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Research seminars & events

2008

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24 July ICT in Education Research Seminar: Allan H.K. Yuen: Information Technology professional development for Hong Kong teachers: Reflections on a 10 Year journey

Date:                    Thursday 24 July, 2-3pm
Presenters:             Dr Allan H.K. Yuen, Associate Professor and Associate Dean (Learning and Teaching), Faculty of Education, University of Hong Kong
Venue:                  Room 712, Level 7, Doug McDonell Building
Topic:                   Information Technology professional development for Hong Kong teachers: Reflections on a 10 Year journey

In 1998, the Hong Kong SAR Government announced the first information technology (IT) in education policy document – “Information Technology for Learning in a New Era: Five-year Strategy – 1998/99 to 2002/03”. This document signified the Government’s commitment to driving Hong Kong to become a leader, not a follower, in the information world of tomorrow. A framework of teachers’ IT training has been launched since 1998, in which training programmes are targeted to develop teachers’ competency at four levels, namely, Basic, Intermediate, Upper-intermediate, and Advanced. However, it is recommended in the second IT in education policy document – “Empowering Learning and Teaching with Information Technology” in 2004 – that the four-level framework should be revamped to provide ongoing professional development for teachers in terms of pedagogical use of IT in specific subject areas, as well as its use for supporting the development of students’ generic competencies in information literacy and other higher-order cognitive skills. With the development of the information literacy framework for students in 2005 and the teachers’ continuing professional development framework in 2003, the Government thus commissioned a research study in 2007 focusing on the revamp of the IT training framework for teachers. The framework attempts to address the followings: (1) to sustain teachers’ professional development opportunities, (2) to advance teachers’ information literacy and pedagogical integration of IT, and (3) to develop models of teacher education that will foster the establishment of teacher learning communities that will in turn generate, refine, consolidate and disseminate emerging pedagogies and professional competencies. This seminar aims to present major findings of the “revamp study” and discuss issues in teachers’ IT professional development in Hong Kong since 1998.

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24 July Artistic & Creative Education Research Colloquium: Shirley Brice Heath, Stanford University: Made for each other: Creative arts and sciences

Date:                    Thursday 24 July, 5-6pm
Presenters:             Professor Shirley Brice Heath, Margery Bailey Professor of English & Dramatic Literature, Stanford University
Venue:                  Frank Tate Room, Ground Floor, Alice Hoy Building
Topic:                   Made for each other: Creative arts and sciences

Professor Brice Heath will explore the commonalities among studios, laboratories, and rehearsal zones, investigating the natural but often unnoticed links between sciences and arts. The presentation is based on her research in a secondary school in the UK.

Biographical Note:
Professor Shirley Brice Heath, Margery Bailey Professor of English and Dramatic Literature at Stanford, is a linguistic anthropologist whose primary interests are oral and written language, youth development, race relations, and organizational learning. . She is also an unashamed advocate of the importance of the arts in education. She is the author of the prize-winning book Ways with Words: Language, life, and work in communities and classrooms (1983) and co-editor of Identity and Inner-city Youth: Beyond ethnicity and gender (1993), as well as several other books and over 100 articles and book chapters. She is widely known for her work with young people as co-researchers in the townships of Johannesburg, South Africa, as well as economically disadvantaged communities of the United States. She is in Australia as Keynote Speaker for the Re-imagining Special Education through Arts and Arts Therapy Symposium.

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25 July Future Research Leaders Program (FLRP) Module 2: Starting Out and Collaboration: Putting ideas into practice

Half day workshop (9am - 1pm) facilitated by Professor Leon Mann, CRDL

There are many issues to address once funding for a research project has been obtained. This module explores the first year of a research project to ensure successful start-up and consolidation. The modules Is extremely valuable for all grant recipients.

For further information and to register your interest in participating in the FRLP modules, please contact:

Kerry Smith
Organisational Development Unit
Human Resources Division
tel: 8344 4195

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25 July: CPELL PhD Completion Seminar: Sergio Riquelme: 'Alleluia this is what we have been waiting for!': The Victorian Essential Learning Standards: A New Curriculum Framework to Survive and Thrive in the Era of Flexibility

Date:                    Friday 25 July, 2.30 pm
Presenters:             Sergio Riquelme, PhD candidate, University of Melbourne
Venue:                  CPELL Seminar Room, Level 3, Doug McDonell Building
Topic:                   'Alleluia this is what we have been waiting for!': The Victorian Essential Learning Standards: A New Curriculum Framework to Survive and Thrive in the Era of Flexibility

In 2005, the government of Victoria, Australia, released the Victorian Essential Learning Standards (VELS). This new curriculum framework aims to equip students with skills, knowledge and behaviours to survive and thrive in a flexible knowledge-based society.

