Katherine Mary Main

A Framework for Research into Australian Middle School Practice.

As a new reform in Australian education, middle schooling has been gaining momentum. The rationale behind middle schooling is to bridge the traditional primary-high school gap and provide a more developmentally appropriate educational experience for young adolescents. Middle schooling in the USA has gone through a “boom-to-bust” cycle and is currently undergoing a “reinvention” as research on practice and reporting of research on practice has, in the most part, been ad hoc and piecemeal. If Australian middle schools are to avoid the boom-to-bust-to-reinvention cycle experienced in parts of the USA (Beane 2001), then a more systematic approach to researching practice is required. Research-based criteria for systematic study and improvement of middle school practice have been identified as (a) acceptance as part ofplanning alternative practice, (b)effectiveness as part ofimplementing alternative practice, and (c)sustainability as part ofevaluating alternative practice.

Effective middle school teacher teams: a ternary model of interdependency rather than a catch phrase

The introduction of middle schooling in Australia has brought about changes to the working conditions of many teachers including finding themselves in teacher teams. The formation of such teams has been identified as critical to Australian middle school reform with teacher teams underpinning several of the fundamental components of a middle school philosophy. For teachers, however, changing their previous practice is a challenging task. Imposed changes often demand new knowledge and skills that teachers are unlikely to have met in their own education or developed in their preceding classroom work. However, changes in teaching practices must be complemented by changes at the school level. That is, individual learning must be supported by concurrent organisational learning. Using structured interviews and participant as observer field notes, this study focused on identifying factors at individual, team and school levels that could enable or hinder the successful implementation of teaching teams. At an individual level, we found that it took time for teachers to learn and perfect the necessary new forms of instruction. At a team level, team processes were shown to need administrative support (i.e. resources both human and physical), and at a school level, the norms and customs that shape a school’s culture were shown to either promote or frustrate teaming practices.

“Mind the gap”: cultural revitalisation and educational change

The success or failure of a school reform can be measured by whether the reform has become an accepted, effective, and sustainable part of the schools culture. For example, as the National Middle School Association (2003) argued, “new programs must become integral to the school culture” (p. 11) before a school can call itself a “middle” school. But how can a school monitor its progress, and at what point can a school claim that a new reform or new programme has become part of its culture? Wallaces revitalisation theory (1956), Hall and Hords Processural Structure (1986) and Hall, Wallace, and Dossetts Concerns-Based Adoption Model (1973) are used to describe the cultural revitalisation taking place with the introduction of middle schooling into Australia and specifically within 3 Queensland middle schools. Results have highlighted gaps and tension points that need to be resolved before any widespread cultural transformation can be claimed.

Teamwork--Teach Me, Teach Me Not: A Case Study of Three Australian Preservice Teachers.

Explicit training in teaming skills (both preservice and inservice) has been identified as a key means of facilitating the effective functioning of teaching teams (Main, 2007). This case study explored how groupwork tasks within university coursework can prepare preservice education students to work effectively in teaching teams. Three students in their final year of study were primed to the skills that have been identified as necessary for successful team practices. The students then participated in a semi-structured interview about their groupwork experiences at university. Results from this study of preservice teacher education students reflected findings from studies of students’ groupwork experiences in other disciplines (i.e., business). Students reported opportunities to practise teamwork. However, they were not explicitly taught “how” to work effectively together. It was also found that the assessment focus was entirely on the final “product” and not on the group “process”.

Core Features of Effective Continuing Professional Development for the Middle Years: A Tool for Reflection

Abstract The authors outline the potent relationship between continuing professional development (CPD), teacher efficacy, and student learning outcomes in the context of a major reform of middle years teacher work in Queensland, Australia. The authors explore core features of effective teacher CPD, including content focus, active learning, coherence, duration, and collective participation. Further, they outline the development of a tool that enables comprehensive feedback for those who design and deliver CPD on all of these dimensions to ensure the work they undertake is effective and will have the potential to lead to improved student outcomes. The purpose of this tool is to evaluate Levels 1 and 2 of Guskey’s (2002) critical levels of professional development. The tool was administered at the completion of 11 unique CPD events with more than 450 participants, with numbers varying from small to large groups, and from one hour to full day CPD events. Data generated were used by the facilitators for three purposes: (1) to evaluate the effectiveness of the CPD they conducted through the participants’ reactions (Level 1) and their learning (Level 2), (2) to gain insights into the comprehensiveness and usefulness of the instrument to capture the core features regarded to be critical for effective teacher professional development (i.e., as a reflective tool to improve future practice), and (3) as a framework for effective CPD design. The process has enabled the development of a tool that will serve as a useful addition for those who are interested in designing CPD using an evidenced-based framework and evaluating their CPD program to consider its effectiveness in terms of the participants’ reactions and learning.

