Brian Lewthwaite

• BEd (SK), BSc, ADV (SK), MEd Hons (Massey), PhD
• James Cook University

The research described and reported on in this article focuses on an analysis of the current English language curriculum in Saudi Arabia and the documents and underlying influences on its construction. The investigation involved a document analysis in order to identify associated curriculum orientations (Eisner, 1985) to determine what Saudi Arabia...

Given that interest is associated with learning in educational research, understanding how its development can be supported in different learning contexts represents an important line of inquiry. In this study, we investigate the influence of the slowmation construction process on middle school students’ interest in learning science and geology. Bo...

This article documents a teaching journey in a 6/7 class with 20 Torres Strait Islander students in the curriculum area of literacy, over the course of one academic year. Specifically, this action research study explores a classroom teacher's efforts to navigate and respond to the prominent teaching model of explicit instruction and culturally resp...

Abstract: Recent developments in Canada’s Yukon Territory draw attention to how political pressure via a century of First Nations activism and a dynamic political climate now shaped by a modern treaty has created space within public education for educators to be responsive to Indigenous peoples’ cultural knowledge systems, practices and needs (Lew...

The Yukon is the most westerly of Canada’s three territories, located north of British Columbia and bordering Alaska in the United States. The territory is sparsely populated with the majority of its population residing in the capital city of Whitehorse. The remainder of the population is distributed across 14 communities, most of which are represe...

There is a need for research-informed instructional approaches that promote school students’ deep conceptual understanding of abstract geological concepts. Given that a type of learner-constructed stop-motion animation, ‘slowmation’, has been shown to offer affordances for learning in science preservice teacher education, we extended its applicatio...

Flexible Learning Options (FLOs) attempt to enable secondary school completion by young people for whom ‘mainstream’ schooling has not worked well. Despite their proliferation and the increased research attention to understanding the mechanisms at work within such programmes, quantitative methods have not been utilised to compare participants’ perc...

This paper reports findings from a systematic literature review conducted to identify effective behaviour management strategies which create a positive learning environment for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students. The search criteria employed resulted in 103 documents which were analysed in response to this focus. Results identified eigh...

This paper summarizes the findings from the first phase of a three-part project which, overall, investigates what Aboriginal¹ students perceive as the qualities and actions of effective teachers and subsequently seeks to determine the impact of the enactment of these identified qualities on educational outcomes. This first phase of the research was...

There are ongoing calls for research that identifies students’ conceptions about geographical phenomena. In response, this study investigates junior secondary school students’ (N = 95) conceptions about plate tectonics. Student response data was generated from semi-structured interviews-about-instances and a two-tiered multiple-choice test instrume...

This paper explores the experiences of 12 young people, all teenagers, who have chosen to attend alternative schools known as flexible learning options within the Australian context. Using a phenomenological approach, the study seeks to understand their experiences outside the normalised public discourse that they had ‘disengaged’ from mainstream s...

Many current economic and social challenges lead to waves of migrating people. The countries where migrants seek refuge can be ethnically homogeneous and monolingual such as Greece, or more frequently, ethnically diverse with local Indigenous populations which have been subjugated and marginalized, such as the US or Australia. In either context, a...

It is well known that students arrive in science classrooms with pre-instructional ideas about science phenomena, and that often students’ ideas are not scientifically accurate representations of these phenomena. This research project will engage Year 9 Science students in the creation of a slowmation to represent an Earth Science concept that has...

This study attempts to locate care and caring in teaching practice. Specifically, the study examines how one pre-service teacher, with a personal imperative to care, mediates the space between performativity and caringUsing self-study methodology, the study attempts to make sense of the “theory/action dialectic” (Osborne, 2003, p. 17) of enacting c...

This study took place on a remote Torres Strait (TS) island in Far North Queensland (FNQ). It focused on my teaching journey in a grade 6/7 classroom. Through an Action Research (AR) methodology the study documents my efforts to navigate and respond to two teaching models – Explicit Instruction (EI) and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy (CRP), both of...

The transition to boarding school for students from the remote Indigenous community of Lockhart River on Cape York is a fact of life when they complete Year 7. With the transition to boarding school, Lockhart River mirrors remote Indigenous communities throughout Cape York and the Torres Strait, and remote regions in South Australia, Western Austra...

Conference program with notes on contributors.

This paper presents findings from the validation of a survey instrument constructed in response to what Indigenous parents/carers and students believe constitutes culturally responsive pedagogies that positively influence Indigenous student learning. Characteristics of culturally responsive pedagogies established through interviews with Australian...

