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This paper examines the establishment and operation of a number of new bodies - variously called councils, boards, collaboratives, groups, forums and panels - concerned with the development of Scottish education. What were the intentions behind their creation during the period 2016-20? Do they amount to a significant reshaping of the policy community, making it more open and democratic, and representing a genuine re-distribution of power, or are they more concerned with public presentation and political positioning? The paper is based mainly, but not exclusively, on publicly available minutes and related papers produced by the various bodies. These allow for an analysis of their composition and remits, as well as an examination of the substantive issues they have considered. The discussion also takes account of earlier descriptions of the character of the policy community, as well as hopes that the creation of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 would lead to greater transparency and accountability in political decision-making. It is argued that, while the new bodies provide opportunities for some previously marginalised voices to be heard, they demonstrate the continuing potency of familiar forms of bureaucratic management and professional protectionism. The paper also indicates a number of areas where further research would deepen understanding of the politics of Scottish education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is widely accepted that children in Scotland, as in other high-income countries, are not engaging in sufficient moderate-to-vigorous intensity physical activity (MVPA), the consequences of which can be adverse for health and wellbeing. In this paper, it is contended that active play (a form of gross motor or total body movement in which children exert energy in a freely chosen, fun, and unstructured manner) has potential to redress this deficit in MVPA. This paper reflects on lessons learned from active play interventions in Scottish schools, providing recommendations for schools on how to encourage more active play. It is argued that promoting active play during school break times and in the after-school period, and participating in active play interventions are promising ways of increasing children's MVPA and improving their fundamental movement skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The starting point of this paper is the Scottish School Grounds Survey of 2005, which provided nationwide insight into the extent to which school grounds were being used as learning environments for children in nursery, primary, secondary and special schools in Scotland. Reflecting specifically on provision for play and the way in which play facilitates formal and informal education, and considering developments in Scotland's school estate over the last decade, this paper argues that Scotland's school grounds are not yet play-full and playful learning environments. The paper concludes by reflecting on ways in which Scotland's school grounds could and should be positioned more centrally in school education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the opening paper in a Scottish Educational Review collection on Making Space for Play in Scottish Education. It is acknowledged that, historically, a perception of divergent purpose enabled education both to enlist play and to curb play to achieve desired educational outcomes. However, a new understanding of play has emerged in recent years, catalysed globally by the assertion in the UNCRC that play is a fundamental right of the child, and within the UK, by the response of the play sector to the challenge to articulate the value of play that was set by the Dobson report. Scotland is now a globally significant locus for the promotion of play, with strong national play leadership and, since 2013, a National Play Strategy. This paper asserts that it is timely to consider the extent to which Scottish education could and should embrace playful learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction to the November 2013 issue of "Scottish Educational Review" is presented which includes information on educational research in Scotland, the importance of supporting children's learning life course, and the relationship between educational researchers and policy makers.