Building social and emotional efficacy to (re)engage young adolescents: capitalising on the ‘window of opportunity’

ABSTRACT Research confirms that when students disengage from learning, there is a greatly increased risk of them dropping out of school and not completing secondary education (Year 12). In an Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) report on Equity in Education [OECD. 2012. “Investing in Equity in Education Pays off”, in Equity and Quality in Education: Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools. Paris, France: OECD. doi:10.1787/9789264130852-3-en], school dropout rates in developed countries averaged 20% and, in some countries, was as high as 25%. Lyche [2010. Taking on the Completion Challenge. A Literature Review on Policies to Prevent Dropout and Early School Leaving. OECD Education Working Papers, No. 53. OECD. doi:10.1787/5km4m2t59cmr-en] noted that school dropout does not ‘just happen’ but rather is a long process of disengagement from school. Students entering early adolescence are experiencing rapid and complex changes to their social, emotional, physical, and cognitive development that can positively or negatively affect their experience in education environments. During this time, there is also an increased expectation, both at school and at home, that young adolescents should accept greater responsibility for themselves and their learning. However, when individual students fail to regulate their behaviour or manage the increasing difficulty of the academic work, they can begin to disengage from learning and become entrenched in a downward cycle of poor academic achievement and poor social competence. With an increasing trend in young adolescents to disengage from learning, identifying how to reengage students is critical to their social and academic success. This study reports on the key features of an early intervention programme that targets young adolescent students who are already showing early signs of disengaging from school. Data show that the programme aligns with evidence-based practice and has had a positive effect in promoting and building students’ social and emotional efficacy and re-engaging them in learning.

Jumping the hurdles: establishing middle school teams

Small learning communities are an integral feature of middle schooling practice. Across Australian education systems, the creation of small teaching ‘teams’ responsible for the same group of students has been a strategy frequently adopted to develop small learning communities. Recently, the formation of these teams has been identified as a critical issue for middle school reform. Successful formation of a middle school teaching team requires a commitment by administration (top-down) and team members (bottom-up) to establishing a structure and culture of teamwork. A year-long study into the formation and subsequent development of middle school teaching teams highlighted the need for schools introducing team practices to consider the cultural aspects of the wider school community that are needed to support and maintain teams over time. That is, the culture of the school should support team practices by providing such necessary supports as time and resources (i.e., training and administrative support). Along with analysis of individual semi-structured interviews, participant and observation notes, literature on evidence-led theory of organizational culture provides an understanding of the challenges of establishing a teaming culture in Australian middle schools.

Re-Engaging 'Youth at Risk' of Disengaging from Schooling through Rugby League Club Partnership: Unpacking the Pedagogic Practices of the Titans Learning Centre.

ABSTRACT The youth learning re-engagement program known as the Titans Learning Centre (or TLC) is an approved alternative schooling program, developed in partnership with state education and a local National Rugby League (NRL) club, the ‘Titans’. Students typically in Grade Three or Four complete a 10 week program, interacting with professional A grade NRL players on a weekly basis during classroom learning time and lunch time ‘handball’ sessions. The project sought to understand the pedagogic practices of the TLC, using Bernstein’s social construction of pedagogic discourse, with its underlying instructional and regulative discourses, particularly the contribution by the players to what and how the students were learning. The ethical consent of recruiting children to the study was achieved via acceptance of a position in the program for classroom observations, with further consent sought for accessing students’ school performance data, student and parent surveys and interviews. Using case study methodology, Productive Pedagogies classroom audits (n = 26) were adapted for classroom observation. Interviews with relevant program stakeholders were conducted, including players (n = 12), NRL game development staff (n = 1) and teachers and teacher aides (n = 4). The findings revealed the pedagogic approaches of teachers and NRL players emphasised making regulative discourses visible to these young learners, developing supportive classroom environments and building students’ sense of connectedness to learning. The players articulated a genuine sense of contribution to the lives of the young learners and saw themselves as role models. The use of high profile athletes in youth re-engagement programs has been questioned in recent times, particularly their effectiveness in terms of student learning outcomes over time. However, we conclude that the depth of involvement in pedagogic action connected to student learning indeed enabled the NRL players to be considered role models for youth re-engagement in learning.

Evaluating the Effectiveness of a Large-Scale Professional Development Programme.

An evaluation of the effectiveness of a large-scale professional development (PD) programme delivered to 258 schools in Queensland, Australia is presented. Formal evaluations were conducted at two stages during the programme using a tool developed from Desimone’s five core features of effective PD. Descriptive statistics of 38 questions and thematic content analysis of open-ended responses reveal that the PD programme was reported to be effective for all five domains evaluated: duration; content focus; active learning; collective participation; and coherence. Recommendations arising from the planning and delivery of the programme include that future PD should be designed and evaluated in line with the framework that considers the evidence-based features of effective PD.

Australian Middle Years Reform

The middle years of schooling focuses on young adolescent learners from approximately 10–15 years of age (Pendergast & Bahr, 2010). During these years, young adolescents experience major developmental changes as they transition from childhood to young adulthood. Indeed, this stage of development is only second to infancy in terms of rapidity of change (Bahr & Pendergast, 2007; Cumming, 1998). Although all young adolescents experience physical, social, emotional and intellectual change, the onset and rapidity of change in each of these areas differs from person to person causing diversity to be greatest among young adolescents.