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Re-engaging young adults who have ‘dropped out’ of school is an important and challenging task for educators. The purpose of this study was to explore the teaching practices that encourage young people to re-engage in further learning. Through interviews with teachers and students, the study identified five major interrelated teaching strategies that were effective in re-engaging young adults in education. These strategies were: strong concern for student welfare; positive teacher–student relationships; relevant course content; a mastery-based approach to learning; and an overarching goal of building students’ confidence in their ability, and more generally, in themselves. Together, these strategies address the behavioural, emotional and cognitive components of student engagement. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Purposes: This study evaluated the experiences of undergraduate student nurses with high-fidelity Human Patient Simulation Mannequins (HPSMs) and their perceptions of empathy. Methods: An exploratory case-study method was used to investigate the literature on empathy and the use of high-fidelity mannequins in nurse education. Two focus groups were conducted with eight third-year undergraduate nursing students in order to elicit responses to their experiences with HPSMs in their learning, especially in relation to empathy. Findings: Undergraduate nurses found it challenging when using HPSMs in the learning environment to relate to the mannequins as real. Students reported that in their experience, the use of mannequins was not conducive currently to the development of skills necessary for positive interpersonal development of the nurse–patient relationship. Conclusions: Focus group data and the empirical literature suggest that more research needs to be conducted into the use of mannequins in the development of nurse–patient interpersonal skills. Educators need to make evidence-based and pedagogically sound decisions about the use and limitations of HPSMs in undergraduate nursing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study aimed to describe perceptions of clinical placement experiences and competency development for international speech-language pathology students and to determine if these perceptions were different for domestic students. Method: Domestic and international students at two Australian universities participated in nine focus group interviews. Thematic analysis led to the identification of two themes shared by international and domestic students and several separate themes. Result: Shared themes identified the important influence of students' relationships with clinical educators, unique opportunities and learning that occurs on placement. International student themes included concerns about their communication skills and the impact of these skills on client progress. They also explored their adjustment to unfamiliar placement settings and relationships, preferring structured placements to assist this adjustment. Domestic student themes explored the critical nature of competency attainment and assessment on placement, valuing placements that enabled them to achieve their goals. Conclusion: The findings of this study suggest that international students experience additional communication, cultural and contextual demands on clinical placement, which may increase their learning requirements. Clinical education practices must be responsive to the learning needs of diverse student populations. Strategies are suggested to assist all students to adjust to the professional and learning expectations of clinical education placements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the Australian Curriculum implemented by Christian teachers in the country. An overview on the national framework for teaching, learning, and assessment for students in school classrooms, is provided. Also emphasized is the essential of documentation and registration on the implemented curriculum across the country.

The affective dimensions of intimacy and emotional labour in academic development are explored utilising two methodological resources: autoethnography and narrative practice. An excerpt from the author’s reflective professional journal infused with affect and emotion is analysed utilising theories of intimacy in modernity, emotion work, and professional intimacy. The journal excerpt is ‘restoried’ to produce narrative lines that provide insight into the journal entry. The article concludes by proposing a ‘pedagogy of intimacy’ as an analytical space that values both skill and care. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This study examined the role of schools' psychosocial safety climate ( PSC) in teachers' psychological outcomes. We proposed that PSC would moderate the effects of teachers' daily job demands on their fatigue and work engagement, and also the effects of teachers' daily recovery on fatigue and engagement. Sixty-one Australian school teachers completed a diary that was repeated three times over the course of approximately 8 months. Each diary ran for five consecutive days, measuring daily self-reports of job demands, recovery, fatigue, and engagement ( N = 915 data points), while perceived PSC was measured once per diary. Multilevel analyses indicated that PSC moderated the relationships between job demands and fatigue, as well as job demands and engagement. This suggests that perceived PSC could act as a buffer against deleterious impacts of daily job demands. PSC also moderated the relationships between recovery and fatigue, and recovery and engagement. This indicates that higher levels of perceived PSC in schools could amplify the benefits of daily recovery for teachers. PSC also exerted a main effect on both fatigue and engagement. These results offer insight into the mechanisms by which PSC may act as a buffer to protect worker mental health, and highlight the importance for school management to promote PSC within their organization. Practitioner points Psychosocial safety climate in organizations may buffer workers from the negative psychological outcomes associated with job demands., Psychosocial safety climate in organizations may boost the psychological benefits that workers gain from achieving good daily recovery outside of work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article talks about mentoring in emergency medicine. Topics discussed include definition of the process of mentoring, occurrence of information mentoring relationships throughout history, mentoring at Australasian College for Emergency Medicine (ACEM) benefits of mentoring, and disadvantages of mentoring.