This paper explores some of the unique issues in accessing Higher Education (HE) faced by pupils living in some Scottish rural communities in Argyll & Bute, Highland, Eilean Siar (Western Isles), Orkney Islands and Shetland Islands. Many of these communities are hard to reach and in some of the least deprived areas of Scotland. Despite this, some pupils come from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds. All pupils face large pecuniary and non-pecuniary costs in studying at HE. This paper presents views of barriers to HE entry drawing on interviews with S5 and S6 pupils and their educators living in these areas. All respondents believed that those in rural areas faced higher barriers than for their peers because of additional costs due to their location. The paper also highlights the need for better information about access to HE and improved communication about the transition between secondary schools and HE institutions for all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Scotland, the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) provides education practitioners with the opportunity for transformational change through the delivery of a holistic, broad and general education. This paper explores the extent to which play can be used as a pedagogical tool in developing the capabilities of children to realise the ambitions of CfE. The focus here is four of the ten core capabilities identified by Martha Nussbaum in her version of the Capabilities Approach; one of which is play, the others being those with which it is intrinsically linked, i.e. affiliation, 'senses, imagination and thought', and 'practical reason'. This conceptual analysis of play, autonomy and the Capabilities Approach constitutes a theoretical case for playful approaches in all stages of Scottish primary schools. It is argued that this would provide opportunities for human flourishing in the context of the CfE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on results from a recently completed research study conducted with pre-service teachers from Nova Scotia, Canada who completed their final student teacher practicum in Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. With our attention directed towards a primary research question related to pre-service teachers' own development, data were collected through synchronous online focus group interviews. Results revealed that pre-service teachers experienced both professional and personal growth, while also experiencing some unanticipated conflict and angst. Herein we present and discuss these results, especially as they relate to relevant literature and our own experiences with international student teacher practicums. This paper should be of particular relevance to those who share an interest in teacher education, practicums/field experiences/internships, and/or international education initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the aims of Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) in Scotland is greater inclusion of interdisciplinary learning and teaching in school education. There is, arguably, a limited amount of guidance in the CfE literature to advise and supporf secondary teachers in the practical implications of the planning, preparation and implementation of interdisciplinary learning and teaching. This paper examines this guidance and insights from research literature and presents the findings from a research project, Searching for Meaning, which focused on science and religious education teachers collaborating in planned interdisciplinary learning and teaching in secondary schools. The paper identifies some of the key factors for effective interdisciplinary learning and teaching between science and religious education. These include; supporf from the school leadership; openness to interdisciplinary work and willingness to learn about other disciplines; teamwork, dialogue and joint planning and the need for time and supporf for teachers. These findings are potentially significant for other forms of interdisciplinary learning and teaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editors discuss articles in the issue on topics related to Scottish education including the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), teacher collaborations in science and religious education, and outdoor education.

This paper is based on a keynote address to the 2012 Scottish Educational Research Association Annual Conference. It explores the relationship between research and teaching, particularly in the context of teacher education in Scotland but also in terms of wider implications. The paper begins with a discussion of how key terms such as education, teaching, learning and research are approached. The relationship between the tasks of teaching and research in UK teacher education and higher education generally is initially considered from the perspective of Skelton's three identities' for university tutors. The paper moves on to analyse the role which research could play in each of Winch's three models of the teacher: the craft model; the technology model; the professional model. The paper concludes that the craft and technology models provide only limited roles for research, while the professional model requires more significant research skills in methods, theory and scholarship. This model will apply to teacher educators, university teachers more generally, and to the wider teaching profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The achievement of equal access to educational opportunity is an international policy imperative that remains as elusive as it is desirable. Despite a plethora of inclusive policies and initiatives in Scotland such as Getting it Right for Every Child (2008 & 2012), Curriculum for Excellence (2009) and the Scottish Attainment Challenge (2015), significant numbers of young people cannot be said to experience equal access to educational opportunity. This paper draws upon complementary sociological and philosophical perspectives to explore why such barriers to equality of educational opportunity persist, before suggesting ways in which serious engagement with