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For the children in the inclusive early childhood classroom, there are acceptable, but only limited ways to speak about disability, and sometimes no way to speak. Discourses of tragedy and suffering have a pervasive, and historically resilient, association with disability in education. A subject of tragedy is discursively created in the classroom via discourses of development and special education, as one who is in need of sympathy, remediation and cure. A normal is re/produced in the classroom and as young children take up the sanctioned discourses that individualise and medicalise subjects, exclusionary practices are observed that reinforce a privileged normal and a subjugated Other. Troubling embedded discourses that privilege the normal, and pathologise the Other, exposes uncomfortable remnants from the past. Interrupting dominant discourses and rethinking the way that they subject us all provides some promise for re-imagining inclusive education.

This article explores the academic identities of college educators of higher education in vocational institutions. Qualitative semi-structured interviews generated data from eleven educators in five vocational education institutions. Discourse analysis revealed that educators distinguished their vocational institutions' contributions to HE as different, but equal or superior to those of universities. Educators presented their culture and practices in advantageous ways, contrasted against imagined stereotypes of university experiences, which are perceived to be deficient for supporting the types of students they teach. In adopting academic identities that distinguish their cultures and practices from those presumed prevalent in universities, these educators seek parity of esteem with universities through distinctiveness, and reject research-focused academic identities and academic drift. In embracing teacherly identities supporting students rather than the research-teaching nexus, educators may be contributing to the 'therapeutic turn', diminishing opportunities for students, and furthering the vertical stratification of institutions within the Australian HE space.

This article is a call to action for English teachers and an invitation to think both critically and creatively about language that has infiltrated the English teaching profession in recent years. Specifically, the article explores the use of the words 'bottom', 'clinical', 'evidence', 'rigour' and 'rubric', and the ways in which their attendant discourses attempt to position teachers within the contemporary field of evidence-based education. The article builds on an individual paper given at the 2020 International Federation for the Teaching of English Conference.

This paper focuses on an Australian university short-term study abroad programme in India part-funded by the Australian Government New Colombo Plan -- an initiative that facilitates transformative people-to-people encounters. Our chief interest is extending our reach, through photo diaries and interviews, to understand how participants' experiences are transformative, how their knowledge production practices contribute towards constructions of global citizenship, and where opportunities to shape future participants' learning may exist. We explore decolonial possibilities for short-term study abroad under New Colombo, contextualising our inquiries historically while exploring the concepts of global citizenship and decoloniality -- ideas that provide a framework for analysis. Although short-term ventures are problematic for enabling two-way benefits, we contemplate how such programmes may still offer space for moving toward decoloniality.

This paper examines the ways in which current affairs related to diversity and difference, nationally and globally, are represented to Australian children in children's digital news media and through family discussions. The discussion is based on qualitative research that explores parents' views and practices in addressing news media and diversity and difference issues with their children. In addition, this project includes a discursive analysis of stories found in "Behind The News" ("BTN"), the primary digital news media source for Australian children, aged 8-13 years, from 2015-2018. The news stories are related to three significant topics: the marriage equality debate, refugees and terrorism. Within feminist post-structuralist, post-developmentalist and critical theorist frameworks, a focus is given to examining the dominant discourses that prevail in the stories, which provide insight into how childhood and children's access to certain types of knowledge is viewed and regulated through media and family practices. Drawing on thematic and Foucaultian discursive analyses, the pilot study findings demonstrate that children's news media is closely scrutinised and regulated, with major news stories framed within dominant discourses of childhood innocence, as well as the agenda and particular interests of the producers of children's new media. These topics, which have dominated news in recent years, are frequently considered by some adults as inappropriate or difficult topics to discuss with children.

Children's participation is valued in early childhood education but how this is achieved in pedagogy is less obvious. The methodology of conversation analysis is used in this paper to show how specific interactional practices afford opportunities for children to initiate, explore, and assert their own perspectives in everyday activities. The analyses illustrate how teachers' practices can encourage child participation through the ways in which teachers respond to and extend child-initiated sequences of learning. Data are drawn from research projects conducted in New Zealand and Australia that explore how teachers construct learning opportunities for children within talk-in-interactions. Three data excerpts of teachers and children, aged from 4 to 6 years, are analysed. The analyses of video-taped interactions reveal that teachers' contributions to (or silences) in interactions and unfolding talk can create particular trajectories of action in early learning environments. Evidence provided by these analyses can inform professional learning for teachers to illustrate how teachers' interactions with children can support children's rights to participation in early childhood education.

In this paper we explore and identify emerging patterns of synchronous digital discourse trajectories between dyads of native (NS) and non-native speakers (NNS), with a particular focus on (absence of) negotiated interaction. We will present a new model of L2 learning interaction that is a schematic representation of two main types of hearer response that have been found after a trigger of nonunderstanding: Task-appropriate response (TAR) and face-appropriate response (FAR). In addition, we outline five different discourse trajectories. The model we propose is based on data derived from interactive task performances of groups of Dutch and Australian students in two telecollaboration projects. The discourse trajectories represented in our model provide us with useful insights into the complexities of digital interaction in an L2-learning environment and show that NNS-NS communication is more complex than traditional negotiation of meaning models suggest. We expect our model to contribute to a better understanding of L2 learning processes related to interaction in digital settings.

