title: Teachers’ perspectives and implementation of the child-centred curriculum for preschool education in Timor-Leste.

authors: De Araujo, Lucia Guterres

subjects: Timor-Leste

abstract: Timor-Leste has been an independent nation for more than 15 years. However, the acts of decolonisation and the rebuilding of the education system has been a dilemma. Today, providing health care, quality education, and upholding the rights of children continue to be fundamental problems for the country. Ensuring the quality of education at any level is pivotal. The quality of teachers’ pedagogy and knowledge are the foundation for providing a positive experience in preschool education in Timor-Leste. The Ministry of Education introduced reforms to the curriculum in 2014 that holds important principles, particularly the enforcing and encouraging of a child-centred curriculum. The teachers implementing this curriculum are mainly high school graduates, trained through INFORDEPE – the Ministry’s teacher training institution.
This study examines and explores teachers’ perspectives, understanding, and methods of implementing a child-centred curriculum for preschool education in Timor-Leste. Through an interpretive paradigm, this study uses primary data to identify the need for changes in teaching practice and explores how child-centred approaches contribute to quality learning in preschools that reflect the learning outcomes desired in the curriculum. Multiple methods including semi-structured individual interviews, focus-group interviews, classroom observations and questionnaires were used in gathering data. Data were collected from four preschools, with the participants consisting of six teachers, four principals, four groups of parents, and four groups of students. The analysis of these data was informed by social constructivist perspectives, particularly those of Bronfenbrenner and Vygotsky.
The key findings revealed that preschool teachers in Timor-Leste are in a process of transition from a colonised rote learning style curriculum to a child-centred curriculum. The recent policy values a child-centred curriculum and learning through play. However, there is a mismatch between the policy and its implementation. Although schools and parents view the preschool curriculum reform as a positive change and there is commitment from the principals and teachers to engage with and implement the new curriculum, a lack of professional knowledge, resources and basic needs remain as significant barriers. In addition, establishing supportive relationships between parents and schools remain under development.
Therefore, a key policy priority should be to provide a robust plan for professional development, including follow-up and addressing the needs and barriers that preschool teachers may encounter. Additionally, a plan for the management and distribution of resources to all preschools, as well as providing for basic needs around toileting and clean water remain critical issues that are yet to be fully addressed.

text: Teachers’ perspectives and implementation of the child-centred curriculum for preschool education in Timor-Leste. Timor-Leste has been an independent nation for more than 15 years. However, the acts of decolonisation and the rebuilding of the education system has been a dilemma. Today, providing health care, quality education, and upholding the rights of children continue to be fundamental problems for the country. Ensuring the quality of education at any level is pivotal. The quality of teachers’ pedagogy and knowledge are the foundation for providing a positive experience in preschool education in Timor-Leste. The Ministry of Education introduced reforms to the curriculum in 2014 that holds important principles, particularly the enforcing and encouraging of a child-centred curriculum. The teachers implementing this curriculum are mainly high school graduates, trained through INFORDEPE – the Ministry’s teacher training institution.
This study examines and explores teachers’ perspectives, understanding, and methods of implementing a child-centred curriculum for preschool education in Timor-Leste. Through an interpretive paradigm, this study uses primary data to identify the need for changes in teaching practice and explores how child-centred approaches contribute to quality learning in preschools that reflect the learning outcomes desired in the curriculum. Multiple methods including semi-structured individual interviews, focus-group interviews, classroom observations and questionnaires were used in gathering data. Data were collected from four preschools, with the participants consisting of six teachers, four principals, four groups of parents, and four groups of students. The analysis of these data was informed by social constructivist perspectives, particularly those of Bronfenbrenner and Vygotsky.
The key findings revealed that preschool teachers in Timor-Leste are in a process of transition from a colonised rote learning style curriculum to a child-centred curriculum. The recent policy values a child-centred curriculum and learning through play. However, there is a mismatch between the policy and its implementation. Although schools and parents view the preschool curriculum reform as a positive change and there is commitment from the principals and teachers to engage with and implement the new curriculum, a lack of professional knowledge, resources and basic needs remain as significant barriers. In addition, establishing supportive relationships between parents and schools remain under development.
Therefore, a key policy priority should be to provide a robust plan for professional development, including follow-up and addressing the needs and barriers that preschool teachers may encounter. Additionally, a plan for the management and distribution of resources to all preschools, as well as providing for basic needs around toileting and clean water remain critical issues that are yet to be fully addressed.

