title: Empowering Solomon Islands’ beginning science teachers through the use of Appreciative Inquiry

authors: Porakari, James

abstract: This paper reports on a study that investigated the potential of using Appreciative Inquiry for exploring the development of three beginning science teachers in the Solomon Islands. Using the four phases of an Appreciative Inquiry framework, the teachers followed a process that allowed their strengths to be identified through the analysis of their stories of best-taught lessons. The findings indicate that the teachers felt they had strengths in knowledge bases relating to planning and teaching generally, and to teaching and learning science specifically. The teachers were able to identify and suggest actions for sustaining and developing their identified strengths. Involvement in the Appreciative Inquiry process allowed the teachers to speak positively, affirming their practice, and gave them agency in planning for future professional learning. This study adds to the sparse literature on beginning science teachers’ strengths, in a Pacific context. This research suggests that through using an Appreciative Inquiry framework, beginning science teachers can be given the opportunity to identify strengths and positive elements of their teaching of science, and plan action to build on these strengths.

text: Empowering Solomon Islands’ beginning science teachers through the use of Appreciative Inquiry This paper reports on a study that investigated the potential of using Appreciative Inquiry for exploring the development of three beginning science teachers in the Solomon Islands. Using the four phases of an Appreciative Inquiry framework, the teachers followed a process that allowed their strengths to be identified through the analysis of their stories of best-taught lessons. The findings indicate that the teachers felt they had strengths in knowledge bases relating to planning and teaching generally, and to teaching and learning science specifically. The teachers were able to identify and suggest actions for sustaining and developing their identified strengths. Involvement in the Appreciative Inquiry process allowed the teachers to speak positively, affirming their practice, and gave them agency in planning for future professional learning. This study adds to the sparse literature on beginning science teachers’ strengths, in a Pacific context. This research suggests that through using an Appreciative Inquiry framework, beginning science teachers can be given the opportunity to identify strengths and positive elements of their teaching of science, and plan action to build on these strengths.

year: 2017

title: Politics or pedagogy? The development of middle schools in New Zealand

authors: Hinchco, Brian J.

abstract: The development of eight New Zealand middle schools during the 1990s was both a continuation of a long held educational tradition and a move in a new innovative direction. The extent to which this development however, was pedagogically driven or politically motivated deserves investigation. 
New Zealand's educational community, since the very beginning of a national education system in 1877, has been predisposed to meeting the needs of emerging adolescents in stand-alone institutions. The development of such educational institutions as; central schools, junior high schools, intermediate schools and latterly middle schools, tend to the conclusion that students in their middle years require a school structure that best caters for their specific needs as emerging adolescents. 
The reform years of the 1990s also provided a political environment conducive to educational change. The policies derived from the introduction of Tomorrows Schools and the concepts of parental choice and school competition provided apolitical environment open to educational innovation. Research evidence gathered from those principals who remain as leaders of the first middle schools made particular mention of the entrepreneurial opportunities provided in the 1990s. 
This was also a decade where policy importation, particularly from the American educational community, was both encouraged and made easier by developments in communication and international travel. The junior high school reform movement and the development of American middle schools supported by such associations as the National Middle Schools Association (NMSA) provided a conduit for research articles, practices and experiences to permeate the New Zealand intermediate school environment. 
This political environment was further supported by the growth in research literature on adolescence, and in particular the development of a concept of "the emerging adolescent." Research from the biological, psychological and sociological disciplines each supported the concept of specific educational programmes delivered in age-specific institutions that could best cater for the needs of this specific age-group. In particular sociological research findings suggested the development of age-appropriate school structures would have beneficial effect on student achievement. 
The development then of a uniquely New Zealand middle school structure, created in a political and pedagogical climate conducive to meeting the needs of the emerging adolescent, led to prolonged debate concerning the ideal structure for such an institution. In particular the debate concerned whether the middle school should evolve from its intermediate school heritage or should be part of a Form 1 to 7 school structure. This debate, and the related interest in middle schools compared with junior high schools, was undertaken by a number of New Zealand educationists and researchers. The research of a single middle school case study, that of Sunset Junior High School, in this thesis enabled a full investigation of the various tensions that existed concerning middle school development. This case study could be considered to be a microcosm of the national community. 
The implications of this study therefore suggest that as with the development of most educational structures the reality is one of cost effectiveness. The declining demographics of New Zealand's school-aged population and the current school network discussions (previously called Educational Development Initiatives (EDI)) suggest that the cost effective reality for New Zealand will be the development of separate Form 1 to 4 and Form 5 to 8 schools on one school site. How the management of these two schools on a single site will be created will, of itself, be in the nature of a trial and a further evolution of the middle school philosophy.

