Reforming Educational Policy With Applied Social Research

Cohen, David; Garet, Michael S.

doi:10.17763/haer.45.1.816r0525w1283044

Cited by 133 publications

(48 citation statements)

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“…The mega-narrative is underpinned by grand ideas about how education needs to work and what has to be addressed regarding functional improvement (Olson and Craig 2009a;Cohen and Garet 1975). The emphasis on the functionality of teaching and learning is identified by Olson and Craig (2009a) as a consequence of paradigmatic knowledge.…”

Section: Mega-narrativesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human elements and the pragmatic approach in the Australian, Scottish and Swedish standards for newly qualified teachers

2018

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Teacher standards are used in many countries, but it has been argued that there is a disconnection between the standards and teachers' everyday practices. Mega-narratives about teachers' practices have been recognised as powerful for educational change and when implementing and legitimising standards. In this comparative study, the standards for newly qualified teachers in Australia, Scotland and Sweden are analysed in order to determine the extent to which they contain human elements, here framed as contextual professionalism, and/or paradigmatic knowledge (Olson and Craig in Teach Coll Rec 111(2):547-572, 2009a). This comparison facilitates an exploration of how teachers' work is envisaged in the respective countries and what is expected or required from newly qualified teachers. The results indicate that the Australian and Scottish standards emphasise paradigmatic knowledge in teaching, whereas the now abandoned Swedish standards emphasise contextual professionalism in teaching.

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Section: Mega-narrativesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human elements and the pragmatic approach in the Australian, Scottish and Swedish standards for newly qualified teachers

2018

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“…True, some authors add caveats that undercut the starkness of these assertions. For example, summarizing the Massialas and Cox instructional model, JoAnn Sweeney and Stuart Foster aver that a "'solution'.. .can never be any more than the best possible statement under the ci~umstances" (p. 68) Nevertheless, talk about consensus, reconciliations, and solutions seems at odds with the complex and of ten divisive nature of most public issues (Kingdon, 1984), the convoluted and often irrational manner in which public policy is made (Cohen & Garet, 1975), and the fact that minority Y oices may go unheard and the oppressed are often excluded from the policymaking arena (West, 1993). Moreover, it raises the specter of students going through the motions of developing a consensus simply to satisfy the teacher and get a g o d grade.…”

Section: The Mixed Messages Of Pssue~centered Educationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Book Reviews

1997

Theory & Research in Social Education

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1997). Doing History: Inves figating With Children in Elements y and Middle Schools. Mahwah N$: Lawrence Erlbaurn Associates. 191 pages, paperback, ISBN 10-8058-804G2 Review by PETER SEIXAS, Faculty of Education, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC V6T 124.Unlike historians (indeed, unlike any researchers in h e humanities), educational researchers have the responsibility to thinlc about haw the fruits of their work will translate into practice. A recent TRSE symposium addressd that msponsibility in respect to research on teaching and leaming history (Barton et aI,, 1996). What are the mechanisms, the participants ask& through w h i c h research on history education can be brought into sustained and fruitful dialogue with policy and teaching? Enter Levstik and Barton with Doing Hkfo y: an exemplary review of research on teaching and learning history. The volume is aimed not at helping academics to define new research projects, but at assisting teachers to improve their teaching of history. In other words, w e have here two =searchers who have put their academic money where heir mouths are, Their achievement, Ddng Histom, is the most important volume for teachers, on teaching and learning history, to be published in North America since Holt's (1990) Thinking Historicdiy. And while it is the first to utilize the outpouring of research which has occured since that date, Levstik and Barton also draw extensively from the work of the teachers whose classrooms they have visited. Rch with voices f mm the schools, the volume thus reads as a conversation among teachers, students and researchers.A Theoretical Orientation The first thee chapters lay out approaches to historical bowledge and cognitive theory which undergird the entiw work. History, PRvstik and Barton explain in the first chapter, tells us who we are and what we can become; it's about significant themes and questions; it is interpretive; it has a narrative structure; it is more than politics; and it is contmversial. Perhaps most importantly it reflects human diversity, including the powerless as well as the powerful. A coherent vision of history is reiterated throughout the vdume. Levstik and Barton advocate: Downloaded by [Wayne State University] at 22:16 26 November 2014Theory and Resmrch in Social Education shifting the focus of history instruction from an oversimplifid emphasis on 'progress'+ery day in every way we are getting better and W r -t o more indepth study of how groups and individuals now and in other times exercise power publicly and privately, how society deals with competing claims between order and protest and how political and social meanings are transmitted to individuals and groups-Ip*lESTheir definition of history is also informed by narrative theov and the recent linguistic and rhetorical turns in the philosophy of 'history. Yet, despite the potentially disabling impact of this literature, k s t i k and Barton keep the discussion safely away from the "edge of the cliff" which has given historians vertigo in the last decade (C...

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“…Weiss, 1977b;Lynn, 1978;Lindblom & Cohen, 1979). Rather, as recent research indicates (e.g., Cohen & Garet, 1975;Weiss, 1977a), it is frequently by way of broadened understanding and improved conceptualization of social reality, leading to a new angle of vision on social processes and problems, with the increased possibility of creative resolutions of the problems confronting policy makers, that social inquiry contributes most to policy making. Indeed, the potential positive benefits of this enlightenment function of social and policy inquiry, which we have justified on theoretical grounds throughout the present essay, have been amply illustrated by Dryzek (1982) and Fischer (1985) in their respective analyses of the Berger inquiry and the Head Start program.…”

Section: Consequences and Relationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Interpretive policy inquiry: A response to the limitations of the received view

Healy

1986

Policy Sci

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This paper seeks to contribute to the growing body of literature on interpretive policy inquiry. As such, its specific focus is the presentation of the interpretive approach as a corrective for the shortcomings inherent in the standard view. Following an outline of the problems facing the received view, a systematic, philosophically grounded, statement of the interpretive position is developed. Thereafter, the tangible positive consequences for policy making of this approach are further discussed. The paper concludes with some reflections on the relationship between the positivistic and interpretive paradigms.

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Reforming Educational Policy With Applied Social Research

Cited by 133 publications

References 0 publications

Human elements and the pragmatic approach in the Australian, Scottish and Swedish standards for newly qualified teachers

Human elements and the pragmatic approach in the Australian, Scottish and Swedish standards for newly qualified teachers

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Interpretive policy inquiry: A response to the limitations of the received view

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