such theory might counter deficit assumptions in play and offer possible new ways forward. The point of departure is Bourdieu's typology of various forms of social capital which highlights how possession of capital is advantageous to upper and middle class families, whereas lack of such capital serves to restrict educational opportunities for young people from working class and disadvantaged backgrounds. Such an analysis argues that reproduction of social conditions, styles of thinking and decision-making, coupled with oppressive societal structures, all serve to disempower young people and impact negatively upon their educational attainment. This paper explores a variety of ways in which theory might challenge and interrupt assumptions informing discourses associated with inequality and their associated remedies. Through engaging a series of problematics within current framings of inequality, the paper argues that a more sustained engagement with theory offers the possibility of more nuanced understandings of inequality and a provocation to imagine otherwise. Engaging in such imaginative work might, moreover, enable the barriers to equality of educational opportunity to be better addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the closing paper in a Scottish Educational Review collection on Making Space for Play in Scottish Education. The paper reflects on the key conclusions from the six papers and three notes that comprise the collection. It identifies a baker's dozen of priority actions for those concerned to enrich Scottish education through play, i.e. (i) establishing a shared sense of purpose for play; (ii) crafting a coherent position among those with an interest in promoting play; (iii) acknowledging the role of play in achieving many of the wider goals of school education; (iv) not only promoting the radical potential of play to enhance education, but also thinking critically about it; (v) reflecting on the benefits of playful learning for pupils, wider society and classroom teachers; (vi) sharing exemplars of playful learning and the process through which it is introduced; (vii) reviewing the resources that are available; (viii) specifying minimum play(space) standards; (vix) strengthening the evidence base; (x) reflecting on the significance of the changing nature of play; (xi) engaging practitioners on the value of playful learning beyond the early years; (xii) involving the wider school community in embracing play; and (xiii) supporting teachers and other educational practitioners to utilise playful learning, while being cognisant of the demands and pressures on their time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that play should be central to children's lives throughout early childhood, including their time in school. First, it charts the history of early childhood education in Scotland through four stages; (i) pioneer of kindergarten; (ii) early adopter of formal education; (iii) promise of a recalibration through Curriculum for Excellence; and the (iv) failure to realise the full playful learning potential of CfE. Second, it asserts that there are four problems with an early introduction to formal learning: (i) it is a disservice to children given wider societal trends in play; (ii) it is conductive to testing, which establishes a culture of failure and induces stress; (iii) it is not in the best interests of all children or Scotland as a whole as it attempts to 'close the attainment gap'; and (iv) it lacks what playful learning can offer. This leads to the conclusion that the dearth of play in Scottish childhoods might be considered as an 'Adverse Childhood Experience'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper builds upon an ethnographical doctoral study that explored how adults exercise power over children. Anchored in the worlds of children's lived experiences, it explores whether play can be deeper, richer and more meaningful when children are beyond the watchful eye of adults. It focuses on children's play within the spaces they occupied prior to, and after, their transition from nursery to primary school. Participants included children aged between 3 .7 -4 7 years of age, as well as Early Year Practitioners (EYPs) and visitors to the setting. The interactions and behaviours of the participants were observed, ensuring that children were not 'objectified' in the process. Vignettes of play episodes highlight complexities surrounding adult understanding of children's play. In particular the need for adults to be more reflexive in using knowledge from practice to support play and resist assigning false purpose to play episodes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alexander Sutherland Neill (1883- 1973) is well-known as the leading figure in the 20th century movement for progressive, child-centred education, a movement which attracted both supporters and critics. The independent school which he founded, Summerhill, was located first in Lyme Regis, Dorset and later in Leiston, Suffolk, both in England, but many of Neill's ideas need to be understood as a reaction against his experiences as a pupil and young teacher in Scotland. This paper examines his attitude to Scotland and Scottish education, drawing on his own writings, including his autobiography, the work of Jonathan Croall, Neill's biographer and editor of a collection of his letters, and the testimony of Scottish educators whose work was influenced by Neill. Detailed examination is given to Neill's 1936 book, Is Scotland Educated?, which has received limited attention from commentators. This volume is particularly interesting in relation to Neill's political, cultural and psychological perspectives on Scottish life and their relevance to his educational views. The book reveals the strength of his (mainly negative) feelings about his native land but also his limited awareness of some important developments that were taking place, especially in the field of child guidance. In addition, the paper explores Neill's links to other Scottish progressive educators, most notably John Aitkenhead and R. F. Mackenzie, both of whom sought to introduce qualified