RECENT DOCTORAL THESES IN EDUCATION

Dr P Smith (PhD), Deakin University, Preparing for flexible delivery in industry : learners and their workplaces.

This thesis examines learning preferences and strategies of apprentices and contexts within which they learn in their workplaces. It also examines the economic context for changes to vocational education and training (VET), and literature on workplace learning. Apprentices are shown to prefer structured instructor-led programs, and to not have a high preference for independent learning, or the development of their own learning goals. Additionally, they are shown to have very low preferences for learning through reading, preferring to learn through direct hands-on experience. Females are shown to have a higher preference than males for learning qualitative material through reading. Younger apprentices are shown to have a higher preference than older ones for self-directed learning. The data are factor analysed and indicate that apprentices clearly prefer to learn (1) through non-verbal means, (2) from structured programs in a structured environment, and (3) through socially mediated presentations and contexts rather than through more independent forms of learning. Research indicates that support for apprentices' learning in their workplace is typically unplanned and haphazard. The learning preferences and learning strategies findings for apprentices, coupled with the findings of typically poor or unplanned support in the workplace, indicate that effective flexible delivery of training to apprentices in the workplace provides a number of challenges. These challenges, it is argued, demand strategies to be developed and implemented to prepare both learners and workplaces for effective engagement with flexible delivery. Using as a theoretical framework Kember's two-dimensional model of open learning for adults, the thesis integrates the findings into a proposed two-dimensional model of learner and workplace preparedness for flexible delivery. The model provides for a Learner Development Space, a Workplace Development Space, and a Strategy Space. Within the Learner Development Space, focuses for the development of learner preparedness are identified in terms of self-directed learning, skills developments, and effective participation in a community of practice. Focuses for workplace development identified in the Workplace Development Space are those associated with development of training policies, training structures, and trainer skills and abilities. The Strategy Space then provides detail of seventy-nine specific strategies developed to enhance learner and workplace preparedness within each of the focuses identified.

Dr S Warren (EdD), University of Wollongong, Quality teaching and its characteristics.

This study aimed to elucidate the characteristics of quality teachers. Following the successful implementation of an inservice course in the South Coast Region of NSW entitled 'Quality Teaching', there was a strong interest in the practices demonstrated by classroom practitioners. Centred on naturalistic enquiry, this study presents four case studies of classroom teachers. It takes the characteristics of quality teachers outlined by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation Development (OECD) and seeks to determine if there is congruence between those characteristics and the work of the four participants in the case studies. The research was carried out using the qualitative methods of interview and observation. After each process, the data collected was clarified in post-observation conferences with the participant and in sessions when the content of interviews was verified and validated. To identify participants for the study, teachers in a variety of different schools were interviewed in terms of their understandings of 'Quality Teaching'. They were asked to identify people they believed demonstrated quality teaching in their day-to-day practice. If the people identified had attended the 'Qua1ity Teaching Inservice Course' in South Coast Region, they were considered to be eligible to participate in the study. Participants were selected on the basis of school size and eventually became self-nominating as participants. A literature review confirmed the aspects of quality that are examined in the study, emphasising the complexity of examining the practice of people in the teaching role. It enabled an understanding of each of the five characteristics: Knowledge of Curriculum Areas and Content; Pedagogical Skill; Reflection; Empathy, and, Managerial Competence. The findings confirm the congruence between four of the characteristics and these people's work. In the case of 'Empathy with the Student', the findings suggest that these people do not regard this 'relationship-based' aspect of their work as the concept of empathy that is defined in the literature. The participants are sensitive to the needs of the students in their classes, but the communication of that sensitivity is focused on positive statements and encouragement rather than the nature of the empathic understanding defined by the literature. This does not decrease the professionalism of any of these teachers nor does it diminish the quality of their work. They are highly committed people who demonstrate both the art and the science of teaching in truly professional ways.

Dr K Wicks (PhD), University of Adelaide, Teaching the art of living' : the development of special education services in South Australia, 1915-1975.