The focus of this study is to investigate early childhood students' discourses of play-based curriculum. In this paper we focus on how students made implicit and explicit links to the Victorian Early Years Learning and Development Framework (VEYLDF). Twenty-six early childhood students had volunteered their de-identified play and pedagogy assignments. We analysed their assignments and selected quotes that focused on their role as educators and related to the VEYLDF. We theorized the concept of conceptual reciprocity as students' understanding of their role in being sensitive and reciprocal with children and families. Our findings indicated that early childhood pre-service students shared a common language as they transitioned to professional practice. This concept links strongly to students and VEYLDF perspectives of pedagogical educators being effective and affectively relating to children. The study shows how pre-service students understand discourses that are in line with the VEYLDF and the National Quality (NQ) reform agenda where professionals must know how to communicate and interact with other cultures and show responsive engagement with children, families and wider society.

The university prospectus is supposed to be a forceful and pioneering text in promoting and marketing higher education. The present research will deal with the disparities in the frequencies of first and second person pronouns in online prospectuses in cross-cultural linguistics from marketing point of view. The research question is to which extent the frequencies of first and second person pronouns in "About Us" section of online prospectuses are contradictory in cross culture and promotional dimensions. This study is based on the data raked from the "About Us" section of online university prospectuses in 463 culturally distinct institutional contexts of Australia, India, Pakistan, the United Kingdom and the United States of America. The categories of the first person I, we, and the second person you, your were analyzed through multidimensional analysis tagger. The analysis showed that the frequencies of first person pronouns were the highest in all the five countries. On the other hand variations in the occurrence of first and second person pronouns were eminent in 5 countries in the "About Us" section. This research is expected to be useful for the universities and international educational organizations to generate better promotional texts in the marketization of higher education for cross-cultural perspective.

This article reports the findings from a study that compares the assessment criteria used to measure pre-service teachers' professional competencies at Rustaq College of Applied Sciences in Oman, and at Griffith University in Queensland, Australia. The study adopts a discourse analytic approach to deconstruct and critically compare the assessment criteria outlined in documents that report on graduating teachers' classroom performance used at each teacher education institution. The results of the analysis reveal a different normative vision of graduating teachers in each country. The Omani graduate pre-service teachers are likely to be "a compliant student-trainee", whereas Australian graduate pre-service teachers are more likely to be "professionally qualified to teach and classroom ready". The findings are used to identify practices that may help to improve the current Omani approach to determining preservice teachers' classroom readiness to be more credible in terms of valid and equitable assessment processes.

This paper explores how four English teachers position their English language learners for critical literacy within senior high school curriculum in Queensland, Australia. Such learners are often positioned, even by their teachers, within a broader "deficit discourse" that claims they are inherently lacking the requisite knowledge and skills to engage with intransigent school curricula. As such, English language learners' identity formation is often constrained by deficit views that can ultimately see limited kinds of literacy teaching offered to them. Using Fairclough's (2003) critical discourse analysis method, analysis of 16 interviews with the teachers was conducted as part of a larger, critical instrumental case study in two state high schools during 2010. Five competing discourses were identified: deficit as lack; deficit as need; learner "difference" as a resource; conceptual capacity for critical literacy; and linguistic, cultural and conceptual difficulty with critical literacy. While a deficit view is present, counter-hegemonic discourses also exist in their talk. The combination of discourses challenges monolithic deficit views of English language learners, and opens up generative discursive territory to position English language learners in ways other than "problematic". This has important implications for how teachers view and teach English language learners and their capacity for critical literacy work in senior high school classrooms.

Teacher education is effective when pre-service teachers are able to transfer knowledge from content areas to practice. This study investigates the extent to which curriculum and assessment designs, along with teaching practices, supported pre-service teachers to transfer knowledge gained about language from a first-year course into a second-year course on planning for effective learning in diverse contexts. Questionnaires and discourse analysis of assessment tasks provided insight into the extent to which the strategies designed to support transference succeeded. The findings indicate that transference of language knowledge occurs when this goal permeates curriculum and assessment design, as well as teaching practices.

One notable "disruptive" impact of massive open online courses (MOOCs) has been an increased public discussion of online education. While much debate over the potential and challenges of MOOCs has taken place online confined largely to niche communities of practitioners and advocates, the rise of corporate "xMOOC" ventures such as Coursera, edX and Udacity has prompted popular mass media interest at levels not seen with previous educational innovations. This article addresses this important societal outcome of the recent emergence of MOOCs as an educational form by examining the popular discursive construction of MOOCs over the past 24 months within mainstream news media sources in United States, Australia and the UK. In particular, we provide a critical account of what has been an important phase in the history of educational technology--detailing a period when popular discussion of MOOCs has far outweighed actual use/participation. We argue that a critical analysis of MOOC discourse throughout the past two years highlights broader societal struggles over education and digital technology--capturing a significant moment before these debates subside with the anticipated normalization and assimilation of MOOCs into educational practice. This analysis also sheds light on the influences underpinning how many people perceive MOOCs thereby leading to a better understanding of acceptance/adoption and rejection/resistance amongst various professional and popular publics.