Flexible Learning Options (FLOs) are common across many countries to enable secondary school completion by young people for whom mainstream schooling has not worked well. Access to high-quality education through FLOs is a social justice issue. In the context of an inclination among governments for accountability and evidence-based policy, as well a...

In response to calls for research into effective instruction in the Earth and space sciences, and to identify directions for future research, this systematic review of the literature explores research into instructional approaches designed to facilitate conceptual change. In total, 52 studies were identified and analyzed. Analysis focused on the ge...

This paper presents findings of Phase 2 of a larger three phase study examining culturally responsive pedagogies and their influence on Indigenous student outcomes. Characteristics of culturally responsive pedagogies obtained through interviews with Australian Indigenous1 parents and students generated characteristics and themes which were distille...

The study described in this paper examines the procedures used in the identification of the broad and complex factors influencing science curriculum delivery in predominantly Māori settings where the teaching of science, in particular Pūtaiao i Roto i te Marautanga o Aotearoa, is the responsibility of non-specialist science teachers and the teachin...

Recent developments in Canada’s Yukon Territory draw attention to how political changes have potential for accelerating practices in education that are responsive to Indigenous Peoples’ cultural knowledge systems and practices. In this study, through the use of case study methodology, an account of the changes that have occurred in one First Nation...

This study presents the outcomes of the first phase of a three phase research initiative which begins by identifying through the voices of Aboriginal1 students and community members the teaching practices that influence Aboriginal student engagement and learning. The study occurs within the Diocese of Townsville Catholic Education schools in North...

This paper presents a review of the literature pertaining to the teacher actions that influence Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander student learning outcomes. This review investigates two foci: the identification of teacher actions influencing learning outcomes for Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander students and the methodological approa...

This research inquiry explores teacher educator knowledge, understandings and beliefs informing their teaching in a web-based Australian teacher education program for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students. Through the use of a phenomenologically aligned interview process, the study investigates instructors' consideration of practice for te...

This paper examines teachers' experiences in responding to a new Chemistry curriculum in the province of Manitoba in Canada informed by a ‘tetrahedral’ orientation (Mahaffy, 2005) as a pedagogical framework for the teaching of Chemistry. This tetrahedral orientation endorses macroscopic, microscopic, symbolic and human element teaching and learning...

This study explores teachers’ thinking about practical work, especially in regards to the types of practical work they privilege in their teaching of chemistry to support students in their learning. It seeks to investigate the view that practical work, especially the type of practical work selected, is unthinkingly and uncritically selected by chem...

In this study, First Nation community members in Canada’s Yukon Territory share their stories about teaching and learning, both in informal and formal settings, in an effort to identify practices that might serve teachers to be more responsive to their First Nation students. In all, 52 community members between the ages of 15 and 82 shared their st...

This paper reports on a teacher’s and his students’ responsiveness to a new tetrahedral-oriented (Mahaffy in J Chem Educ 83(1):49–55, 2006) curriculum requiring more discursive classroom practices in the teaching of chemistry. In this instrumental case study, we identify the intentions of this learner-centered curriculum and a teacher’s development...

[Extract] When the Natural Sciences and Engineering Council (NSERC) established the centres for Research in Youth, Science Teaching and Learning (CRYSTAL) in 2004 it was responding to concerns about improving the quality of the science and mathematics experience provided for Canadian students. The focus of the University of Manitoba CRYSTAL was to...

This ongoing research inquiry investigates through the analysis of teacher candidate experiences the factors influencing two groups of chemistry teacher candidates’ development during their extended practica in their second and final year of an after-degree bachelor of education at a university in central Canada. The tenets of Bronfenbrenner's bioe...

Our inquiry uses accounts from the history of science to develop teacher-candidate (student teacher) understanding of the nature of science (NOS) in a science teacher education methods course. This understanding of the NOS is then used as a foundation for developing teacher candidate appreciation of the attributes of authentic science lessons. Base...

This paper reports on the initial outcomes from the end of the fourth year of a 5year research and professional development project to improve chemistry teaching among three cohorts of chemistry teachers in Manitoba, Canada. The project responds to a new curriculum introduction advocating a tetrahedral orientation (Mahaffy, Journal of Chemical Educ...

This article presents and discusses outcomes arising from a recently completed National Primary Science Survey (England) intended, in part, to elicit how teachers and others perceive the effectiveness of colleagues and the schools in which they work to implement and deliver primary science within the National Curriculum. While the majority view amo...

