Andrew Noyes

Video diary: a method for exploring learning dispositions

This paper presents an innovative method for qualitative research in education. The video dairy technique was developed and used alongside other qualitative methods to map the socio‐cultural landscape of primary‐school childrens learning dispositions prior to their transfer to secondary school. The larger project comprised a case study of a group of children transferring from one Year 6 classroom to their local comprehensive secondary school, with particular reference to their learning of mathematics. Theoretically framed by Pierre Bourdieus sociological tools, the study explored the impact of three fields—school, family and peer group—upon childrens learning dispositions and trajectories at this school interface. The alternative perspectives afforded by the diary entries highlighted the inter‐relatedness of the three fields of interest, often in ways that had not been anticipated or considered. I will explain practical aspects of the process and consider some of the challenges that might be experience...This paper presents an innovative method for qualitative research in education. The video dairy technique was developed and used alongside other qualitative methods to map the socio‐cultural landscape of primary‐school childrens learning dispositions prior to their transfer to secondary school. The larger project comprised a case study of a group of children transferring from one Year 6 classroom to their local comprehensive secondary school, with particular reference to their learning of mathematics. Theoretically framed by Pierre Bourdieus sociological tools, the study explored the impact of three fields—school, family and peer group—upon childrens learning dispositions and trajectories at this school interface. The alternative perspectives afforded by the diary entries highlighted the inter‐relatedness of the three fields of interest, often in ways that had not been anticipated or considered. I will explain practical aspects of the process and consider some of the challenges that might be experienced by researchers using video diary techniques.

Exploring social patterns of participation in university-entrance level mathematics in England

In recent years in England, considerable attention has been given to a range of apparent crises in mathematics education, one of which has been the long term decline of participation in university-entrance level (Advanced or A level) mathematics. Given the negative impact upon mathematics participation of a national reform of Advanced level qualifications, commonly known as Curriculum 2000, together with the governments emphasis on science, technology engineering and mathematics (STEM), the political intent to increase participation in Advanced level mathematics is clear. This paper uses the National Pupil Database (NPD) to develop a descriptive statistical account of how completion of Advanced level mathematics varies along the social axes of socioeconomic status, ethnicity and gender. The process of working with the NPD is discussed in some depth in order to clarify the processes involved in this type of quantitative analysis and then to illustrate how such analyses can be used to raise questions about who is studying mathematics in the post-16 age-range.

School transfer and the diffraction of learning trajectories

School transfer acts like a prism, diffracting children’s social and learning trajectories. In this paper I explore this sociological effect through two case studies of children moving from the primary to the secondary school. The impacts of the school, peer and family fields are explored using Bourdieu’s theory of practice, and shifts in the relative power of these fields are traced across the primary–secondary interface. My analysis explains why, decades after Nisbet and Entwistle first linked poor school transition with social class, it is still the case that the economically and culturally more well‐endowed make the most of moving school. So it is that through processes of harmonization and dissonance, of compliance and resistance, children navigate, and are steered, from their embodied social and education pasts towards future constrained possibilities. These processes are partially contextualized in the learning of school mathematics.

Investigating Participation in Advanced Level Mathematics: A Study of Student Drop-Out.

There has, for some years, been a growing concern about participation in university-entrance level mathematics in England and across the developed world. Extensive statistical analyses present the decline but offer little to help us understand the causes. In this paper we explore a concern which cannot be explored through national data-sets, namely the retention of mathematics students on Advanced level (A-level) mathematics courses. Drawing on survey data from 15 secondary schools in the Midlands of England, we examine subject differences in decisions to study, withdraw from, and continue in a range of A-level subjects. Not only is the rate of attrition from mathematics higher than most other subjects, but there are substantial differences between schools. In order to explore this high rate of attrition further we consider one school (Queensbury Park) in which a large proportion of students decided not to continue with their study of mathematics from Year 12 to Year 13. Drawing on performance data and focus group interviews we explore some of the reasons for the students’ decisions.

