This article examines how interest groups in Hong Kong have politicised national history, an unpopular school subject, for their own political ends and allied themselves with the PRC against the SAR government and its policy of not making it a single, independent, compulsory core subject in the school curriculum. The article argues that this has…

This article looks at the evolution of the social studies curricula in Pakistan, which are of critical importance in shaping the outlook of many young Pakistanis, who are affected by this polarised discourse. The author argues that this trend of polarisation springing from dynamics of education also effectively contributes to a widening social…

This article examines pedagogical shifts in art history teaching that have developed as a response to the implementation of a standards-based assessment regime. The specific characteristics of art history standards-based assessment in the context of New Zealand secondary schools are explained to demonstrate how an exacting form of assessment has…

The Transition Year (TY) programme is an optional, one-year, stand-alone, full-time programme offered in 75% of second-level schools in the Republic of Ireland. Aimed at those in the 15-16 age group, TY has a strong focus on personal and social development and on education for active citizenship. The implementation of TY in schools is seen as a…

The poor success rate of policy for curriculum change has been widely noted in the educational change literature. Part of the problem lies in the complexity of schools, as policy-makers have proven unable to micro-manage the multifarious range of factors that impact upon the implementation of policy. This article draws upon empirical data from a…

This article will focus on an event in the educational history of Wales in the 1980s which still impacts both on school practice and on thinking about concepts of Welsh identity. That event was the creation of the History Committee for Wales which was charged with devising a history curriculum for Welsh schools in the wake of the 1988 Education…

In this article, we describe how the concept of "learning to learn" has developed in Spain, and give you an overview of relevant Spanish projects. First, we sketch out how this approach has developed in Spanish educational laws. We then give examples of research projects, assessment instruments and instructional programmes pertinent to…

In this article we examine the recent development of Education Studies as an undergraduate subject of study in England. The evolution of Education Studies is inextricably linked to the political context which it exists to critique. Changes within teacher education have spawned education studies in a number of guises. It is only latterly that…

The "Learning How to Learn" project of the ESRC Teaching and Learning Research Programme engaged teachers from primary and secondary schools in the UK in development and research of practice related to "assessment for learning" between 2001 and 2005. As part of the project, we were concerned to discover what factors encouraged…