This article addresses the issue of teacher educators' emotion display when teaching and interacting with students. Little is known about this phenomenon in higher education generally, and teacher education specifically. An empirical study was conducted to address this gap by investigating teacher educators' views on appropriate and inappropriate emotion display and its functions in the process of teaching. The study also examined how teachers used emotion regulation strategies to manage the intensity of their experienced emotions. The participants (six male, nine female) were from two public Australian universities and were all teaching first-year students in pre-service education. Data were collected through in-depth, semi-structured face-to-face interviews. Qualitative analyses revealed that these teachers viewed the open expression of positive emotions as an integral aspect of their teaching practice. In terms of negative emotions, they reported the criticality of controlling such experiences, and the occasional need to completely conceal them. Some reflected on the instrumental functions and conscious use of emotion display and emotion suppression. Findings are discussed in light of prior research; limitations of this exploratory study are addressed, and directions for future research are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the present study was to explore speech-language pathologists' (SLPs) perceptions and experiences of factors influencing the implementation of communication interventions for students with multiple and severe disabilities. Eight SLPs in New South Wales, Australia, participated in individual interviews and a focus group. Interview transcripts were scrutinized using thematic analysis. Transcripts were coded into categories, which were then grouped to yield themes. Participants identified a broad range of themes, including SLPs' experience and skills, professional development, and collaboration with teachers and families; as well as home and school contexts, the role of government departments, and broader societal factors. These complex influences suggest that systemic supports may be required at multiple levels in order to increase the likelihood of effective implementation of communication interventions for students with multiple and severe disabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is now a strong body of evidence (e.g. Hattie, 2009; Roorda et al., 2011) that confirms the value of positive teacher-student relationships for learning and behaviour. The quality of relationships in a school, however, also impacts on teacher wellbeing and their ability to cope well with the many and varied stresses that are the hallmarks of the profession. Teacher attrition is a major concern in the Western world - how teachers feel makes a difference to their ability to respond effectively to the challenges they face. This article explores issues of social capital within the learning environment and how this impacts on all stakeholders within an ecological framework. It examines how teacher resilience might be enhanced by specific actions that promote positive feelings of belonging, respect, value, and trust. The article examines international research on these issues, including a specific qualitative study in six schools in Australia. Findings are confirmed and illustrated by an online survey on student wellbeing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents one teacher's perspective on issues of student difference. 'Elissa's' account begins with her views as a pre-service teacher and continues through to her early career teaching. Elissa's overwhelming tendency to construct students of difference as deficit alongside her efforts to 'fix' these deficits to align with an Anglo-Australian middle class ideal strongly resonate with concerns long expressed in the literature about teacher-student cultural discontinuity; teachers' ill-preparedness for addressing student diversity; and the failure of universities to support pre-service teachers in this respect. Amid broader climates of unprecedented diversity where equity for marginalised groups is a mandated schooling goal, Elissa's story is another cautionary tale. It further illuminates the gap between the kinds of teachers currently being produced and the kinds of teachers likely to realise social justice through education. As such it provides further warrant for rethinking how best to support teachers to productively address student diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the Key Word Sign and Gesture (KWS&G), an augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). It mentions the pilot study, where KWS&G was implemented in a special education school for children with intellectual disabilities in Australia, by Movement for the Intellectually Disabled of Singapore (MINDS). It mentions that based on the pilot study, it shows the importance of having a training for KWS&G to acquire appropriate knowledge and skills on the application of the AAC.