It matters which class you are in: student-centred teaching and the enjoyment of learning mathematics

The 2007 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Survey highlighted how attitudes to mathematics had declined sharply for students in many of the high attaining countries in the survey, England being no exception. There is a notable drop in positive attitudes to mathematics between 9 and 14, as well as a remarkable decline for 14 year olds over time. This paper explores survey data collected from over 3000 11-year-olds in 16 schools during 2008 with the goal of exploring possible factors that might be contributing to this attitudinal decline. The association between student-centred teaching and enjoyment of learning mathematics is reported as part of a multi-scale analysis that shows the extent to which student experiences differ between schools and between classes within schools.

Participation in Mathematics: What Is the Problem?.

This article considers participation in post-compulsory mathematics education (Advanced or A-level) which is currently exercising education policy-makers in England and elsewhere. I argue that the central problem is neither that of devising an economically motivated strategy for increasing student numbers nor simply raising the level of mathematical capability attained. Rather, the central problem is about what mathematics to teach, how and why? I will present emerging findings from two current studies of 14—19 mathematics education, highlighting socially differentiated patterns of participation. Then I will consider the values/philosophical influences on current policy and practice. This leads me to argue that the curriculum needs reframing so that all students are enabled to use their mathematics to read, understand, critique and act in the mathematically formatted worlds in which they live.

The effective mathematics department: adding value and increasing participation?

Given the commonly accepted view that having a mathematically well-educated populace is strategically important, there is considerable international interest in raising attainment, and increasing participation, in post-compulsory mathematics education. In this article, multilevel models are developed with the use of datasets from the UK Department for Educations National Pupil Database (NPD) in order to explore (1) school effects upon student progress in mathematics from age 11–16 in England and (2) student participation in advanced-level mathematics over the following 2 years. These analyses highlight between-school variation in the difference between mathematical and general academic progress. Furthermore, the between-school differences in post-compulsory mathematics participation are large. Importantly, there is no evidence to suggest that schools/departments with higher “contextual value added” from 11–16, a key measure in government accountability processes in England, are also more effective in recruiting and retaining students in post-16 advanced mathematics courses.

Scale in education research: towards a multi-scale methodology

This article explores some theoretical and methodological problems concerned with scale in education research through a critique of a recent mixed-method project. The project was framed by scale metaphors drawn from the physical and earth sciences and I consider how recent thinking around scale, for example, in ecosystems and human geography might offer helpful points and angles of view on the challenges of thinking spatially in education research. Working between the spatial metaphors of ecology scholars and the critiques of the human geographers, for example, the hypercomplex social space in Lefebvres political-economic thinking and the fluid, simultaneous, multiple spatialities of Masseys post-structuralism, I problematize space and scale in education research. Interweaving these geographical ideas with Giddens’ structuration and Bourdieus theory of practice, both of which employed what might be termed scale-bridging to challenge social sciences entrenched paradigms, leads me to reconsider what is possible and desirable in the study of education systems. Following the spatial turn in the social sciences generally, there is an outstanding need to theorize multi-scale methodology for education research.

MATHEMATICS LEARNING TRAJECTORIES: CLASS, CAPITAL AND CONFLICT

This is the story of Marie and Edward as they approach the time of transfer from the primary to the secondary school. They both consider themselves to be successful mathematicians and have shared common classroom experiences throughout their time in the primary school. However, as they approach this critical relocation point it becomes clear that their future mathematical careers are set on two distinct trajectories. This paper explores the impact of the class-formed family habitus on them as learners of mathematics, and describes how family transferred cultural capital propels one of them whilst notions of conflict threaten to restrict the progress of the other.

Assessing ‘functionality’ in school mathematics examinations: what does being human have to do with it?

This article analyses aspects of the process of developing ‘functional’ assessments of mathematics at the end of compulsory schooling in England. A protocol that was developed for scrutinising assessment items is presented. This protocol includes an indicator of the ‘authenticity’ of each assessment item. The data are drawn from scrutiny of 589 assessment items from thirty-nine formal unseen examinations taken by students aged sixteen, and the article illustrates ways that mathematics is presented in different contexts in examinations. We suggest that currently the ‘human face’ of the questions may serve to disguise routine calculations, and we argue that, in formal examinations, connections between mathematics assessments situated in context and functional mathematics have yet to be established.