Contemporary Challenges In Education

Contemporary Challenges in Teaching Young Children provides both veteran and aspiring early childhood educators with the information and tools they need to build on their understanding of developmentally appropriate practice. Teachers face many challenges, including family configuration, social and political stressors related to accountability requirements, funding shortages, and the resulting need to teach with fewer resources. This innovative book focuses exclusively on problem-solving at the classroom level and fosters creative methods of ensuring best practices are in place for all children, including those with limited experience in formal social settings and a lack of self-regulatory behaviors. Drawing on current research and their own wealth of experience, expert contributors cover topics from the critical importance of social-emotional learning to culturally responsive teaching to using technology to empower teachers and learners. Written in accessible, non-technical language, this book addresses complex factors affecting child development, guiding readers through the best strategies for tackling real problems in their practice.

This insightful book offers a wide-ranging collection of lively discussions on contemporary issues, policies and practices in higher education. Bartram integrates contributions from experienced academics, teachers and students in a unique approach and structure, designed to enable students with both specific and wide-ranging interests in higher education to extend their understanding. Including discussion points, research tasks and suggestions on further reading in each chapter, Understanding Contemporary Issues in Higher Education discusses a range of topics, such as: universities and the mental health ‘crisis’; knowledge, the state and the market; the role of technology in teaching and academic celebrification; disability, diversity and inclusive placement learning. Written specifically for Education Studies students, this book constitutes a timely addition to student-focused themed studies looking at aspects of higher education.

This book provides a roadmap for frontline clinician-educators who are grappling with how best to teach learners in the fast paced learning environment of clinical medicine where the hidden curriculum still remains. We provide insight into how to approach these topics with learners, and pose unanswered questions for future scholarly work.

Contemporary Issues of Equity in Education argues that equity and social justice must be brought back to the centre of discussions about education. It traces international, system-wide and local effects of policies that increase marketization and competition between students, schools and systems, whilst erasing wider considerations of the socio-cultural contexts that shape educational experiences and outcomes. Leading researchers interrogate the design of educational systems for social justice, fairness and inclusion at multiple levels from classrooms and schools through to universities and initial teacher education. Chapters trace the ways in which gender, ethnicity, class, and refugee experiences intersect with indices of socio-economic disadvantage in ways that directly impact on young people’s learning and on the pedagogical work of teachers. The book demonstrates collaborative and inclusive approaches for researching schooling in disadvantaged communities. It offers strategies and practices for reimagining schools and universities in ways that enable young people in high poverty and culturally and linguistically diverse communities to effectively engage with education.

Contemporary Challenges Confronting School Leaders is the eleventh in a series on research and theory dedicated to advancing our understanding of schools through empirical study and theoretical analysis. Consequently, the chapters include analyses that investigate relationships between school organizations and administrative practice that affect teacher and student effectiveness. This edition is organized around concepts that are significant to contemporary school leaders: student achievement and variables that contribute to it or influence achievement indirectly.

From being on the margins of scholarly debate for much of the past century and a half, religion is being recognized once again as an area of concern for scholars, politicians, and public policy makers, and thus, the role of religious and spiritual education has taken on a new importance. Apart from its socio-political ramifications, the place of religiousness and spirituality in the make-up of individuals has been given renewed prominence through updated brain science, and neuroscientists regularly refer to elements of this brain science in terms such as spiritual intelligence and even mystical consciousness. This book explores many of the new directions being taken in the field of religious and spiritual education, as new developments challenge the priorities of formal education, and open up new avenues for incorporating religion and spirituality into the modern curriculum. It asks whether the educational aims of teachers should be focused on specifically personal development, or whether religious education should be used to develop understanding of more global and social issues such as citizenship, conflict, and ethics. The book also addresses neuroscientific insights, which suggest a need to engage with cognition and emotion in order to create a rich learning environment, something to which a particularly contested subject area like religion and spirituality is well-placed to contribute. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Beliefs & Values.

Contemporary Issues in Learning and Teaching looks at current issues across the three key areas of policy, learning and practice. It will help you to think critically on your Education course, and to make connections between the processes of learning and the practicalities of teaching. The book addresses key issues in primary, secondary and special education, and includes examples from all four countries of the UK. The contributors reflect on current thinking and policy surrounding learning and teaching, and what it means to be a teacher today. Looking at the practice of teaching in a wider context allows you to explore some of the issues you will face, and the evolving expectations of your role in a policy-led environment. The book focuses on core areas of debate including: - education across different contexts and settings - teaching in an inclusive environment - Continuing Professional Development (CPD) for practitioners Each chapter follows the same accessible format. They contain case studies and vignettes providing examples and scenarios for discussion; introduction and summary boxes listing key issues and concepts explored in the chapter; key questions for discussion reflection; and further reading. This essential text will be ideal for undergraduate and postgraduate courses, including BEd/BA degrees, initial teacher-training courses, and Masters in Education programmes. All editors and contributors are based in the Faculty of Education at Glasgow University, UK.

Educating for the Twenty-First Century explores critical issues facing education in the 21st century.