Pub Date : 2024-04-23DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9460
Louis J. Gorst, Alice Chen Jia, Maria Cooper
Educational leadership resists a unifying definition, assumption, or theory. This complexity encourages us to learn about leadership to understand its core components, underlying assumptions, and relevance for context. In Aotearoa New Zealand, policy rhetoric promotes leadership as being enacted by teachers and positional leaders. This consideration for teachers is positive but problematic, as it requires them to consider leadership in ways beyond what they feel equipped or supported to achieve. Augmenting this concern is the limited professional learning support for leadership development, especially in early childhood, and the increasing responsibility for teachers to achieve policy aspirations. To understand the rhetoric used to emphasise this responsibility, we utilise qualitative document analysis to examine the leadership narratives promoted in the Teaching Council’s Leadership Strategy and Capability Framework, from the perspectives of provisionally certificated teachers, teacher leaders, and positional leaders. Our argument suggests the leadership narratives promulgated by these texts are ambitious and raise issues of: coherence, contextualisation, and complexity. We discuss these issues in relation to support for teachers to critically engage with policy texts as important leadership learning.
{"title":"Early childhood teachers engaging with leadership narratives in policy","authors":"Louis J. Gorst, Alice Chen Jia, Maria Cooper","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9460","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9460","url":null,"abstract":"Educational leadership resists a unifying definition, assumption, or theory. This complexity encourages us to learn about leadership to understand its core components, underlying assumptions, and relevance for context. In Aotearoa New Zealand, policy rhetoric promotes leadership as being enacted by teachers and positional leaders. This consideration for teachers is positive but problematic, as it requires them to consider leadership in ways beyond what they feel equipped or supported to achieve. Augmenting this concern is the limited professional learning support for leadership development, especially in early childhood, and the increasing responsibility for teachers to achieve policy aspirations. To understand the rhetoric used to emphasise this responsibility, we utilise qualitative document analysis to examine the leadership narratives promoted in the Teaching Council’s Leadership Strategy and Capability Framework, from the perspectives of provisionally certificated teachers, teacher leaders, and positional leaders. Our argument suggests the leadership narratives promulgated by these texts are ambitious and raise issues of: coherence, contextualisation, and complexity. We discuss these issues in relation to support for teachers to critically engage with policy texts as important leadership learning.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"1 7","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-04-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140671450","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-23DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9454
L. Chesworth, Helen Hedges
Policy makers have a powerful influence on educational practice. When such bodies are vague about the evidence-base for their policies they may uncritically rely on outdated theories, beliefs, and selective research evidence. A tension may then exist where practitioners become undermined as agents in curricular decision-making. Practitioners may aim to provide curriculum and pedagogy aligned with contemporary knowledge, but are also bound to the policy bodies who hold persuasive power. In England and Aotearoa New Zealand, two particular organisations in each country have most influence on early childhood education. Focused on the notion of children’s interests, this article questions the basis for the key curricular policy, accompanying advice and guidance, and evaluation standards of these organisations. We do so having discussed children’s interests from historical and contemporary research perspectives. We then trace and critique ways children’s interests present in significant policy documents. We suggest that both policy and practice adopt contemporary perspectives of children’s interests and move towards a middle space between curriculum-as-plan and curriculum-as-lived (Aoki, 2005). Such a space provides a way forward for ongoing curriculum conversations about children’s interests.
{"title":"Children’s interests and early childhood curriculum: A critical analysis of the relationship between research, policy, and practice","authors":"L. Chesworth, Helen Hedges","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9454","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9454","url":null,"abstract":"Policy makers have a powerful influence on educational practice. When such bodies are vague about the evidence-base for their policies they may uncritically rely on outdated theories, beliefs, and selective research evidence. A tension may then exist where practitioners become undermined as agents in curricular decision-making. Practitioners may aim to provide curriculum and pedagogy aligned with contemporary knowledge, but are also bound to the policy bodies who hold persuasive power. In England and Aotearoa New Zealand, two particular organisations in each country have most influence on early childhood education. Focused on the notion of children’s interests, this article questions the basis for the key curricular policy, accompanying advice and guidance, and evaluation standards of these organisations. We do so having discussed children’s interests from historical and contemporary research perspectives. We then trace and critique ways children’s interests present in significant policy documents. We suggest that both policy and practice adopt contemporary perspectives of children’s interests and move towards a middle space between curriculum-as-plan and curriculum-as-lived (Aoki, 2005). Such a space provides a way forward for ongoing curriculum conversations about children’s interests.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"112 13","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-04-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140669415","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-23DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9455
Kiri Gould
In policy, teachers are persistently positioned as central to improving the quality of early childhood education and care (ECEC). They are frequently the targets for policy reform that proactively seeks to shape teaching priorities and practices. The constructions of teachers in policy shape notions of ideal professional identities, opening up spaces for certain identities and closing spaces for others. This critical discourse analysis of seven key ECEC policy texts assembles a range of discourses to identify and critically examine two prevalent and distinct 'ideal' professional identities for early childhood teachers: The Professional and The Kaiako.
