Voices Of Learners Research Articles

Facilitating the development of creativity using special collections and archives

How can special collections and archives (SCA) services contribute to the development of creativity in higher education students? An understanding of how creativity is developed can help those who work with special collections and archives to better design sessions that facilitate this development. Creativity is defined, put in context, and discussed as a metacognitive process. SCA as an environment that can contribute to the development of creativity is explored, along with the importance of the learner voice and pedagogical tools that allow for the facilitation of metacognitive experiences.

Inside Out Literacies

Since 1997, adult literacy education has been of increasing interest to UK policy makers amid perceptions/claims of a causal relationship between attainment in literacy and positive economic participation, social inclusion, and life chance transformation. However, research in the field of literacy studies suggests that many prisoners who identify as beginner readers, report feeling alienated by formal education failing to take sufficient account of the social identities learners bring to their learning or how they want to use literacy to bring about change in their lives. This has resulted in deficit models of the prisoner as learner that impose ‘spoiled educational identities' and fail to engage prisoners as active, agentic participants in their learning. In this article, the authors draw on data produced in the qualitative phase of a year-long study across the English prison estate of Shannon Trust's prison-based reading plan, to explore alternative approaches to prison literacy education that challenge the traditions of formal education and put learner identity and aspiration at the heart of the beginner reader learning process. The qualitative phase of the project involved twelve focus groups across eight prison settings and included 20 learner, and 37 mentor participants engaged in the Shannon Trust peer-reading programme. The authors listen closely to the voices of learners and mentors describing their experiences of peer to peer learning and plug in Anita Wilson's concepts of educentricity and third space literacies to read participants' experiences of formal and informal literacy education. They make use of this analysis to identify and describe a ‘grounded pedagogy' approach that pays attention to learning as social practice and enables prisoners to re-imagine themselves both as learners and social actors and to begin to connect their learning to self-directed desistence identity building. The authors conclude with a consideration of the implications of this work for prison literacy teaching and the potential role of grounded pedagogy ideas in the development of more provocative approaches to prison teacher education.

Listening to Learners’ Voices

This 2018 issue was initially intended as unthemed, but in fact a theme does emerge from the three papers – that of language learners’ voices, reminding us as educators of how much we need to listen – and the kinds of things we need to listen to more reflexively. Anna Filipi’s paper points to the frequent absence of the voices of international students in investigations, giving an account of their identities through a critical examination of English language learner categorisation. Suma Sumithran then asks how EAL/D teachers speak about their adult students’ language learning experiences, indicating that sometimes students’ voices are not heard in crucial ways, resulting in a perpetuation of cultural stereotyping, even if their teachers engage with them with the best of intentions. In an Australia characterised by cultural and linguistic diversity, an examination of the hybrid and fluid identities of its peoples reveal that ‘othering’ based on geographical nation-state boundaries is highly problematic. Finally, Nicholas Carr and Michiko Weinmann look at written corrective feedback from a sociocultural angle to give an account of how the voices of adult English language learners in Japan reveal their experiences of processing teacher feedback through collaboration, both with peers and with the language teacher.

Disseminating a Learner Voice through Collaborative Reflection

This paper reports on a series of collaborative work on weaving and disseminating a personal narrative presented at the annual conference of the Japan Association for Self-Access Learning (JASAL) in 2017. The authors of this paper, Ota and Yamamoto, have engaged in advising dialogue in the self-access learning center in their institution since 2016. After completing one year of study abroad in the United States, Ota was passionately sharing her experience with her advisor, Yamamoto, in advising sessions. Her willingness to share her voice encouraged them to showcase her journey in overcoming hardships during study abroad at JASAL 2017. Drawing on Ota’s study abroad experience, they discussed emerging themes in her written work throughout the continuous advising dialogues. Simultaneously, taking a reflexive approach, they actively shared their views and background as a crucial dimension of co-constructing Ota’s personal narrative. Reflecting on their collaborative work, the authors illuminate the active roles of self-access learning centers and the educators in empowering learners to disseminate their voice as a form of activating their agency.