This thesis, drawing on Levinas’ ethics and Critical Pedagogy, presents a critical hermeneutics of the 'educative value' of the aims and values underpinning the VELS. It also discusses the ethico-pedagogical nature of teacher engagement in curriculum implementation. Both topics are examined on the basis of a selection of teachers' and policy makers' narratives.

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25 July Assessment Research Centre PhD Confirmation Seminar Negar Keshavarz-Mehr: Item-rater interaction at item level and the impact of feedback on reducing interviewers’ effects

Date:                    Friday 25 July, 5-6pm
Presenters:             Negar Keshavarz-Mehr, PhD candidate, University of Melbourne
Venue:                  G.05, Ground Floor, 234 Queensberry Street
Topic:                   Item-rater interaction at item level and the impact of feedback on reducing interviewers’ effects

There is no doubt about the significance of English language proficiency testing and the role of such tests in the assessment of the most recognized language of the world on many people’s life. However, there are always serious concerns on the reliability of such examination, especially when they are conducted in the oral format which consequently involves interviewers’/raters’ decision making. In fact, one of the major sources of error in some subjective tests is known to be the inconsistencies among raters within and across elements of the language tests. In other words, there is an interaction between interviewers and judgments required on individual test items. The impact of some items on raters could be so important that the test reliability may be affected. This means the interviewers may have the tendency to rate some items more harshly but the others more leniently. This is why this research aims to use Item Response Modelling to investigate item-rater interaction as a source of raters’ error and also examine the effect of detailed feedback at item level on raters’ stringency and inconsistency. In fact, the research aims to see if raters could match their rating patterns with those of a benchmark interviewer/rater by considering their diversion from the desired rating pattern and receiving detailed feedback.

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30 July Future Research Leaders Program (FLRP)Module 7: Managing and Leading People in the Research Context

Half day workshop (9am - 1pm) facilitated by Professor Leon Mann, CRDL

Research projects require some particular approaches for managing people. This module explores the ongoing management of the research team and allied contributors, and looks at associated management issues that may arise. It focuses on management within the distinctive research context of constrained periods of employment and tight timelines. If you have responsibility for managing students, research teams, a research centre or a program of research, this is an important module as it will make a real difference to how your group operates.

For further information and to register your interest in participating in the FRLP modules, please contact:

Kerry Smith
Organisational Development Unit
Human Resources Division
tel: 8344 4195

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4 August ICCR Doctoral Confirmation Seminar: Fang SuChi: Teaching and learning "the mole" in Australia and Taiwan

Date:                    Monday 4 August, 3.30 p.m.
Presenters:             Fang SuChi, PhD candidate, University of Melbourne
Venue:                  ICCR meeting room, 109 Barry Street
Topic:                   Teaching and learning "the mole" in Australia and Taiwan

The concept of the amount of a substance and its unit [the mole] is a fundamental principle in basic chemistry. Understanding the mole well provides a link between the microscopic world of particles and the macroscopic world that we can measure and also lays a foundation for solving stoichiometry problems in advanced chemistry and practical laboratory work. However, because of its abstract nature and the anomalous evolution of the definition in scientific history, the mole is generally acknowledged to be one of the most challenging and misunderstood concept for teachers and students of chemistry.

This study aims to explore how the mole is taught and learned during secondary education in Victoria and Taiwan, with a particular focus on chemistry teachers whose students are learning this concept for the first time. Rather than identifying their perceptions, this investigation attempts to reveal practices in classrooms, and teachers’ teaching and students’ learning experiences and perspectives. Various data collection methods, including video and audio-taping, interviewing, questionnaire and documentation will be adopted in this study. It is hoped that by gaining these participants’ points of view it will be possible to better discern how the mole is attained in genuine educational settings, and what factors facilitate or impede meaningful learning.

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12 August ARC Doctoral Confirmation Seminar: Louise Hobbs: Developing and validating a continuum of practice for the infection control professional

 

Date:                    Tuesday, 12 August, from 5.15pm
Presenters:             Louise Hobbs, PhD candidate, University of Melbourne
Venue:                  Room 521, 234 Queensberry Street
Topic:                   Developing and validating a continuum of practice for the infection control professional

Previous surveys have identified that the infection control professional (ICP) has a nursing background and therefore primarily needs to meet generic nursing competencies (Murphy 1998, Hobbs 2007).

The aim of this study is to validate a set of competencies that were designed to define the scope of practice for the Victorian infection control professional (Hobbs, 2007). This will be achieved by developing a behavioural rating scale based on the competency standards. The behavioural rating scale will form the framework for a self assessment instrument and will be panelled by a group of profession experts. Participants will be invited from state and territory infection control associations and the aged care associations to complete a voluntary, anonymous on-line self assessment survey. Item response modelling procedures will be used to empirically validate that the identified skill thresholds correlate with those identified within the competencies (Bond, 2001).

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