versions of Neill's philosophy into schools in Scotland. It is argued that it is not necessary to subscribe to every aspect of Neill's approach to education to appreciate his value as a source of an alternative narrative to official accounts of the Scottish educational tradition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting in August 2014, all registered teachers in Scotland are now required to engage in a process of Professional Update (PU) managed by the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS). The aim is to ensure that teachers at every stage of their careers participate in worthwhile professional learning, which can take a variety of forms. PU is, in effect, a system of regular professional reaccreditation. This paper examines the new arrangements, the way in which they have been devised and the thinking that lies behind them. It also looks at the provisions which preceded them and suggests that a change of terminology does not necessarily mean that there will be a significant change of practice. One particular form of Professional Update which is recommended - Practitioner Enquiry (PE) - is shown to have had a long history, but relatively modest results. A number of reasons for the slow pace of change in the field of professional learning and development are considered: these include teacher resistance, bureaucratic obstruction and academic failure. The paper concludes by arguing for greater intellectual freedom in defining what counts as legitimate professional learning and cautioning against the expectation that new systems and structures will by themselves bring about major shifts in attitude. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the light of the Scottish Government's commitment to the principles enshrined in the Christie Commission and developing approaches worldwide to public administration, this article considers the forces at work and the major arguments for suggesting the need for increased and enhanced participation by parents in educational decision-making and school governance by focusing on the early 1980s. This was another period when participative democracy and partnership between lay-persons and public ofticials was widely supported at a theoretical level but often met resistance on the ground. An analysis of the responses to the abortive School Council consultative exercise of 1984 conducted by the Scoftish Education Department (SED) is oftered. The period before the emergence of Michael Forsyth as Education Minister in the Scoftish Office in Mrs Thatcher's era as UK Prime Minister is reviewed. Forsyth's controversial proposals for the establishment of School Boards that caused such consternation among the educational establishment and parents have subsequently been replaced by Parent Councils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the rescaling and re-spatialization of policy and governance in education, including the constitution of a global education policy field. It deals with the changing education policy work of the OECD, particularly the influential Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). We argue that PISA has become the most successful OECD 'product' and as such has become the prototype for other OECD developments, including PISA-Based tests for schools, PISA for development, PIACC and AHELO. These developments help constitute a global education policy field and contribute to the production of a global data infrastructure in education. At the same time, they also have impacts on other spatial relations, including sub-national and local effects in schooling. For example, the PISA-based test for schools programme can be used directly by schools and sub-national systems as part of the new policy spaces in education. In this paper, we document the role of the OECD's education work in respect of these matters. We focus specifically on a video, PISA 2012 - Representing Your Country, produced by the Scottish Department of Education and anchored by the Scottish National Party Minister for Education. The aim of the video is to inspire the participation and strong performance of Scottish students in the 2012 PISA sample. As we will show, using a 'videological analysis', this video demonstrates how Scottish independence and nationalism involve reaching out to draw on the expertise of supranational organisations such as the OECD, while at the same time the OECD is reaching in to nations to shape policy agendas in sub-national spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers two Scottish cases, in 1693 and 1711, in which legal opinions were obtained from professors in law faculties in the Netherlands. These are the only known examples of this phenomenon. As well as considering the contemporary citation of Dutch sources in Scottish pleadings, and the relevance of legal education particularly in Utrecht, the article considers why, in the context of the cases concerned, such appeals might have been made to the Dutch universities. These Dutch opinions are contrasted with the later tendency of Scottish lawyers to obtain opinions from English counsel in certain circumstances. The article ends with the text and translation of the 1711 opinion from Utrecht. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alan Milburn, the Chair of the Government's Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission recently highlighted the role of education in progressing social mobility in Scotland; 'In my view it's a grave social injustice that only one in forty pupils from Scotland's most deprived households...got three As in their Highers in 2011, compared to one in ten across all income levels'. An analysis of the data on school leavers in Scotland also points towards a considerable inequality in access to higher education in particular. This paper reports on a research and development project that progressed the provision of intergenerational mentoring for young people from communities experiencing social and economic disadvantage. The findings affirm the role of research in such innovation and indicate that intergenerational mentoring offers a process, long awaited, through which young people