Australia Association for Research in Education
COVID-19 and schools
Have we lost trust in science?
Trust in Science, Society, and the Australian State: A Crisis in the Making? “The return to school has …
‘My teacher sucks’: how teacher shortages shatter learning
Teacher shortages in NSW exist. This is a surprise to long-term casual teachers who describe permanency as a unicorn. They compete for limited positions in certain locations, sectors and KLAs (Key Learning Areas). But still the teacher shortages exist. Having worked across a range of settings, metropolitan and regional, highly competitive selective environments, metropolitan disadvantaged …
Why it’s a nightmare to use Zoom to get moving
Schools around Australia were forced into online delivery of physical education (PE) in Term 2, 2020, due to measures taken to suppress and restrict the spread of Covid-19. We looked at what really happened in classrooms. The results show us exactly how marginalised PE became. What we found in our research, ‘Just do some physical …
Seven great ways to connect with students during snap lockdowns
This research might be about students with added learning needs but could easily apply to all students. The snap school lockdowns required to combat the Delta variant of Covid-19 disproportionately affect different cohorts of students and teachers. When the first school lockdowns were implemented in NSW in 2020, a group of researchers undertook a study …
Why we must abandon the 2021 HSC now
A stop-start directive to return to schools has been going on for over a month and produced anxieties for teachers, students and their families. How can we respond to the confusion this has produced, particularly regarding Year 12 students? The argument mounted here is that there really is only one way to respond and that …
Teachers deliver powerful mindfulness programs for students. Now they might need space to strengthen their own minds.
Since the first confirmed case of COVID-19 appeared in Australia in late-January 2020, the country has been through …
The White Paper: old, tired and lacking evidence
In the months before the pandemic gripped the world, the NSW Productivity Commission released a presciently titled discussion paper, Kickstarting the Productivity Conversation. Its recently released followup White Paper sets out its plan for rebooting the economy. Lifting school results is part of the plan. The Commission acknowledges the ‘pandemic has shown how quickly schools, …
COVID coaches: tutoring only works when backed by quality teaching directed at the students who really missed out
The injection by NSW and Victorian State Governments of more than half a billion dollars on tutoring programs to help students catch up after Covid-19-related disruptions to normal schooling is welcome. However, there is a need to ensure the intervention is more than an economic ‘sugar hit’ and that it leads to sustained improvement in …
More help needed for vulnerable learners in the age of COVID-19 school closures
During lockdowns due to the COVID-19 virus outbreak, school closures were hotly debated. Complete school closures were perceived …
TikTok teachers go viral in these #COVID-19 times
TikTok is one of the world’s fastest growing apps, with an estimated two billion total downloads since its …