Learners as leaders in Namibian schools: taking responsibility and exercising agency

Educational leadership and management (ELM) research has, all-too-often, attributed a positional quality to leadership and equated school leadership with the principal at the top of the management hierarchy. We argue that leadership is not limited by formal authority and can be exercised by individuals and groups other than the principal. Of specific interest to us is the leadership of learners. However, research in this niche area is limited, and particularly so in African countries such as Namibia. Framed by the concepts of learner voice and democratic citizenship, this article focuses on the leadership development of Namibian school learners and argues that learners should be treated as people whose ideas matter. It draws on a Bachelor of Education Honours ELM elective which required Honours students (practicing teachers) to establish leadership clubs in their schools and involve learners in a change initiative in pursuit of leadership development. The research which informed this article was designed as a case study to explore learner voice and the development of leadership across extra-curricular leadership clubs in 32 Namibian schools. Data were generated from a number of different sources and analysed thematically. The purpose of this article is two-fold; first to give a broad overview of the 32 Namibian clubs and show, through the identification of the focus areas of their club projects for the year, ‘what mattered’ to learners, and second to discuss, in detail, one of these 32 clubs. On the basis of our findings, we argue that learners can indeed be developed as leaders through the introduction of learner leadership clubs in schools. Given the appropriate forum, learners are able to articulate what matters to them in schools; they are able to develop a voice. Given the right conditions and concomitant support, learners can enact leadership, particularly when they have conceptualised the school change initiative. Because learners are central to school life, they are well placed to bring about school change. Yet, we caution, the leadership development of learners is unlikely to be sustained without bold and continued leadership on the part of teachers and the school management team.

On being and becoming a jazz musician: Perceptions of young Scottish musicians

This paper examines what goes on in an improvising jazz combo in a secondary school in Scotland, where teaching follows Rogoff's three-stage sociocultural process, moving from an initial apprenticeship model through one of guided participation to one of participatory appropriation. Using a case study research design and interpretative phenomenological analysis, and drawing on sociocultural perspectives, the music-making and participation of three participants is discussed and presented through narrative account. Three key themes emerged as perceived benefits: (1) personal effects, (2) social effects; and (3) jazz effects. The development of confidence was seen as the main outcome of learning in the jazz combo. This study suggests that learning in an active participatory jazz combo with pedagogy more appropriate to an informal learning style may help to foster the development of learner voice and help enable a creative disposition, in line with the philosophy of Scotland's Curriculum for Excellence (CfE).

Recommendations for undergraduate medical electives: a UK consensus statement.

Many doctors, across grades and specialities, supervise or advise students and juniors undertaking elective placements. Electives form part of medical curricula on a worldwide scale. The Medical Schools Council (MSC) Electives Committee in the UK identified a gap in the current literature in relation to provision of comprehensive recommendations for the design and management of undergraduate elective programmes. Electives afford many known benefits for medical and other health care students, but the context, and risks (impacting potentially on patient, public and student well-being) are usually different from those associated with 'home' clinical placements. The aim is to share experiences and good practice within UK Medical Schools, and inform and inspire others involved with similar programmes across the globe. This paper reports the results of the formation of a sub-group to draft a set of recommendations, drawing on the reported experiences of academic elective leads across all UK schools, and including input from the MSC, and the student group Medsin (to capture the learner voice). The final document was the result of a national consultative process of four iterations. The end document was approved at school level, e.g. by curriculum committee, by each of the participating schools. The recommendations consolidate the experiences of 30 participating UK medical schools. The consultation process generated 17 pre-departure recommendations, seven during elective recommendations, 11 post elective recommendations and a further four recommendations relating to infectious disease. We believe developing elective programmes using collective recommendations will provide a basis for a safer and more structured approach to a medical elective without losing the uniqueness and creative experiences valued by participants. Issues relating to undergraduates leaving their home school to experience medicine in a new context or country replicate across sites, so many recommendations will be transferable internationally.

Facilitating Chinese EFL Learners’ Critical Thinking Skills: The Contributions of Teaching Strategies

Many teaching strategies have been used to promote the development of critical thinking skills, among which the most frequently used are group discussion, concept mapping, and analytical questioning. The study aims to explore learners’ voice and learning experience in the pedagogical contributions of these strategies to the development of critical thinking skills in Chinese EFL (English as a Foreign Language) learners. One full university class was chosen as the sample in the instruction of critical thinking skills and to take part in a learner voice survey, among which 15 participants were chosen by purposeful sampling for semistructured interviews. The instruction of critical thinking was embedded in an English reading class by using the three teaching strategies, during which four interviews were conducted for each critical thinking skill. After the instruction of critical thinking skills was completed, all participants were surveyed with the learner voice questionnaire. The results show that participants thought the three teaching strategies could improve critical thinking skills. Each teaching strategy made unique and specific contributions to the development of critical thinking skills. These findings have pedagogical implications for using these teaching strategies in the instruction of critical thinking skills in Chinese EFL learners.

