British Educational Research Journal最新文献

This paper explores how non-Indigenous teachers understand challenges and barriers to academic progress and success for Indigenous students in Taiwan. Drawing on data from a study with 17 teachers of Han Taiwanese and Hakka background who had worked closely with Indigenous students from elementary to high school across Taiwan, we utilise Expectancy-Value Theory to explore teacher participants’ views of the barriers and challenges to educational success for their Indigenous students. Previous research suggests a deficit view among majority background teachers, depicting them as biased against Indigenous peoples and lacking relevant knowledge that would allow them to teach Indigenous students and about Indigenous cultures and histories. In contrast with this previous research, the teachers we interviewed exhibited a good and nuanced understanding of the obstacles and challenges of Indigenous students, families and communities which prevent their success. The teachers in our study indicated that they lack agency and are limited by structural forces in effecting meaningful change. Far from holding deficit views, the teachers interviewed pointed to the importance of working together with Indigenous families and communities to support the learning of Indigenous students. In our conclusion we point to ways of capitalising on the non-deficit positive views captured here to effect long-term sustainable change to support teachers to, in turn, support the learning of Indigenous students.

In addition to the mounting stresses associated with teaching in the UK resulting from decades of neoliberal reform (Ball, 2021), lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ+) teachers experience a range of challenges to their professional identity from institutions that perpetuate the gender binary and hegemonic heteronormativity. Consequently, there is an urgent need for a deeper understanding of how these teachers can be better supported to thrive in education settings. To begin to address this, this pilot study employs the Power, Threat, Meaning Framework (PTMF) with five LGBTQ+ teachers. The main findings from this study are that teachers experience power as a form of self-surveillance and policing but also positively, as a tool to reclaim space for positive representation. Threats came principally from media and parents and impacted participants’ sense of inclusion/exclusion in practice. Finally, participants made meaning of their experience through channelling their LGBTQ+ activism into EDI leadership roles, reclaiming space as a role model and using visual tokens to prompt ‘micro-moments’ of connection. The results of this study demonstrate the potential of the PTMF for future research to support LGBTQ+ teachers in practice and that the rigid nature of the framework may benefit from a more holistic approach to data analysis.

The UK's Quality Assurance Association for Higher Education (QAA) recommend that all undergraduate courses at UK universities include in their curricula elements of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion; Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Education; and Education for Sustainable Development. This paper examines the detail of the QAA's recommendations and finds that they are significantly influenced by critical pedagogy. While the potential benefits of the QAA's recommendations are readily apparent, the paper identifies a number of potential risks, including opportunity costs for students, dumbing down and political bias. Alongside this theoretical analysis, this paper presents a case study which examines in detail the course materials of a cross-curricular module piloted at King's College London called the ‘King's First Year: Gateway to King's’ which covered essentially the same themes. It appears that many of the risks identified with the QAA's approach would have been realised had this module been introduced as a compulsory module for all undergraduates at King's College London as was originally planned. As student take-up was low, it was abandoned after the pilot, and so ultimately the risks were not realised. When introducing significant curriculum changes such as those proposed by the QAA, it is important to be certain that the benefits outweigh the risks. For this reason, a case study of an unsuccessful educational intervention is valuable and may correct for the possibility of publication bias in the literature if institutions choose not to publicise their less successful projects.

The learning and social development benefits associated with pupils collaborating in small groups have been well documented over recent decades; however, research exploring personality as a mediating factor in small group learning is sparse. In this study we identified pupils who self-reported low levels of extraversion and/or high levels of neuroticism (tendency to worry) as personality traits and observed them working in small group collaborative learning situations. Using mixed methods social network analysis as a way of understanding group interactions, we combined a degree centrality measure and a novel concept of ‘provocatory participation’ with a qualitative analysis of group interactions. Data integration facilitated in-depth interpretations of relationships between personality and pupil interactions. Findings suggest that low levels of extraversion and/or high levels of neuroticism can be, but are not always, associated with lower levels of participation and that a range of other factors, notably the personality traits of all pupils in a small group, affect participation. These findings are used to suggest ways that teachers could employ more personality-sensitive pedagogies, particularly with respect to small group activities.

We investigate the effects of ‘lecture-based’ (LBT)—i.e. individual work and rote learning—vs. ‘discussion-based’ (DBT)—i.e. participative and focused on student-centred learning—teaching styles on the test scores and socio-economic inequality of middle-school students randomly assigned to classes using data from the China Education Panel Survey—a large-scale nationally representative survey. Estimates from unconditional quantile regressions and decompositions based on the recentred influence function suggest that LBT raises scores in mathematics, but the effect is non-linear, as students in the bottom and top quintiles are more likely to benefit from it. In contrast, LBT lowers scores in Chinese and English. Lecture-based teaching also has greater influence on socio-economically advantaged students, resulting in larger inequality within classrooms, especially between top and median students. These effects arise under various robustness checks, implying that (i) teaching styles affect scores and classroom inequality and (ii) they appear to be subject-specific. These results suggest that teaching styles can be used as a tool to influence students’ academic performance as well as the socio-economic heterogeneity that they bring to their classrooms.

