivity growth in Northern Ireland:the impact of exporting, innovation and public financial assistance

Motivated by the historically poor productivity performance of Northern Ireland firms and the longstanding productivity gap with the UK, the aim of this thesis is to examine, through the use of firm-level data, how exporting, innovation and public financial assistance impact on firm productivity growth. These particular activities are investigated due to the continued policy focus on their link to productivity growth and the theoretical claims of a direct positive relationship. In order to undertake these analyses a newly constructed dataset is used which links together cross-sectional and longitudinal data over the 1998-2008 period from the Annual Business Survey, the Manufacturing Sales and Export Survey; the Community Innovation Survey and Invest NI Selective Financial Assistance (SFA) payment data. Econometric methodologies are employed to estimate each of the relationships with regards to productivity growth, making use in particular of Heckman selection techniques and propensity score matching to take account of critical issues of endogeneity and selection bias. The results show that more productive firms self-select into exporting but there is no resulting productivity effect from starting to export; contesting the argument for learning-by-exporting. Product innovation is also found to have no impact on productivity growth over a four year period but there is evidence of a negative process innovation impact, likely to reflect temporary learning effects. Finally SFA assistance, including the amount of the payment, is found to have no short term impact on productivity growth suggesting substantial deadweight effects and/or targeting of inefficient firms. The results provide partial evidence as to why Northern Ireland has failed to narrow the productivity gap with the rest of the UK. The analyses further highlight the need for access to comprehensive firm-level data for research purposes, not least to underpin robust evidence-based policymaking.

On the periphery of Europe:an investigation of the construction of Turkish-Cypriot adolescent identities

This research study investigates the identities of a group of adolescent Turkish Cypriot (TC) students in their final year of secondary education in northern Cyprus, which it is argued, lies on the periphery of Europe. The main aim is to explore the linguistic construction of TC youth identities within school contexts but primarily the classroom in a political context in which the uniquely ambiguous status of Turkish Cypriots within the European Union (EU) continues, and where Turkish Cypriots are considered to be Europeans as individuals but not as a separate political entity. A secondary focus is upon the students’ investment in learning the English language. Identity is defined as a lifelong process of 'the social positioning of self and the other' (Bucholtz and Hall, 2005:586) which is endlessly re-created (Tabouret-Keller, 1997) and the distinction between the terms 'identity' and 'identities' is discussed. The study explores the social construction of TC students' identities using an ethnomethodological case study. By using Conversation Analysis of selected extracts from the data collected through observations of classroom interactions, focus group discussions and interviews, the thesis shows that TC students perceive and enact 'in-betweener identities' in terms of their ethnicity, societal values, age, religion, languages and Europeanness. Being on the periphery of the EU, it is argued that the Turkish Cypriots of northern Cyprus are the ‘peripheral members of the EU, remaining present yet absent. They are personally EU citizens but not as a society and cannot be represented within EU institutions. But will they ever acquire full membership, as any peripheral member would aspire to have or will they remain in between occident and orient? The possible answers to this question and the resulting ideological associations will shape how and to what extent these TC students perceive and enact their identities.

The risk of re-intervention after endovascular aortic aneurysm repair

This thesis studies survival analysis techniques dealing with censoring to produce predictive tools that predict the risk of endovascular aortic aneurysm repair (EVAR) re-intervention. Censoring indicates that some patients do not continue follow up, so their outcome class is unknown. Methods dealing with censoring have drawbacks and cannot handle the high censoring of the two EVAR datasets collected. Therefore, this thesis presents a new solution to high censoring by modifying an approach that was incapable of differentiating between risks groups of aortic complications. Feature selection (FS) becomes complicated with censoring. Most survival FS methods depends on Cox's model, however machine learning classifiers (MLC) are preferred. Few methods adopted MLC to perform survival FS, but they cannot be used with high censoring. This thesis proposes two FS methods which use MLC to evaluate features. The two FS methods use the new solution to deal with censoring. They combine factor analysis with greedy stepwise FS search which allows eliminated features to enter the FS process. The first FS method searches for the best neural networks' configuration and subset of features. The second approach combines support vector machines, neural networks, and K nearest neighbor classifiers using simple and weighted majority voting to construct a multiple classifier system (MCS) for improving the performance of individual classifiers. It presents a new hybrid FS process by using MCS as a wrapper method and merging it with the iterated feature ranking filter method to further reduce the features. The proposed techniques outperformed FS methods based on Cox's model such as; Akaike and Bayesian information criteria, and least absolute shrinkage and selector operator in the log-rank test's p-values, sensitivity, and concordance. This proves that the proposed techniques are more powerful in correctly predicting the risk of re-intervention. Consequently, they enable doctors to set patients’ appropriate future observation plan.

