Scaffolding of Wikipedia translation for technology-enhanced language learning

This paper reports on the fi ndings from training on language learning of pre service language student teachers on the translation of English Wikipedia articles into Oshikwanyama and Oshindonga. The interpretative framework of scaffolding was used to conduct the training. The study involved a group of 24 pre-service language student and teachers from a university in Namibia. Data was generated through the observation of the Wikipedia translation intervention referred to above. An openended questionnaire that served as a tool for refl ection on the translation was also used. The participants made use of several mediating technological tools (computers, internet, the Wikipedia website, and online dictionaries) as well as language books and dictionaries to translate articles on the Wikipedia website from English, the students’ second language, into Oshikwanyama/Oshindonga, their home languages. The fi ndings suggest that Wikipedia is a good resource for helping student teachers integrate the use of technology into their language learning in the fi rst-language classroom. It also offers student teachers a chance to develop strategies that scaffold learning in a structured way, using both technological and language mediating tools that are accessible and convenient to use.

(In)visible perceptions of objects (‘things’) during early transitions: Intertwining subjectivities in ECEC

Objects in early childhood education (ECEC) experiences have begun to receive a great deal more attention than ever before. Although much of this attention has emerged recently from new materialism, in this paper we turn to Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological concern with the (in)visibility of ‘things’ to illuminate the presence of objects within infant transitions. Drawing on notions of écart and reversibility, we explore the relational perceptions objects are bestowed with on the lead up to, and first day of, infant transitions. Recognizing the intertwining subjectivities that perceive the object, a series of videos and interviews with teachers and parents across three ECEC sites in Australia and New Zealand provided a rich source of phenomenological insight. Our analysis reveals objects as deeply imbued anchoring links that enable relational possibilities for transitions between home and ECEC service. Visible and yet invisible to adults (parents and/or teachers) who readily engage with objects during earliest transitions, the significance of things facilitates opportunities to forge new relationships, create boundaries and facilitate connections. As such, our paper concludes that objects are far more than mediating tools, or conceptual agents; they provide an explicit route to understanding with potential to play a vital role in supporting effective early transitions when granted visibility within this important phenomenon.

Struggling to-be or not-to-be a bilingual teacher: Identity formation in a Change Laboratory intervention

While the methodology of formative intervention research has long been established, the aspect of new instrumentality of Change Laboratory is fragmentally documented. Therefore, in this study, we modified two major Change Laboratory mediating tools used in bilingual student-teaching seminars, namely the disturbance diary and four-field model. These two empirically investigated Change Laboratory tools have mediated transformative agency within the collective movement toward identity formation as the Change Laboratory participants (bilingual preservice teachers) conveyed their dilemma of to-be or not-to-be a bilingual teacher. We provide evidence on the relationship between the bilingual preservice teachers’ identity formation and their participation in the Change Laboratory intervention. The analysis made salient the role of two new Change Laboratory mediating tools, the adapted disturbance diary and individually generated four-field models, for the bilingual preservice teachers’ collective transformation in bilingual teaching. It also crystallized the importance of deepening the bilingual preservice teachers’ analysis of multiple languages and pedagogy as understood in the new bilingual teaching model in the Change Laboratory intervention.

Activity Theory used as an Analytical Lens for Business Research

Activity Theory is used in this paper to demonstrate the process of critical analysis of qualitative data from two case studies. The paper explains the elements of an activity system (the subject, object, outcome, mediating tools, rules, community and division of labour). Thereafter, practical examples from the work of two recent PhD students are used to show the importance of identifying and analysing activities that are found either in the introduction or the current use of information systems in business organisations. These examples highlight the applicability of Activity Theory in analysing data from projects of interest to Business Management whose topics and contexts are very different. The first focusses on the introduction of an Accounting Information System to microbusinesses in a low‑income community in South Africa and the second focusses on Information Security Management in Mobile Network Organisations in Uganda. The examples illustrate the value of Activity Theory as a lens and as a way of stimulating critical analysis. Activity Theory is known for its ability to identify reasons for failure or disappointing performance in existing situations by highlighting contradictions either between different activities, between an earlier version of an activity and a later version as the activity evolves, or within an activity (between the elements of that activity). However, as shown in the first example, it can also be seen as a useful tool when proposing a new project as a predictor of success. Despite the fact that data is typically qualitative, the analytical process related to Activity Theory can be structured, which assists novice researchers or those unaccustomed to interpretivist analysis to uncover insights that are not immediately obvious. Activity Theory is said to act as a lens in data analysis and is particularly useful in organisational sciences for the theorization of technology‑mediated organizational change.

