Search results for ""Author Geoffrey Walford""

The United Kingdom General Election on 1st May 1997 gave a landslide victory to a re-vitalised Labour Party. Tony Blair became Prime Minister with a huge Commons majority of 179 over all other parties. Such a majority meant that extensive changes of policy could be implemented with little effective opposition. During the election campaign Tony Blair had repeatedly claimed that the top three priorities of a New Labour government would be 'education, education, education' , and on page two of the Labour Party's election manifesto a smiling Blair is seen with Nelson Mandela - the unacknowledged originator of the oratorical education triplet. Following a third Election victory in 2005 and after over ten years as Prime Minister, Blair finally stepped down to Gordon Brown in mid-2007, but only after a promotional ‘final tour’ that lasted several months. Towards the end, Blair devoted considerable efforts to try to ensure that his legacy would be positive and that he would be remembered for more than his role in the Iraq war. But what is his legacy in the field of education? This book brings together the assessments of key educational researchers who have been centrally involved with both the critique and implementation of various policy developments. It is now time to make a solid academic evaluation of his influence on education. This book is timely, and relates directly to the central policy themes of the last decade. It considers the relationships between theory and practice and examines the nature of policy and politics. Each contribution will review empirical data and policy changes relating to Blair’s period as Prime Minister and will make an assessment of the enduring effects of changes in policy. Each will assess the long-term and lasting effects as well as the shorter-term responses. This book was published as a special issue of the Oxford Review of Education.

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Within the United Kingdom questions about the relevance of educational research and its relationship to policy have recently been the centre of a prolonged, public and sometimes acrimonious debate. The chapters in this book illustrate the ability of ethnographic work to assist in understanding the effects of educational policies to gradually influence the policy discourse. The book includes studies of policy initiatives at the local level that show the extent to which an intended change actually occurred in practice, others where actual change occurred, but there were unintended consequences as well as those planned by the policy, and others that illuminate the contradictions within the original policy itself. Chapters focus on a diversity of topics such as the ideology of educational 'success', politics and school mathematics, ITC teaching, sports coaching, basic skills provision for offenders, second language learning, ESOL teaching, primary teachers work, and the teaching of reading and spelling.

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The series as a whole recognises that the nature of ethnography is contested, and takes this to be a sign of its strength and vitality. This second volume in the series focuses on debates and developments in methodology and the many ways in which ethnographic work interacts with education. The contributions to this volume are diverse and challenging. They indicate that ethnography is a rich field that has much to offer the study of education. Particular chapters are concerned with access to research sites, critical ethnography, text construction, dilemmas of researching different ethnic groups and or researching children, the influence of the researcher, writing ethnography, ethno-drama, and the concept of triangulation.

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What counts as ethnography and what counts as good ethnography are both highly contested. This volume brings together chapters presenting a diversity of views on some of the current issues and practices in ethnographic methodology. It does not try to present a single coherent view but, through its heterogeneity, illustrates the strengths and impact of the debate. The collection includes chapters on the ethnographic research process; the use of photographic diaries; the idea of toleration in the research process; and the personal aspects of research. It has chapters that question generalisation; perceive ethnography as a potential form of surveillance; analyse the notion of display in ethnography; critique the way culture is commonly theorised; and examine the possibilities of comparative ethnographic work. It also includes and exchange of views between Martyn Hammersley and Barbara Korth on partisan research.

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