Peter Renshaw

Loneliness in children.

ASHER, STEVEN R.; HYMEL, SHELLEY; and RENSHAW, PETER D. Loneliness in Children. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1984, 55, 1456-1464. Children experiencing difficulties in their peer relations have typically been identified using external sources of information, such as teacher referrals or ratings, sociometric measures, and/or behavioral observations. There is a need to supplement these assessment procedures with self-report measures that assess the degree to which the children themselves feel satisfaction with their peer relationships. In this study, a 16-item self-report measure of loneliness and social dissatisfaction was developed. In surveying 506 thirdthrough sixth-grade children, the measure was found to be internally reliable. More than 10% of children reported feelings of loneliness and social dissatisfaction, and childrens feelings of loneliness were significantly related to their sociometric status. The relationship of loneliness and sociometric status to school achievement was also examined.

Reshaping teacher and student roles in technology-enriched classrooms

This paper draws on data from a three-year longitudinal study of secondary school classrooms to examine pedagogical issues in using technology resources in mathematics teaching—in particular, graphics calculators and overhead projection panels that allow screen output to be viewed by the whole class. We theorise four roles for technology in relation to such teaching and learning interactions—master, servant, partner, and extension of self—and illustrate this taxonomy with observational data from five senior secondary mathematics classrooms. Our research shows how technology can facilitate collaborative inquiry during both small group interactions and whole class discussions when students use their calculators and the overhead projection panel to share their mathematical understanding.

Social Competence and Peer Status: The Distinction Between Goals and Strategies

Sociometric status in the peer group is a fairly stable phenomenon (Asher, Singleton, Tinsley, & Hymel, 1979; Roff, Sells, & Golden, 1972), and longitudinal research suggests that low status is predictive of later life adjustment (Cowen, Pederson, Babigian, Izzo, & Trost, 1973; Roff et al., 1972; Ullmann, 1957). However, the reasons for poor acceptance by the peer group are not well understood. Several explanations have been advanced since the 1930s to explain why certain children are unpopular. One group of researchers has focused on the characteristics of the group itself and examined how group roles and responsibilities are distributed (Jennings, 1959; Moreno, 1934). From this perspective, unpopular children are those who have been temporarily assigned, either formally or informally, to a marginal group role. In order to assist unpopular children, these researchers suggest that a new group structure be engineering by reassigning roles or creating new responsibilities for marginal group members (Jennings, 1959).

South-east Asian students at Australian universities: A reappraisal of their tutorial participation and approaches to study

ConclusionThis study is a beginning—it begins to question the established literature, and hopefully to provoke university staff into reassessing their perceptions of Southeast Asian students and their assumptions that all students from South-east Asia fit a particular mould. On the other hand we acknowledge that adjustments need to be made by South-east Asian students studying at Australian universities, and depending on their English language proficiency and background these adjustments may be substantial and challenging. However, many of the adjustments South-east Asian students face in Australia will be similar in kind to those that confront all students moving from the more structured environment of the school to a university setting where greater self-reliance and self-management of study is required. Some of the adjustments will be unique to the particular circumstances of each individual student. Some of the adjustments will be related to reconciling the competing demands of university study, securing financial resources, maintaining personal relationships, and setting aside time for recreation. Within these overlapping sets of adjustments will be socially and culturally constituted strategies and resources that students will draw on as they move forward through their programs of study. We need to learn to recognise the resourcefulness of students in this process rather than presume that their differences are a deficiency.

Dialogic Learning teaching and instruction: Theoretical roots and analytical frameworks

This chapter provides an analysis of the construct of ‘dialogue’ in order to frame the contributions of the various authors and research traditions represented in this volume. This volume brings together one group of researchers whose primary interest is in the ‘dialogue’ between speaking and thinking, between the social and the individual, between the public distributed performance of dialogue and the private appropriation of dialogue for individual reflection. It also brings together researchers whose primary interest is in the micro-macro interface that links specific moments of dialogue between participants to how those participants are situated and constituted by different histories and cultures. ‘Dialogue’ as a construct looks both ways—towards individual processes of thinking and reflection, as well as towards the constitution of cultural practices and communities at particular historical moments.

