title: Distributed leadership: Growing strong communities of practice in early childhood centres

authors: Clarkin-Phillips, Jeanette

subjects: educational leadership

abstract: This paper explores how leadership roles that are distributed across participants and mostly non-hierarchical (Bennett, Wise, Woods, and Harvey, 2003; Mayrowetz, 2008) can build strong communities of practice. In early childhood centres this community will include teachers, children, family and whānau ('extended family'). Using Wenger's (1998) notion of communities of practice, the paper analyses the data from a case study of a professional development programme focussed on developing 'leaderful' centres to ascertain the relationship between distributed leadership practices and communities of practice. Through the analysis the paper concludes that qualified teachers engaging in a model of distributed leadership play a significant role in building strong communities of practice and that further research is needed to confirm the importance of qualifications.

text: Distributed leadership: Growing strong communities of practice in early childhood centres This paper explores how leadership roles that are distributed across participants and mostly non-hierarchical (Bennett, Wise, Woods, and Harvey, 2003; Mayrowetz, 2008) can build strong communities of practice. In early childhood centres this community will include teachers, children, family and whānau ('extended family'). Using Wenger's (1998) notion of communities of practice, the paper analyses the data from a case study of a professional development programme focussed on developing 'leaderful' centres to ascertain the relationship between distributed leadership practices and communities of practice. Through the analysis the paper concludes that qualified teachers engaging in a model of distributed leadership play a significant role in building strong communities of practice and that further research is needed to confirm the importance of qualifications.

year: 2011

title: The pedagogical architecture of modern learning environments in four New Zealand secondary schools

authors: Hest, Julie Badeena

subjects: Learning environments

abstract: The New Zealand Ministry of Education has committed significant resources to develop state-owned school buildings that are purposefully built with quality materials, embrace internet capable technology and contain large, flexible learning spaces. Schools and classrooms built in this manner have been referred to as modern learning environments (MLEs). The development of MLEs was to improve the quality of school property infrastructure and increase student achievement with learning environments that support 21ˢᵗ-century teaching and learning. Initially, there was quite specific guidance on building and design standards for MLEs, but there was limited guidance on how to change teaching and learning practices to match with the physical changes of learning environments.  
	This thesis reports on qualitative multi-site research that explored teaching and learning in four New Zealand secondary schools that followed the requirement to adopt MLEs. Data was collected at each school via document review, a semi-structured interview with the principal, semi-structured interviews with teachers who taught in the MLEs and a focus group discussion with students who were timetabled to the MLEs. Across data sources, the main foci were (1) to investigate how the concepts of learners, educators, content and resources were interpreted and organised in the MLEs and (2) to explore what those in MLEs considered 21ˢᵗ-century skills and competencies to be and how these were being developed in learners.
The employed methodology offered primacy to the participants' understandings and experiences to help make visible the operation of MLEs from the varying perspectives of those involved in daily teaching and learning in these environments. Viewing the MLES in the four schools this way identified an observable gap between the potential that literature presumes MLEs may contain to develop 21ˢᵗ-century skills and competencies in learners and the realities of the daily operations of these learning environments. This gap is visible when considering how underpinning concepts related to the operation of MLEs are employed and when exploring individual reflections on how aspects of the physical space of MLEs may enable or constrain teaching and learning practices. Viewing MLEs this way also demonstrated how influential participants' individual perspectives were when limited guidance on how to change teaching and learning practices was offered, and therefore how essential purposeful time to reflect with colleagues is when collaboration is a valued or required aspect of a learning environment. Additionally, viewing MLEs this way suggests teaching and learning in an MLE deprivatises both teacher and student practice by making teacher and student actions visible to colleagues and peers in a way they were not visible in pre-MLE learning environments. 
The approach taken in this thesis to explore the phenomena of MLEs in the New Zealand secondary school context contributes to the emerging discourse around the development and understanding of MLEs from the perspectives of those involved in the reality of teaching and learning in such spaces. By making visible the reality of the use of MLEs, this research can be used to develop support for those who carry out teaching and learning in these environments.

text: The pedagogical architecture of modern learning environments in four New Zealand secondary schools The New Zealand Ministry of Education has committed significant resources to develop state-owned school buildings that are purposefully built with quality materials, embrace internet capable technology and contain large, flexible learning spaces. Schools and classrooms built in this manner have been referred to as modern learning environments (MLEs). The development of MLEs was to improve the quality of school property infrastructure and increase student achievement with learning environments that support 21ˢᵗ-century teaching and learning. Initially, there was quite specific guidance on building and design standards for MLEs, but there was limited guidance on how to change teaching and learning practices to match with the physical changes of learning environments.  
	This thesis reports on qualitative multi-site research that explored teaching and learning in four New Zealand secondary schools that followed the requirement to adopt MLEs. Data was collected at each school via document review, a semi-structured interview with the principal, semi-structured interviews with teachers who taught in the MLEs and a focus group discussion with students who were timetabled to the MLEs. Across data sources, the main foci were (1) to investigate how the concepts of learners, educators, content and resources were interpreted and organised in the MLEs and (2) to explore what those in MLEs considered 21ˢᵗ-century skills and competencies to be and how these were being developed in learners.
The employed methodology offered primacy to the participants' understandings and experiences to help make visible the operation of MLEs from the varying perspectives of those involved in daily teaching and learning in these environments. Viewing the MLES in the four schools this way identified an observable gap between the potential that literature presumes MLEs may contain to develop 21ˢᵗ-century skills and competencies in learners and the realities of the daily operations of these learning environments. This gap is visible when considering how underpinning concepts related to the operation of MLEs are employed and when exploring individual reflections on how aspects of the physical space of MLEs may enable or constrain teaching and learning practices. Viewing MLEs this way also demonstrated how influential participants' individual perspectives were when limited guidance on how to change teaching and learning practices was offered, and therefore how essential purposeful time to reflect with colleagues is when collaboration is a valued or required aspect of a learning environment. Additionally, viewing MLEs this way suggests teaching and learning in an MLE deprivatises both teacher and student practice by making teacher and student actions visible to colleagues and peers in a way they were not visible in pre-MLE learning environments. 
The approach taken in this thesis to explore the phenomena of MLEs in the New Zealand secondary school context contributes to the emerging discourse around the development and understanding of MLEs from the perspectives of those involved in the reality of teaching and learning in such spaces. By making visible the reality of the use of MLEs, this research can be used to develop support for those who carry out teaching and learning in these environments.

