This article takes up an ANTian sensibility to explore the enactment of a policy for educational collaboration in one region in the South Island of Aotearoa New Zealand (New Zealand). The case offers potential for considering the benefits of a sociology of associations (Latour 2005/2007): a Treaty-based bicultural nation, school atomisation…

The premise of this brief opinion piece is that the fundamental paradigm of education appeared with Plato. It is that there is a co-location in time and space of learners, teachers, and resources. The absence of any of these elements can lead to shortcomings in the meaning of the term "to be educated". Recent events such as COVID-19…

Metaxis offers a powerful, yet elusive space for learning. We argue that authentic questions can provoke compelling metaxis moments where students and their teachers straddle two worlds at one time: the fictional and the real. We report findings from two New Zealand research projects in primary schools where we investigated the precursors to…

Prevailing heteronormative discourses in early childhood education in Aotearoa New Zealand present difficulties for upholding the right of gender diverse tamariki ("children") and lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex and queer-parented families to experience belonging in equitable, inclusive early childhood settings. The purposeful…

There is a need to develop an understanding of how science knowledge is interpreted and used when a Socially Acute Question (SAQ) is discussed on the "agora" of the Internet. A case is made for using Actor-Network Theory (ANT) to unravel the diversity of participants taking part, their stance, source and expression of their…

This article explores the experiences of a group of established academic staff in New Zealand and the UK, as they undertake a doctorate in their home institutions. Our interest is in how individuals negotiate this dual status from a cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) stance that explores how rules, tools, community and divisions of labour,…

There exists considerable and rich literature on students' misconceptions about probability; less attention has been paid to the development of students' probabilistic thinking in the classroom. Grounded in an analysis of the literature, this article offers a lesson sequence for developing students' probabilistic understanding. In particular, a…

Although dissertations have traditionally been part of master's programmes, non-dissertation track master's programmes are on the rise across the world. This paper reports faculty views on MA TESOL dissertations (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) in five Anglophone countries. Drawing on the academic literacies tradition and informed…

"Working theories" are described as one of the two principal outcomes of Te Whariki, the early childhood curriculum in Aotearoa New Zealand. Despite its prominence as a curricular outcome, the theoretical positioning of the concept of working theory remains relatively undebated, with researchers readily attributing the term to a…

When "they" come to "us" in "our" place, what happens, for "them" and for "us"? This article investigates conceptions of Otherness through the story of an immigrant early childhood teacher, seen as the stranger, foreigner, who comes to "our" place, our early childhood setting. It provokes…

Children are particularly vulnerable to structured inequalities in society. Building on the work of Erich Fromm (1900-1980), this article contends that modern (post)industrial capitalism corrupts the human capacity to operate in the "being mode"--that is, in altruistic and compassionate ways. Rather, within the individualistic logic of…

Teachers are obligated to construct an environment inclusive of "all" students. This article argues critical literacy with queer intent can offer strategies to expose normative constructions of gender and sexuality that can exclude some students. I initiate the case with a queer theory analysis of a description of critical literacy…

This article attends to the affective-political dimensions of doctoral aspiration. It considers why doctoral students continue to hope for an 'academic good life' in spite of the depressed and precarious features of the academic present. The article emerges from 2013 research with ten doctoral students in the Arts and Social Sciences, at a…

Young children are keenly motivated to inquire into and make meaning about their worlds. This article discusses "working theories", one of two indicative learning outcomes of the New Zealand early childhood curriculum, "Te Whariki". Working theories occur as children attempt to find connections between their experiences and…

Sessional teachers in universities are often marginalised by their part-time status, availability for training, and invisibility within the institution's infrastructure. Nevertheless, tutors as a subset of this group, regularly have access to some training and development. This paper presents a methodological approach for implementing the BLASST…