Design and implementation of a relative localization system for ground and aerial robotic teams

The main focus of this thesis is to address the relative localization problem of a heterogenous team which comprises of both ground and micro aerial vehicle robots. This team configuration allows to combine the advantages of increased accessibility and better perspective provided by aerial robots with the higher computational and sensory resources provided by the ground agents, to realize a cooperative multi robotic system suitable for hostile autonomous missions. However, in such a scenario, the strict constraints in flight time, sensor pay load, and computational capability of micro aerial vehicles limits the practical applicability of popular map-based localization schemes for GPS denied navigation. Therefore, the resource limited aerial platforms of this team demand simpler localization means for autonomous navigation. Relative localization is the process of estimating the formation of a robot team using the acquired inter-robot relative measurements. This allows the team members to know their relative formation even without a global localization reference, such as GPS or a map. Thus a typical robot team would benefit from a relative localization service since it would allow the team to implement formation control, collision avoidance, and supervisory control tasks, independent of a global localization service. More importantly, a heterogenous team such as ground robots and computationally constrained aerial vehicles would benefit from a relative localization service since it provides the crucial localization information required for autonomous operation of the weaker agents. This enables less capable robots to assume supportive roles and contribute to the more powerful robots executing the mission. Hence this study proposes a relative localization-based approach for ground and micro aerial vehicle cooperation, and develops inter-robot measurement, filtering, and distributed computing modules, necessary to realize the system. The research study results in three significant contributions. First, the work designs and validates a novel inter-robot relative measurement hardware solution which has accuracy, range, and scalability characteristics, necessary for relative localization. Second, the research work performs an analysis and design of a novel nonlinear filtering method, which allows the implementation of relative localization modules and attitude reference filters on low cost devices with optimal tuning parameters. Third, this work designs and validates a novel distributed relative localization approach, which harnesses the distributed computing capability of the team to minimize communication requirements, achieve consistent estimation, and enable efficient data correspondence within the network. The work validates the complete relative localization-based system through multiple indoor experiments and numerical simulations. The relative localization based navigation concept with its sensing, filtering, and distributed computing methods introduced in this thesis complements system limitations of a ground and micro aerial vehicle team, and also targets hostile environmental conditions. Thus the work constitutes an essential step towards realizing autonomous navigation of heterogenous teams in real world applications.

The implementation of a literacy intervention 'Station Teaching' in infant classes in Irish primary schools

Background: I conducted my research in the context of The National Literacy Strategy (DES, 2011), which maintains that every young person should be literate and it outlines targets for improving literacy in schools from 2011 to 2020. There has been much debate on the teaching of literacy and in particular the teaching of reading. Clark (2014) outlines how learning to read should be a developmental language process and that the approaches in the early years of schooling will colour the children’s motivation and their perception of reading as a purposeful activity. The acquisition of literacy begins in the home but this study focuses on the implementation of a literacy intervention Station Teaching in the infant classes in primary school. Station Teaching occurs when a class is divided into four or five small groups of pupils and they receive intensive tuition at four or five different Stations with the help of Support teachers: New Reading, Familiar Reading, Phonics, Writing and Oral Language. Research Questions: These research questions frame my study: How is Station Teaching implemented? What is the experience of the intervention Station Teaching from the participants’ point of view: teachers, pupils, parents? What notion of literacy is Station Teaching facilitating? Methods: I chose a pragmatic parallel mixed methods design as suggested by Mertens (2010). I collected and analysed both the quantitative and qualitative data to answer the study’s research questions. In the study the quantitative data were collected from a questionnaire issued to 21 schools in Ireland. I used Excel as a data management package and thematic analysis to analyse and present the data in themes. I collected qualitative data from a case study in a school. This data included observations of two classes over a period of a year; interviews with teachers, pupils and parents; children’s drawings, photographs, teachers’ diaries and video evidence. I analysed and presented the evidence from the qualitative data in themes. Main Findings: There are many skills and strategies that are essential to effective literacy teaching in the early years including phonological awareness, phonics, vocabulary, fluency, comprehension and writing. These skills can be taught during Station Teaching. Early intervention in the early years is essential to pupils’ acquisition of literacy. The expertise of the teacher is key to improving the literacy achievement of pupils Teachers and pupils enjoy participating in ST. Pupils are motivated to read and engage in meaningful activities during ST. Staff collaboration is vital for ST to succeed ST facilitates small group work and teachers can differentiate accordingly while including all pupils in the groups. Pupils’ learning is extended in ST but extension activities need to be addressed in the Writing Station. More training should be provided for teachers on the implementation of ST and more funding for resources should be available to schools Significant contribution of the work: The main significance of the study includes: insights into the classroom implementation of Station Teaching in infant classes and extensive research into characteristics of an effective teacher of literacy.

