Working towards a ‘thirdspace’ in the teaching of writing to middle years students

The teaching of writing, particularly in the middle years of schooling, is impacted on by converging, and at times, contradictory pedagogical spaces. Perceptions about the way in which writing should be taught are clearly affected by standardised testing regimes in Australia. That is, much writing is taught as a genre process, yet results on standardised tests such as National Assessment Program in Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) show that the writing component consistently receives the lowest scores (ACARA, 2013. Research shows that creative and individualised approaches are necessary for quality writing (Grainger, Goouch & Lambirth, 2005). This paper investigates the writing practices of students in years 5 to 7 in two culturally and linguistically diverse schools. It shows that the writing practices of these students are greatly influenced by teachers’ perceptions about what is required by external testing bodies such as the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). The paper will then highlight how socio-spatial theory (Lefebvre, 1991) can be applied to explain these practices and offers the notion of a more productive ‘thirdspace’ (Soja, 1996) for improvement in the teaching of writing.

Challenges in embedding numeracy throughout the curriculum in three Queensland secondary schools

The new Australian Curriculum and national standardised testing have placed the teaching of numeracy across the curriculum at the forefront of what Australian schools must do. However, it has been left to schools to determine how they do this. Although there is a growing body of literature giving examples of pedagogies that embed numeracy in various learning areas, there are few studies of cross-curricular numeracy from the management perspective. This paper responds to the research question: How do selected Queensland secondary schools interpret and apply the Australian Curriculum requirement to embed numeracy throughout the curriculum? A multiple case study design was used to investigate the actions of the senior managers and mathematics teachers in three large secondary schools located in outer Brisbane. The numeracy practices in the three schools were interpreted from asocial constructivist perspective. The study found that in each school key managers had differing constructions of numeracy that led to confusion in administrative practices, policy development and leadership. The lack of coordinated cross-curricular action in numeracy in all three schools points to the difficulty that arises when teachers do not share the cross-curricular vision of numeracy present in the Australian Curriculum. The managers identified teachers’ commitment, understanding, or skills in relation to numeracy as significant barriers to the successful implementation of numeracy in their school. Adoption of the Australian Curriculum expectation of embedding numeracy across the curriculum will require school managers to explicitly commit to initiatives that require persistence,time and, most importantly, money.

Ethical leadership in a time of increasing accountability

Australia, like many other countries, has embraced national testing as part of wider reforms and increased accountability in schooling. Results for standardised testing programs, such as NAPLAN, are widely published yet form only one part of accountability for educators. We argue that accountability also has moral, ethical and professional dimensions. In this paper we offer a discussion of background to our study of ethical leadership in a time of data driven or contractual accountability. Based on Starratt’s (1996) model, we define ethical leadership as a social, relational practice concerned with the moral purpose of education (Angus, 2006). Our central thesis is that given increasing accountabilities, school leaders need to consider approaches to ethical leadership to improve quality and equity in education and achieve equitable outcomes for all students. The paper concludes with key implications for school leaders.

Internationalizing school curriculum in Australasia: As niche, by test, or at heart?

Global citizenship has emerged as a pressing curricular priority which all educational systems are currently grappling with. The challenge is to negotiate how this orientation might sit alongside the more traditional mission of mass school curriculum in building collective ballast for a national identity through a common morality and shared narratives, or may conflict with efforts to protect and promote indigenous and minority identities. As a case study of how these agendas interact, this chapter will consider curricular responses to global imperatives in the variegated conditions across the Australasian region (defined as Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea). The chapter will outline recent developments in the social, economic and political contexts surrounding curricular reforms in these settings, and demonstrate how these developments have changed the conditions of possibility and strength of purpose behind efforts to internationalise school curricula. Three types of systemic responses are then described: firstly, an appetite for globally branded curricula such as the International Baccalaureate, Montessori, and Cambridge University Certificates to distinguish some in a stratified market; secondly, convergence in curriculum to improve national performance on international standardised tests; and thirdly, the infusion of cosmopolitan sensibilities, regional identities and intercultural competencies as a core curricular goal for all. The chapter considers the various pragmatic interpretations of ‘internationalisation’ in these responses, and argues that the third response seems both the most difficult to enact, and the most vulnerable to political interference.

