Fiona Ell

The Politics of Responsibility: Teacher Education and “Persistent Underachievement” in New Zealand

Abstract Historically, New Zealand policy makers have defined quality teachers as those who form effective learning relationships with students and teach in culturally appropriate and responsive ways. Recent global emphasis on standardised test score improvement suggests that this definition is shifting, implying changes for the focus and the form of teacher education. This article explores this shift and its effect on raising achievement for learners in New Zealand schools and its implications for teacher education.

Teacher education in New Zealand

This paper provides an overview of how teacher education is currently structured in New Zealand. This overview is set in a historical, cultural, political and professional context with a brief examination of aspects of these influences on the structure. Two very recent policy documents are discussed to exemplify current directions in New Zealand teacher education.

¿I¿m a natural and I do it for love!: ¿exploring students¿ accounts of studying mathematics

Drawing on in-depth interviews with the third year students at a New Zealand university, we explore the ways in which students speak about studying mathematics, their relationship with the subject and how this has developed over time. These interviews were conducted as part of a project looking at undergraduate mathematics from the perspective of lecturers, students, and interactions in lectures, and funded by the Teaching and Learning Research Initiative in New Zealand. We use the work of Gee [Identity as an analytic lens for research in education, Rev. Res. Educ. 25 (2000), pp. 99–125] to tease out some discourses of mathematics that frame students’ participation in the subject, and show that notions of ‘natural ability’, and of being passionate about the study of mathematics for its own sake, dominate the narratives of mathematics students. In developing this position, we turn to psycho-social theorists such as Hollway and Jefferson [Doing Qualitative Research Differently: Free Association, Narrative and the Interview Method, Sage, London, 1997] so as to question the ‘face-value’ meanings of these narratives and to argue that students’ choices have less to do with rational decision making than with constructing identities that protect vulnerable aspects of themselves. Finally, we develop the metaphor of a ‘maths club’, which we feel captures something of the culture of mathematics and students’ orientations towards the subject. This metaphor also allows us to raise questions about widening participation in mathematics.

Understanding linear measurement: A comparison of filipino and new zealand children

An understanding of linear measurement depends on principles that include standard unit size, iteration of units, numbering of a unit at its end, and partial units for measuring continuous length. Children may learn these principles at school, for example through experience with informal measurement, or they may learn them through use of measurement in society. This study compared the application of these principles by children aged 8 and 9 from the Philippines and New Zealand. These countries were selected because they have quite different curricula, societal influences and economies. Ninety-one children were interviewed individually on a common set of unusual tasks that were designed to tap underlying principles. Results showed many similarities and some differences between countries. Most tasks requiring visualisation and informal units were done more accurately by New Zealand children. Some tasks involving the use of a conventional ruler were done more accurately by Filipino children. These differences appear to be related to differences in curricula and possibly to differences in societal use of measurement. We suggest that these results, like those of other writers cited, demonstrate the need for extensive work on the underlying concepts in measurement through work on informal measurement and a careful transition between informal and formal measurement.

Mapping a complex system: what influences teacher learning during initial teacher education?

ABSTRACT Despite a growing body of knowledge about what content, processes and arrangements for learning may result in more effective initial teacher education, there remains a problem with the variability of outcomes from teacher education programmes. This paper reports on a multi-perspective exploration of what influences learning to teach in valued ways during initial teacher education. Framed by complexity theory, which emphasises the non-linear nature of social phenomena, the paper presents an analysis of 76 maps of influences on learning to teach (made by teacher candidates, teacher educators, mentor teachers and policy makers), looking for differences and patterns that might point the way to explanations about teacher candidates’ varying ability to enact practice that improves outcomes for all learners.

Getting beyond “gut feeling”: understanding how mentors judge readiness to teach

Assessing whether or not a teacher candidate is ready to take their own class is a high-stakes decision that requires consideration of multiple, often competing, sources of information. Three research instruments were designed to explore how mentors judge readiness to teach during final practicum placements. This article describes the three instruments. It discusses how the three tasks worked as ways to understand how people judge readiness to teach and as ways to develop mentors’ judgement making. While there was broad agreement about what was important in this judgment, the data from all three instruments suggest that individual judges rely on their own experience and frames of reference when deciding about readiness to teach, leading to variability in the decisions they make.