text: Politics or pedagogy? The development of middle schools in New Zealand The development of eight New Zealand middle schools during the 1990s was both a continuation of a long held educational tradition and a move in a new innovative direction. The extent to which this development however, was pedagogically driven or politically motivated deserves investigation. 
New Zealand's educational community, since the very beginning of a national education system in 1877, has been predisposed to meeting the needs of emerging adolescents in stand-alone institutions. The development of such educational institutions as; central schools, junior high schools, intermediate schools and latterly middle schools, tend to the conclusion that students in their middle years require a school structure that best caters for their specific needs as emerging adolescents. 
The reform years of the 1990s also provided a political environment conducive to educational change. The policies derived from the introduction of Tomorrows Schools and the concepts of parental choice and school competition provided apolitical environment open to educational innovation. Research evidence gathered from those principals who remain as leaders of the first middle schools made particular mention of the entrepreneurial opportunities provided in the 1990s. 
This was also a decade where policy importation, particularly from the American educational community, was both encouraged and made easier by developments in communication and international travel. The junior high school reform movement and the development of American middle schools supported by such associations as the National Middle Schools Association (NMSA) provided a conduit for research articles, practices and experiences to permeate the New Zealand intermediate school environment. 
This political environment was further supported by the growth in research literature on adolescence, and in particular the development of a concept of "the emerging adolescent." Research from the biological, psychological and sociological disciplines each supported the concept of specific educational programmes delivered in age-specific institutions that could best cater for the needs of this specific age-group. In particular sociological research findings suggested the development of age-appropriate school structures would have beneficial effect on student achievement. 
The development then of a uniquely New Zealand middle school structure, created in a political and pedagogical climate conducive to meeting the needs of the emerging adolescent, led to prolonged debate concerning the ideal structure for such an institution. In particular the debate concerned whether the middle school should evolve from its intermediate school heritage or should be part of a Form 1 to 7 school structure. This debate, and the related interest in middle schools compared with junior high schools, was undertaken by a number of New Zealand educationists and researchers. The research of a single middle school case study, that of Sunset Junior High School, in this thesis enabled a full investigation of the various tensions that existed concerning middle school development. This case study could be considered to be a microcosm of the national community. 
The implications of this study therefore suggest that as with the development of most educational structures the reality is one of cost effectiveness. The declining demographics of New Zealand's school-aged population and the current school network discussions (previously called Educational Development Initiatives (EDI)) suggest that the cost effective reality for New Zealand will be the development of separate Form 1 to 4 and Form 5 to 8 schools on one school site. How the management of these two schools on a single site will be created will, of itself, be in the nature of a trial and a further evolution of the middle school philosophy.

year: 2004

title: Can large taonga bivalves speed up recovery in degraded estuaries?

authors: Prinz, Natalie

abstract: THE QUESTION:
Will there introduction of adult, long-lived bivalves with differing functional traits speed up recovery of degraded soft sediment habitats in estuaries?
RESULTS:
Average bivalve survival after one year was 18% in + tuangi plot sand 59% in + hanikura plots. Sediment oxygen consumption (SOC) after one month was enhanced by 116% in treatments containing tuangi compared to control treatments. After one year those were similar to ambient levels, still showed higher SOC than control plots.

text: Can large taonga bivalves speed up recovery in degraded estuaries? THE QUESTION:
Will there introduction of adult, long-lived bivalves with differing functional traits speed up recovery of degraded soft sediment habitats in estuaries?
RESULTS:
Average bivalve survival after one year was 18% in + tuangi plot sand 59% in + hanikura plots. Sediment oxygen consumption (SOC) after one month was enhanced by 116% in treatments containing tuangi compared to control treatments. After one year those were similar to ambient levels, still showed higher SOC than control plots.

year: 2023