can gain access to the different forms of social and cultural capital that are implicitly essential for progression into higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Educational research in Scotland has a very distinguished history and has made a major contribution in several aspects of methodology, not least in the relationships between researchers, policymakers and practitioners. The paper considers the Scottish contribution to the development of educational research past, present and future and the significance of interactions at three levels - the UK, European and global. Against the backdrop of the forthcoming Independence vote, it is argued that the historic distinctiveness of educational provision in Scotland - both before and after devolution - has been a significant benefit to the research community here. However, there are some internal dependencies that may need active nurturing, if the benefits of this independence are to be sustained. Furthermore there are critical elements of interdependence, at all three levels, which will be important in pursuing an aspiration to maintain research of the highest quality that will support learners and teachers in the years ahead. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the frequency and nature of outdoor learning provision in Scoftish schools, with specific attention paid to teachers' approaches to learning outdoors, and it considers what further support and professional development teachers need to progress their practice. This enquiry is timely as limited data has been gathered over the past ten years (see Higgins ei ai. 2006 and Mannion ei ai. 2007) and little is known about how the policy document Curricuium for Exceiience through Outdoor Learning and associated Education Scotland support has influenced outdoor learning provision. Ouestionnaires were administered to primary and secondary schools (n=90 returns) across four local authority areas. The results indicate that secondary schools are keen to develop outdoor learning provision and they need support to do so. Also, there is an increased use of school grounds as a context for learning within the primary school sector. In light of these findings and recent developments within national education, recommendations are made for both in-service and pre-service teacher training. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently schools in Scotland are engaged in major curriculum and assessment reform entitled Curriculum for Excellence (CfE). In common with other areas of education policy pre- and post-devolution, the CfE development process has been characterised by consultation, but additionally `engagement' has been sought with stakeholders. This paper offers an account of the development of the engagement process and reports key findings to emerge from within the profession. Drawing mainly from data derived from teachers who participated in the process, the paper considers the re-professionalising claims attached to the new flexibilities within the revised curriculum. The paper initially addresses the challenges faced by the profession in working with looser curriculum structures that afford a higher degree of professional judgement to teachers and greater autonomy to school leaders to build the curriculum to meet local needs. In the discussion that follows, it emerges that those teachers who experienced fuller `engagement' with the draft curriculum materials, through piloting them, tended to be more wholehearted in their disposition towards the new curriculum and its associated pedagogy, than those who had only been `consulted', through completing questionnaires, for example. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the time of writing, the Donaldson Review of Teacher Education in Scotland is being undertaken for the Scottish Government, covering the continuum from Initial Teacher Education (ITE) through Induction onto Continuing Professional Development (CPD). This paper focuses on ITE, but considers some possible implications for CPD. The paper argues the current Review must take a broader and deeper approach than recent national reviews of ITE, avoiding recommendations which narrow long-term possibilities. The future development of ITE should be based upon a fuller partnership between universities and the teaching profession than currently exists, with a collaborative `inquiry as stance' approach to the knowledge-practice relationship within teacher learning, and with collaborative models of ITE partnership replacing outdated duplication models. The paper considers issues to be addressed, including within universities, if such partnership is to be developed. The potential for creative innovation within this partnership is illustrated through the importance of breadth in any new framework of lIE qualifications as these relate to professional development. Challenges are highlighted in achieving support for innovation from other stakeholders involved in the governance of Scottish ITE. However, the paper concludes that stimulating possibilities may follow for CPD, as well as ITE, if the type of ITE envisaged creates the basis for a truly activist teaching profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The introduction of the Additional Support for Learning Act (2004) has been a significant milestone in Scotland's understanding of issues of inclusion. The Act is already beginning to have a significant and far-reaching impact on the work of schools; requiring staff to reconceptualise what was traditionally known as 'special needs' and asserting a much more complex and dynamic view of the potential barriers to inclusion. This paper explores the experiences and changing understandings of key staff (pastoral care, learning support, behaviour support) in three mainstream secondary schools as they worked to translate the new legislation into a coherent, holistic and sustainable set of practices. The paper raises some critical and timely questions about the tensions between competing priorities and roles and responsibilities for those working in education in such challenging times but also offers comment on the emerging potential of the legislation for building new confidence and capacities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the Scottish government renewing the pledge to implement A Curriculum for Excellence (2004) the schools' sector arguably faces a period of radical reform that could fundamentally affect the nature of pedagogy and schooling. This paper explores the disjunction in national policy that is foregrounded by this particular initiative. Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) can be seen as an attempt to move the Scottish approach to school improvement away from an alignment with the tenets of 'hard' managerialism and the requirement for conformity with centrally determined procedures and practices. It can be interpreted as using a 'softer' version of the discourse, where notions of organisational learning and contextualised development are seen as the basis for securing better performance. As such the implementation of CfE might be construed as incompatible with the approach to school improvement embedded in the Quality Initiative in Scottish Schools. This paper argues that the key to curricular reform lies with increasing the capacity for teacher, as well as student, learning in schools and that this requires a major revision of our approach to accountability. Given the recent OECD report on schooling in Scotland, the outcomes of the Crerar review of audit and inspection and the signing of the Government Concordat with local authorities, this is an ideal time for rethinking how we set about achieving quality assurance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the implications of adopting social audit approaches in order to implement equality policies in Scottish FE colleges, exploring the tension between surface compliance and deep institutional engagement. It provides a brief overview of the Scottish further education context, before turning to a consideration of social audit and equalities within the sector. The data reported comes from a research study funded by the Scottish Further Education Unit which examined college policies and practices in relation to equalities. The study involved analysis of statistical data, a questionnaire survey of all Scottish colleges and in-depth case studies in five colleges. The paper examines the pros and cons of social audit as a means of achieving institutional changes in the field of equality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last fifteen years the diagnosis of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) has acquired a high level of professional acceptance and public awareness in Britain. A range of critiques have also developed in relation to the concept of ADHD, the constellation of symptoms that make up the 'disorder', its diagnosis and the use of medication. However diagnoses and medication rates continue to increase. This increasing medicalisation of behaviour is paradoxical in relation to current policy and legislative direction of Additional Support for Learning in Scotland. This paper surnmarises some of the critiques of the concept of ADHD, discusses their minimal impact on practice and refers to research data to highlight some issues for education. The data from a small pilot study highlights the role primary schools take in the diagnosis of ADHD, their relationship with the diagnosing professionals and the management of prescription medication during the school day. Finally the paper argues for further social and educational research on this important issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historically, formal barriers to gender equality in teaching were justified on the grounds that a predominance of women within the profession would be detrimental to the social and emotional development of male pupils, who needed male teachers as role models. Such arguments continue to be voiced in debates about what should be done to tackle the declining proportion of men in the teaching profession in Scotland. The research reported in this paper investigated the nature of the gender balance amongst teachers in Scottish publicly funded schools, undergraduate students' attitudes to teaching as a career and policy-makers' and practitioners' accounts of the underlying reasons for the growing gender imbalance in teaching. Practical suggestions were sought for possible courses of action to ensure greater diversity amongst the teaching workforce. In this paper it is argued that, whilst there is consensus on the need for a teaching workforce which reflects social diversity, recruiting reluctant men into teaching would be counter-productive. Rather, ways have to be found of promoting the positive aspects of teaching to both men and women, and, at a more general level, encouraging men to place greater value on the caring and empathic qualities which are increasingly required in teaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the education remit of the Education and Culture Committee of the Scottish Parliament from September 2015 to February 2016 for the Stage two amendments of the Education (Scotland) Bill including topics on

The article presents a study which covers the remit of the Education and Culture Committee from February 2015 to August 2015 in Scotland in which the committee took evidence in several issues including Curriculum for Excellence, British Sign Language (Scotland) Bill, and educational attainment gap.

The article focuses on the education remit presented by the Scottish Parliament's Education and Culture Committee between February and July 2013. Topics include the national qualifications for the educational initiative Curriculum for Excellence, an educational research study conducted by the Centre of Educational Sociology at the University of Edinburgh, and the implications of cyber-bullying.

The article presents information on the education remit of Scotland's Parliamentary Education and Culture Committee from February through July 2013. It addresses efforts to change funding to post-16 year-old education in Scotland, issues associated with the ethics of taking children into government care, and a review of teacher employment in Scotland.

