Research on self-regulation of children's learning is seldom set at lower primary school levels.  Indeed, there are conflicting views about the ability of young childen to self-regulate their learning.  We have found that, with appropriate teacher support, and the use of purposefully constructed learning materials, Year 1, 2, and 3 children were able to demonstrate what we consider to be foundational aspects of self-regulated learning.  This paper reports on an ...

In this paper, Cathy Wylie examines the history and impact of school choice policies in New Zealand.

Although 91% of primary students and 84% of secondary students attend their first choice school, roughly 30% of students do not attend schools closest to their homes, suggesting there is some competition for students between schools. Low-income schools are less likely to produce qualified students, and competition does not appear to have induced ...

Videotaped sessions of students working on 'fair testing' investigation scenarios were analysed (N = 204). 

The analysis suggested avenues for the development of strategies that could help develop teachers' pedagogical content knowledge for teaching the skills used during a simple 'fair testing' investigation.  Most conversation during each activity focused on specific aspects of measuring or task completion so that the overall investigation appeared to become a series of disjointed episodes.  ...

With the advent of New Zealand’s NCEA reforms, subject choice is becoming more complex.

In this paper we suggest that the notion that traditional subjects will be important ‘just because’ is no longer an adequate basis for sound subject choice decision-making.

We report on students’ opinions and beliefs about their Year 11 subject choices, collected during the initial stages of a 3-year longitudinal study. The research, Learning Curves: Meeting Student ...

Have we neglected to communicate key ideas about how science is different from other types of knowledge building, and so unwittingly sustained a communication gap between 'science' and 'the public'?

This paper explores five broad principles for developing communication strategies that address the substance of science while still meeting the challenge of varying the tone of the message for six different sectors of the New Zealand public.

The paper was ...

This paper draws on the insights gained from documenting the journeys undertaken by six Normal Schools as they integrated the new Key Competencies (KCs) framework from the draft revised curriculum into their teaching and learning programmes.

This paper discusses some of the challenges the schools faced. The issues explored include:

• creating a shared understanding of the KCs between staff and students
• creating space to foreground the KCs
• findings ways to ...

This NZARE conference paper summarises the results of a small-scale, exploratory study which was designed to include around 6 families from each of 5 ethnic groups (Cook Islands, Niue, Samoan, Tokelauan, and Tongan).

The intention was to provide an account of the experiences of children, parents, and teachers focusing on language and other aspects of children's move from Pacific Islands early childhood centres into English-language primary schools.

Paper presented at ...

Teaching approaches which support the development of students’ “critical thinking” skills, and the use of socioscientific contexts for learning, have both been advocated as necessary and desirable directions for secondary school science education.

In 2004 we were asked to evaluate a teaching resource, distributed to all New Zealand secondary schools, which aimed to support both these approaches at Year 10 level.

We found low levels of uptake and use of ...

Developing a sense of agency as a learner is at the heart of Self-Regulated Learning (SLR).  If students in mathematics are going to become self-regulated learners they need to be confronted with opportunities that allow them to reveal their thinking and to observe and emulate the thinking of others.  In what follows we begin by introducing SRL and exploring its connection with mathematics education.

In our small-scale classroom study, two ...

This paper draws from a background paper prepared for the Ministry of Education: School-based curriculum development: Principles, processes, and practices.

The term "school-based curriculum development" (SBCD) had great currency in 1970s and 1980s educational literature. However, in many countries the term dropped out of use during the late 1980s/early 1990s.

In the 1970s and 1980s, SBCD was seen as a solution to many of the problems of school ...