Transition programs aimed at assisting new students to become part of the learning community have been a common feature in Australian and New Zealand universities for many years. The University of New England (Australia) established two new programs aimed at supporting the academic transition of commencing students studying by distance education in 2007. One was a peer mentoring program. The other was an online university induction and academic mentoring program. Evaluation and outcomes, plus an analysis of resources required by each program, led to the online induction program taking precedence over the peer mentoring program. The induction program has been more successful, more risk averse, and more resource effective in introducing students to the academic culture of the university and assisting with their integration into, and comfort within, the academic community. It appears from our experience that academic mentoring is best left in the hands of professional, experienced and continuously employed university staff. The online induction program won a prestigious Australian Learning and Teaching Council Citation in 2011 for an outstanding initiative that effectively supports student learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Recent data show that only 15% of Australian adolescents participate in adequate amounts of physical activity (PA) and those students from Asian and Middle-Eastern backgrounds in Grades 6-12 are significantly less active than their English-speaking background peers. Schools have recently been recognised as the most widely used and cost-effective setting for promoting PA among youth and one domain within schools where PA can occur regularly for all youth, regardless of cultural background or socio-economic status, is during physical education (PE). Methods: This study describes changes in physical activity (PA), lesson context and teacher interaction in physical education over the first two years in culturally and linguistically diverse secondary schools. Grade 7 PE classes in six schools were randomly observed using systematic direct observation (n = 81) and then followed up over the same period (n = 51) twelve months later. Results: There was no significant decline in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) during PE (MD= -4.8%; p=.777), but a significant decline and medium negative effect in time spent in vigorous physical activity (VPA) (MD= -7.9%; p = .009) during PE was observed. Significant declines and large negative effects over time in percentage of PE time spent in management (MD = -8.8%; p<.001) and the number of observations where teachers promoted PA (MD= -20.7%; p < .001). Conclusions: The decline of VPA and teacher promotion of PA in culturally and linguistically diverse schools is of concern. Given the declines in VPA and the increases in time spent in game play, further research is needed to ascertain whether PE instruction could be improved by focussing on skill instruction and fitness in a games-based PE instruction model. Further research for increasing teacher promotion of PA during PE is needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The transfer of nursing education into the higher education sector occurred over a 10-year period in Australia (1985-1994). Australian nurse leaders settled on a single outcome measure to be applied for all nursing graduates in the form of national competency standards. While this move enabled diversity, the lack of consistency in curriculum design has subsequently led to increasing confusion for clinicians who support students' learning in clinical placements. Using a shared critical reflection method, the authors reviewed (1) the evaluation comments from nurses in one nursing unit of a hospital in one Australian jurisdiction and (2) an historical review of nursing literature at the time of the transfer of nursing education into the higher education sector. The reflection suggests that the aim of the transfer, to create critical thinking graduates, has been undermined by the implicit clinical education practices that have since emerged. In order to address the contemporary challenges for clinical staff working with students from multiple universities, as well as increased student numbers to address the nursing shortage, we recommend a new approach to curriculum design: a national clinical curriculum drawn from social, as well as cognitive, learning theory that at once informs clinicians of students' potential abilities and provides the scope to accommodate the increasingly difficult and critical learning requirements of tertiary-based nursing students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies have shown that teachers' aggressive classroom management impacts negatively on students. The authors compared student reaction to teachers' use of aggressive management techniques in Australia, China, and Israel. Reactions included distraction negativity toward teachers and perceptions that teachers' responses were unjustified, yet the perception of aggression as justified (or not) only minimally affected the degree of students' distraction and negativity toward the teacher. Yelling in anger and sarcasm appeared less problematic in Israel and somewhat less so in China; in Australia, no difference in potential impact between different forms of aggression was evident. Implications of these findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Leadership capacity-building is a key factor in sustainable school improvement, and the leadership contribution of students is an integral part of an authentic distributed conception of school leadership. Thus it is important to understand the factors which influence high school students' motivations to engage in formal and informal leadership in their school. A sample of 167 Australian public school Grade 11 students (average age 16.6 years) completed a self-report survey of their perceptions and motivations. Students holding formal leadership roles reported more positive views of their school and peers. Girls not holding a formal leadership position reported higher levels of leadership motivation