Change is not a new concept in the Australian early childhood sector. However, the rate of change has significantly increased throughout the last decade, specifically with the introduction of the curriculum and quality frameworks, changes to regulations, and subsequent reviews (some particularly affecting the Victorian long day care sector). The rapid timeline of these reforms created challenges for early childhood professionals who needed to understand, interpret and translate multiple changes to their practice. This paper presents some key findings from a poststructural study involving 11 participants from the Victorian long day care sector. Foucauldian Discourse Analysis has been applied to explore how reform discourses shape and reshape the positioning and engagement of professionals within the reform process. These findings reveal how specific subject positions and discursive practices within available discourses of knowledge, teacher education and workplace can either challenge and/or support early childhood professionals in their ability to engage in reform.

This article explores public debates about credibility in media discourse regarding a Somali refugee who was raped on Nauru. Given the pseudonym "Abyan", she was living on Nauru as a result of Australian refugee policy and was brought to Australia for medical assistance. Her treatment by the Australian authorities became the subject of debate and was widely discussed in the Australian media. Analyzing a corpus of media articles reporting and commenting on this debate, this article explores how the media's representations of the key actors shape their credibility. Reflecting existing research, this article finds that Abyan's experience is used to support broader policy arguments. Further, the discourse presents Abyan as a key speaker, despite her limited ability to defend her credibility. The article concludes that credibility remains an important theme in discourse on refugees and that power asymmetries hidden within this discourse create obstacles for those wishing to challenge it.

This article addresses the controversy surrounding the Safe Schools Coalition Australia. Certain politicians and media commentators have accused the initiative of harming the students it ostensibly aims to benefit. Those accusations have, in turn, been labelled 'homophobic' by supporters of the Coalition. This article suggests that the term homophobic does not adequately describe or explain the visceral hostility of anti-Safe Schools discourses. Drawing on discourse analysis, I demonstrate how Safe Schools has been represented by its critics as being a sexual predator, while students have been represented as innocent, asexual, and requiring protection by their parents. These parents are the ones who can and should regulate their child's access to sexual knowledge -- and who can and should oppose Safe Schools. I conclude by arguing that the Safe Schools controversy is useful in that it provides an opportunity to recognise gender and sexually diverse student lives as being 'lives'; and to consider how programmes such as Safe Schools can help create safer educational environments for these and other disadvantaged students.

Early childhood education has undergone immense change over the years. In Australia, this has included the introduction of curriculum and quality frameworks [ACECQA. 2012. "National Quality Framework." http://acecqa.gov.au/national-quality-framework/the-national-quality-standard; DEEWR. 2009. "Belonging, Being and Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia." Barton: ACT: Commonwealth of Australia. ISBN:9780642778727; DET. 2016. "Victorian Early Years Learning and Development Framework: For All Children From Birth to Eight Years." East Melbourne, VIC: Department of Education and Training. ISBN:978-0-7594-0800-5], and changes to early childhood pre-service and in-service teacher education [ASQA. 2015. "Training for early childhood education and care: Report." https://www.asqa.gov.au/sites/g/files/net3521/f/Strategic_Review_2015_Early_Childhood_Education_Report.pdf?v=1508135481]. This article is based on a broader qualitative study, which was conducted in 2015-2016. It investigated how workplace discourses supported or hindered the ability for early childhood professionals in Victorian long day care settings to engage in education reform. Using a poststructuralist lens and Foucauldian Discourse Analysis [FDA] [Arribas-Ayllon, M., and V. Walkerdine. 2017. "Foucauldian Discourse Analysis." In "The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research in Psychology, 2nd ed., edited by C. Willig, and W. Stainton-Rogers, 110-123. London: SAGE Publications Ltd. ISBN:9781526405555; Willig, C. 2008. "Discourse Analysis." In Qualitative Psychology: A Practical Guide to Research Methods," 2nd ed., edited by J. A. Smith, 160-185. Los Angeles: SAGE Publications. ISBN:9781412930833], specific workplace discourses were identified. These discourses framed the available subject positions which were afforded by directors, centre-coordinators and educators relating to reform engagement. Some of these positions were supportive of reform engagement, while others hindered this process. The findings presented throughout this paper offer some insight into how workplace discourses impact reform engagement in early childhood education.