year: 2018

title: Surface tension: Place/poverty/policy: From "poverty" to "social exclusion": Implications of discursive shifts in European Union poverty policy, 1975-1999

authors: Peace, Robin M.

subjects: discourse analysis

abstract: This dissertation addresses four substantive issues or arguments that are linked in an interdisciplinary discussion informed by contemporary feminist and cultural geographies, feminist political philosophy, policy studies and discourse analysis.
The first argument is that there are flexible and contingent uses of discourses of 'social exclusion' in the supranational context of the European Union. The concept of 'exclusion' as the 'new kid on the welfare discourse block' has a distinctive provenance. I discuss the development of Poverty Programmes, and European Union social policy more generally in the liberal democratic milieu of the European Union over the period from 1975-1999.
My second argument concerns the relationships between policy and place. I develop a number of arguments about paradoxical spatiality and social policy. Metaphors of 'subsidiarity' and 'solidarity' have key place-effects in relation to anti-poverty discourse. Regional policy produces countervailing effects to supranational and national policy configurations. Projects, such as those developed under Poverty 3 of the European Union Poverty Programmes, clarify the scale of operations of European Union policy initiatives and highlight the local level. Migrant bodies exemplify many of the axiomatic ways in which the principles of solidarity and social cohesion intersect in social exclusion discourse. All of these circumstances identify and reiterate the mutually constitutive and paradoxical nature of place / policy / poverty interactions.
The third issue relates to the metaphors and metonymic figurations that produce, and are in tum influenced by, particular interpretations and enactments of social policy. On the one hand, 'social exclusion' is linked to metaphors of 'social integration' and 'social cohesion'. This suggests that anti-poverty policy is part of a complex of social control measures. On the other hand, metaphors of economic 'progress' are linked to discourses of employment, employability and citizenship rights in a way that occludes the discursive space of poverty, and makes it appear as if economic progress is the sole motivation for anti-poverty policy. In either of these circumstances certain categories of poor unwork( able) bodies continue to be excluded from discourses of social exclusion.
The current discourses of 'social exclusion' are also producing new ways of 'targeting' 'poor bodies'. This final issue is taken up through a discussion of the relationship of social exclusion, as it is currently deployed in European Community discourse, to 'politics of recognition' and 'politics of redistribution'. Both of these dominant organising strategies for politicised policy initiatives have unanticipated outcomes for the social exclusion of unwork(able) 'poor bodies'. Care needs to be taken, in re-categorising the poor as 'excluded', to ensure that a 'politics of cohesion' does not produce new economies of disregard.
The thesis is also experimental in a number of ways. A specific 'technical' objective was to 'test' an approach to policy analysis through the application of textually oriented discourse analysis (TODA), following work pioneered by Norman Fairclough (1992, 1994), coupled with the use of a computer assisted qualitative data analysis system (CAQDAS). I used Qualitative Systems Research software (QSR): NUD.IST© as the tool. The method entailed the development of an online document corpus and also encouraged the use of the Internet as a data source.

