3D virtual worlds as environments for literacy learning

Background: Although much has been written about the ways in which new technology might transform educational practice, particularly in the area of literacy learning, there is relatively little empirical work that explores the possibilities and problems - or even what such a transformation might look like in the classroom. 3D virtual worlds offer a range of opportunities for children to use digital literacies in school, and suggest one way in which we might explore changing literacy practices in a playful, yet meaningful context. Purpose: This paper identifies some of the key issues that emerged in designing and implementing virtual world work in a small number of primary schools in the UK. It examines the tensions between different discourses about literacy and literacy learning and shows how these were played out by teachers and pupils in classroom settings.Sources of evidence: Case study data are used as a basis for exploring and illustrating key aspects of design and implementation. The case study material includes views from a number of perspectives including classroom observations, chatlogs, in-world avatar interviews with teachers and also pupils, as well as the author’s field notes of the planning process with accompanying minutes and meeting documents.Main argument: From a Foucauldian perspective, the article suggests that social control of pedagogical practice through the regulation of curriculum time, the normalisation of teaching routines and the regimes of individual assessment restricts teachers’ and pupils’ conceptions of what constitutes literacy. The counternarrative, found in recent work in new litearcies (Lankshear & Knobel, 2006) provides an attractive alternative, but a movement in this direction requires a fundamental shift of emphasis and a re-conceptualisation of what counts as learning.Conclusions: This work on 3D virtual worlds questions the notion of how transformative practice can be achieved with the use of new technologies. It suggests that changes in teacher preparation, continuing professional development as well as wider educational reform may be needed

Listening to old wives’ tales: small stories and the (re)making and (re)telling of research in HE/FE practitioner education

In this paper we share the outcomes of a project that sought to take up Nutbrown’s challenge to ‘push out from the safe(er) boundaries of established methodologies’ in early years research. We explore the value of auto-ethnographic storytelling, Lyotard’s ‘petit récit’, to the processes of doing and learning about research in the context of practitioner education. We offer a rationale for the use of creative methods in (post?) professional learning and describe the process of working with identity boxes and symbolic objects, to produce a collection of auto-ethnographic narratives, the old wives’ tales of the title, through which to explore practitioners’ experiences of professional identity formation. We consider the opportunities such methods offer for reflexive learning about practitioner positionality within the knowledge-making practices of research and attempt to (re)position ourselves differently as writers and makers of research. Towards a conclusion we review and theorise meanings participant-researchers make about their career trajectories and proffer auto-ethnography as a dynamic modality for practitioner learning. We mobilise Patti Lather’s notion of methodological proliferation to re-think practitioner education as a wild profusion of post-professional possibilities

Cyberbullying: its nature and impact in secondary school pupils

Background:  Cyberbullying describes bullying using mobile phones and the internet. Most previous studies have focused on the prevalence of text message and email bullying. Methods:  Two surveys with pupils aged 11–16 years: (1) 92 pupils from 14 schools, supplemented by focus groups; (2) 533 pupils from 5 schools, to assess the generalisability of findings from the first study, and investigate relationships of cyberbullying to general internet use. Both studies differentiated cyberbullying inside and outside of school, and 7 media of cyberbullying. Results:  Both studies found cyberbullying less frequent than traditional bullying, but appreciable, and reported more outside of school than inside. Phone call and text message bullying were most prevalent, with instant messaging bullying in the second study; their impact was perceived as comparable to traditional bullying. Mobile phone/video clip bullying, while rarer, was perceived to have more negative impact. Age and gender differences varied between the two studies. Study 1 found that most cyberbullying was done by one or a few students, usually from the same year group. It often just lasted about a week, but sometimes much longer. The second study found that being a cybervictim, but not a cyberbully, correlated with internet use; many cybervictims were traditional ‘bully-victims’. Pupils recommended blocking/avoiding messages, and telling someone, as the best coping strategies; but many cybervictims had told nobody about it. Conclusions:  Cyberbullying is an important new kind of bullying, with some different characteristics from traditional bullying. Much happens outside school. Implications for research and practical action are discussed