El profeso de musica como gestor cultural (The concept of a music teacher as a cultural manager)

The concept of teacher as cultural manager examines two teachers working in a difficult school context and compares their characteristics and behaviour in this context to theory derived from a larger ongoing study. The paper outlines a preliminary study that has been created to identify a framework of research strategies that are able to capture the characteristics of good practice in music teaching that promotes social inclusion. The study is philosophically founded upon Buber’s notion of inclusive relationships and explores a description of the characteristics of the teacher and community derived from a doctoral study into the meaning of music to children and the ways in which teachers give access to meaningful music making. The findings suggest that the teacher performs multiple roles to facilitate access to meaningful music experience through their relationship with community and the students. The role of teacher as builder of context and as a manager of the cultural life of students emerges as an important concept that requires further study in a larger investigation

The future for primary physical education

An in-depth examination of secondary research was undertaken together with a focussed case study to investigate whether current practices within primary physical education (PE) were best serving the learning needs of children in primary schools. A secondary purpose of this research was to examine the implications for this area of primary education regarding the professionalisation of sports coaching. The study was conducted within a unitary authority in the South West of England. Semi-structured interviews were conducted, firstly with both Partnership Development Managers (PDMs), followed up by questionnaires carried out with all of their School Sport Co-ordinators (SSCo's). Subsequent semi-structured interviews were then conducted with a primary school head teacher, a head of primary Initial Teacher Education (ITE), and with the only specialist primary PE teacher found within this authority. These research processes extrapolated information which highlighted current practices in many primary schools with regards to their PE delivery, and the findings illustrated that whilst current PE provision in most secondary schools was generally believed to be of a high standard, embracing recent initiatives and the current National Curriculum, the delivery of PE in primary schools was found to be less consistent. After several processes of inductive research it was concluded that widespread changes in the whole primary PE provision, starting from Initial Teacher Education, ought to be considered

save to DISC: Documenting Innovation in Music Learning

The paper discusses an approach to determining the worth and value of innovation in music education and measuring it’s capacity for meaning and engagement. It also aims to identify new examples of innovation across a broad range of music learning contexts and establish a rigorous digital process for documenting, evaluating and distributing innovative cases and resources for present and future contexts. It discusses specifically a pilot project that seeks to document innovation in sound curriculum (DISC). save to DISC is an exploratory study in an Australasian CRC for Interaction Design (ACID) project that proposes to establish flexible and effective procedures for the sourcing, evaluating, refereeing, editing, producing, validating, storing, publishing, and distributing of a wide range of media and content types. It involves documenting innovative and successful practice in music education, creating and evaluating programs in difficult/challenging school contexts and commissioning and encouraging the production of resource materials for 21 st century contexts

Area 1: An Overview of Evidence for the National Approach to Professional Learning in Education

This report reviews published literature on the way that countries around the globe have organised and systematised professional learning for teachers in a time of curriculum change. It first reviews country specific literature and then presents evidence on the organisation of professional learning from more general literature, which is more concerned with improvements in practice. All literature used is either from peer-reviewed journals or from academic books. The literature was found by using scholarly search engines, searching under various terms indicating professional learning. In this way literature was uncovered that will be used to support or to question the approach that the Welsh Government takes towards professional learning in education

PB4L school-wide evaluation: preliminary findings

Abstract: This report presents indicative findings from the first phase of an evaluation of Positive Behaviour for Learning: School-Wide (PB4L: School-Wide). The report discusses the implementation and short-term shifts for schools that began PB4L: School-Wide in 2010/11. The findings suggest that overall, PB4L: School-Wide is well-regarded in participating schools and is linked to a wide range of changes for schools, teachers, and students

Making time for great teaching

The report examines the timetables and budgets of six diverse schools across the country to identify ways they can change their practices in order to free up time for teacher development. Overview School education in Australia is slipping. We are falling down the international rankings and our students are performing at a lower level in some subjects than they were a decade ago, according to the OECD. How we respond is vital for our students’ future. High-performing systems around the world know that improving the effectiveness of teaching is the way to lift school performance. They seek to increase the quality – not the quantity – of teaching. They know teaching improves when teachers learn from each other. So they ensure teachers are mentored and teach classes in front of skilled observers, who provide constructive feedback. They make time for teachers to undertake practical research in their schools on how to lift student learning. Governments and many schools have tried to implement similar professional learning programs. But success has been limited. A major stumbling block is finding the resources and time in the school week. Each year we ask schools and teachers to do more. In fact, we need to get them to do less, so they have more time to improve their teaching. This report shows how. We worked extensively with six diverse schools across the country that are striving to give teachers more time. We talked to their teachers and school leaders to develop, fully cost and find time for intensive programs such as intensive mentoring, observation of teachers and feedback on their work, active collaboration and school-based research. Ideally, teachers would have at least three extra school periods a week for these programs. Most of the time can be found by reducing the time teachers spend on ineffective professional development, staff meetings, school assemblies, extra subjects and extra-curricular activities. Schools must make difficult but crucial trade-offs in how teachers and school leaders spend their time. We must be explicit that every time we ask teachers to perform extra activities we are decreasing the quality of teaching and learning in schools. Education strategy must change. Governments must lead the way and prioritise how money is spent at all levels of education. They are still funding ineffective professional learning that lacks accountability. Government regulations restrict schools. Enterprise bargaining agreements restrict changes to work schedules, and duty of care requirements restrain schools that want to free their teachers from child minding to focus on improving teaching. We cannot expect teachers to lift our students to the world’s best while also insisting they spend time on yard duty, pastoral care, and supervising extra-curricular activities. Similarly, we should not follow low-performing systems around the world that have tried to improve schools by decreasing class sizes and increasing the time teachers spend in the classroom. Instead, we must make time for programs that develop teacher skills and deliver great teaching. Some Australian schools, even those with scarce resources and high levels of disadvantage, are making hard choices right now. For the sake of our students all schools and school systems should follow their lead

