Jill Clark

Building bridges: Understanding student transition to university

This article explores challenges in ensuring effective student transition from school or college to university. It examines the complex liaison needed for students to progress to appropriate courses, settle into university life and succeed as higher education learners. Secondary data (international literature on transition and the formation of learner identity) are analysed to identify underpinning concepts. Primary data are taken from two studies of student transition in England using student and staff surveys, student focus groups, staff interviews and staff–student conferences that discussed selected project data sets. The article goes on to offer a model of the process of transition and the formation of learner identity. It proposes that the development of higher education learner identity is essential to student achievement and is initially encouraged where schools, colleges and universities adopt integrated systems of transition. This has clear implications for practice for higher education administrators, academics and quality officers.

Using diamond ranking as visual cues to engage young people in the research process

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to describe and consider the use of diamond ranking activities as visual cues to elicit ideas, prompt reflection and promote discussion amongst pupils (aged 10‐13), teachers and other staff in two qualitative research studies.Design/methodology/approach – The activities included nine photographs as visual cues, and participants cut out these pictures and stuck them onto a piece of A3 paper in a diamond shape, ranking them by position where their preferred picture is at the top and the most disliked at the bottom.Findings – Importantly, participants also annotated their diamond with qualitative comments and explanations.Originality/value – This article explores the use of diamond ranking as visual cues – a tool within qualitative research that is under‐developed – as a way of engaging participants in the research process. Issues explored include inclusivity, active discussions and applicability to a wide range of people.

Patient information leaflets: producing understandable PILs

The concept of the informed health-care ‘consumer’ rests on the availability of comprehensible information. While various bodies have made information available, its quality is mixed. Information is sometimes untrustworthy, incomprehensible, or simply forgotten by patients. An understandable record of advice is more likely to bring about compliance with treatment and lessen the need to revisit the surgery. This is a report of the revision of health-care information leaflets and their testing on 59 volunteers (61-81 years old). Presentation, reading ease and understanding were considered. The goal of making health-care information comprehensible was achieved. Guidelines for revising such material are described and illustrated. The informed consumer goal may be achievable if writers of health-care information attend to communication as much as to the adequacy of their medical advice.

A school tries to change: How leaders and teachers understand changes to space and practices in a UK secondary school

This article considers a school community initiating change in pedagogical practices to complement new-build premises in the context of demands for school improvement, but constraints on autonomy. We investigate how school leaders planned the change towards enquiry-based learning in flexible spaces, and how teaching staff prepared for the coming change. We worked with teachers to explore current experiences of teaching and learning in self-contained classrooms where teachers mainly teach alone, and anticipations for the new building, where there will be large, shared spaces, facilitating movement and different groupings of students, encouraging student autonomy and teacher teamwork. Preparation for change was centred on an ‘experimental week’ of enquiry learning that took place in an existing large space (a school hall). Here we explore the experiences of the teachers involved, particularly their ideas about the potential for changing practices, considering these in light of the plans of the school leaders and of wider understandings of school change. We met the teachers before and after the experimental week, observed the week and conducted interviews mediated by photographs of the week. The tensions and stresses of attempting to make extensive changes to teaching practices were evident, together with suggestions that the school leaders were failing to appreciate the complexity of the change they were planning or to communicate the ideas about it that they had developed. The probable consequences for the school, given the uneven distribution of autonomy in UK schools, are briefly considered.

Transformation in interdisciplinary research methodology: the importance of shared experiences in landscapes of practice

ABSTRACT Current debates around the concept of boundary crossing stress the importance of boundary objects in bringing people together to share understandings. We argue that the boundary object is of secondary importance, and that what is important for the transformational potential of interdisciplinary understanding is opportunities for ‘boundary experiences’. We present three examples of interdisciplinary boundary experiences: the first describes a collaboration between an education academic and speech and language therapists; the second presents a research opportunity experienced by a group of education, architecture, and sociology academics, alongside practising architects and educators; and the third reflects on the process of co-production involving academics from education, medical education, cultural and heritage studies, sociology, music, and social computing. We argue that engaging in shared landscapes of practice, when accompanied by opportunities for dialogue and for developing relationships, creates meaningful moments of service, and thus has transformational potential. However, we believe that this necessitates a new way of thinking about research methodology. We advocate a co-production approach that is grounded in developing and maintaining relationships, and routinely provides opportunities for boundary experiences. This requires a more open and flexible approach to research design than is currently usually promoted within academic research infrastructures.

Will the lessons be learned?: Reflections on local authority evaluations and the use of research evidence

Sure Start programmes are complex, community-based initiatives – forerunners of the Children’s Centres Initiative – that have been evaluated nationally and locally. Using an in-depth, retrospective case study of an evaluation of one local programme, the authors raise key issues pertinent to both practice and evaluation in the field, highlighting conflicts and dilemmas both within evaluation generally and, specifically, relating to the evaluation of this programme. We illustrate the difficulties placed on local evaluators by the lack of clear structures within which to work, and provide useful lessons as we move forward into the development and evaluations of new services for children and families.

Perspectives of Enhanced Thinking Skills in prisons in the United Kingdom: a qualitative case study

This article discusses findings from one phase of a research study funded by the Learning and Skills Development Agency which aims to improve the thinking and communication skills of prisoners in England and Wales. Perceptions and discussions of a qualitative case study of an offending behaviour intervention ‐ Enhanced Thinking Skills (ETS) ‐ are presented, including perceptions of the ETS experience. Discussion includes factors which affect the delivery of the programme, such as group climate and dynamics, personality differences, responses of inmates and accounts of motivation. These are set in the context of current criminal justice policy in England and Wales.

Designing for Formative Assessment: A Toolkit for Teachers

This paper describes the outcomes of the three-year design research project: Formative Assessment in Science and Mathematics Education (FaSMEd) (http://www.fasmed.eu). Its goals: to develop a toolkit for teachers, and to research the use of technology in formative assessment in mathematics and science. Countries in the partnership included the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, Norway, The Netherlands, France, Germany, Italy, and South Africa. The project used an iterative, collaborative, process-focused approach. Case studies drew on a wide variety of researcher and teacher obtained evidence. The paper draws on analysis of the case studies and country reports to provide policy recommendations and suggestions for further research.

Co-production with young people to tackle alcohol misuse

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present the learning gained from undertaking research activities in co-production with young people in order to tackle alcohol misuse in local communities. Design/methodology/approach The findings are drawn from an evaluation of an alcohol misuse change programme in which opportunities to learn about and conduct research were provided to young people through co-production. The evaluation was guided by a theory of change, and a portfolio of evidence collected which included feedback from the young people and project staff about their experiences. Findings This paper demonstrates that young people can be empowered to take on roles as agents of change in their own communities by learning more about research processes. However, the empowerment does not come from undertaking research training per se, but by being able to work co-productively with researchers on issues and questions that are of direct relevance to themselves and which are framed within a change agenda. Shared values, strong relationships and reciprocal knowledge exchange enabling flexible and relevant responses to real-world problems and questions are needed. Originality/value The paper suggests a reflexive and co-productive learning, design and delivery approach to involving young people in research. It challenges notions of young people as a problem in terms of alcohol misuse, and rather situates them as part of a solution that is aiming at longer-term transformational community change. This is significant in that much of the existing evidence concentrates on individual intervention.