This thesis examines the development of special education services in South Australia from 1915 to 1975. It explores the factors which positioned the `mentally retarded' child, (today known as a child with an intellectual disability) previously excluded or marginalised from schooling, and his or her family, within the modern school system. It also seeks to understand the part played by the human sciences of medicine, psychology and sociology in the production of the `mentally retarded' child as a visible figure of knowledge and administration. Although many historians have written about the history of `normal' childhood, less is known about intellectually disabled children. This is partly because until the last two centuries, most did not survive. What their lives have been like since then, how the state viewed them and their families and the issues behind the development of special education are questions addressed in this thesis. By examining changes in society's attitude to the family during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the role and treatment of children and the broad social and economic settings in which these changes took place, the study analyses in overall context the place of `mentally retarded' children. In particular, it focuses on the changes in societal discourses and responses to the `mentally retarded' population, especially their schooling. The research has been influenced by the work of post-modern theorists, particularly Michel Foucault, in terms of the relationship between the emergence of particular forms of knowledge/language and the exercise of particular forms of power, particularly with regard to the `mentally retarded' population. In constructing my argument, the author juxtaposes the moderate threads of post-modern argument with those advanced by more conventional critics. Data collection has included interviews with parents of some of the children who attended the first special school in South Australia as well as Education Department staff. Although the state and the parents may have had different expectations regarding schooling for these children, it was the persistence of the parents and their formation of the Mentally Retarded Children's Society that finally brought about the opening of the long awaited special school in 1954.

Dr J Wilson (PhD), University of Melbourne, Assessing metacognition.

Researchers, educators and curriculum documents promote the importance of metacognition for student learning but much confusion in the field continues to exist about what the term 'metacognition' means. This lack of clarity creates obstacles for researchers and educators. It is difficult to teach and assess what has not been clearly defined. Because of the importance attached to assessed curriculum, a likely implication is that metacognition will not be widely embraced as a worthwhile part of the curriculum unless metacognition is clearly defined and is included as part of assessment practices. This thesis investigated the assessment of metacognition within the curriculum domain of mathematics. The study involved Year 6 students from three different schools. Conventional techniques used for monitoring metacognition are criticised in terms of their validity and reliability. The need for practical assessment tasks was identified to minimise limitations of individual techniques and attend to questions of rigor. A new multi-method approach was developed and trialled for the assessment of three key metacognitive functions: Awareness, Evaluation and Regulation. The main features of this approach were a hands-on card-sorting task and a video replay used within the context of a problem based clinical interview. This thesis sets out the consequences of implementing a new method for the assessment of metacognition. The data generated provides a detailed endorsement of a theoretical model for metacognition developed in the course of this thesis. The findings of the study call into question previous research into metacognition (both methodologically and in terms of actual findings) and shed significant light on the nature of metacognition and its use by Year 6 students in the solution of mathematical problems. The results consistently show that student metacognitive behaviour is predictable regardless of school, class or task. The study also provides a technique for assessing and researching metacognition that could be adapted for other purposes and in other contexts.

Dr K Yoshimitsu (PhD), Monash University, Language maintenance efforts of Japanese school children in Melbourne.

Language maintenance research centres on different types of language contact situations and different forms of bilingualism. This study was concerned with a minority group's efforts to retain the use of its language, as well as maintaining age-appropriate levels of language proficiency in a two-language environment. The study investigated the language maintenance efforts of 10 Japanese children (aged 1O to 11) in Melbourne, whose parents were of Japanese background. The aim was not only to provide a descriptive account of the children's degree and direction of Japanese language maintenance, but also to engage in a more critical evaluation of 'who maintained the Japanese language, how and why', a most relevant question in the study of language maintenance raised by Li Wei. The findings presented in this study are the outcome of a small-scale case study which will contribute to gaining deeper insights into the process through which individuals undergo language maintenance. Focusing on the micro-level language planning for maintenance, this study examined children's maintenance levels in terms of Japanese language proficiency, and analysed the correlation between the maintenance levels achieved and the factors and the strategies adopted by both parents and children. It also examined the effects of parental attitudes towards maintenance planning on their child's maintenance outcome. Three maintenance patterns emerged from the study. There were the successful cases with a good maintenance level, the moderately successful cases with a fair maintenance level, and the unsuccessful cases with a poor maintenance level. A maintenance pattern related to residential status, which indicates a difference in social positioning in Australia, emerged as anticipated. The implications of the findings were: (1) language maintenance of a child is a result of the combined efforts of the parents and the child; (2) the child's maintenance outcome is largely affected by the maintenance programs (strategies) which the parents and the child implements; and (3) the quality and the effectiveness of maintenance programs are largely affected by the-parents' attitudes towards maintenance, the child's motivation as well as the family's financial capability to employ the maintenance aids.