Sean Wiebe

The use of technology in Prince Edward Island (Canada) high schools Perceptions of school leaders

The purpose of this paper is to document the perceptions of school leaders regarding the technological use, skills, and attitudes of high school teachers. Using a qualitative research approach, 11 educational leaders from Prince Edward Island (Canada) were individually interviewed. Participants represented the Department of Education, principals, vice-principals, and department heads. Analyzed through the concept of e-leadership, the findings indicated that participants used a growing array of technological tools and activities including Smartboards, flipped classrooms, Prezi, educational apps, YouTube, and teacher blogs. Participants identified lack of time as a possible reason why some teachers were not incorporating technology into student learning. Findings highlight the need for provincial and school district authorities to promote policies aimed at promoting e-leadership among teachers. We insert an appendix to provide descriptions of the technological terms included within the paper.

The Role of Digital Technologies in Learning: Expectations of First Year University Students / Le rôle des technologies numériques dans l’apprentissage : les attentes des étudiants de première année universitaire

A growing literature suggests that there is a disjuncture between the instructional practices of the education system and the student body it is expected to serve, particularly with respect to the roles of digital technologies. Based on surveys and focus group interviews of first-year students at a primarily undergraduate Canadian university and focus group interviews of professors at the same institution, this study explores the gaps and intersections between students’ uses and expectations for digital technologies while learning inside the classroom and socializing outside the classroom, and the instructional uses, expectations and concerns of their professors. It concludes with recommendations for uses of digital technologies that go beyond information transmission, the need for extended pedagogical discussions to harness the learning potentials of digital technologies, and for pedagogies that embrace the social construction of knowledge as well as individual acquisition. Des etudes de plus en plus nombreuses suggerent qu’il existe un ecart entre les pratiques d’enseignement dans le systeme de l’education et la population etudiante desservie, notamment en ce qui concerne le role des technologies numeriques. La presente etude, fondee sur les resultats de sondages et d’entrevues de groupe aupres des etudiants de premiere annee inscrits a une universite canadienne principalement axee sur les etudes de premier cycle, ainsi que sur des entrevues de groupe aupres de professeurs du meme etablissement, explore les ecarts et les concordances entre, d’une part, l’utilisation et les attentes des etudiants relativement aux technologies numeriques dans l’apprentissage en classe et dans les relations sociales en dehors des classes, et, d’autre part, l’utilisation de ces technologies dans les pratiques d’enseignement, les preoccupation et les attentes des professeurs. L’etude se conclut par des recommandations concernant une utilisation des technologies numeriques depassant la transmission de l’information, et la necessite de discussions pedagogiques poussees permettant d’exploiter le potentiel des technologies numeriques dans le cadre de l’apprentissage ainsi que de methodes pedagogiques adaptees a la construction sociale des connaissances et au mode individuel d’acquisition des connaissances.

Teaching through Duoethnography in Teacher Education and Graduate Curriculum Theory Courses

In this chapter we discuss how we have incorporated duoethnographies in our teaching to assist our students in an examination of their teaching beliefs and practices. We explore both the teaching of education courses and duoethnography as a methodology as we simultaneously introduce both, adapting lessons to the various types of student who we have encountered. Reflexivity, openness to uncertainty, vulnerability, diversity, placeholders, points of view, and assessment criteria are some of the emergent themes.

Curriculum as playlist: Responses of synopsis and expansion

ABSTRACT Do you remember boom-boxes with two decks so a personalized playlist could be recorded onto a cassette tape? Perhaps you received a playlist from a friend, family member, or lover? In this project, 14 colleagues first compiled and shared their curriculum playlists—their favorite texts/performances about curriculum including some of their own texts/performances. Then, they composed responses, expressed in music, dance, poetry, narrative, ruminations, and drama, that annotate, trouble, riff on, and respond to one anothers playlists in order to investigate how the art of (re)mixing offers metaphorical possibilities for artfully making curriculum (poiesis). How might the art of mixing be a way of mediating understandings of scholarly lives contingent on histories, politics, and psychologies of knowledge?

Creativity and pedagogical innovation: Exploring teachers’ experiences of risk-taking

ABSTRACT Objective: The purpose of this paper is to share the results of research into the experience of teacher risk-taking in the classroom. The development of children as risk-takers is featured prominently in curriculum documents and reports calling for the competencies of 21st century learning. Teachers are expected to become 21st century learners who model risk-taking. The repeated calls for the development of risk-taking students through the modelling of risk-taking teachers makes the experience of risk an important pedagogical question. However, 21st century learning documents do not take up substantively the meaning of teacher risk-taking. Research Design: Phenomenological research is concerned with the unique and the individual and in that regards each teacher-participant represents particular perceptions of risk-taking experiences and responses to risk in the classroom. The six (6) teacher-participants responded to a call distributed widely to teaching staff in a Canadian school district. The inquiry relied on phenomenological interviews and experiential life world material. In this paper three phenomenological themes are described: risk and readiness; risk and the in-between spaces of pedagogy, and risk as exploration and finding a way. This research allows us to understand teachers’ lived experience rather than assume the meaning of the terms risk and risk-taking.

A Bone of Contention

Mrs. Currie rubs open a clear patch so she can see through her fogged up windows. It is 7:30 a.m. and, alone in her car, she becomes preoccupied with her accounts, mentally checking and rechecking whether she has enough to cover this month’s withdrawals. She waves to several people in the parking lot but doesn’t really see them. After a few minutes, she notices having eaten from a bag of stale potato chips on the passenger seat, and becomes angry for snacking without thinking.

What is good for the poem is good for the poet

As Kittay (2001) suggests, and later Sedgwick (2002), literary myth holds promise for better understanding the deep-rooted systems and processes which produce and enforce normalcy. One predominant human myth is transcendence of the body, with variations from ‘enhancing’ the aesthetic body to complete mastery of the body, culminating in the self—as master—transforming the body at will.