{"title":"ideal early childhood teacher?","authors":"Kiri Gould","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9455","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9455","url":null,"abstract":"In policy, teachers are persistently positioned as central to improving the quality of early childhood education and care (ECEC). They are frequently the targets for policy reform that proactively seeks to shape teaching priorities and practices. The constructions of teachers in policy shape notions of ideal professional identities, opening up spaces for certain identities and closing spaces for others. This critical discourse analysis of seven key ECEC policy texts assembles a range of discourses to identify and critically examine two prevalent and distinct 'ideal' professional identities for early childhood teachers: The Professional and The Kaiako.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"51 18","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-04-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140667178","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-23DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9462
Philippa Nicoll Antipas
It is vital to engage with professional learning and development (PLD) to be a teacher in Aotearoa New Zealand. In the way it has been enacted due to education policy, PLD has essentially become synonymous with teacher inquiry: to engage with PLD is to follow an inquiry cycle. Literature into what constitutes effective teacher PLD similarly endorses an inquiry approach. But teacher inquiry as interpreted by Ministry of Education neoliberal-influenced policy and procedures risks becoming a linear process abstracted away from the context and complexity of schools and teaching. Neoliberal influences on education policy have similarly supported input-output assumptions of PLD and have led to a narrowing effect. However, it is possible to open PLD up to be creative and subversive. If policy and procedure were to be decoupled, introducing greater flexibility, and refocused on the principles that underpin effective teacher PLD, then this creativity and transformation could be realised.
{"title":"Opening up the narrow","authors":"Philippa Nicoll Antipas","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9462","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v29.9462","url":null,"abstract":"It is vital to engage with professional learning and development (PLD) to be a teacher in Aotearoa New Zealand. In the way it has been enacted due to education policy, PLD has essentially become synonymous with teacher inquiry: to engage with PLD is to follow an inquiry cycle. Literature into what constitutes effective teacher PLD similarly endorses an inquiry approach. But teacher inquiry as interpreted by Ministry of Education neoliberal-influenced policy and procedures risks becoming a linear process abstracted away from the context and complexity of schools and teaching. Neoliberal influences on education policy have similarly supported input-output assumptions of PLD and have led to a narrowing effect. However, it is possible to open PLD up to be creative and subversive. If policy and procedure were to be decoupled, introducing greater flexibility, and refocused on the principles that underpin effective teacher PLD, then this creativity and transformation could be realised.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"18 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2024-04-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140666100","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-20DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8358
Bronwen Cowie, Maurice Cheng, Nick Bryant
In this paper we take a credit/asset view of the breadth of knowledge and expertise that teachers have to contribute to curriculum and curriculum making from their everyday and professional experiences. We argue and illustrate the value of teachers grounding their funds of knowledge and identity in designing curriculum that connects with their students and the local context. Teacher funds of knowledge and identity are part of their personal learning ecology. Barron (2006) defines this as encompassing the ideas/knowledge, relationships, and material and virtual resources that people draw on within and across their everyday lives. The ability to mobilise a personal ecology that goes beyond academic or formal/professional knowledge would seem to be a crucial capability for teachers as they localise curricula. Even more so when teachers aim to do this in ways that foster engagement, develop agency and progress student ‘achievement.’ We offer suggestions for researchers, school leaders and teachers interested in exploring the nature and use of funds of knowledge/identity within a learning ecology framing.
{"title":"Unleashing the full potential of teachers","authors":"Bronwen Cowie, Maurice Cheng, Nick Bryant","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8358","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8358","url":null,"abstract":"In this paper we take a credit/asset view of the breadth of knowledge and expertise that teachers have to contribute to curriculum and curriculum making from their everyday and professional experiences. We argue and illustrate the value of teachers grounding their funds of knowledge and identity in designing curriculum that connects with their students and the local context. Teacher funds of knowledge and identity are part of their personal learning ecology. Barron (2006) defines this as encompassing the ideas/knowledge, relationships, and material and virtual resources that people draw on within and across their everyday lives. The ability to mobilise a personal ecology that goes beyond academic or formal/professional knowledge would seem to be a crucial capability for teachers as they localise curricula. Even more so when teachers aim to do this in ways that foster engagement, develop agency and progress student ‘achievement.’ We offer suggestions for researchers, school leaders and teachers interested in exploring the nature and use of funds of knowledge/identity within a learning ecology framing.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"2 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136263040","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-20DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8359
Ro Parsons, Joanna Higgins
External evaluation in Aotearoa New Zealand is an important accountability mechanism in education. In 2019 the Tomorrow’s Schools Independent Taskforce recommended that the Education Review Office (ERO) develop and implement an improvement-oriented approach to external evaluation in schools. This approach requires fundamental shifts in evaluation practice. In implementing an improvement-oriented approach, while maintaining accountability functions in a public sector context, evaluators need to balance key tensions: relational, epistemological, pedagogical, contextual, political, methodological, and organisational. The role of the evaluator in implementing ERO’s new approach, and managing the shifts required, is key to the approach’s success. Building evaluation capability and capacity and strengthening the evaluation evidence base are critical areas for further development.
