This article is concerned with the continuing staff shortages in Australian long day care services. To expand possibilities for addressing this ongoing problem, the article advocates the use of discourse as a theoretical and practical tool for reframing discussions about staff shortages. Drawing on discourses of crisis and professionalism as…

The present research investigated whether children's referential choices for verb arguments are motivated by pragmatic features of discourse referents across different developmental stages, not only for children learning null argument languages but also for those learning overt argument languages. In Study 1, the form (null, pronominal, or…

This article investigates the multimodal discourses taking place in a primary school computer supported collaborative literacy environment, in which face-to-face talk in pairs is combined with computer-mediated communication. Following a socially mediated model of education, we have taken into account the collaborative process of the participants…

In this research note we explore how children construct their identity in the context of a literacy practice: developing written and audio-visual texts in small-group situation to be published on the Internet. Through their dialogue, a shared identity is growing on the context, and every children create an identity as member of a community in…

The conquest of Chile and of America in general constituted an encounter between different and mutually unknown civilizations that discovered the existence of an "extreme otherness" which European civilization would generically call "Indians." The Spanish encounter with the aboriginals was both violent and subtle. The…

Purpose: This paper investigates the specialist learning undertaken in graphic design classrooms and its relationship to industry practices. It considers how well students are prepared for work and the nature of this vocational preparation. Design/methodology/approach: The paper is based on an empirical study using a qualitative, case study…

Contemporary debates about academic freedom and institutional autonomy in South Africa's "liberal" universities began in the 1950s, stimulated by the policies and legislation for racial segregation. While the form that these debates had taken has differed from university to university, the University of Cape Town stands as a good case…

This paper reports on a study of classroom interaction and discourse in privately-funded schools serving low-income families in Hyderabad, India. In common with other developing countries, India has seen a proliferation of such schools and yet little systematic study has been made of them. One hundred and thirty eight lessons were analysed using a…

The use of technology in the educational setting can provide support for professional development early in a teacher's career. The purpose of this qualitative exploratory study was to examine the use of an electronic discussion board in a field-based block of courses as a place where 17 preservice teachers could share experiences and ideas. The…

High-risk behavior in youths related to HIV transmission continues to occur despite large-scale efforts to disseminate information about safe sexual practices through education. Our study examined the relationships among knowledge, decision-making strategies, and risk assessment about HIV by youths during peer group focused discussions. Two focus…

We assessed whether and how the discourse written for prototype integrated tasks (involving writing in response to print or audio source texts) field tested for Next Generation TOEFL[R] differs from the discourse written for independent essays (i.e., the TOEFL Essay[R]). We selected 216 compositions written for six tasks by 36 examinees in a field…

The present study assumes that, despite the relative uniformity of research articles (RAs) imposed by the requirements of the genre, there may be intercultural variation in the rhetorical preferences of different writing cultures. This study develops further Moreno's [Text 18 (1998) 545] model for the comparison of the metatext employed in English…

This article focuses on the government's higher education policy trajectory during the post apartheid period. The central argument of the article is that government policy ought to be examined in the light of a struggle over aligning the higher education policy discourse with the government's chosen macro development path. Policy activity has to…

The present secondary education system in Kiribati is little changed from its establishment and growth through the colonial years when the island group was known as the Gilbert Islands. It is marked by a heavy emphasis on English language and a curriculum geared to place students in a limited labour market. It is also marked by an uneven…

The following paper deals with the importance of genre in academic and professional engineering discourse. The main objective is to explore the use of analogy and metaphor in one specific genre, namely civil engineering research journal articles both in English and in Spanish. Thus, we will start by briefly outlining the use of metaphor in…