The 1960s in Australia was a politically turbulent time with assimilation policies being questioned by moves in various spheres, including education, to address inequality. The late 1960s also saw the emergence of activist responses to racism as well as the groundbreaking 1967 Referendum, which called for the alteration of two clauses within the Australian Constitution that discriminated against the Indigenous population. A few months after the Referendum was held, a conference called Aborigines and Education was convened at Monash University. Education was seen to be vital in addressing what was described as "profound educational disadvantage" experienced by Indigenous people. The debates that ensued show how education was imagined to be able to solve the problems Indigenous students were encountering. In this article I confine my interest to a selection of papers and examine the features of two distinctive discourses that emerge: that of "uplifting the Aborigine" and that of "upholding" Aboriginal dignity and pride. In doing this, I demonstrate how particular "race logics" were employed and contested in these debates. I argue that the insights garnered through analysis of these discourses offer opportunities for education research and practices that are in solidarity with the emancipatory goals of marginalised communities.

Drawing on Robin Alexander's theory and method of 'Dialogic Teaching', this paper engages with debates about the need to reconceptualise the teaching of sexuality education. By exploring the complexities of educating about sex and sexuality it calls for attention to be paid to the how patterns of talk may function to open up spaces for more robust pedagogies. Dialogic Teaching is presented as providing opportunities to mitigate the ideological conflict endemic to sexuality education today. Using examples of classroom conversations between a teacher and his group of students involved in a recent Australian study this paper critically analyzes one teacher's opportunities (or missed opportunities) for dialogic teaching, including opportunities for students to explore, challenge, reconsider, extend and enhance their learning of the myriad and complex issues relevant to sexuality such as negotiation and consent, pleasure and desire. As a form of pedagogical ethics, dialogic teaching offers a radical model for the future teaching of sexuality education.

This paper reports on the findings of a genealogical study and argues that the global discourse of quality in early childhood education and care (ECEC) is based on a number of problematic assumptions that converge to identify 'quality' as the site of government investment. Using the Australian policy context as an example, the assumption that only quality ECEC is beneficial for children is linked to the historical privileging of mother-care and the male breadwinner through family policy. Using Foucault's notion of the 'art of government', the implications of the discursive logics of quality are outlined, including how 'not quality' childcare is positioned as potentially harmful, yet, the workforce can never be 'quality enough'. It is recommended that early childhood sector academics, advocates and professionals work to introduce new discursive statements to the global policyscape, in order to create and foster diverse representations and understandings of the benefits and value of ECEC.

This paper examines the ways in which authentic conversation provides a sociocultural resource for developing the cultural competence of learners of Chinese as a heritage language in Australia. It draws upon language socialization as a theoretical framework to study the interconnected processes of linguistic and cultural learning in interactional discourse practices through an intergenerational interaction model. In this model, local community resources were effectively utilized when older speakers of Chinese as their first language and English Chinese heritage learners were paired and conducted naturalistic conversations. Building on discourse analysis of the linguistic exchange between three pairs of interactants, we illustrate how the older speakers, that is, expert users, socialize the novice learners of Chinese into acquiring Chinese cultural knowledge through the related lexical items. Our analysis shows that this interaction model proves beneficial for developing socially and culturally competent members within minority communities.

'Student success' is a key driver in higher education policy and funding. Institutions often adopt a particular lens of success, emphasising 'retention and completion', 'high grades', 'employability after graduation' discourses, which place high value on human capital or fiscal outcomes. We explored how students themselves articulated notions of success to understand how these meanings aligned with the implicit value system perpetuated by neoliberal higher education systems. Qualitative data collected from 240 survey responses in the first phase of a study, were analysed using "Appraisal," a linguistic framework to systematically categorise evaluative language choices. This article focuses on questions eliciting students' articulations of success. Neoliberal discourses were challenged by these students, who were first-in-family at university, with success expressed in a personal and generational sense rather than solely meritocratic terms.

Until relatively recently, financial planning typically involved investment advisers advising relatively wealthy and financially literate individuals about where to place their abundant disposable incomes. Today, many financial planners are focused on advising individuals with modest incomes and little understanding of finance how best to manage their financial affairs in anticipation of retirements that could last for decades. The domain of financial planning discourse, despite the profession's remarkable growth, is virtually unexplored territory in terms of studies conducted using applied linguistic analytic tools. This paper sheds light on the social purpose of financial planning consultations and their realization through their generic structure. A dataset of 10 authentic recorded telephone-based financial planning consultations was established and analysed for generic moves using Halliday and Hasan's (1985) generic structure potential. Using the generic structure potential (GSP) as a basis for evaluating the achievement of intended social purpose, and identifying a problem in the move sequencing and the common omission of a key component, we suggest strategic discursive modifications that would improve outcomes for all stakeholders. Implications for professional and academic training are discussed.

Globally, education policy reforms are increasingly aimed at attending to excellence in education. This is mainly expressed as attempts at raising educational standards generally, but also of identifying intellectual elites and making special provisions for them. Denmark, which is otherwise considered an exponent of an equality-oriented tradition in education, is now pursuing strategies of developing talent throughout the educational system, which is to cater more to the needs of so-called gifted and talented students. This policy is claimed to have found inspiration from Australia, where some of the states have been pursuing such policies for several years and where we find a more developed tradition for this. The paper is focused on understanding what concept of excellence such education policies imply; we aim to analyse the targeted groups with respect to means of identification and development, and to analyse the wider implications of such policies. The analysis is empirically focused on education policy documents on gifted and talented educational provisions at national/state level. Beginning with the political discourse of talent development in education as it has appeared in Denmark, we analyse this in relation to the policies and curricular provisions for the gifted and talented in England and Australia.