Community and Learning: contradictions, dilemmas and prospects

In this article I reflect on learning and community and their joint deployment. ‘Community’ evokes images and feelings of security and comfort (‘us’ and ‘ours’), while ‘learning’ evokes a sense of progress and confidence in overcoming obstacles—a lifelong and somewhat breathless journey these days. We learn every day, but what is worthwhile learning? What types of communities are worth learning towards? Such crucial considerations can remain unexamined because these words are so beguiling—every one can agree that learning communities are worthwhile. Together these terms have provided a powerful contemporary discourse for different educational reform agendas. Recent proponents of ‘learning communi ties’ have drawn upon sociocultural theorising of learning initiated by Vygotsky and others in the early 20th century. I suggest that this recent deployment of sociocultural learning theory is opportunistic and reflects an effort to resolve certain endemic pedagogical dilemmas related to how inclusion/exclusion is negotiated, how diversity/uniformity is reconciled, and how membership of a learning community is managed over time. I suggest that our role as learning and/or community theorists is principally to critically reflect on what types of learning and communities are worth striving towards.

Productive Pedagogies: A Redefined Methodology for Analysing Quality Teacher Practice.

This paper identifies the ways in which the Productive Pedagogies framework has been refined as a research tool for evaluating classroom practice within a current study into issues of school reform in Queensland. Initially emerging from the landmark Queensland School Reform Longitudinal Study (1998–2001), the Productive Pedagogies has been taken up widely in Australia and internationally as both a research tool and metalanguage to support teachers to critically reflect on their practice. In this paper, following a brief description of the model’s four dimensions, we detail how we have addressed some methodological concerns in using and modifying the framework for the present study. In response to critiques by other researchers and debates within our own research team, we justify our use of the framework. To these ends, we present a refined methodology that addresses the importance of pedagogical process, substantiates the inclusion of particular items within the framework, supports a critical approach to issues of difference, includes students’ perspectives and recognises the significance of content knowledge in the assessment of quality pedagogy.

Learning and Community

Abstract‘Learning’ recently entered the vocabulary of politicians and business leaders, as they began to articulate policy reforms related to the knowledge economy. The Australian Council of Deans of Education has also entered the debate for economic and educational reform by arguing for ‘New Learning’. Contemporary theorists have begun to frame research on learning in terms of community concepts and processes, such as acculturation and appropriation. In this paper I explore these intersecting discourses regarding learning and community, arguing that different models of learning are privileged at different times because they fit with the economic and social conditions of the era. In reflecting on the current prominence of the sociocultural model of learning that brought ‘community’ to the fore, and my own endorsement of this community model of learning, I propose that as learning researchers we are required to remain critically aware of our normative judgements and articulate the kinds of learning and communities that we endorse.

The Relevance of Sociocultural Theory to Culturally Diverse Partnerships and Communities

The phenomenal growth of information technology and globalization promises a future where education about diversity and difference will be very significant. In this information age where existing knowledge and technology are constantly being replaced in an ever changing interdependent global environment, the fundamentals of education are also changing. Education will focus on building new knowledge rather than passing on existing knowledge. The increasing interconnectedness between cultures and their concomitant intermixing as a result of globalization requires that pedagogies about cultural diversity also focus on creating new knowledge and meanings about cultures as they change. In this article, we discuss sociocultural theory as an alternative educational pedagogy that situates the teaching and learning of cultural diversity within rapidly changing local and global conditions. We argue that features of this theory are especially relevant to providing a guiding pedagogy for valuing difference in inclusive environments. We engage the literature on cross-cultural communication and collaboration between culturally diverse professionals and parents of children with disabilities to illustrate sociocultural perspectives on conceptualizing cultural differences and their interaction, and the possibilities for creating culturally inclusive partnerships and communities.

Differentiated learning: from policy to classroom

This paper explores the impact of a Teaching and Learning Audit of all government schools in Queensland, Australia. This audit has a concern with the extent to which schools ‘differentiate classroom learning’. We note that in England, since September 2012, one of the standards that teachers have been expected to demonstrate is an ability to ‘differentiate appropriately’, and thus the lessons of how this particular audit was implemented in Queensland have relevance outside of Australia. The paper draws on data collected from Red Point High School, one of the State’s 1257 schools and education centres audited in 2010. We suggest that this requirement to differentiate classroom learning was implemented without appropriate clarity or support, and that it increased teacher surveillance in this school. However, we also argue that some spaces were opened up by this audit, and its concern with differentiation, to articulate a social justice agenda within the school. We conclude that differentiation is a complex concept which is not easy to shift from a policy to a classroom context, and requires more careful explication at policy level and more support for teachers to enact.