{"title":"Exploring the shift to an improvement-oriented approach to external evaluation in Aotearoa New Zealand","authors":"Ro Parsons, Joanna Higgins","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8359","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8359","url":null,"abstract":"External evaluation in Aotearoa New Zealand is an important accountability mechanism in education. In 2019 the Tomorrow’s Schools Independent Taskforce recommended that the Education Review Office (ERO) develop and implement an improvement-oriented approach to external evaluation in schools. This approach requires fundamental shifts in evaluation practice. In implementing an improvement-oriented approach, while maintaining accountability functions in a public sector context, evaluators need to balance key tensions: relational, epistemological, pedagogical, contextual, political, methodological, and organisational. The role of the evaluator in implementing ERO’s new approach, and managing the shifts required, is key to the approach’s success. Building evaluation capability and capacity and strengthening the evaluation evidence base are critical areas for further development.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"34 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136263039","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-20DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8356
Fiona Ell
Mathematics education in English-medium schools in Aotearoa New Zealand currently reproduces inequity. There is widespread concern about overall levels of student achievement and who participates and who succeeds. Rapid, and accelerating, social and technological change impacts what students need to know in mathematics and statistics and increases its significance. There are fundamental debates about how mathematics education should respond to inequity and rapid change. Content and pedagogy are both contested spaces. Research in mathematics education tends to exacerbate rather than resolve this contestation. In this cacophony it is hard to hear marginalised voices and yet these groups are the most impacted by current practices. Mathematics education is entwined with other curriculum areas and has far-reaching consequences; therefore, policy has to treat improving system performance as a complex problem requiring intervention at multiple levels to achieve equitable outcomes for students.
{"title":"Lifting the quality and effectiveness of mathematics education provision in English-medium schools in Aotearoa New Zealand","authors":"Fiona Ell","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8356","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8356","url":null,"abstract":"Mathematics education in English-medium schools in Aotearoa New Zealand currently reproduces inequity. There is widespread concern about overall levels of student achievement and who participates and who succeeds. Rapid, and accelerating, social and technological change impacts what students need to know in mathematics and statistics and increases its significance. There are fundamental debates about how mathematics education should respond to inequity and rapid change. Content and pedagogy are both contested spaces. Research in mathematics education tends to exacerbate rather than resolve this contestation. In this cacophony it is hard to hear marginalised voices and yet these groups are the most impacted by current practices. Mathematics education is entwined with other curriculum areas and has far-reaching consequences; therefore, policy has to treat improving system performance as a complex problem requiring intervention at multiple levels to achieve equitable outcomes for students.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"28 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136263037","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-09-20DOI: 10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8357
Mohamed Alansari, Mengnan Li
Based on findings from The National Survey of Schools project, this study aimed to examine the interactions between schools’ professional learning and development cultures, teachers’ general attitudes towards NCEA changes, their equity-related attitudes towards NCEA changes, and their working experiences (morale and workload views). The participants were 749 teachers from Years 9-13 and Years 7-13 English medium secondary schools who completed our national surveys. Data were analysed quantitatively through descriptive and exploratory techniques. Results suggested a positive association between a perceived culture of ongoing PLD in schools, and teachers’ general attitudes towards NCEA changes. Teachers who reported positive attitudes towards the NCEA changes in general, were more likely to understand how these changes can improve outcomes for Māori learners, Pacific learners, and those with disabilities and who need learning support. In addition, a strong culture of ongoing PLD was also positively associated with teachers’ morale and workload views. The study has practical implications by indicating how teachers can be better supported to enact educational changes in Aotearoa New Zealand.
{"title":"Maintaining good working experiences in the context of NCEA changes","authors":"Mohamed Alansari, Mengnan Li","doi":"10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8357","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.26686/nzaroe.v28.8357","url":null,"abstract":"Based on findings from The National Survey of Schools project, this study aimed to examine the interactions between schools’ professional learning and development cultures, teachers’ general attitudes towards NCEA changes, their equity-related attitudes towards NCEA changes, and their working experiences (morale and workload views). The participants were 749 teachers from Years 9-13 and Years 7-13 English medium secondary schools who completed our national surveys. Data were analysed quantitatively through descriptive and exploratory techniques. Results suggested a positive association between a perceived culture of ongoing PLD in schools, and teachers’ general attitudes towards NCEA changes. Teachers who reported positive attitudes towards the NCEA changes in general, were more likely to understand how these changes can improve outcomes for Māori learners, Pacific learners, and those with disabilities and who need learning support. In addition, a strong culture of ongoing PLD was also positively associated with teachers’ morale and workload views. The study has practical implications by indicating how teachers can be better supported to enact educational changes in Aotearoa New Zealand.","PeriodicalId":485885,"journal":{"name":"The New Zealand Annual Review of Education","volume":"13 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136263038","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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