than boys. Students who were members of formal extracurricular clubs or teams did not report higher levels of school identification or leadership motivation. Students' perceptions of the quality of relationships between their peers and between teachers and students predicted their sense of membership or identification with their school. In turn, students' sense of identification, and not their level of achievement motivation, predicted their willingness to contribute and engage in leadership in their school. The implications of these findings for school leadership and culture and teachers' behaviour are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the growing adoption of the Positive Behaviour Support (PBS) system state-wide in New South Wales, Australia, it was of interest to determine the readiness of behaviour specialists to conduct Functional Behaviour Assessments (FBA) as part of the third tier of School-wide PBS provision. This article presents the findings from a survey conducted with 86 behaviour specialists employed by NSW DET in metropolitan Sydney. Seventy four participants (86%) reported some form of training in FBA, 85 (99%) had used indirect assessments, all reported using direct assessment methods, and, 40 (46.5%) had written a FBA based behaviour intervention plan (BIP). Suggestions for priority training and preferred delivery options are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports a cross-national study of classroom environments in Australia and Indonesia. A modified version of the What Is Happening In this Class? (WIHIC) questionnaire was used simultaneously in these two countries to: 1) crossvalidate the modified WIHIC; 2) investigate differences between countries and sexes in perceptions of classroom environment; and 3) investigate associations between students’ attitudes to science and their perceptions of classroom environment. The sample consisted of 1,161 students (594 students from 18 classes in Indonesia and 567 students from 18 classes in Australia). Principal components factor analysis with varimax rotation supported the validity of a revised structure for the WIHIC. Two-way MANOVA revealed some differences between countries and between sexes in students’ perceptions of their classroom environments. Simple correlation and multiple regression analyses revealed generally positive associations between the classroom environment and student attitudes to science in both countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prioritization of school students with additional learning needs is a reality due to a finite resource base. Limited evidence exists regarding teachers' prioritization of primary and secondary school students with additional learning needs. The aim of the present article was to differentiate teachers' perceptions of the level of support required by and provided to students with respect to nine additional learning needs. Teachers of 14,533 students in an Australian school district (in 37 primary schools and 7 secondary schools) identified students' required and actual level of support. Teachers identified 4,845 students with additional learning needs: 34.71% of primary students and 30.14% of secondary students. Of the nine areas of additional learning need, presence of a communication disorder was the most important predictive factor of teachers' recommendation that primary or secondary students required a high level of support at school. Students were more likely to be identified with communication disorder if they were in grades 1, 2, 7, 8 or 10; that is, at the time of transition to different levels of schooling. Students with communication disorder + behavioural/emotional disorder + intellectual disability were identified by teachers as requiring the highest level of support at school. Overall, students received limited additional support at school; however, those with communication disorder + intellectual disability received the highest level of learning support within the educational setting. In contrast, students who received the greatest curriculum adaptations were those with intellectual disability + physical/medical disability. Those with intellectual disability + communication disorder were most likely to have an individual education plan, and those with communication disorder + intellectual disability + physical/medical disability were most likely to receive long-term support from agencies outside of the school system. Socio-economic status (specifically, being in a middle-class school) was the most predictive demographic variable for higher levels of support for students with communication disorder, followed by being male. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between teachers' classroom discipline techniques and students' individual and communal responsibility in Australian, Chinese, and Israeli classrooms. The sample comprised 5521 students in grades 7-12 and 748 teachers. The participating Australian, Chinese, and Israeli schools included both larger and smaller schools, situated in a range of socioeconomic and geographic areas. Results showed that teachers who utilize more inclusive disciplinary techniques have students who take more responsiblity for their own behavior and for the behavior of their peers. In general students appeared to act responsibly in class in all three settings, and their self-reported levels of responsibility were generally validated by their teachers' perceptions. Implications for educators and further research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main purpose of this study was to investigate the factors that might be associated with students' attitudes towards science. The participants were 1745 students from secondary schools and universities across Australia. The results of factor analysis, descriptive statistics, Tukey's post hoc test and correlation analysis demonstrate that there were statistically significant differences between male and female students. Finally, the study provides a valid and reliable instrument. Implications of this study for future research are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]