The paper deals with the concept of 'Critical Literacy' in the context of VET teacher education. It focuses on the question of whether and how critical literacy can be developed drawing on elements of discourse research. This is illustrated by means of a higher educational setting, dealing with business administration textbook usage and research. The impact of our learning and teaching setting is illustrated via an empirical longitudinal study (three-phase pre-post design) of students doing a master's degree in business education at an Austrian university. Data were initially collected directly before and after the university seminar using a semi-standardised questionnaire (n = 54). In order to obtain an insight into the sustainable impact of our discourse analysis course on students' thought and actions, in the third phase of data collection, eight participants, who in the meantime had four months experience in VET schools as student teachers (120 h) were invited to a qualitative interview. The paper encompasses a theoretical discussion on the concept of critical literacy, applies it to the target group VET teacher students and shows empirical evidence on pros and cons of discourse analytical course design aiming at the critical literate teacher.

Many have observed challenges in translating internationalization policy into practice in universities. When key policy documents provide inconsistent messages, a gap can emerge between vision and practice. Understanding the complexities of an institution's local, national, and global context and its rationale for internationalization can shed light on why such gaps arise. This case study demonstrates how a thematic analysis of relevant international, national, state, and institutional policies can reveal tensions between these layers, and indicate possible reasons for the failure to translate policy into practice. The main rationale driving internationalization at the university studied here is economic; however, starting in 2016, a variation in key themes and, thus, rationales is found in the documents. This indicates a shift in the university's internationalization discourse may be occurring. We argue that a more comprehensive approach to internationalization is needed to address inconsistencies in policy directions and drive practice.

This article contrasts educational discourses and their associated policy and practice in the field of adult literacy in two sociopolitical eras in Australia: firstly, the social-democratic era that describes the beginnings of adult literacy as a distinct educational field from the late 1970s, and in particular the 1980s; and secondly, the neoliberal era that first strongly influenced the field from the early 1990s, and has reached its zenith in the contemporary state of the field. The terms 'empowerment' and 'compliance' are used in a reductionist way to describe the key discourses underpinning adult literacy provision in these two eras. The language of empowerment was popular with policy makers and literacy educators in the social-democratic era of free courses in a public education system. In the subsequent neoliberal era, while 'compliance' may not feature much in the language of policy makers and literacy educators, it nevertheless accurately describes the overarching process of what contemporary adult literacy provision does to teachers and students. In working towards nationally accredited curriculum outcomes, adult literacy educators and their students can be seen primarily to comply with the dominant industry and productivity agendas that underpin the curriculum. There are now few spaces for an empowering adult literacy education.

Children are known to use different types of referential gestures (e.g., deictic, iconic) from a very young age. In contrast, their use of non-referential gestures is not well established. This study investigated the use of "stroke-defined non-referential" 'beat' gestures in a story-retelling and an exposition task by twelve 6-year-olds, an age at which proficiency in discourse is beginning to develop. The goals of the study were to (1) establish if children this age use "stroke-defined beats," (2) determine whether the two discourse types influence the incidence of stroke-defined beats, and (3) examine the extent to which stroke-defined beats co-occur with lexical words or pitch accents. The results showed that nine of the children produced at least one beat gesture with a well-defined stroke phase, and that the frequency of the stroke-defined beat gesture use did not differ significantly between the two tasks. Stroke-defined beats occurred more often on lexical words than function words, but they did not co-occur more often with a pitch accent, suggesting its "potential" link with pitch accents for emphasis. This study therefore provides support for children's 'prosodic' use of gesture--a function which may become more common as discourse abilities develop.

Objective: As children become increasingly exposed to health information and education, it is important to understand how these messages affect the way children speak about health and health behaviours. Children are social agents and co-constructors of their social worlds. Exploring how pre-school children speak about health and health-promoting behaviours can help explain what children make of health messages and may help facilitate communication between children, parents and educators. Methods: Participants included 163 pre-school children aged 3-5 years attending childcare centres in South-East Queensland, Australia. Semi-structured interviews were used to explore how pre-school children speak about health and health behaviours. Data were analysed using thematic analysis. Results: Participant responses were structured as two categories. The first category was "Meaning of Healthy." This category comprised four themes of eat your food (n = 74 of 145, 51%), participating in activities (n = 36, 24%), growing big and strong (n = 20, 13%) and not being sick (n = 15, 10%). The second category, "How to be Healthy," comprised five themes including eat healthy food (n = 86 of 150, 57%), reduce risk (n = 31, 20%), treat illness (n = 13, 8%), be well behaved (n = 12, 8%) and do exercise (n = 8, 5%). Conclusion: Findings highlighted the centrality of food in how children speak about health. In comparison to the discussion of food and the importance of eating healthy food, there was limited mention of physical activity by participants as a way to be healthy. The theme reduce risk emerged from participant responses and relates to the practice of safety behaviours to prevent injury and illness. Future research needs to determine whether the emphasis children place on risk minimisation is shaping how young children speak about health and how this interaction plays out in their health behaviour.