text: Surface tension: Place/poverty/policy: From "poverty" to "social exclusion": Implications of discursive shifts in European Union poverty policy, 1975-1999 This dissertation addresses four substantive issues or arguments that are linked in an interdisciplinary discussion informed by contemporary feminist and cultural geographies, feminist political philosophy, policy studies and discourse analysis.
The first argument is that there are flexible and contingent uses of discourses of 'social exclusion' in the supranational context of the European Union. The concept of 'exclusion' as the 'new kid on the welfare discourse block' has a distinctive provenance. I discuss the development of Poverty Programmes, and European Union social policy more generally in the liberal democratic milieu of the European Union over the period from 1975-1999.
My second argument concerns the relationships between policy and place. I develop a number of arguments about paradoxical spatiality and social policy. Metaphors of 'subsidiarity' and 'solidarity' have key place-effects in relation to anti-poverty discourse. Regional policy produces countervailing effects to supranational and national policy configurations. Projects, such as those developed under Poverty 3 of the European Union Poverty Programmes, clarify the scale of operations of European Union policy initiatives and highlight the local level. Migrant bodies exemplify many of the axiomatic ways in which the principles of solidarity and social cohesion intersect in social exclusion discourse. All of these circumstances identify and reiterate the mutually constitutive and paradoxical nature of place / policy / poverty interactions.
The third issue relates to the metaphors and metonymic figurations that produce, and are in tum influenced by, particular interpretations and enactments of social policy. On the one hand, 'social exclusion' is linked to metaphors of 'social integration' and 'social cohesion'. This suggests that anti-poverty policy is part of a complex of social control measures. On the other hand, metaphors of economic 'progress' are linked to discourses of employment, employability and citizenship rights in a way that occludes the discursive space of poverty, and makes it appear as if economic progress is the sole motivation for anti-poverty policy. In either of these circumstances certain categories of poor unwork( able) bodies continue to be excluded from discourses of social exclusion.
The current discourses of 'social exclusion' are also producing new ways of 'targeting' 'poor bodies'. This final issue is taken up through a discussion of the relationship of social exclusion, as it is currently deployed in European Community discourse, to 'politics of recognition' and 'politics of redistribution'. Both of these dominant organising strategies for politicised policy initiatives have unanticipated outcomes for the social exclusion of unwork(able) 'poor bodies'. Care needs to be taken, in re-categorising the poor as 'excluded', to ensure that a 'politics of cohesion' does not produce new economies of disregard.
The thesis is also experimental in a number of ways. A specific 'technical' objective was to 'test' an approach to policy analysis through the application of textually oriented discourse analysis (TODA), following work pioneered by Norman Fairclough (1992, 1994), coupled with the use of a computer assisted qualitative data analysis system (CAQDAS). I used Qualitative Systems Research software (QSR): NUD.IST© as the tool. The method entailed the development of an online document corpus and also encouraged the use of the Internet as a data source.

year: 1999

title: Medications and meanings in Maori households with chronic illnesses

authors: Carlson, Teah

subjects: medications

abstract: Domestic spaces have always featured as sites for health care. The home is increasingly referred to as a new therapeutic space within which chronic illnesses are managed within everyday life. This research explores the meanings and use of medications within four Māori households containing at least one chronically ill householder. A broad ethnographic approach was used to capture popular understandings and medication use in daily life. Multiple methods were used, including group discussions with household members, individual interviews, household mapping, and photographic and diary elicitation tasks. Findings shed light on the sources and uses of medications, householder knowledge of medications, communal practices of sharing, caring, rationalising use, grappling with side-effects and the management of illness. I consider what it means for householders to take medications themselves or give these to others, and the care-giving practices that feature in the everyday consumption of medicines. The research is based on the premise that medications are material objects with therapeutic uses that enter into and take on meaning within people’s lives. Medications become culturally embedded phenomena that carry meanings and shape social relationships and practices with Māori households. As such, medications were used in a way that reflected the cultural values and bonds within the households. Within household relationships, medications were invested within meaning to show aroha, support and care. Within a Māori whānau context, the values of maanakitanga, rangatiratanga, and whanaungatanga were recognised as having an integral role in understanding the social practices with medications in each household.

text: Medications and meanings in Maori households with chronic illnesses Domestic spaces have always featured as sites for health care. The home is increasingly referred to as a new therapeutic space within which chronic illnesses are managed within everyday life. This research explores the meanings and use of medications within four Māori households containing at least one chronically ill householder. A broad ethnographic approach was used to capture popular understandings and medication use in daily life. Multiple methods were used, including group discussions with household members, individual interviews, household mapping, and photographic and diary elicitation tasks. Findings shed light on the sources and uses of medications, householder knowledge of medications, communal practices of sharing, caring, rationalising use, grappling with side-effects and the management of illness. I consider what it means for householders to take medications themselves or give these to others, and the care-giving practices that feature in the everyday consumption of medicines. The research is based on the premise that medications are material objects with therapeutic uses that enter into and take on meaning within people’s lives. Medications become culturally embedded phenomena that carry meanings and shape social relationships and practices with Māori households. As such, medications were used in a way that reflected the cultural values and bonds within the households. Within household relationships, medications were invested within meaning to show aroha, support and care. Within a Māori whānau context, the values of maanakitanga, rangatiratanga, and whanaungatanga were recognised as having an integral role in understanding the social practices with medications in each household.

year: 2010