The term 'ideas-informed society' describes democracies in which citizens believe in the value of staying well-informed and up-to-date with current affairs. They also put these beliefs into action: critically engaging with new ideas and perspectives, delving into scientific discoveries or emerging technologies and exploring aspects of history and…

This article introduces a form of 'conversation' distinct from dialogue or dialectic to the context of educational theory, practice, and research. Through an engagement with the thought of Maurice Blanchot, this paper outlines the conditions he attributes to conversation in the form of plural speech, its relationship to research, how it can be…

An international consensus seems to have developed in educational research--and among educational planners and policymakers--during the last 10-15 years proclaiming that learning is, and must be, a visible phenomenon. This paper questions this predominant view and serves an assemblage of points offering educational scientists at least four…

A vast existing literature in educational research has been explored on Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) with the focus on addressing self-efficacy, self-regulation and social interactions in learning. This theory is used as a framework to predict behaviours and interventions. However, researchers have managed to comprehend and adopt the theory…

The aim of the "National Academy of Education (NAEd) Educating for Civic Reasoning and Discourse" report is to better prepare students to examine and discuss complex civic, political, and social issues by ensuring that the curricula, pedagogy, and learning environments that they experience are informed by the best available evidence and…

This chapter addresses how fundamental principles regarding how people learn in the last decade open up possibilities for conceptualizing a broad ecological culturally rooted framework for the design of robust learning environments in a variety of settings, especially schools. These cross-disciplinary principles emerging from across relevant…

With a growing culture of accountability and institutional "managerialism" at universities and other higher education institutions, graduate employability and actual employment outcomes have become key indicators for higher education success. Research on graduate outcomes has gained significant currency among national governments,…

Outdoor adventure education (OAE) has a long history of being credited with the personal and social development (PSD) of its participants. PSD is notoriously difficult to measure quantitatively, yet stakeholders demand statistical evidence that given approaches to eliciting PSD are effective in their methods. Rightly or wrongly, many stakeholders…

This paper illustrates the use of narrative as a means of examining the complex array of factors that shape academic practice. Through focusing on the personal, using the narrative voice of the participants, a series of situated perspectives on the journey towards academic life, and more specifically teaching, is presented. The paper argues that…

Schools have a seminal role in preparing a society's children for their adult responsibilities as workers, parents, friends, neighbors, and citizens. The United States, countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Brazil, India, South Africa, and other multiethnic democratic nation-states have increasingly diverse…

Most young children in the United States regularly spend time in early care and education (ECE) settings. Institutionalized messages surrounding ECE claim that it has the potential to promote children's life-long success, especially among low-income children. I examine the legitimacy of these claims by reviewing empirical evidence that bears on…

Although it is generally assumed that the thoughts of Ernst Mach and the scientific fields he influenced (in this case psychophysics and "Gestalt" psychology) emigrated from Europe during Second World War they apparently survived in Finland, influencing the Finnish education system. The following article evaluates this relationship and…

Although the value of school-community partnerships is unquestioned, the reasons for success and failure are not sufficiently understood. This mixed-methods case study examines 60 years of partnering at one urban high school, using Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory to better understand the effect on student development as measured by…

Outlines an investigation into the types of learning experienced by adolescents involved in recreational youth theater. Proposes that youth theater has the capacity to provide essential rites of passage for young people. Concludes that drama has the potential to be a creator of consciousness during adolescence. (PM)

This paper explores various epistemological paradigms available to understand, interpret, and semiotically depict young people. These paradigms all draw upon a metadiscourse of developmental age and stage (e.g. Hall 1914) and then work from particular epistemological views of the world to cast young people in different lights. Using strategic…