Australia Association for Research in Education
How children’s aspirations change as they grow up: latest research
Two research findings from our University of Newcastle large-scale longitudinal study of the career aspirations of Australian children attracted a lot of media coverage recently. The first was that Australian children begin to form career aspirations from a very young age and the second that children have similar aspirations whether they are from low or …
Educating teachers to be researchers: three surprising gaps in what we are doing in Australia
Much is asked of teachers these days. Governments and school systems seem to regularly increase their expectations of …
Arts-based approaches to teaching literacy: stop all the testing and do this
Millions of dollars have been spent on targeted programs to improve literacy and numeracy learning outcomes around Australia. However this year’s NAPLAN data shows stagnation in terms of data improvement, with a downward shift in performance levels for writing. We don’t believe this lack of movement in data is matched by a lack of impact …
The dark side of NAPLAN: it’s not just a benign ‘snapshot’
The release of the latest NAPLAN results this week identified a problem with student performance in writing. This …
Harry Potter’s world: keeping spaces for magic making in our schools
If you are a Harry Potter fan you probably celebrated last month, the twentieth anniversary of the first …
The myth of teacher as superhero (and other bad messages) peddled by hit TV series
It makes good cinema to put six bright and passionate teacher recruits into some of the most underserved schools and communities in Australia and follow them around. When the filming is by Screentime (think Underbelly crime drama series, Outback Coroner, Outback ER) it is no wonder the result is highly entertaining and heart-touching. But we …
The creeping commercialisation of public schools
The privatisation of public education is attracting a lot of attention around the world but what is happening …
Are regular classroom teachers really not qualified to teach students with special needs?
Sure enough, representatives of parent and teacher groups have emerged to back Senator Pauline Hanson’s claims that children with ‘autism and disabilities’ should be removed from mainstream classroom. Primary principals in south western Sydney were reported as saying a shortage of places in special schools and classes is leading to the placement of students with …
Revaluing science in the school subject marketplace
Around this time each year Australian students are thinking about the subjects they will choose for their final …