Learner Dashboards a Double-Edged Sword? Students’ Sense-Making of a Collaborative Critical Reading and Learning Analytics Environment for Fostering 21st Century Literacies

The affordances of learning analytics (LA) tools and solutions are being increasingly harnessed for enhancing 21st century pedagogical and learning strategies and outcomes. However, use cases and empirical understandings of students’ experiences with LA tools and environments aimed at fostering 21st century literacies, especially in the K-12 schooling sector and in Asian education contexts remain relatively scarce in the field. Our paper addresses this knowledge gap in two ways. First, we present a first iteration design of a computer-supported collaborative critical reading and LA environment, WiREAD, and its 16-week implementation in a Singapore high school. Second, we foreground students’ evaluative accounts of the benefits and drawbacks associated with this techno-pedagogical innovation. Our analysis of students’ collective sense-making pointed to a number of potentialities and perils associated with the design and use of LA dashboards. Positives included (1) fostering greater self-awareness, reflective and self-regulatory learning dispositions, (2) enhancing learning motivation and engagement, and (3) nurturing connective literacy among students. The motivational value of peer-referenced LA visualisations for stimulating healthy competition and game-like learning was identified, alongside the perils of these serving to demoralise, pressurise and trigger complacency in learners. By focusing on students’ experiences and interpretations of how the LA dashboard visualizations impacted their learning motivation and outcomes, this paper aims to shed insights into the pedagogical complexities of designing LA that considers the voices of learners as a critical stakeholder group.

Building a Picture of Usage Patterns in a Language Learning Space: Gathering Useful Quantitative and Qualitative Data

While evaluation of a language learning space can be a difficult undertaking, it is possible to design evaluation instruments that both satisfy institutional demands for numeric data and also provide useful information that can be used to improve the space. This paper reports on the implementation, one quantitative and one qualitative, of two evaluation instruments at a small and relatively new self-access centre in Osaka, Japan. The area counting system gives rich data about how students are using the space, while the user experience survey provides much valued learner voices on different aspects of the space and its mission. Examples are given from the findings and how this data can be utilised to enhance the space itself.

Exploring virtual world innovations and design through learner voices

Student voice has played a big role in shaping the development and measure of success/failure of virtual worlds in education. Data on past and ongoing educational uses and contexts of use of virtual worlds and associated student feedback was gathered via a survey of educational researchers specialising in virtual worlds. Introduced are a range of specific uses that provide the source of and context for student feedback. Ten major themes emerged from student voices that highlight strengths and weakness and point the way forward for both educators and the students themselves. Positive feedback highlighted experiences of both pedagogical design and the ability of the technology to support it. Negative feedback revolved around technical problems, seen as hampering the effectiveness of student learning experiences. Student voice regarding virtual worlds is both positive and rewarding, and commending of staff who have dedicated their time and effort to transform the learning experience.

In Their Own Voices: Study Habits of Distance Education Students

ABSTRACTDistance learners must balance many challenges when studying away from their home institution, including balancing work, family and study times. How, where, and when a student organizes and interacts with his or her study environment is a significant factor in student persistence and retention. Support services provided by the home institution, including the library, that can help students succeed are an essential resource but capturing how, if, and why distance students interact with these services presents a unique challenge. Distance from the home institution means that the distance learner's voice is often lost. This research study uses an ethnographic method (photo-elicitation) to gain a better understanding of how distance learners engage with their study environment and offers some suggestions on what libraries can do to close the gap.

Impact of Repeatedly Failing a High School Exit Exam: Voices of English Language Learners

This qualitative study explored the perceived psychological impact of repeated failures on a high school exit examination (HSEE). We interviewed eight self-identified English language learners (ELLs), whose ages ranged from 20 to 29. All participants were attending tutoring HSEE programs at urban community colleges in New England. Using a modified grounded theory approach (Goldkuhl and Cronholm in Int J Qual Methods 9:187–205, 2010), interviews were transcribed, coded, and analyzed. The interviewees perceived many more negative effects than benefits of failing a HSEE. They reported adverse effects on academic motivation, emotions, goals, and self-perceptions. Despite these perceived adverse effects, they identified both individual (efforts, goals, self-reflection and positive mindset, positive self-perceptions) and environmental protective factors (encouragement, instructional support and emotional support) that helped them persist in attempting to pass the HSEE. The findings from study have implications for educational and psychological research, policy and practice.