year: 2022

title: Just take a second to breathe: Empowering youth through mindfulness at Atawhai 2019

authors: McAllister, Suzanne Maree

subjects: Mindfulness

abstract: This research was an evaluation of The Kindness Institute’s 2019 Atawhai programme. It examined the effects that exposure to mindfulness-based skills, Māori cultural practices, mentoring, and the creative arts had on a cohort of marginalised youth. Specifically, the research aimed to determine (1) if learning mindfulness-based skills helped the youth to positively deal with challenges, (2) what effect learning mindfulness-based skills has on their positive and negative emotions and (3) were youth empowered to share the skills they learned within their homes, families and communities to enable a wider benefit from the mindfulness-based skills. Participants included 12 youth who attended the Atawhai programme during 2019. They all completed shortened versions of the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ), Adolescent Self-Regulatory Inventory (ASRI), The Oxford Happiness Questionnaire (OHQ), Revised Children’s Anxiety and Depression Scale (RCADS) and Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) at seven stages over a nine-month period from March 2019 to December 2019. Self-report debrief questionnaires and researcher observations were recorded during the October 2019 residential intensive of 5 days. Inferential statistics (repeated measures ANOVA and post-hoc paired t-tests) indicated a statistically significant increase in positive emotions (p<0.01) with a large effect 1.07 over the duration of the evaluation period from March 2019 to December 2019; the October 2019 intensive, p<0.01, d=1.37; and the April 2019 intensive, p<0.01, d=1.89. Statistically significant decreases in anxiety (p<0.01) with a large effect d=1.99 were indicated over the duration of the evaluation period from March 2019 to December 2019; the October 2019 intensive, p=0.07, d=0.57; and the April 2019 intensive, p≤0.01, d=1.19. Self-report measures indicated the youth; found the mindfulness-based skills beneficial, preferred a particular skill over others, and found their mentors supportive in helping them incorporate the skills into their daily lives. Youth reported they had continued their mindfulness-based practice outside Atawhai and were regularly sharing the skills within their homes, families and communities including their schools. These findings suggest the Atawhai programme has a profound and significant positive effect on the wellbeing of the young people it serves.

text: Just take a second to breathe: Empowering youth through mindfulness at Atawhai 2019 This research was an evaluation of The Kindness Institute’s 2019 Atawhai programme. It examined the effects that exposure to mindfulness-based skills, Māori cultural practices, mentoring, and the creative arts had on a cohort of marginalised youth. Specifically, the research aimed to determine (1) if learning mindfulness-based skills helped the youth to positively deal with challenges, (2) what effect learning mindfulness-based skills has on their positive and negative emotions and (3) were youth empowered to share the skills they learned within their homes, families and communities to enable a wider benefit from the mindfulness-based skills. Participants included 12 youth who attended the Atawhai programme during 2019. They all completed shortened versions of the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ), Adolescent Self-Regulatory Inventory (ASRI), The Oxford Happiness Questionnaire (OHQ), Revised Children’s Anxiety and Depression Scale (RCADS) and Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) at seven stages over a nine-month period from March 2019 to December 2019. Self-report debrief questionnaires and researcher observations were recorded during the October 2019 residential intensive of 5 days. Inferential statistics (repeated measures ANOVA and post-hoc paired t-tests) indicated a statistically significant increase in positive emotions (p<0.01) with a large effect 1.07 over the duration of the evaluation period from March 2019 to December 2019; the October 2019 intensive, p<0.01, d=1.37; and the April 2019 intensive, p<0.01, d=1.89. Statistically significant decreases in anxiety (p<0.01) with a large effect d=1.99 were indicated over the duration of the evaluation period from March 2019 to December 2019; the October 2019 intensive, p=0.07, d=0.57; and the April 2019 intensive, p≤0.01, d=1.19. Self-report measures indicated the youth; found the mindfulness-based skills beneficial, preferred a particular skill over others, and found their mentors supportive in helping them incorporate the skills into their daily lives. Youth reported they had continued their mindfulness-based practice outside Atawhai and were regularly sharing the skills within their homes, families and communities including their schools. These findings suggest the Atawhai programme has a profound and significant positive effect on the wellbeing of the young people it serves.

year: 2020