Peer coaching in a school in Cairo, Egypt: Implementation, barriers, and pathways to effective adoption

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine how peer coaching was introduced in one school in Egypt and to identify barriers and opportunities for successful implementation. Design/methodology/approach – The methodology included semi-structured interviews with eight teachers, participant observation of their classes and meetings, and three focus group meetings with teachers and school administrators. Findings – Ladyshewsky’s (2017) five key aspects of peer coaching are considered in the findings: establishing peer partners, building trust between the partners, identifying specific areas to target for learning, training on non-evaluative questions and feedback, and supporting each other as new ideas are attempted. Each aspect of these is reviewed in light of the implementation process in the school. Practical implications – The study provides practical suggestions for teachers and school administrators that include considerations for implementation. Numerous connections are made to research on peer coaching that is relevant to the implementation of peer coaching in schools in Egypt and other countries in the Global South. Originality/value – The study provides an examination of the implementation of peer coaching in a school in Egypt. Thus, it contributes to the limited literature on peer coaching in the Global South. The discussion and conclusion sections consider further questions and research opportunities for effective practices in peer coaching in international contexts

The sustainable delivery of sexual violence prevention education in schools

Sexual violence is a crime that cannot be ignored: it causes our communities significant consequences including heavy economic costs, and evidence of its effects can be seen in our criminal justice system, public health system, Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC), and education system, particularly in our schools. Many agencies throughout New Zealand work to end sexual violence. Auckland-based Rape Prevention Education: Whakatu Mauri (RPE) is one such agency, and is committed to preventing sexual violence by providing a range of programmes and initiatives, information, education, and advocacy to a broad range of audiences. Up until early 2014 RPE employed one or two full-time positions dedicated to co-ordinating and training a large pool (up to 15) of educators on casual contracts to deliver their main school-based programmes, BodySafe – approximately 450 modules per year, delivered to some 20 high schools. Each year several of the contract educators, many of whom were tertiary students, found secure full time employment elsewhere. To retain sufficient contract educators to deliver its BodySafe contract meant that RPE had to recruit, induct and train new educators two to three times every year. This model was expensive, resource intense, and ultimately untenable. The Executive Director and core staff at RPE wanted to develop a more efficient and stable model of delivery that fitted its scarce resources. To enable RPE to know what the most efficient model was nationally and internationally, with Ministry of Justice funding, RPE commissioned Massey University to undertake this report reviewing national and international research on sexual violence prevention education (SVPE)

The sustainable delivery of sexual violence prevention education in schools

Sexual violence is a crime that cannot be ignored: it causes our communities significant consequences including heavy economic costs, and evidence of its effects can be seen in our criminal justice system, public health system, Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC), and education system, particularly in our schools. Many agencies throughout New Zealand work to end sexual violence. Auckland-based Rape Prevention Education: Whakatu Mauri (RPE) is one such agency, and is committed to preventing sexual violence by providing a range of programmes and initiatives, information, education, and advocacy to a broad range of audiences. Up until early 2014 RPE employed one or two full-time positions dedicated to co-ordinating and training a large pool (up to 15) of educators on casual contracts to deliver their main school-based programmes, BodySafe – approximately 450 modules per year, delivered to some 20 high schools. Each year several of the contract educators, many of whom were tertiary students, found secure full time employment elsewhere. To retain sufficient contract educators to deliver its BodySafe contract meant that RPE had to recruit, induct and train new educators two to three times every year. This model was expensive, resource intense, and ultimately untenable. The Executive Director and core staff at RPE wanted to develop a more efficient and stable model of delivery that fitted its scarce resources. To enable RPE to know what the most efficient model was nationally and internationally, with Ministry of Justice funding, RPE commissioned Massey University to undertake this report reviewing national and international research on sexual violence prevention education (SVPE). [Background from Executive Summary.]Rape Prevention Education: Whakatu Maur