Reciprocal mentoring across generations: sustaining professional development for english teachers

This article draws on a collaborative research project entitled Teachers Investigate Unequal Literacy Outcomes: Cross-generational Perspectives, funded by the Australian Research Council 2002-2004 and awarded to Barbara Comber, University of South Australia and Barbara Kamler, Deakin University. The university researchers invited early career teachers in their first five years of teaching, and late career teachers with at least twenty-five years experience, to collaboratively explore the problem of unequal outcomes in literacy. Over a period of three years, the teacher researchers conducted audits of their classroom literacy programs and the effects on different children; case studies of students they were most concerned about; and redesigns of their literacy curriculum and pedagogy.  Bev Maney and Ivan Boyer collaborated as research partners in the context of their work together as English teachers at Portland Secondary College, Victoria. This paper is based on transcripts of their many conversations with one other and the research team and is represented as an interrupted conversation with the university researchers. Here they critique current models of professional development and the effects of standardised testing and argue for the importance of serious teacher conversations and ongoing school-based research.

Seeing 'things' differently : recognition, ethics, praxis

This essay focuses on the recent introduction by the Australian Federal Government of standardised literacy testing in all states across Australia (that is, the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy, or NAPLAN), and explores the way this reform is mediating the work of English literacy educators in primary and secondary schools. We draw on data collected as part of a research project funded by the Australian Research Council, involving interviews with teachers about their experiences of implementing standardised testing. These interviews indicate that the introduction of standardised testing does not merely constitute an additional part of teachers” workloads, but that it is having a significant impact on their identity as language educators, their understanding of curriculum and pedagogy, and the relationships they seek to maintain with their students. By introducing the NAPLAN tests, the Australian Federal Government is going down the path of other neo-liberal governments around the world. No doubt the story we tell will be familiar to readers in other countries. Our aim, however, is more than simply to give yet another account of the tensions experienced by committed language and literacy teachers as they implement neoliberal policy mandates. Key questions for us include: Why is the Australian government persisting with such policies, even when they have had such dubious consequences (teaching to the test, dumbing down, and so on.) in other national settings? How might educators resist these reforms? What intellectual resources might enable us to articulate an alternative vision of language education to that imposed by neoliberal reforms?
We present an account of conversations with a group of teachers in a primary school in the northern suburbs of Melbourne, not in order to make large claims about how the profession in Australia as a whole judges standards based reforms, but because their talk prompts reflection about the possibility of resisting such policy initiatives. Our impulse is largely a philosophical one – we are raising questions about how neoliberal reforms construct teachers and their students, what they presuppose about the nature of life and its potential, and how educators might dissent from the world view that is being imposed. And rather than simply investigating how teachers are grappling with standards-based reforms, as though it is yet again a matter of putting teachers under the spotlight, we also raise questions about the responsibility of academics and teacher educators to maintain a critical standpoint within the policy environment created by such changes.

Standards-based accountability : reification, responsibility and the ethical subject

Over the last two decades, teachers in Australia have witnessed multiple incarnations of the idea of ‘educational accountability’ and its enactment. Research into this phenomenon of educational policy and practice has revealed various layers of the concept, particularly its professional, bureaucratic, political and cultural dimensions that are central to the restructuring of educational governance and the reorganization of teachers’ work. Today, accountability constitutes a core concept of neoliberal policy-making in education, both fashioning and normalizing what counts as teacher professionalism in the ‘audit society.’ This article focuses specifically on the recent introduction by the Australian Federal Government of standardised literacy testing in all states across Australia, and raises questions about the impact of this reform on the work practices of English literacy teachers in primary and secondary schools. We draw on data collected as part of a major research project funded by the Australian Research Council, involving interviews with teachers about their experiences of implementing standardised testing. The article traces the ways in which teachers’ work is increasingly being mediated by standardised literacy testing to show how these teachers grapple with the tensions between state-wide mandates and a sense of their professional responsibility for their students.

