Engineering and technology have a central role in shaping our reality that frequently goes unnoticed or not critically analyzed by engineers and engineering faculty and curricula. In so doing, the engineering that is taught, investigated (and improved), and practiced can unwittingly foster an ethical-political reality with which many engineers and…

Sentimentalism as a genre is known for its association with melodramatic 19th-century novels, such as Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" or Alcott's "Little Women." But, as a cultural tendency, sentimentalism can be found in a range of 19th- and 20th-century cultural, social, and political phenomena, with philanthropic and educational…

In this essay, I draw upon Ellen J. Langer's notions of mindlessness and mindfulness to identify and delineate Confucius' views on mindfulness. Langer's theory exemplifies a social-cognitive approach to mindfulness which is a prominent orientation in the extant research. I argue that Confucius, like Langer, rejects mindlessness that is…

This article explores emerging findings in a sensory ethnography based in a nursery setting where video data has been co-produced with parents, practitioners and 2-year-old children. The project mobilises Froebel's twin concepts of 'unfoldment' and 'self-activity', reinstating the importance of the sensory-motor register as a form of knowledge…

Education faces a dilemma: policy and practice are primarily humanist in orientation, and yet the environmental challenges education hopes to confront require moving beyond humanist perspectives -- to posthumanist awareness. Recent policy advances in Victoria, Australia, highlight the empowerment of students. Yet widening the scope of education…

This paper reports the findings of a research project that sought to understand how a group of 19 graduating physical education teacher education (PETE) students' biographies served to mediate their understanding of the messages of their PETE programme, which was underpinned by a critical pedagogy philosophy. We use the Bourdieuian concepts of…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to discuss the critical realism (CR) philosophical viewpoint and how it can be applied in qualitative research. CR is a relatively new and viable philosophical paradigm proposed as an alternative to the more predominant paradigms of positivism, interpretivism and pragmatism. This paper reviews the concept, its…

This article recognises that for increasing numbers of teachers with no faith, religion may seem alien, and this may impact their choice of subject content knowledge. Teachers may, subconsciously, choose to teach aspects of religion(s) and non-religious worldviews which adhere to their own worldviews but ignore aspects with which they disagree.…

This article offers a response to some recent critiques of character education in a UK context, in general, and the approach promoted by the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues, in particular. The article argues that critiques of current UK character education betray an inadequate grasp of significant factions within its group of advocates,…

Indoctrination is an ongoing concern in education, especially in debates about moral education. One approach to this issue is to come up with a rational procedure that can robustly justify potential items of moral education content. I call this the 'rationalistic justification project'. Michael Hand's recent book, "A Theory of Moral…

Although human talent is essential to achieve social and organizational development with a sustainable focus, its definition and features remain unclear considering humanity's current challenges and the transformation towards the knowledge society. The purpose of this conceptual analysis is to propose a new definition of talent using…

This study aims to examine the knowledge-seeking competencies of prospective philosophy teachers who have received pedagogical training in an online environment according to their "reflective thoughts" and "Inventory of Online Information Search Strategies". The methodology of the study was the single-group pretest-posttest…

This essay suggests an alternative accountability process on the basis of critiques of current evaluation practice in higher education. Using cases in the British university system, with some international commentary and thinking through experience in Asian universities in four countries in the wake of 'audit culture', the work of Thorstein Bunde…

The work of Vygotsky is widely used in teacher education and other education-related literature, in discussion of sociocultural perspectives, and in relation to themes such as second language acquisition, the teaching of mathematics, and approaches to teaching and learning. Much of this work gives the impression that Vygotsky's work is…

The article presents the results of an analysis of the academic dispute about the scholarly ethos, conducted at the time of intense higher education reforms in Poland. Previous analyses of the academic debate on the change of the traditional university towards its entrepreneurial organization emphasize the polarization, that is, the criticism or…