Search results
1 – 10 of over 9000
This study determines which aspects of the intended object of learning (planned by teachers during the first phase of a learning study) is made discernible from a learners'…
Abstract
Purpose
This study determines which aspects of the intended object of learning (planned by teachers during the first phase of a learning study) is made discernible from a learners' perspective. In a learning study, the intended, enacted, and lived object of learning are considered. This study focuses on the learning material used by teachers while designing a lesson.
Design/methodology/approach
In many learning studies, variation theory is used to design lessons, which predicts difficulties in and possibilities for student learning. The data consisted of a lesson part – instruction through a video-recorded dance choreography – employed to enhance primary school (in a Swedish context, grade 4) students' dancing skills in the subject of Physical Education and Health. The choreography comprised five different sequences, where a variation occurred when the subsequent (new) sequence was applied to the previous movement pattern. The sequences acted as building blocks, where the students' transitions from one movement pattern to another were logical and distinguishable.
Findings
The results of this study show in what way an analysis of learning material, based on variation theory, can help teachers take into account the level of complexity of the object of learning. The results also identify which parts of a lesson design can be predicted to present a higher degree of challenge and by that more difficult to grasp, especially for students with different educational needs.
Originality/value
Lessons may be designed based on theoretical assumptions to ensure effective classroom learning and provide guidance to teachers based on student needs.
Details
Keywords
This research explores lesson study as a way to enhance the quality of teaching for pupils with learning disabilities and autism spectrum disorder by observing changes to one…
Abstract
Purpose
This research explores lesson study as a way to enhance the quality of teaching for pupils with learning disabilities and autism spectrum disorder by observing changes to one pupil's (Wilma) active educational participation. The study also investigates if and in what ways the professional development impacted teaching practices.
Design/methodology/approach
Five teachers met with the author on four occasions. Between these meetings, the teachers delivered the lessons they had planned together. The author video recorded the meetings to discern how the teachers' expressions developed. The author shared their thoughts with another researcher to enable an interrater validity examination.
Findings
The implementation of the lesson study vehicle enabled the teachers to transform their thinking from mainly focusing on pupils' deficiencies to instead focusing on their strengths. A relationship was found between teachers' understanding of central coherence, their skills in adapting received instructions and pupils' abilities to process and contextualize information or discern the whole picture.
Research limitations/implications
Research that involves teachers in the learning process emphasizes the relation between teachers’ thinking and their potential to enable the contextualized inclusion of pupils with learning disabilities.
Originality/value
This research offers important insights into how school-day navigation for pupils with severe intellectual disability and autism can be understood through the lens of variation theory; the teachers' repeated and adjusted use of the frame on the schedule strip enabled Wilma to discern what would happen next during the school day.
Details
Keywords
Stefan Cronholm and Hannes Göbel
Action design research (ADR) has become widely accepted as a prominent research method within information systems when managing design-oriented research projects. One purpose of…
Abstract
Purpose
Action design research (ADR) has become widely accepted as a prominent research method within information systems when managing design-oriented research projects. One purpose of the ADR method is to provide methodological guidance for the building of IT artefacts. However, several scholars have reported a lack of guidance of method support at the micro level. This article aims to complement the macro level of the ADR method by integrating prescriptive method support at the micro level.
Design/methodology/approach
A qualitative approach including direct content analysis. An empirical ADR project was analysed in order to identify method support that could be integrated into the ADR method.
Findings
Method support at the micro level was identified for all the stages of the ADR method. The method support consists of procedural support, guiding concepts, and various techniques for the documentation of project tasks stated in the ADR method.
Research limitations/implications
The contribution to theory consists of aspects concerning the integration of macro and micro levels: relationships between normative and prescriptive support, continuous focus shifts, and method completeness.
Practical implications
The contribution to practice consists of explicit suggestions for method support that could be integrated into the ADR method.
Originality/value
This study extends previously provided knowledge by offering empirical evidence concerning theoretical constructions consisting of explicit relationships between ADR tasks and integrated method support, and elaboration on the integration of macro and micro levels.
Details
Keywords
Martha L.P. MacLeod, Neil Hanlon, Trish Reay, David Snadden and Cathy Ulrich
Despite many calls to strengthen connections between health systems and communities as a way to improve primary healthcare, little is known about how new collaborations can…
Abstract
Purpose
Despite many calls to strengthen connections between health systems and communities as a way to improve primary healthcare, little is known about how new collaborations can effectively alter service provision. The purpose of this paper is to explore how a health authority, municipal leaders and physicians worked together in the process of transforming primary healthcare.
Design/methodology/approach
A longitudinal qualitative case study was conducted to explore the processes of change at the regional level and within seven communities across Northern British Columbia (BC), Canada. Over three years, 239 interviews were conducted with physicians, municipal leaders, health authority clinicians and leaders and other health and social service providers. Interviews and contextual documents were analyzed and interpreted to articulate how ongoing transformation has occurred.
Findings
Four overall strategies with nine approaches were apparent. The strategies were partnering for innovation, keeping the focus on people in communities, taking advantage of opportunities for change and encouraging experimentation while managing risk. The strategies have bumped the existing system out of the status quo and are achieving transformation. Key components have been a commitment to a clear end-in-view, a focus on patients, families, and communities, and acting together over time.
Originality/value
This study illuminates how partnering for primary healthcare transformation is messy and complicated but can create a foundation for whole system change.
Details
Keywords
Stefan Kleinke and David Cross
The purpose of this two-part research was to investigate the effect of remote learning on student progress in elementary education. Part one, presented in this paper, examined…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this two-part research was to investigate the effect of remote learning on student progress in elementary education. Part one, presented in this paper, examined achievement differences between learners in a fully remote learning environment and those in a hybrid setting.
Design/methodology/approach
A quantitative, quasi-experimental study with factorial design was used to investigate group differences in student achievement between the different learning environments. Ex-post-facto data from standardized test scores were utilized to examine in which ways the learning environment may have affected learner progress in two distinct subject areas crucial to elementary education: English language (ELA) and math.
Findings
Findings revealed a significant difference between the two learning environments in both subject areas. While preexisting group differences, selection biases and testing inconsistencies could be effectively ruled out as potential causes for the observed differences, other factors such as developmental and environmental differences between the learning environments seemed to be influential. Therefore, the follow-on research aimed at further investigating and confirming the influence of such factors and will be presented in a Part 2 paper.
Practical implications
Knowledge of the observed differences in learning achievements between the different environments, as well as the factors likely causing them, may aid educators and school administrators in their decision processes when faced with difficult circumstances such as during the pandemic.
Originality/value
When the SARS-CoV-2 virus started to rapidly spread around the globe, educators across the world were looking for alternatives to classroom instruction. Remote learning became an essential tool. However, in contrast to e-learning in postsecondary education, for which an abundance of research has been conducted, relatively little is known about the efficacy of such approaches in elementary education. Lacking this type of information, it seems that educators and administrators are facing difficult decisions when trying to align the often conflicting demands of public health, local politics and parent pressure with what may be best for student learning.
Details