Teaching Presence in MOOCs

Despite the rapid growth of massive open online courses (MOOCs) in recent years, a fundamental question is still being debated widely in the education community: how to design and deliver MOOCs and move them away from the banking model of education (Freire, 1974), in which the teacher has traditionally been the central authority. Our goal in this paper is to improve the MOOC pedagogy through the lens of teaching presence. We argue that teaching presence is much more than just a facilitation strategy; rather, teaching presence is about creating a meaningful and receptive relationship between and among learners. To accomplish this we propose that instead of a single facilitative role there is a diversity in teacher roles. Teachers can themselves become learners in their own classrooms, as well as enabling and encouraging learners also take on the role of teachers in this open learning process. This leads us to propose the notion of hybrid presence, a construct that emerges out of authentic relationships among esteemed co-learners (Rheingold, 2014) in an open educational environment. This hybrid presence is particularly evident in community-based MOOCs. To aid in the design and facilitation of such MOOCs we propose three interrelated learning design principles aligning with the notion of hybrid presence: prepare to cede authority, embrace plasticity, and be present with fellow learners.All the learning design principles we propose highlight approaches that are responsive to the affordances of connectivity and diversity on the World Wide Web. In the first principle cede authority we suggest that MOOC instructors see themselves as conveners of MOOCs, and that they see the learners as co-learners in their educational journey. The second principle embrace plasticity draws attention to the importance of being receptive and responsive to the direction and nature of learner voices in distributed networks. Finally, in the last principle be present with fellow learners we suggest using tools that foster mutual empathy and awareness for both learners and teachers to be present in the environment in authentic ways. Each principle is illustrated with specific examples from different types of community-based MOOCs, such as Change11 MOOC, Rhizomatic Learning, MobiMOOC 2011, and UNIV 200: Inquiry and the Craft of Argument.

Learner enhanced technology

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose a conceptual model of engagement, appropriated from social media marketing, as a sense-making framework to understand engagement as a measurable process through the development of engagement profiles. To explore its potential application to education the paper follows previous work with Personalised Learning strategies to place emphasis on the promotion of the learner voice – their ability to influence decisions affecting them and their community. Design/methodology/approach – This paper will position engagement as a sociocultural process and adopt an Activity Theory based methodology demonstrated through a desk analysis of VLE data from a further education college. Findings – The analysis suggests that the approach can yield insights that may be elusive in traditional measures reinforcing the overall conceptual proposal for a multi-method approach to profiling learner engagement. Research limitations/implications – The paper has focused on presentation and exploration of the conceptual approach, which has limited the scope to broaden the discussion of the desk analysis and wider findings that this approach reveals. Practical implications – It is intended that the approach offers a generalizable model that can be adopted by institutions planning to measure engagement or develop learner activity profiles. Several areas of immediate potential are identified throughout the paper. Originality/value – This paper contributes a multi-method approach to engagement as argued for in recent engagement literature. This should offer institutions a way to realise value from emerging ideas within related domains of Learning Design and Learning Analytics.

Remix Culture and English Language Teaching: The Expression of Learner Voice in Digital Multimodal Compositions

A number of scholars maintain that the affordances of digital media to easily copy, edit, and share digital content has led to the development of aremix culturein which the amateur creation of cultural artifacts—often remixes, mashups, or parodies based on the creative works of others—has proliferated. At the same time, inTESOLthere is increasing interest in engaging students with processes of digital multimodal composition, focusing not only on language proficiency as it is traditionally conceived but also on the strategic use of multimodal resources and collaborative tools to reach a wide authentic audience on the Internet. One issue which such approaches must face is the tendency for some students to draw upon and remix existing creative works in their digital compositions. In particular, the issue is whether this practice of remix promotes or compromises the expression of learner voice. This article considers these questions by examining the multimodal compositions of students in a course in English for science at a Hong Kong university. The analysis generates a theoretical model of remix practices, which can be applied to the teaching and evaluation of multimodal compositions in English language courses.

