Breaking Free from the Needs Paradigm: A Collaborative Analysis of Inclusion

The Version of Record of this manuscript has been published and is available in Studying Teacher Education 2019 http://www.tandfonline.com/doi:10.1080/17425964.2018.1541290This self-study, based on research, conducted over five years, focuses on my leadership role employing an inclusion model of education in a school in Iceland serving students from ages 6 to 16. In this article, we examine how Edda’s practice helped support inclusion for the students, their families, and the teachers who engage with them. This multilayered self-study research project included feedback and insights from others in order to inform my understanding of my practice within the context of inclusion. Findings reveal Edda’s focus on the discourse of diagnosis as a dominant structural issue within her practice. The resulting themes on perceptions of inclusion, coordination of support, deployment of people, and collaboration across different entities have informed my understanding about my practice and my perspective on the meaning of a support system within inclusive education and improved student performance.Peer Reviewe

The 13th Southern Hemisphere Conference on the Teaching and Learning of Undergraduate Mathematics and Statistics

Ngā mihi aroha ki ngā tangata katoa and warm greetings to you all. Welcome to Herenga Delta 2021, the Thirteenth Southern Hemisphere Conference on the Teaching and Learning of Undergraduate Mathematics and Statistics. It has been ten years since the Volcanic Delta Conference in Rotorua, and we are excited to have the Delta community return to Aotearoa New Zealand, if not in person, then by virtual means. Although the limits imposed by the pandemic mean that most of this year’s 2021 participants are unable to set foot in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, this has certainly not stopped interest in this event. Participants have been invited to draw on the concept of herenga, in Te Reo Māori usually a mooring place where people from afar come to share their knowledge and experiences. Although many of the participants are still some distance away, the submissions that have been sent in will continue to stimulate discussion on mathematics and statistics undergraduate education in the Delta tradition. The conference invited papers, abstracts and posters, working within the initial themes of Values and Variables. The range of submissions is diverse, and will provide participants with many opportunities to engage, discuss, and network with colleagues across the Delta community. The publications for this thirteenth Delta Conference include publications in the International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and Technology, iJMEST, (available at https://www.tandfonline.com/journals/tmes20/collections/Herenga-Delta-2021), the Conference Proceedings, and the Programme (which has created some interesting challenges around time-zones), by the Local Organizing Committee. Papers in the iJMEST issue and the Proceedings were peer reviewed by at least two reviewers per paper. Of the ten submissions to the Proceedings, three were accepted. We are pleased to now be at the business end of the conference and hope that this event will carry on the special atmosphere of the many Deltas which have preceded this one. We hope that you will enjoy this conference, the virtual and social experiences that accompany it, and take the opportunity to contribute to further enhancing mathematics and statistics undergraduate education. Ngā manaakitanga, Phil Kane (The University of Auckland | Waipapa Taumata Rau) on behalf of the Local Organising Committ

Rereading and its effects on reading comprehension

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of rereading as a metacognitive strategy termed focused rereading. The study was conducted over three weeks, involving sixty-six fifth grade subjects from four classrooms in one elementary school. Subjects were randomly assigned to three treatment groups: rereading with training (RRT), rereading without training (RRW), and a control assignment (CA). All subjects were pretested for prior knowledge during the first week, followed by training in the use of written retellings over four days during the second week. Specific treatment training, either in the focused rereading training or in a placebo training, occurred during the first four days of the third week. Post testing occurred on the final day of the third week, involving a test expository passage, a primary comprehension measure using written retelling, followed by a secondary comprehension measure using a multiple choice post test. Results showed no significant differences across treatment groups. High-achievement readers scored significantly better than low achievement readers across treatments. Written retellings appeared to measure different comprehension factors than multiple choice testing, however, both ranked performance in similar ways. Teacher evaluations of achievement were strongly similar to stanine evaluations of achievement