Storytelling and professional learning

This essay explores the role that storytelling might play in the professional learning of English teachers. It begins by reflecting on the ways that stories shape our everyday lives, and then considers how the meaning-making potential of storytelling might enable us to gain insights into our work as educators. This is in contradistinction to the 'knowledge' currently privileged by standards­ based reforms, most notably the fetish of measurement reflected in standardised testing. The essay concludes that stories are not simply a form of knowing but a vital means of making the world human to us.

Chemosensory science in the context of cancer treatment: implications for patient care

Introduction: This collaborative commentary brings together both clinical and sensory science perspectives in an effort to explain the mechanisms of cancer treatment and the ensuing implications for the sensorium. Strategy: This paper makes the distinction between food hedonics and true chemosensory effects in the cancer context and describes the adverse effects cancer and its treatment have on the eating and drinking experience, including gastronomic, nutritional and emotional implications. Results from a prospective breast cancer cohort study, conducted by an interdisciplinary team of nurses, medical oncologists, dietitians and sensory science researchers shed new light on specific sensory symptomatology associated with chemotherapy treatment and the implications this has for informing reliable pre-treatment patient education. Findings: Two conceptual models are posed as frameworks for better understanding the determinants and consequences of altered eating and drinking experiences during chemotherapy, as well as the link between patient-reported symptoms and chemosensory or hedonic disturbances. Discussion: Application of evidence of cancer treatment and its sensory effects in the patient treatment context continues to be a challenge for cancer clinicians, especially where standardised testing of taste and smell function are not able to be practically administered. Conclusions: Recommendations are made for further research and practice pursuits to underpin improved food enjoyment and dietary quality throughout the cancer trajectory. Clinician education of sensory science is also encouraged.

Course of psychological variables in whiplash injury--a 2-year follow-up with age, gender and education pair-matched patients

This study evaluated the course of psychological variables during a 2-year follow-up in patients after common whiplash of the cervical spine. From a sample of 117 non-selected patients with common whiplash (investigated on average 7.2 +/- 4.2 days after trauma) a total of 21 suffered trauma-related symptoms over 2 years following initial injury. These patients (symptomatic group) were compared with 21 age, gender and education pair-matched patients, who showed complete recovery from trauma-related symptoms during the 2-year follow-up (asymptomatic group). Both groups underwent standardised testing procedures (i.e., Freiburg Personality Inventory and Well-Being Scale) at referral, and at 3, 6 and 24 months. In the symptomatic group during follow-up no significant changes in rating of neck pain or headache were found. Significant differences between the groups and significant deviation of scores over time were found on the Well-Being and Nervousness Scales. There was a lack of significant difference between the groups on the Depression Scale, indicating a possible somatic basis for changes in psychological functioning in the investigated sample. With regard to scales of Extraversion or Neuroticism, there were neither significant differences between the groups nor significant deviation over time. These results highlight that patients' psychological problems are rather a consequence than a cause of somatic symptoms in whiplash.