Teacher intervention in children's disputes most commonly features cessation strategies, despite evidence showing the value of modelling problem-solving behaviours. Existing research has categorized strategies used by teachers in early childhood settings, but in this article we aim to illustrate how these practices are realized. Using the method of conversation analysis, we are able to show how children respond to different interventions, and in particular, how successful modelling of problem solving can be achieved with 4-year-old children. The extracts in this article make a case for the close study of teacher-child interactions and demonstrate how educators can support children to resolve their own disputes.

The purpose of this article is to examine the disconnect happening in relation to family-centre partnerships. Developing partnerships with families is hotly debated and provides challenges for educators teaching in the early childhood sector. Using a comparative case study analysis, several research studies conducted in the states of New South Wales and Victoria, Australia, are examined to illustrate these disconnects. These issues are examined within "Belonging, Being and Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia", a national framework that is common to all programs across Australia, which identifies practice, principles and learning outcomes for young children. This disconnect is related to the language that is used by the early childhood staff and misunderstood by the parents, the ways communication occurs and its ineffectiveness. The article argues that there is a need to move beyond the current rhetoric of engaging in partnerships with families to a space that allows for transparency, reciprocity and new language.

University students who enrol in foreign language (FL) programmes are motivated by various needs, but in particular the need to achieve communicative fluency, which generally requires interaction with others. This study therefore explores the notion of 'interactivity,' as conceptualised in second language learning theories and how it might be applied in online and blended delivery settings. It also considers whether current levels of resourcing of FL programmes in Australia and England reflect the unique needs of FL learners in these countries, where FLs are facing serious challenges. The requirement for interactivity in FL teaching and learning in fact reinforces the need for more favourable funding to FLs when compared to most other humanities disciplines, as already exemplified in Australian and English university funding models. Theoretical constructs suggest that to develop students' interactional competence, programmes need to strike a balance between teachers' direct instruction and students' autonomous interaction with expert speaker peers. Guidelines derived from the theoretical exploration thus harness the potential for global connectivity and developing learner autonomy offered by communication technologies, to promote 'interactive' FL university programmes which are fundamentally social, intercultural and collaborative, with consideration for linguistic and technological-interactional constraints. Based on theories and current delivery practices, the study argues that interaction with native speaker peers would be facilitated through further streaming of beginners' courses, the introduction of compulsory FLs to final year of high school level, and continued implementation of favourable funding ratios at the chalkface, to arrest the decline of FLs in English-speaking countries.

This article uses critical discourse analysis to interrogate government documents associated with the passing of the "Education (Strengthening Discipline in State Schools) Act 2013" in Queensland, Australia. It uses these documents to demonstrate the way in which the discourse of discipline has been constructed in order to legitimate the removal of legislative safeguards intended to curtail the disciplinary power of school officials.

This paper takes as its subject the circulation of tolerance discourse within two pedagogical encounters in two Australian educational settings, and draws from the work of Wendy Brown on tolerance as a regulatory force. Brown argues that discourses of tolerance are produced within historical and cultural milieu that enable tolerance and aversion to exist simultaneously. This has significant implications for how we might come to understand the project of working towards a socially just educational system and the various struggles encountered within pedagogical sites. I also examine the pedagogical affects that are produced within different educational moments as we work to teach in or around difference and when we embody the Other in the classroom. I engage with how these experiences speak to the way in which tolerance as national ideal acts to both alleviate and circulate discourses of inequality such as sexism and homophobia.

Global contexts of accountability have placed unprecedented pressure on school leaders to improve the performance of their schools. Despite recognition that leaders' influence is mediated by school culture, few studies offer systematic examinations of culture-in-action in schools. The concept of culture remains nebulous and is frequently glossed over as being 'messy' in studies of school change. This paper uses tools from membership categorisation analysis to demonstrate how culture is produced at a micro-level in and through the actions of leaders in one school. My analysis shows a disjuncture between the purported values and policies of the school and the ways that school leaders through their talk construct and implement school practices, and thus the culture-in-action at their school. I argue that implementing effective change is impossible without understanding and disrupting the micro-level production and reproduction of culture in schools.