Trapped in the needs paradigm

This paper is a result of a collaboration across three researchers: the first author is a leader of the support system at the Waterfront school (pseudonym used) whose practice is the focus of this study, and the second and third authors engaged in the role as critical friends. Inclusion is the national policy that has the most effect on my practice as the leader of the support system for inclusive practice in a compulsory school serving all the children (ages 6-16) in the local community (approximately 500 pupils). As the leader of support I supervise special education teachers, classroom assistants, and social educators (educators who focus on social needs of learners). Another aspect of my role is to help classroom teachers with effective practices for learners with special needs, and to coordinate the delivery of special education. Inclusive practice is grounded in the ideologies of social justice, democracy, human rights and full participation of all (Ainscow, 2005; Florian, 2008; Guðjónsdóttir & Karlsdóttir, 2009; Jónsson, 2011). Inclusion is seen as an ongoing process focusing on increased performance, working against inequality, and increasing people’s sense of belonging in school and society (Booth, 2010). My reasons for doing self-study of my practice were that I felt the functionality of inclusive practices in my school was lacking, as could be seen in the “overreliance on paraprofessionals”(Giangreco, Broer, & Suter, 2011, p. 23), in the call for pull-out programs, in the lack of innovative solutions for pupils with emotional/behavioural problems, and in the daily discourse of labelling pupils according to their assessed deficits. However, my main reason for concern was that teachers often regarded pupils with special needs as guests in their classrooms, as these pupils have allocated support and the support system “owns” them. This self-study research, conducted over the past five years, focuses on my leadership role within an inclusion model of education and examines how my practice can help to support inclusion for the pupils, their families, and the teachers who engage with these pupils (Ainscow, Booth, & Dyson, 2004, 2006; Florian, 2014). This self-study was the central focus of this multi-layered research that included feedback and insights from others in order to inform my understanding of my practice within the context of inclusion. The purpose of this self-study was twofold: a) to understand my role in improving leadership and collaboration for inclusion, and b) to develop the support service in Waterfront School so that it reinforces inclusive practice. My self-study research was driven by the following over-arching question and sub-question: • How can I as a coordinator for support services improve the practice of support services in an inclusive school? • What can I do to make the organisation of support more inclusive

Self-Study and Diversity II: Inclusive Teacher Education for a Diverse World

Self-Study and Diversity II is a book about the self-study of teacher education practices in a diverse world. In this volume, the authors examine the preparation of teachers through a shared orientation to diversity grounded in a commitment to addressing issues of identity, equity, diversity, social justice, inclusion, and access in their professional practice. The first chapters are autobiographical studies in which teacher educators reflect on how their personal identities as minorities within a historically oppressive culture inform their professional practice. These powerful narratives are followed by accounts of teacher educators addressing diversity issues in the United Arab Emirates, India, South Africa, and Thailand. The closing chapters attend to the challenges of preparing teacher candidates to become inclusive educators in a diverse world. Even though each chapter focusses on a particular dimension of equity and social justice or dilemma of practice, the insights in these self-studies are relevant to all teacher educators interested in improving teacher education by respecting diversity and becoming more inclusive. Particular strengths are the diversity of authors and international scope of the book. -- Provided by publisherhttps://scholarworks.uni.edu/facbook/1445/thumbnail.jp

Self-Study and Diversity

Self-study and Diversity is a book about self-study of teaching and teacher education with equity and access as focal issues of practice. Chapters in this book have a shared orientation to diversity grounded in the acknowledgement that educators have a responsibility to address equity and access issues inherent in teaching. To that end, individual chapters address such areas of diversity as race, ethnicity, gender, disability, and power, as well as broader areas of social justice, multiculturalism, and ways of knowing. Even though the focus in a chapter may be on one particular dimension of diversity, the dilemmas and responses of a teacher educator, elicited through self-study, can apply well beyond that immediate context. This broadens the appeal of the book beyond the self-study community and beyond specific issues of diversity, to people interested in teaching in general and in the process of improving practice. The chapters of the book are organized in five sections, with each section containing similar self-study approaches. These self-study approaches were specifically chosen by the researchers as effective avenues toward understanding the complex dynamics inherent in their diversity contexts. Section one comprises autobiographical research, drawing readers in through life stories. In section two the autobiographical method is grounded in explicit theory. Section three takes the reader into classrooms where practices of teaching and learning are illuminated. In section four, collaboration is highlighted as the focal point within classroom-based self-studies. In section five, self-study is supported by the use of artifacts and visual representation. An additional strength of this book is the inclusion in each chapter of information regarding the use of particular strategies, both for self-study and for teaching for diversity. -- Provided by publisherhttps://scholarworks.uni.edu/facbook/1446/thumbnail.jp