Evaluation of modern intraocular lenses

Accommodating Intraocular Lenses (IOLs), multifocal IOLs (MIOLs) and toric IOLs are designed to provide a greater level of spectacle independency post cataract surgery. All of these IOLs are reliant on the accurate calculation of intraocular lens power determined through reliable ocular biometry. A standardised defocus area metric and reading performance index metric were devised for the evaluation of the range of focus and the reading ability of subjects implanted with presbyopic correcting IOLs. The range of clear vision after implantation of an MIOL is extended by a second focal point; however, this results in the prevalence of dysphotopsia. A bespoke halometer was designed and validated to assess this photopic phenomenon. There is a lack of standardisation in the methods used for determining IOL orientation and thus rotation. A repeatable, objective method was developed to allow the accurate assessment of IOL rotation, which was used to determine the rotational and positional stability of a closed loop haptic IOL. A new commercially available biometry device was validated for use with subjects prior to cataract surgery. The optical low coherence reflectometry instrument proved to be a valid method for assessing ocular biometry and covered a wider range of ocular parameters in comparison with previous instruments. The advantages of MIOLs were shown to include an extended range of clear vision translating into greater reading ability. However, an increased prevalence of dysphotopsia was shown with a bespoke halometer, which was dependent on the MIOL optic design. Implantation of a single optic accommodating IOL did not improve reading ability but achieved high subjective ratings of near vision. The closed-loop haptic IOL displayed excellent rotational stability in the late period but relatively poor rotational stability in the early period post implantation. The orientation error was compounded by the high frequency of positional misalignment leading to an extensive overall misalignment of the IOL. This thesis demonstrates the functionality of new IOL lens designs and the importance of standardised testing methods, thus providing a greater understanding of the consequences of implanting these IOLs. Consequently, the findings of the thesis will influence future designs of IOLs and testing methods.

MySchool:whose school? an Australian investigation of the mediatization of educational policy

In investigating how three Australian newspapers and six school principals interacted with a significant policy initiative, namely the MySchool website, this research argues against homogenous views of both print-media and mediatization. It further argues that while press reporting on education policy is often an opportunity for newspapers to present newspaper-specific views of what policy ought to be, mediatization is not a one-way process. Rather, it is a dynamic one, defined and shaped by struggle and contestation, through which the press may also be subject to change. The research further suggests that strong school leaders play a crucial role in enabling schools to resist mediatized efforts to alter their practice and autonomy.

The effects of standardised assessment (NAPLAN) on teacher pedagogy at two Queensland schools

The purpose of this qualitative interpretative case study was to explore how the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) requirements may be affecting pedagogies of two Year 3, Year 5 and Year 7 teachers at two Queensland schools. The perceived problem was that standardised assessment NAPLAN practices and its growing status as a key measure of education quality throughout Australia has the potential to limit the everyday literacy and numeracy practices of teachers to instructional methods primarily focused on teaching to the test. The findings demonstrate how increased explicit teaching of NAPLAN content and procedural knowledge prior to testing has the potential to negatively impact on the teaching of everyday literacy and numeracy skills and knowledge that extend beyond those concerned with NAPLAN. Such teaching limited opportunity for what teachers reported as valued collaborative learning contexts aiming for long-term literacy and numeracy results.

Design, characterisation and in vivo testing of a new, adjustable stiffness, external fixator for the rat femur

Very little is known about the infl uence of the mechanical environment on the healing of large segmental defects. This partly reflects the lack of standardised, well characterised technologies to enable such studies. Here we report the design, construction and characterisation of a novel external fixator for use in conjunction with rat femoral defects. This device not only imposes a predetermined axial stiffness on the lesion, but also enables the stiffness to be changed during the healing process. The main frame of the fi xator consists of polyethylethylketone with titanium alloy mounting pins. The stiffness of the fi xator is determined by interchangeable connection elements of different thicknesses. Fixators were shown to stabilise 5 mm femoral defects in rats in vivo for at least 8 weeks during unrestricted cage activity. No distortion or infections, including pin infections, were noted. The healing process was simulated in vitro by inserting into a 5 mm femoral defect, materials whose Young’s moduli approximated those of the different tissues present in regenerating bone. These studies confirmed that, although the external fixator is the major determinant of axial stiffness during the early phase of healing, the regenerate within the lesion subsequently dominates this property. There is much clinical interest in altering the mechanics of the defect to enhance bone healing. Our data suggest that, if alteration of the mechanical environment is to be used to modulate the healing of large segmental defects, this needs to be performed before the tissue properties become dominant.