Rowena Passy

On the Edge: a drama‐based mental health education programme on early psychosis for schools

Aims:  On the Edge is a mental health education programme designed to support early intervention by increasing knowledge and understanding of early psychosis, reducing the stigma associated with mental health issues and improving awareness of avenues of help. The target audience was young people aged 14–22 years in schools and colleges.

Industrial relations in education: Transforming the school workforce.

All phases of education from pre-school to post-compulsory, in virtually all parts of the world, have experienced unprecedented reform and restructuring in recent years. Restructuring has largely been driven by a global agenda that has promoted the development of human capital as the key to economic competitiveness in the global market. This book adopts an inter-disciplinary approach drawing not only on education research but also from the fields of industrial sociology, management studies and labour process theory to locate the reform agenda within a wider picture relating to teachers, their professional identities and their experience of work. In doing so the book draws on critical perspectives that seek to challenge orthodox policy discourses relating to remodelling. Illustrating of how education policy is shaped by discourses within the wider socio-political environment and how unionization and inter-organizational bargaining between unions exerts a decisive, but often ignored, influence on policy development at both a State and institutional level, this book is a must read for anyone researching or studying employment relations.

Primary teacher education in England: 40 years on

This article examines the relationship between pre-service teacher education (ITE) for primary schooling and primary teaching in England between 1974 and 2014, and explores the ‘fitness of purpose’ of the current system of preparing teachers for the classrooms of the twenty-first century. Our historical analysis suggests that, despite 40 years of change in ITE, there are still a number of unresolved issues in ITE. These include: how to prepare for the multisubject, class teacher role which the majority of primary teachers still undertake; how to equip future teachers to deal with the social and emotional aspects of primary teaching; how to ensure that they are creative and flexible practitioners, able to cope with the demands of future curricula, pedagogical changes and the new roles and responsibilities which will inevitably occur during the course of their teaching careers in the next decades of this century; and how to structure ITE to provide adequate long-term foundations for the necessary professional development as a teacher.

School Gardens: Teaching and Learning outside the Front Door.

This article reports on two projects: one that investigated the impact of school gardens on primary childrens learning and one that is currently exploring the pedagogies involved in teaching children in the garden. The evidence presented suggests that school gardens can be an interesting and effective way of engaging children with learning, but that there is a divide between those teachers who are willing to use the garden in their teaching and those who are not. The article considers the reasons for this and argues that mixed messages about policy relating to learning outside the classroom are a barrier to garden use.

Excellence and Enjoyment Continuing Professional Development Materials in England: Both a Bonus and Onus for Schools.

Teachers’ continuing professional development (CPD) in England is a controversial area, and there is arguably little evidence of a ‘coherent’ framework around which consistently high‐quality CPD has been developed, provided and accessed despite the establishment of the General Teaching Council in 2000, the publication of the CPD Strategy in 2001 by the Department for Education and Employment, and the extension of the Training and Development Agency for Schools’ remit to include CPD in 2005. This paper presents the findings of research commissioned by the Primary National Strategy to evaluate the CPD materials arising from the document Excellence and Enjoyment: A Strategy for the Primary Years. It reports on teachers’ views of the materials and discusses their possible contribution to the development of a systematic and sustainable approach to primary CPD. The paper considers the extent to which the materials are interpreted as encouraging innovation in primary teaching—a bonus—and as requiring high levels of mediation and developmental work in order to access this potential—an onus.

Falling into LINE: school strategies for overcoming challenges associated with learning in natural environments (LINE)

ABSTRACT As the benefits of outdoor learning have become of increasing interest to the education sector, so the importance of understanding and overcoming challenges associated with this pedagogy has gained greater significance. The Natural Connections Demonstration Project recruited primary, secondary, and special schools across south-west England with a view to stimulating and supporting ‘learning in the natural environment’ across the region. This research paper examines qualitative data obtained from case study visits to 12 of these schools. The results from teaching staff interviews and focus groups show that schools face many and varied challenges to embedding outdoor learning, and a raft of strategies are presented for tackling these challenges and integrating learning in the natural environment into much of the current curriculum.

Family Values and Schools

Sociological research into the changing nature of the family provided the context for a pilot project on the family values of Year 4 children in an inner-city school in Birmingham. An innovatory aspect of the research was that the researcher communicated with the pupils mainly through the means of email. The project’s findings indicate that the family values that the children bring to school may not coincide with those of their teacher. This raises the question of how far the school and its teachers have the right to challenge values that are learned in the home and that underpin family life.

Widening Participation, Aimhigher and the Coalition Government: Narratives of Freedom and Efficiency

This article responds to the decision of the United Kingdoms coalition government to abolish Aimhigher, a programme for widening higher education participation among disadvantaged young people in England. It examines recent research into widening participation and shows how the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged students has narrowed slowly but significantly over the past decade. Aimhighers role is explored, and the strengths of its partnership approach considered. Drawing on the notion of assemblage, the article then compares the values that underpin the narrative of Aimhigher with those embedded in the coalition governments proposals for widening participation. The article concludes that the gains made over the past decade will be reversed and that social class divisions in university study will become further entrenched.

Family values and primary schools: an investigation into family‐related education

Within the context of the changing nature of family life within contemporary Britain, this article is concerned with the introduction of education on family relationships into the Personal, Social and Health Education curriculum. It draws on a research project that, through observations and interviews, investigated how three teachers portrayed ‘family’ within the classroom and how a sample of their pupils reacted to the images and values that were presented. The evidence presented suggests that the subject matter is complex and sensitive, and that careful thought needs to be given to both content and delivery if this area of values education is to be effective.

Building learning partnerships between schools and universities: an example from south-west England

ABSTRACT In this article we examine the efforts of a University in south-west England to develop long-standing relationships with some partnership schools into a richer association modelled on university practice schools. These are used widely in countries such as Finland, Japan and Hungary, and offer trainee teachers high-quality practica with expert teachers while providing opportunities for university staff to keep their practice up to date and to collaborate in school-based research. Using the research approach of ‘Appreciative Inquiry’, which builds on the strengths of a social system to shape future sustainability and development, we focus on the experience of three partnerships. In each school a University-based Researcher-in-Residence was paired with a partner teacher or senior leader. We draw on the notion of a ‘third space’ to examine the ways in and the extent to which the partners in each school have created a non-hierarchical space for collaborative working.