‘There is a shark coming, then there is a du-du-du-du-du…’: Mediating cultural tools in a Norwegian creative music-making project

This article reports on a case study in a Norwegian primary school where nearly 50 fifth-grade pupils took part in a creative music-making project. Facilitated by two professional artists, they created an original piece of music and performed their composition for an audience at the end of the project week. A substantial part of the data consisted of recorded sounds, notations, transcribed interviews and documentations of the process of music composition from the first ideas to the final performance. The analysis was conducted from a sociocultural perspective with a special focus on the mediating tools used in the community of creative musical practice. The findings suggest that the cultural tools used in the project were dynamic and interactive, employed by both the facilitators and the participants. The mediating tools found in the creative music making make up a complex toolbox the participants share and develop, consisting of both psychological and material tools. There were three main categories of mediating tools identified. First, the use of symbolic signs, such as graphic notation, was important from the initial stages when the participants developed musical ideas to the final performance. Second, the actions and interactions of music making, such as conducting gestures shared and developed through the project, were both founded on traditional conductor signs but also transformed and adapted to new ways of mediating musical meaning in this particular project. Third, the participants worked with ‘creative reworkings’ of experiences in this project. Through the transformation of previous experiences into the creation of new musical material, important mediating tools were identified as experiences and meaning in the creative musical practice.

Using Cultural-Historical Theory to Design and Assess a Chemistry Play-Based Learning Intervention

This study has been performed in Sweden, where the preschool curriculum states that children’s understanding of simple chemical processes is a goal to strive towards [13]. However, uncertainty within the current preschool practice exists and has been described by B. Sundberg et al. [20]. Motivated by the lack of scientific literature on what chemistry content is suitable for preschool children and how to introduce it, this study aims to tackle how abstract concepts like “atoms” and “molecules” can be introduced to preschool children. With this purpose, a play-based learning intervention was designed, following the cultural-historical model for preschool science education proposed by M. Fleer [7], and implemented in two Swedish preschools, dividing a total of 20 three-years-old children into four groups of five children each. Data were collected in the form of video-recordings of the sessions and analysed following the principles from the experimental-genetic method summarized by N. Veresov [23]. Results are presented in the form of vignettes that illustrate significant moments from the intervention, together with discussion of how the social situation of development, the zone of actual development and the mediating tools facilitate the children in starting to talk about atoms.

Influence of Context in Teachers' Perception of Graphing Calculator Use in Mathematics Instruction

This study focuses on the influence of socio-contextual factors in the interrelations between teachers' perceptions of the role of graphing calculators, as mediating tools, to help facilitate mathematics instruction of students from two different SES backgrounds. The main source of data are in-depth semi-structured interviews with four teachers, two from each SES school. To better understand the role of SES socio-context, this study suggests a framework, consisting of teacher, student, subject matter, and graphing calculator use, for graphing calculator integration in the classroom. The components of the framework were taken to be continuously in interaction with one another implying that a change or perturbation in one of the components affected all the other components. As such, addressing equity issues in connection to the successful integration of graphing calculator in the classroom requires continually creating, maintaining, and re-establishing a dynamic equilibrium among all components of the framework.

The Role of Situational Context in High School Teachers Use of Graphing Calculator in Mathematics Instruction

By taking into consideration the significance of the socio-economic contexts, this research investigates teachers' perceptions of the role of graphing calculators, as mediating tools, to help facilitate mathematics instruction of students from two different SES backgrounds. The main source of data are in-depth semi-structured interviews with four teachers, two from each SES school. In general, the participants' perceptions of the role of the graphing calculator were dependent on the context within which it was used. Also, the participants played a crucial role in determining the nature of graphing calculator use with the low-SES school's participants appearing not to involve their students in lessons that capitalized on the powerful characteristics of graphing calculators. To tease out the role of the situation context, a four-component framework was conceptualized consisting of teacher, student, subject matter, and graphing calculator use. The components of the framework were taken to be continuously in interaction with one another implying that a change or perturbation in one of the components affected all the other components. The continuous interactions of the components of this framework suggest that equity issues in connection to the nature of graphing calculator use should be an ongoing process that is continuously locating strategies that will afford all students appropriate access and use of graphing calculators.