Background: There has been a proliferation of external agencies 'knocking on the door' of, and being welcomed into, Health and Physical Education (HPE). This opens HPE up to new products, partners, and services. Although scholarship on the practice of outsourcing HPE is steadily growing in quantity and in scope, there is a significant gap in the literature around how external providers (or outsourcers) of HPE interpret the curriculum, and how this translates into certain kinds of products and services. Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to critically analyse one external provider's interpretations of the curriculum and of the roles of key pedagogical agents and stakeholders (e.g. HPE teachers and students), as well as their translation of these interpretations into particular kinds of products and services. This is achieved through a critical discourse analysis (CDA) of Tennis Australia's Tennis in Secondary School (TSS) Program teacher resources and interviews with key employees of Tennis Australia. Methods: The larger study from which this paper draws is a network ethnography of the external provision of HPE. TSS was selected as a case study in the initial web-audit undertaken as part of this network ethnography. The criteria which resulted in the selection of TSS as a case study were: the utilisation of educational language within product descriptions or marketing, provision of services to a significant number of schools, and a rationale for services that included a contribution to HPE. A CDA was undertaken on the TSS advertising, product materials, teacher resources, and the transcripts of semi-structured interviews conducted with three employees of the organisation. Findings: Tennis Australia markets an explicit alignment between their TSS Program and the Australian Curriculum: HPE (AC:HPE). For example, teacher resources are structured to include a 'Learning Intention' (i.e. a curriculum content descriptor); 'Focus Questions and Teaching Points' (i.e. pedagogical styles); and 'Success Criteria' (i.e. self-described 'assessment criteria'). Significantly, however, there were several tensions and gaps in their interpretations and understandings of the AC:HPE and their approaches to pedagogy and assessment within the subject. Conclusion: External agencies, such as Tennis Australia, are becoming increasingly sophisticated at marketing their products in relation to HPE curricula. Rather than divesting or relieving teachers of curriculum decision-making and design responsibility, however, we argue that these efforts from external agencies mean that now, more than ever, teachers need to recognise, articulate, and enact their pedagogical and curriculum expertise. This will allow teachers to better broker, bridge, and translate knowledge and ensure that HPE remains an educative experience.

This paper reports on the findings of an in-depth genealogical study of the discourse of quality in Australian Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) policy. Quality reform has become the foremost global policy agenda for ECEC due to assumptions about the economic potentials of quality services. In Australia, the recent National Quality Framework elevated early childhood policy in Australia from the margins as the lynchpin of a broader economic reform agenda. However, quality ECEC--what it is and does- is a complex, contestable notion that could be considered problematic for the sector to execute, particularly through market models of provision. Drawing on Foucauldian notions of discourse as the 'already said', the truth assumptions that have underpinned policy uses of quality ECEC in Australia are identified and critiqued. It is shown that the discourse of quality has been tactically deployed in Australian ECEC policy to realign quality ECEC outcomes with educative outcomes, as a means for government to selectively grow and govern human capital. This positions quality as a high-stakes reform discourse for early childhood stakeholders, entwined with the expanded reach and intensification of selective, performance-related standards and incentives.

The use of the Initiation-Response-Evaluation (IRE) sequence is common in education and, although classroom research does not preclude its practice in pedagogy, it recommends introducing other forms of talk into teaching. The present study, inspired by Task-Based Language Teaching research on learner language, uses Conversation Analysis to explore the variations on the IRE pattern that take place in a class of French beginners as they complete a learning task. Based on audio-recorded data collected in situ, the study uncovers two IRE subcategories and one pattern of interaction that diverges from the standard IRE pattern. These variations reflect changes in the lesson phase and show how a three-phase lesson plan focused on a specific task can move classroom participants away from the exclusive use of IRE.

The New Colombo Plan and similar student mobility initiatives in Aotearoa/New Zealand have been pitched as reversing the culturally imperialist focus of the original Colombo Plan (CP) because they involve sending Australian and Aotearoa/New Zealand students to the Indo-Pacific region instead of funding Asian students to study overseas. However, changes in this direction of student mobility mask ongoing geopolitical inequities. In order to interrogate these subtle power relations, this article adopts a Foucauldian genealogical approach. It briefly outlines the competing goals of the original CP before undertaking an analysis of the discourses evident in the Australian government's New Colombo Plan and in the Education New Zealand's Prime Minister's Scholarship for Asia. This discourse analysis illustrates the extent to which the new student mobility programmes established in Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand involve consuming the 'Indo-Pacific' and 'Asian' Other and often serves to reinforce rather than address global geopolitical inequities.

School leaders in Queensland, Australia, are working in a rapidly shifting policy landscape, expected to work towards system-defined improvement measures involving increasingly higher external accountabilities. This article analyses a group of long-term case studies of the effects of school improvement expectations on principals since the introduction of National Assessment Program -- Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) in 2008. Foucauldian theory is used to analyse the influence of performative cultures on a group of Queensland principals. A unique feature of this geographical region is the large proportion of small-school principals, the majority of whom are in the early stages of their teaching careers. Having joined the teaching profession post-NAPLAN, the influence of these accountabilities emerges as a point of difference between them and longer-established principals. The article identifies the emergence of this new leadership paradigm as an area inviting further inquiry within the field of educational leadership research, exploring the influence of rapidly shifting expectations on leadership practices.