Teaching for equity: insights from international evidence with implications for a teacher education curriculum

ABSTRACT Researchers, practitioners, and policy-makers in many countries are grappling with ways to address the persistent problem of inequitable educational outcomes between advantaged and disadvantaged students. This paper reports the results of a unique cross-country, cross-cultural analysis undertaken to provide insights into teaching practices that promote equity, drawing on programmes of empirical research or syntheses of major programmes of research that worked from a complex, non-linear view of teaching and its outcomes. We analysed international evidence about teaching practices that have a positive influence on diverse students’ learning outcomes and opportunities and then compared and contrasted the results of these analyses. From the commonalities we identified, we derived six interconnected facets of practice for equity, which are general principles of practice rather than specific teaching strategies or behaviours. Building on these facets, we developed a conceptual framework that can inform an equity-centred teacher education curriculum that specifically addresses the task of preparing teachers who can make a positive difference to the learning opportunities and outcomes of diverse students, particularly those historically disadvantaged by the education system.

Rethinking initial teacher education: preparing teachers for schools in low socio-economic communities in New Zealand

Abstract Differential student achievement has particular significance in New Zealand as it has one of the largest gaps between high and low achievers among all OECD countries. Students from low socio-economic status (SES) communities, who are often Māori and Pasifika, are heavily over-represented in the low achieving group, while students from wealthier communities, mainly European and Asian, are over-represented in the high achieving group. This article reports a predominately qualitative study, which investigated student teacher perceptions of how their programme, specifically designed to put equity front and centre, prepared them for teaching in low SES communities. Overall, the findings indicated that the student teachers perceived their programme did prepare them to work in such contexts. However, the study also highlighted ways in which the programme could be strengthened, including the need for a more direct focus on the effects of poverty on children’s learning, and the implications of this for teaching.

Teaching undergraduate mathematics in interactive groups: how does it fit with students’ learning?

Debates about how undergraduate mathematics should be taught are informed by different views of what it is to learn and to do mathematics. In this qualitative study 10 students enrolled in an advanced undergraduate course in mathematics shared their views about how they best learn mathematics. After participating in a semester-long course in combinatorics, taught using a non-traditional, formal group work approach, the 10 students shared their views about how such an approach fitted in with their experience of learning mathematics. A descriptive thematic analysis of the students’ responses revealed that despite being very comfortable with the traditional approach to learning new mathematics, most students were open to a formal group work approach and could see benefits from it after their participation. The students’ prior conceptions of the goal of undergraduate mathematics learning and their view of themselves as ‘mathematicians’ framed their experience of learning mathematics in a non-traditional class.

Assessment capability and student self-regulation: The challenge of preparing teachers

Research over several years has found that “effective learners tend to monitor and regulate their own learning and, as a result, learn more and have greater academic success in school” (Andrade, 2010, p.90). In New Zealand primary schools the primary purpose of assessment and evaluation is to improve students’ learning and teachers’ teaching as both respond to the information it provides. To bring this purpose to fruition teachers need to be educated to facilitate genuine engagement by learners in assessment processes; known in New Zealand as having assessment capability. In this study we investigated to what extent, and how, teacher candidates learn to involve their students in formative assessment of their own work. Participants were a cohort of undergraduate, elementary school teacher candidates in a three-year undergraduate program taught across three campuses at one university in New Zealand. Surveys and interviews were used to investigate assessment capability. Although the survey results suggested the teacher candidates may be developing such capability, the interviews indicated assessment capability was indeed an outcome of the program. Our findings demonstrate that these teacher candidates understood the reasons for involving their students and are beginning to develop the capability to teach and use assessment in these ways. However, developing assessment capability was not straight forward and the findings demonstrate that more could have been done to assist the teacher candidates in seeing and understanding how to implement such practices. Our data indicates that a productive approach would be to partner teacher candidates with assessment capable teachers and with university lecturers who likewise support and involve the teacher candidates in goal setting and monitoring their own learning to teach.