Homophobic violence in a Northern Cape school: Learners confront the issue

abstract Violence has become synonymous with South African schooling. A burgeoning body of literature points to homophobia as a source of such violence. Research conducted by social justice research institutes and international non-governmental organisations (NGOs) found that homophobic violence undermines young people’s inherent right to human dignity, and has devastating psychosocial effects. Efforts to combat school-based violence more generally, and homophobic violence in particular, have to a larger extent been insufficient and ineffective. This briefing reflects on learner voices on how to combat the problem of homophobic violence in South African schools. Data was gathered through observation, informal recorded face-to-face interviews and focused group discussions with male learners (between the ages of 17 – 19 years). Themes such as: ‘the extent of homophobic violence’ and ‘what could be done to deal with violence in the school context’ were explored. The research found that homophobic violence is pervasive, and that boys experience routine discrimination on the grounds of their sexual identity. Learners proposed multipronged interventions, focussing on families, schools, and communities at large. These interventions are aimed at promoting a culture of tolerance and respect in and outside the school context.

Part-time learners in open and distance learning: revisiting the critical importance of choice, flexibility and employability

In this article, we argue that, if open learning seeks to (re)assert a social justice mission, issues of openness and flexibility are more critical than ever. Drawing on qualitative data from a National Union of Students Wales/Open University study, which explored, in the voices of Welsh students, the identity, motivation and barriers faced by part-time distance learners, three key findings emerged. First, the chimaera of ‘choice’ – for part-time distance learners whose personal circumstances prevent any other mode of study; second, the vacuity of policy assertions around ‘flexibility’ in HE – what personalised learning means for part-time distance learners should be contested and re-examined; third, the mantra of ‘employability’ – for part-time distance learners, employability is a conundrum which needs to be understood in a far more inclusively nuanced way. We conclude that the voices of part-time distance learners need to be heard by policy makers and should inform open universities’ continuing efforts to enable vulnerable and marginalised learners to access HE.

Invoking learner voice and developing leadership: what matters to learners?

Educational leadership and management (ELM) research overly focuses on adult leadership development at the expense of leadership of learners. Framed by the concept of learner voice, this article focuses on learner leadership and argues that learners should be treated as people whose ideas matter. It draws on a Bachelor of Education Honours (ELM) elective which required students (practicing teachers) to establish school leadership clubs and involve learners in a reform initiative in pursuit of leadership development. The longitudinal study which informed this article was designed as a multi-case study to explore learner voice and the development of leadership across 44 leadership clubs drawing on three data sources. The study found that while the phenomenon of learner leadership was not common across schools, leadership clubs offered a space for the development of learner voice. Learner voice was generated in relation to the school physical environment, English proficiency amongst learners, improved learner conduct, developments pertaining to the extra-mural curriculum, and leadership training initiatives. In addition, the clubs afforded learners the opportunity to initiate and lead a change project in their schools. However, the take-up of learner leadership as a whole school initiative was problematic in the majority of schools. The article concludes with some suggestions for a future research agenda emerging out of the first phase of the project.

DEMOCRATIC SCHOOL GOVERNANCE, LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT: A CASE STUDY OF TWO SCHOOLS IN SOUTH AFRICA

This article reports on a qualitative study that investigated the functioning of school governing bodies (SGBs) as a tool for promoting democracy in two schools. Data was gathered through interviews, observations and document reviews. Findings revealed that democracy was in existence and practised at both schools and that it was characterised by shared decision making and acknowledged rights of individuals, representations, participation and equality. Two structures for promoting democracy were found to be in existence in both schools. These are school governing bodies and representative councils for learners. Such structures were found to be functioning effectively and contributing to the democracy in schools. However, although the learner voice was represented at both schools, learner participation in crucial issues in both the schools was limited. The study recommends that all teachers, learners and parent representatives on the SGBs be trained in skills such as deliberation, debate, dialogue and managing differences. Furthermore, training or capacity building related to advocacy skills and leadership development should be provided for all members of the SGBs, including teachers. The more learners, parents and staff are involved in school policy and decision making, the more there is a genuine community involvement in schools, and the more effective a school becomes. Also, schools need to move towards learnerinitiated decision making where learners initiate the process and invite adults to join them in making decisions. Also, there is need for teachers to be trained in democratic ways of operating in the school and classroom, which will possibly help them learn ways of working democratically in both the whole school and the classroom.