This paper analyses children's sector policy and the 2011 Teaching Scotland's Future: Report of a review of teacher education in Scotland report with the aim of distinguishing their coherence and extent of disconnect. Overarching children's services policies which stress inter/professional collaboration are reviewed and the findings of the report summarised. Modes of knowledge and capitals theory are defined and applied as a conceptual frame to examine the ways in which co-working is constituted in the report, with the conclusion that co-working is conceptualised in a limited way, not connecting with wider policies. Issues in danger of being marginalised are then considered, and a number of suggestions made concerning how to (re)connect policy rhetoric relating to co-work with action to prepare practitioners across the sector with the knowledge and skills needed to work together. The method is document review. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the relationship between established teachers' professional learning and their use of practitioner enquiry, or action research, as a means of improving the quality of their classroom teaching. It reports on one aspect of a ten-month pilot study jointly funded by the Scottish Government and the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) to explore means of evaluating the impact of the Chartered Teacher initiative on pupil learning. Whilst the study found evidence for the beneficial effects of teachers' engagement in practitioner research, as part of the requirement for the completion of Chartered Teacher programmes, it also raised a number of issues as to exact nature of participants' learning and whether current approaches to the use of practitioner research in teacher education need to be revised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers a description and analysis of recent developments in higher education, taking account of the expansion of the sector, the financial pressures to which it is subject, and the ideological climate in which it operates. It examines the significance of the emergence of various university `mission groups' or `think tanks' for the unity and coherence of the sector as a whole. Although the main focus is on Scottish higher education, the analysis makes some reference to UK-wide developments and to global pressures affecting the HE systems of all countries. The effects of corporate culture and competitive branding on the traditional values and purposes of higher education are discussed, and it is argued that there is now a serious divide between university leaders and academic staff. It is also suggested that the current discourse of higher education shifts uneasily between principles that are not readily compatible: excellence and access; quality and inclusion; global reach and community engagement. The need for academics to contribute to wider public debate about the aims of higher education is seen as an important first step in achieving a more coherent role for the sector as a whole. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current educational policy in many parts of the world is dominated by the discourse of the market. Choice is seen as a lever by which quality will be enhanced through its direct effects on providers. Choice is intended to provide an exit for users but, in doing so, it is argued by policy makers that it makes user voice more effective. This paper examines the relationship between exit, voice and loyalty in public services using Scottish education as a case study where choice is constrained by both geography and political factors. We consider the implications of Le Grand's (2003, 2007) analysis of public services in terms of characterising providers as "knights" or "knaves" and users as "queens" or "pawns" and discuss the advantages and difficulties of maintaining a system of knightly providers and queenly users. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Glow is a £40m public-private partnership project that aims to connect 800,000 Scottish pupils, parents and teachers, equipping them with online tools and resources for email, electronic conferencing and file sharing, that will support the new Curriculum for Excellence. The discourse that has developed around Glow focuses almost exclusively on the technology's intended outcomes, all of which are said to be benefits. However, as with all technology, there will also be some unintended outcomes, some of which may be unwelcome. This paper explores what might be termed 'the dark side of Glow': the opportunity costs of the project and its risks and threats, including those of project failure, managerialism, inequity, cultural trivialisation and surface change. It is argued that an acknowledgement of the dark side is essential in order that risks and threats can be addressed and mitigated. At present, the lack of balance in the discourse not only reflects badly on the quality of critical thinking in Scottish education but also increases the likelihood of unwelcome outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Scottish Curriculum for Excellence lists 'responsible citizenship' as one of the four capacities which it envisages that all children and young people should develop. By understanding citizenship as a capacity and by seeing it as a concern that should permeate the whole curriculum, the Scottish approach to education for citizenship is distinctly different from approaches developed in many other countries around the world. This paper provides a critical analysis of key-documents in the development of the Scottish approach over the past decade. It argues that the Scottish approach is characterised by a focus on individuals and their capacities, by a broad conception of the domain of citizenship, and by an emphasis on activity and