Investigating practitioner self-efficacy in an era of mathematical reform

The purpose of this study is to explore teacher self-efficacy at a time of radical mathematical reform. Project Maths – the new initiative which was rolled out nationwide in 2010 differs from previous attempts at innovation in that it targets a much closer connection between curriculum and pedagogy. Gone are the days of well-rehearsed routines where the role of the mathematician was essentially that of demonstrator. Teaching for understanding is now the main ‘official’ pedagogical focus, with emphasis on the practitioner playing the part of mediator between subject-matter and student. Mathematical instruction is not merely concerned with the transmission of knowledge and skills which is a particular pedagogical position to take. It is also an emotional practice (Hargreaves, 1998) that colours and expresses the feelings and actions of practitioners. While emotion plays a key role in teachers’ commitment to curricular reform, it is also shaped by the social and cultural contexts of mathematical change, alongside with the attitudes and beliefs of the mathematical teaching community. Inspired by Bandura’s theory of learning (1986), this investigation aims to shed light on the complex interplay between so-called mastery and vicarious experiences, social persuasion and physiological states. Vygotsky’s view of learning (1978) as a socio-cultural process is also drawn upon, as it provides a useful structure against which teacher self-efficacy and professional development can be examined. Finally, Hiebert’s theory (1986) is used to examine mathematics teaching self-efficacy and mathematics self-efficacy.

Assessment in primary education in Ireland

This doctoral study examines assessment in primary education in the Republic of Ireland. The nature and purpose of assessment offer an insight into the values which are prioritised by an education system. In 2011, in the Republic of Ireland, the Department of Education and Skills (DES) published a strategy aiming to improve standards of literacy and numeracy. The document, entitled, Literacy and numeracy for learning and life: the national strategy to improve literacy and numeracy for children and young people 2011-2020, contains improvement targets as measured by standardised tests. It also mandates the increased use of standardised tests in primary education, and directs that aggregated scores should be reported to both Boards of Management and the DES. The study is framed by the theoretical perspectives of Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu. Both of these commentators examine social policy and practice in an effort to provide insight into the history and operation of social institutions. This study is especially influenced by Foucault’s archaeology and genealogy of knowledge, and his notion of governmentality. It is also particularly cognisant of Bourdieu’s thoughts on habitus, doxa and capital. The study contains reviews of literature in the areas of assessment, assessment policy, and assessment policy in Ireland. These reviews highlight current debate in each of these areas while also grounding this debate in an historical context. The dissertation contains four empirical sections. 1) It analyses policy documents prepared in the development of the published strategy as well as investigating the strategy itself. In so doing it is aware of the burgeoning influence of pan-national bodies on policy development. 2) A number of high profile policy makers were interviewed as part of the study and their views are interpreted in light of the findings of the literature reviews. 3) The perspective of teachers was sought through a questionnaire survey. This gathered data on these teachers’ views on the purpose of assessment as well as their actual practice. 4) Finally, children were also included as participants in this study. They were interviewed in focus groups and encouraged to contribute drawings as well on their views of assessment in primary school. Literacy and numeracy for learning and life is seen as a seminal document in Irish education. This study is significant in its analysis of original data from high profile policy makers, including two Ministers for Education and Skills. It is also significant in its inclusion of the perspectives of primary school pupils. Finally, the study considers the nature and role of assessment in a holistic manner by including the views of policy makers, teachers and pupils. The study notes that policy development in Ireland underwent a change in the preparation of Literacy and numeracy for learning and life and that international influences, while present, are also mediated to suit the local context. It also highlights a lack of clarity in the definition of assessment in primary education and argues that there is a lack of balance in the approaches that are prioritised. The study demonstrates that teachers are impacted by the strategy but that they also change it by focusing on their own concerns while using assessment tools. The children provide compelling evidence of the impact of assessment on the learner. The study shows how assessment tools (and school subjects) are valued with differing levels of importance by a variety of stakeholders.