In this study, we have investigated, through interviews, conversations, questionnaires, and observations, perceptions of learning success of northern Qikiqtani (Baffin Island) of Nunavut Inuit middle years (grades 5-8) students and the classroom pedagogy influencing their success, in particular their learning in science. Most of the processes ident...

This research exercise, based on the initial stage of a school‐wide science curriculum improvement project, explores the factors influencing science program delivery in a multicultural elementary school in northwestern Canada. Using a validated science program delivery evaluation tool, the Science Curriculum Implementation Questionnaire (SCIQ), as...

This article outlines the practices informing and the preliminary outcomes derived from these practices in a 5-year school community science development project in three schools in the Qikiqtani (Baffin Island) region of Nunavut. The development process attempts to apply the guiding principles of Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (IQ) to the improvement of s...

This research inquiry investigates the factors influencing chemistry teacher candidates’ development during their extended practica in the second and final year of an After-Degree Bachelor of Education at a university in central Canada. A variety of data sources are used to identify the risk and protective factors impeding and contributing to the a...

This article reports on the first two phases of a multiphase science education development project in predominantly Maori kura (school communities) in the central region of the North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. The development project in its entirety employs an action research methodology and by so doing endeavors to support the improvement of...

This paper reports on the first phase of a multiphase science education development project being conducted in three Inuit communities in the northern Qikiqtani region of Nunavut. The development project, in its entirety, employs an action research methodology, and by so doing endeavours to support the improvement of science education delivery in a...

L'étude décrite dans cet article constitue la phargse initiale qualitative d'une étude à phases multiples portant sur l'amélioration de l'enseignement des sciences de la nature dans les milieux minoritaires francophones du Canada central. Cette phase de l'étude fait état des facteurs, divers et complexes, qui influencent l'enseignement du programme...

The study described in this paper examines the procedures used in the identification of the broad and complex factors influencing science curriculum delivery in francophone‐minority settings where the teaching of science is the responsibility of non‐specialist science teachers. Furthermore, it describes the processes involved in the development and...

This inquiry uses teacher-candidate critiques of science lessons as a means of evaluating the effectiveness of an instructor's pedagogical approach to promote teacher candidate understanding of the nature of science (NOS) in a science methods course. Three cohorts of teacher candidates enrolled in a middle-years teacher education program were requi...

This paper explores the history and processes associated with the transformation of a northern Canadian Aboriginal² school into a culture-based community school for its Metis, Inuvialuit and Gwichin citizens. In particular, the role of the principal, a local Aboriginal, as a leader in initiating and facilitating the transformative change is examine...

This inquiry examines the personal attribute and environmental factors that contribute to and impede science teacher-leader development. Using a narrative approach, the inquiry focuses on the experiences of three teachers in three different New Zealand primary schools (years 1–6) as they develop in their capabilities as science teacher-leaders duri...

This research inquiry explored the factors influencing successful science program delivery among early- and middle-years schools within a rural school division in central Canada. The study is framed by the author's personal inquiry into how psycho-social factors at the classroom, school and school division level influence science program delivery....

The purpose of this study was to monitor the development of teacher personal attribute and school environmental factors at an urban intermediate (years 7 and 8) school in New Zealand as a result of an extended science professional development intervention project. Over a 2-year period, a validated, comprehensive science curriculum delivery evaluati...

This study describes the processes involved in the development and statistical validation of a primary science curriculum delivery evaluation instrument, the Science Curriculum Implementation Questionnaire (SCIQ), used to identify factors influencing science programme delivery at the classroom and school level. The study begins by exploring the the...

This research exercise, employing an action research model for curriculum improvement, explored the factors influencing science program delivery at an elementary school in New Zealand. Using a validated science program delivery evaluation tool, the Science Curriculum Implementation Questionnaire (SCIQ), as a foundation for data collection, staff di...

The purpose of this investigation was to apply a validated curriculum evaluation instrument, the Science Curriculum Implementation Questionnaire (SCIQ), in an educational context in which a science curriculum review had recently been completed and, by so doing, ascertain the accuracy and potential value of the instrument as a curriculum delivery ev...

This study focuses on the identification of the broad and complex factors influencing primary science program delivery within the New Zealand context. The study is divided into two phases. In the first phase, the factors influencing science program delivery are identified through (1) a questionnaire survey of 122 teachers in the Central Districts o...