This paper presents lesser known accounts from policy makers whose experiences as elite informants span 40 or so years in Australian early childhood education and care (ECEC) policy history between 1972 and 2009. Drawing on a post-structuralist theoretical frame, this paper employs a Foucauldian-influenced approach to discourse analysis. Given the complexity of policy-making contexts, an adaptation of Bradley's categories was utilised to categorise the elite informants as policy insiders according to their roles and positions within organisations. Bacchi's approach to policy analysis was drawn upon to critically analyse the effects of policy insider categories on meanings of quality in the formation of ECEC policy. The findings raise questions about what could be known and spoken about meanings of quality in past policy-making processes. They suggest the innermost categories of policy insiders struggle to retain complex meanings of quality in final ECEC policy decisions.

Pre-service teacher educators, both nationally and internationally, must negotiate a plethora of expectations including using Professional Standards to enhance teacher quality. In Australia, the recent Teacher Education Ministerial Advisory Group (TEMAG) report highlighted weak application of Standards in Initial Teacher Education (ITE). However, recent reports suggest that many education stakeholders feel positive about the implementation of the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers (APSTs). This study responds to these differing viewpoints by exploring how teacher educators in a large metropolitan university in Australia account for the use of Standards in their work. Discourse analysis techniques in conjunction with socio-spatial theory make visible particular metaphors of practice as teacher educators negotiate the real-and-imagined spaces of regulated teacher education programmes. The findings highlight the importance of investigating the utility of Standards in the lived experiences of teacher educators, as they are responsible for preparing quality, classroom ready graduates.

Research on youth subjectivities and disappearing media is still in its infancy. Ephemeral technologies such as Snapchat, Frankly and Wickr offer young people opportunities for discursive agency, harnessing teenage discourses of social positioning. These media facilitate social mobility in teen peer contexts by providing a medium for dynamic and shifting relationships. The transmission of digital images can enable a social flexibility that has a significant impact on youth subjectivities where discursively constructed relational identities are brokered through cyber technologies. We tackle the question "what discourses are evoked and produced in the discussion of disappearing social media?" by exploring two parents' accounts of their children's use of this media. We also examine a discourse of innocence that surrounds teens' use of social media and, in particular, ephemeral applications, by sexting and cyberbullying. We engage in the debate on the use of ephemeral social media to consider the discourses influencing youth subjectivities and the nature of networked publics.

The structure of the Australian national curriculum encompasses engagement with "intercultural education". Significantly, the context from which the curriculum was developed was heavily influenced by a multiculturalist ideology in which notions of cohesion and harmony were dominant. Therefore, those working with the curriculum need to understand the limited ways in which ideas of "diverse" culture might be constructed. As a cultural text this curriculum is a place of encounter between teachers and the various influences on the curriculum document itself. We assert that the perpetuation of ideographs in the context and text of the curriculum, underpin how "intercultural understanding" is positioned in the Australian Curriculum, and limit the narrative possibility of this encounter. It is essential to identify and interrogate such ideographs if we are to be cognisant of the complex politics of national curriculums and opportunities to "re-open" the place for encounter.

Much of the literature on social class and language study in schools argues that for middle-class parents and their children, languages are chosen for their capacity to offer forms of distinction that provide an edge in the global labour market. In this paper, we draw on data collected from interviews with parents and children in middle-class schools in Australia to demonstrate how a complex amalgam of elite, cultural identity and/or trade language discourses came into play to explain the choice (or not) to study a language and the choice of specific languages. For many of the parents languages provided a limited form of "civic multiculturalism", as a means of better understanding and respecting the "other". We argue that the value attributed to high status languages via this discourse, means their continued presence in schools hoping to attract middle-class parents, but their relative absence in schools with largely working-class populations, where more "practical" concerns dominate.

This article explores the construction and shifting of "expert" and "novice" roles between and within two languages (Japanese and English). Taking a language socialization perspective while drawing upon insights from conversation analysis on epistemics in interaction, it analyzes seven hours of audio recordings of dinnertime talk in a Japanese-speaking immigrant family with a university-aged adult daughter living together in Australia. The analysis identifies several key communicative practices, such as word definitions and repair, which participants deploy in displaying epistemic stances that constitute the self and family members as possessing relatively more or less knowledge and expertise (epistemic status) with respect to these two languages. The findings reveal the dynamics of language socialization in a bilingual/immigrant setting in which the relative roles of expert and novice emerge, shift, and are negotiated in interaction. In conclusion, the findings are discussed in relation to language expertise, power and hierarchy, agency and bidirectional language socialization.

The movement of students across borders has had profound impact on higher education policy development. This article seeks to unpack international student mobility through a discourse approach, using five policy documents on international student mobility from well-established recruiters of international students. Eight headline findings are presented in this article. It was found that there are many different types of international students. Higher education institutions are located at the heart of the action, and provide a broad range of services across four distinctive stages of the students' sojourn. Governments reaffirm their commitment in providing good higher education experience to the international student population. However, there are signs that the students' presence has shaped higher education policies to be more service-, market-, and reputation driven. The ethics of care concept is proposed to balance the present role of higher education as "wealth creation agents," and to ensure both institutions and students reap the benefits of international higher education.