Challenging 'quality': an investigation of theoretical and pedagogical conceptualisations of 'quality' in the primary school in England

This thesis challenges the way the concept of quality is understood, approached and defined. The concept of quality has fascinated me for over a decade. Initially I was shocked by the importance of the concept and the complete absence of any clear understanding about what it means. In recent years I have become increasingly concerned about the emphasis on simple outcome oriented definitions – the acceptance that quality can be measured solely in terms of pupils test scores. The literature depicts the concept of quality as complex and elusive in equal measure, compounded by narrow interpretations that focus on pupil outcomes as an overly simplistic (and problematic) definitional approach. It also suggests ways of approaching the concept that offer broader more humanist interpretations but these do not feature in the dominant definitions. Quality as a concept has received attention from the academic world but the literature is complex and contradictory. I argue that quality is typically treated as abstract but defined as concrete – it has become reified. The evidence would suggest that quality is in fact contested, poorly defined and hard to debate. This has been associated with problematic positioning of teachers and pupils – separately and in relation to each other In my quest to challenge the concept of quality my intentions have been threefold: 1) to explore the literature and reveal weaknesses or gaps in the current understandings; 2) then, to reawaken interest in less prevalent ways of investigating or understanding the concept; and finally, 3) to experiment with investigating quality through interaction in particular. I have done this in four ways: 1) through exploring the way that the concept of quality has been understood and defined in text (the academic literature) arriving at two conceptual frameworks; 2) through exploring with staff and pupils in four English primary schools how they understand the concept of quality (talk) by collating the views 45 staff members and 97 pupils; 3) through observing and interpreting the interactions and enactments of four teachers and four pupils (interaction); and through critical consideration of a connection I think may exist between the work of research-engaged schools and an alternative approach to defining quality that has been proposed but ignored in the literature. Inspired by post-structuralism and social constructionism, with influences from interpretivism and discourse analysis the thesis combines an analysis and synthesis of literature with two phases of empirical work that were conducted in four primary schools in England. The thesis contributes to knowledge theoretically and empirically. First, through the development of two conceptual frameworks from a synthesis of literature; secondly, by privileging in-school voices and exploring what quality means to staff and pupils; and thirdly, by investigating the concept of quality through observation of teacher/pupil interaction and enactment

The effect of magnesium vacancies on the intraband scattering in MgxB2 as determined by point contact Andreev reflection

In order to introduce structural defects into the band with minimal distortions in the band, bulk samples of varying magnesium content were prepared. Point contact Andreev reflection measurements reveal that the density of states of the band and the behavior of the energy gaps in field imply a relative increase of band to band scattering with increasing magnesium deficiency. The results are consistent with the observed increase of the low temperature Hc2 value in magnesium deficient MgB2

IMBES pre-conference: using insight from research to improve education

In September 2016, the International Mind, Brain, and Education Society (IMBES) biennial conference took place in Toronto, Canada. The pre-conference (organized by the Wellcome Trust) was designed to share new findings, lessons learned, and inspirational innovation within the field, and to encourage the community to not only identify current challenges, but to start planning potential ways to address them. This article provides a brief summary of the discussions from the day, and suggests steps that members of the community, conference organizers, and funders can take in helping to move the field forward. Finally, it outlines new work Wellcome has commissioned since the conference in response to some of the challenges defined on the day

The sustainability of Egan’s Skilled Helper Model in students’ social work practice

This paper investigates the nature of students’ learning of the Egan Skilled Helper model in enabling them to develop collaborative communication skills which place service-users at the centre of decision making. The paper is a follow-up to an earlier paper which found that the Egan model was helpful to students as a communication and problem management tool and that they had transferred their learning into practice. The current study involves seven students from the first study and examines whether their knowledge and skills from learning the model in year one have been sustained two years later during their third year practice placement. A key finding is that participants were continuing to use most stages of the model (with the exception of challenging skills) with service-users in a variety of settings. Further findings are that the model is still useful in situations where goals are set by social workers rather than by service-users; and that it is the utilisation of role-play when learning the model which most embeds skills. The implications of these findings for skills training are discussed together with suggestions for further focus

Extracting the diffusivity ratio from point contact Andreev reflection spectroscopy and upper critical field measurements in MgB2

The di®usivity ratio ´, which measures the relative intraband scattering in the ¼ and ¾ bands in MgB2 has been determined by ¯tting the Hc2(T) at T » Tc and by Point Contact Andreev Re°ection. We ¯nd a satisfactory agreement between the values for ´ obtained by both methods for c-axis orientated MgB2 thin ¯lms. Point contact Andreev Re°ection was then applied to bulk MgB2 containing Mg vacancies. Spectra obtained in zero ¯eld indicate a distribution of the two gaps ¢¾;¼ but no merging of the values with increased magnesium de¯ciency. Spectra ¯tted as a function of ¯eld are consistent with an increase in ¼ intraband scattering with increasing magnesium de¯ciency. Measurement of the point contact Andreev re°ection spectra as a function of temperature revealed features not immediately expected from current theoretical models

Testing a dynamic field account of interactions between spatial attention and spatial working memory

Studies examining the relationship between spatial attention and spatial working memory (SWM) have shown that discrimination responses are faster for targets appearing at locations that are being maintained in SWM, and that location memory is impaired when attention is withdrawn during the delay. These observations support the proposal that sustained attention is required for successful retention in SWM: if attention is withdrawn, memory representations are likely to fail, increasing errors. In the present study, this proposal is reexamined in light of a neural process model of SWM. On the basis of the model’s functioning, we propose an alternative explanation for the observed decline in SWM performance when a secondary task is performed during retention: SWM representations drift systematically toward the location of targets appearing during the delay. To test this explanation, participants completed a color-discrimination task during the delay interval of a spatial recall task. In the critical shifting attention condition, the color stimulus could appear either toward or away from the memorized location relative to a midline reference axis. We hypothesized that if shifting attention during the delay leads to the failure of SWM representations, there should be an increase in the variance of recall errors but no change in directional error, regardless of the direction of the shift. Conversely, if shifting attention induces drift of SWM representations—as predicted by the model—there should be systematic changes in the pattern of spatial recall errors depending on the direction of the shift. Results were consistent with the latter possibility—recall errors were biased toward the location of discrimination targets appearing during the delay