The Politics of the Canon: An exploration of the factors influencing teachers’ text choices for the new GCSE specification in English Literature

As English teachers in England are aware, the new GCSE specifications which will be examined for the first time in Summer 2017 mark a significant departure from previous practice in terms of...

Critical Pedagogies: Are the benefits of alternative schooling being overlooked?

With increasing criticism of the English government regarding over-testing and high pressure in state schools, alternatives to early years formal education, such as practitioners of the Montessori...

Language choice in the Science classroom

Maltese society has for years been described as bilingual. The national language is Maltese and is spoken by 90% of the population aged 10 years and over (NSO, 2007) while English is the second...

An Actor-Network Theory Reading of Change for Children in Public Care

Children in public, or Local Authority (LA) care, known in the U.K as looked-after children (LAC), often find remaining in education a challenge, are twice as likely to be permanently excluded,...

Why we need a new digital curriculum for schools

It’s never been a safer time to be a child, in statistical terms, yet the perception is often very different. One reason for this is that people aren’t always very clear about the function of...

The effects of discourses in regional contexts on the development of curriculum-based literacy standards for adolescents in schooling: A comparative study of South Australia and Ontario

Governments in countries around the world are applying standards-based reforms to education in attempts to achieve future economic prosperity and social cohesion (Levin, 2010; Rizvi & Lingard,...

Analysing Design and Technology as an educational construct; an investigation into its curriculum position and pedagogical identity

The hierarchal status of academic disciplines, what defines valuable or legitimate knowledge and what should we teach our children is a topic of much debate. Amidst concerns of an academic...

Validating curriculum development using text mining

Developing a new subject from the ground up is often demanding. Developing a new program is even more of a challenge. However developing a new program for an emergent discipline in its own right...

Can self-advocacy skills support young people to participate in person-centred planning? An example from research involving young people with dyslexia

As part of a radical reform of educational and health support for young people (YP) with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities, the Code of Practice (DfE & DH, 2015) now advocates the use of...

Democracy through Pedagogy: the Mantle of the Expert in Initial Teacher Education

In his powerful speech at the Cambridge Primary Review Trust’s (CPRT) conference in November last year, Robin Alexander suggested, in relation to recent electoral outcomes in the UK and the US,...

“I was born here, so I’m British” – What do fundamental British values mean to teachers of RE and year 11 RE students?

Transformational Further Education: Empowering People & Communities

Can our values as teachers accommodate the demands of what seems to be a progressively securitised education system? The requirement not to undermine fundamental British values (FBV) was...

The desire for knowledge

I came across this innocuous looking phrase in an interview with the French sociologist of education Bernard Charlot on the internet. He was quoting the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan to explain how...