community. The analysis not only reveals something about the particular choices implied in the Scottish approach but also hints at some of the more problematic sides of education for citizenship in Scotland, most notably the risk that citizenship focuses too much on the social and too little on the political dimensions of what it means to be a citizen in a pluralist democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The attainment of literacy has been positioned as a key to achieving the Scottish Executive's social inclusion and widening participation agendas. This paper explores the argument that the social practices discourse around literacy has been written into policy documents but has yet to be drawn upon within practice in the Scottish Further Education context. To achieve this, it will provide a brief overview of Scottish Further Education and the most recent policies which were intended to impact on its literacy provision. It will argue that in both national policy documents and national reports commissioned by the Adult Literacies in Scotland (now Learning Connections) Literacy Team, two discourses of literacy are drawn upon. These are the discourse of ‘deficit’ and the discourse of ‘social practices’. Finally, drawing on data emerging from ‘Literacies for Learning in Further Education’ (www.lancs.ac.uk/Iflfe), a phase 3 Teaching Learning Research Project (TLRP), it will argue that since the introduction of a National Literacy Strategy in 2000, the social practices discourse has made little impact on practice within the FE sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research on teaching the Holocaust, notably case studies in the primary or the secondary sectors, suggests that Holocaust education can make a significant contribution to citizenship by developing pupils' understandings of justice, tolerance, human rights issues, and the many forms of racism and discrimination. Yet, there have been no longitudinal studies into its impact on primary pupils. This paper, reports on the first stages of ongoing longitudinal research (sponsored by the Scottish Executive Education Department), and concentrates on the relevance of Holocaust education to citizenship, by comparing the attitudes of primary 7 pupils before and after Holocaust teaching using data from questionnaires. Results show an improvement in pupils' values and attitudes after learning about the Holocaust in almost every category related to minority groups, ethnic or otherwise. One significant finding was a deep anti-English feeling and this in itself the need for further investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper summarises the findings of a study of the first four years of Higher Still. The reform aimed to provide `opportunity for all' by introducing a `unified curriculum and assessment system' of post-16 education. Higher Still's flexible climbing-frame model did indeed extend opportunities, especially for middle- and lower-attaining 16 year olds who stayed on at school and for students with special needs. It encouraged collaboration between schools and colleges and it enhanced the comprehensive principle rather than undermined it. It placed vocational' and general education on a formally equal footing, although its short-term impact on subject choices was modest. However, while the climbing-frame model extended access it was less successful in increasing attainment, and the goal of a seamless progression framework proved difficult to realise. Moreover, the system introduced by Higher Still was not fully unified: implementation in the college sector was incomplete and schools and colleges implemented somewhat models of curriculum and assessment. Some of the `unifying' goals of Higher Still transferred to the Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes what happened when a group of middle school teacherresearchers at the International School of Billund (ISB), Denmark, joined university-based researchers from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, to engage in a new qualitative methodology called "Playful Participatory Research" or PPR (Baker & Davila 2018; Baker et al. 2016). The goal of the inquiry was to explore some of the tensions that exist between play and school--in particular the paradox between the timeless nature of play and the timetabled nature of school. The experiment was an example of one of the principles of a pedagogy of play proposed by the research team, which suggests that teachers' collective and systematic study of artifacts of student learning (or "pedagogical documentation") helps them to navigate such paradoxes. The teachers decided to replace two weeks of the standard school schedule with a 'student-composed schedule', in which students were free to design their own programme. Although the experiment got off to a shaky start, as it progressed, many students capitalized on the opportunity to choose where and with whom to work; they began to see each other as intellectual resources; and they started to take more responsibility for their own learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 'Crofting Connections' (Ceanglaichean Croitearachd) project is described in this article as an exemplar of the prescribed 'Scottish approach' to Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). Drawing upon the evaluation of this project an argument is made for increased attention to such initiatives that seek to (re)connect children with issues of community, heritage, land and place. In doing so, we also call for a reconceptualization of crofting in academic discourse and in the curriculum. While crofting is a specifically Scottish phenomenon, this may be of interest to readers in other nations with similar small scale agricultural traditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]