This study aims to contribute to the themes expounded by Deuchar (2022; British Educational Research Journal, 48, 504-518) concerning international students’ strengths, contributions, and practices in higher education by focusing on the experiences and practices of Chinese doctoral students across four English higher education institutions. The investigation deploys Bourdieu's tools of habitus, field and capital to understand how these students employ their capital and skills in the process of sense-making in the English field. The findings revealed that Chinese students displayed signs of confrontation during their initial interaction with the English institutional milieu, stemming from discrepancies between the forms of capital and norms valued in the British system and those encouraged and developed within the Chinese system. However, interpretations of these challenges among Chinese students were not uniform. Their practices and responses to these challenges also exhibited variability, which provides insights into the evolving and enduring aspects of their habitus. The study advocates moving beyond a homogeneous ‘deficit’ view that focuses on what Chinese students ostensibly lack, built on the assumed norm of Western modes of thinking and learning. Instead, it emphasises recognising the strengths and unique capacities, such as their linguistic repertoire, developed in the Chinese system. This perspective could provide policymakers and stakeholders with valuable insights into recognising Chinese students as agentive and diverse actors, thus better supporting and protecting their interests. This, in turn, could unleash their potential and facilitate greater academic contributions in their respective disciplines.

Schools adopt student voice as a means of identifying educational problems and weaknesses for improvement. In recent decades, student voice work has gained momentum, and, more importantly, dwelling on hearing students has been noticed as a way of facilitating educational decisions for school reforms. To this end, the study, drawing upon a qualitative research method, investigated the student voice in schools within the context of Iran in an effort to determine what obstacles they face in education. Data was collected through an open-ended questionnaire. Employing thematic content analysis, the major themes and patterns were extracted for codifications. The findings illustrated that students specified four major problems, including resources (books), processes (rules), relationships (teachers, parents, staff) and environment (school). To conclude, student voice needs to be embedded in the educational system of Iran if stakeholders seek improvement and reform in schools in the near future.

At present, the concept of wellbeing in schools appears more muddled than ever, encompassing an even wider range of meanings, connotations and dimensions than when it first gained currency two decades ago. Drawing upon a systematic literature review on wellbeing in schools, this article conceptualises the normative tensions underpinning the understandings of wellbeing in schools and related critical discussions. Guided by the claim that educational notions of wellbeing are not neutral but always laden with values and interwoven with expansive ideas about what education in general, and school wellbeing in particular, should be and do, we analyse a range of conceptualisations by illuminating the underlying normative assumptions. Our argument is that the concept of wellbeing is not only shaped by but also subject to opposing forces and inherent tensions. We outline three ‘axes’ to highlight these central points of tension characterising the conceptualisations of wellbeing in the literature, thereby shedding light on the normative underpinnings. The three axes portray a spectrum of perspectives, moving from individual skills, competencies and affective states, through approaches that underscore the relational nature of wellbeing and the importance of interpersonal relationships, to more comprehensive conceptualisations that construe wellbeing as interconnected with aspects of the whole-school environment and broader societal dynamics. Our conceptual analyses suggest that parallel to the concept of subjectivity, wellbeing can be construed as either detached, value-neutral and decontextualised, or as enacted in specific social realms and co-created in the interplay between interpersonal interactions and socio-material dynamics.

This study investigates the student- and school-level predictors of reading performance across five top-performing countries in the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) 2021. Utilising a multilevel analysis, the research examines the influence of cognitive development, socio-cultural contexts and educational environments on reading achievement. The results reveal significant variances both between and within schools, highlighting the critical role of educational policies and practices in shaping student outcomes. Finland, known for its equity-focused education system, demonstrates low between-school variance, while Russia shows high between-school variance owing to socio-economic disparities. Key student-level predictors include gender, digital self-efficacy and a sense of school belonging, varying in significance across countries. At the school level, factors such as the number of computers, principal experience and academic emphasis significantly influence reading scores. The full model, incorporating both student- and school-level predictors, explains a substantial portion of the variance in reading scores, especially in Hong Kong and Russia. These findings underscore the importance of a comprehensive approach to educational research, considering both individual and institutional factors. Policy implications suggest targeted interventions for countries with high between-school variances and support for inclusive learning environments where within-school variances are significant. Future research should explore the impact of non-cognitive factors and emerging educational practices on reading performance to develop more effective educational strategies globally.

This article seeks to provide a clearer understanding of Digital Capital in education. It introduces a comprehensive analytical framework that explores the relationship between Digital Capital and Bourdieu's Cultural Capital Theory. Instead of treating digital skills and resources as separate entities, it integrates them into Cultural Capital Theory as complementary elements. This approach helps shed light on the disparities in ICT usage. Data from the 2018 OECD-PISA survey conducted in Italy are analysed to assess whether Digital Capital can be considered a component of Cultural Capital. The findings indicate that differences in Cultural Capital do not significantly impact the possession and usage of digital assets. Instead, distinctions become apparent through students’ behaviours within the school environment. This underscores the connection between digital competencies and various dimensions of cultural and educational capital. The article posits that status and cultural disparities stem not solely from digital competencies but also from their interplay with social and cultural resources. This offers deeper insights into how the digital divide intersects with broader societal power dynamics.