Findings from ICSEI specials

Between the two ICSEI special parallel sessions on Wednesday and Friday during ICSEI 2019, participants were asked to dwell on important questions. The idea was to collect findings during the conferece, but also identify key questions for future research.

Feedback and impulses were collected by LearnLab, and is now summed up in the attached document.

ICSEI Special findings

Key findings

Key findings from the leadership parallel include:

  • The essence of the leadership is to listen, understand and act.
  • Creating a culture of trust  and supporting the risk taker.
  • Developing the principal’s capacity in leading the teachers’ collaborative  learning through collaborative inquiry, lesson study,  learning walks and other collaborative methods that challenges our thinking and practice.

The parallel on teaching and professional learning for the future found that collaboration and listening were the keywords that stood out.

The early childhood education parallel points to the fact that highly trained ECEC teachers will increase quality in early childhood education, which in turn will increase the status  of ECEC.

The ICSEI special parallel on data use parallel sums up their key findings in:

  • Expand the understanding and use of different data, by involving teachers and learners, be aware of the different context and change the practice  based on action learning.
  • We need to avoid that data use leads to a “paperization” of teaching that creates a split world: the “real” world of teaching and meetings in the classrom, vs. the picture of this world in the form of data that are used for accountability etc.

Future research questions

Data use
  1. How is data perceived and used differently across cultures? How can this be leveraged to understand and improve data use?
  2. Further research on teachers’ views: what data is useful to you? ow will you use it to change your practice? What support do you need on your journey?
  3. Why does quantitative data carry so much greater validity than other forms of data?
Leadership
  1. We need more knowledge in the field of managing complexity and uncertainty
  2. How do you practically develop a culture of trust and risk taking? What actions do leaders need to take and which structures do they need to put in place? How do they affect this culture?
  3. What is good leadership in the perspective of the students?

 

 

 

 

What is ICSEI Specials?

Yngve Lindvig and jarl Inge Wærness.

Delegates to the Stavanger congress will find a newcomer in the program after the opening ceremony on Wednesday. The ICSEI special parallels are invented to increase learning efforts during the congress. A follow-up parallel on Friday will build on the discussions and reflections from the ICSEI special on Wednesday.

We leave it to representatives from the steering group to explain with their own words what the ICSEI specials are about.

Jarl Inge Wærness and Yngve Lindvig will host the ICSEI Specials.

The purpose of the ICSEI Specials is to invite all participants to answer/ reflect on important questions and to develop new knowledge together. In a shifting word we need education systems who create students that is active in finding the solutions for the future. The big question is what we as educators can do to promote this? In what ways can we assess outcomes and progress for equity, excellence, wellbeing, democracy, and human rights?
How do we create relevant data on broad curriculum outcomes?

The ICSEI Specials will model the main theme of the conference: Bringing together. The steering committee will facilitate these sessions and sum up the findings for further learning.

The ICSEI Specials are organized as four parallels. The themes of the four parallels are broadly based on the ICSEI networks: 1) Early Childhood, 2) Leadership, 3) Teaching and Professional Learning, 4) Data Use.

Questions for enquiry in the Early Childhood parallel are:

  • How do we stimulate children’s creativity and free play in early childhood education?
  • To what extent should early childhood education include premeditated learning goals?

Questions for enquiry in the Leadership parallel are:

  • How do we model future leadership through professional learning communities?
  • How can learning between schools (district leadership) be initiated through leadership that empowers the profession?

Questions for enquiry in the Teaching and Professional Learning parallel are:

  • How can the teachers be the driving force in innovation and school development?
  • How to build partnerships in the community to enhance education and teaching for the future, equity, and inclusion?

Questions for enquiry in the Data Use parallel are:

  • How can teachers assess learning outcomes related to a broad curriculum developing equity, inclusion and life skills?
  • Is there a difference between the kind of data schools need as a basis for school development, compared to data for education policy Development.

The second ICSEI Special on Friday will build on the discussions and reflections from the first ICSEI Special on Wednesday, together with the participants reflections during the congress. In the end of the congress, the findings will be shared with all participants for further learning.

We are looking forward to your contribution on the ICSEI Specials!

The Foundation Years Researcher and Practitioner Forum: “Educational Research: Making it practical so it can be impactful”.

Dr. Peter DeWitt
Dr. Peter DeWitt

Are you a PhD student in educational science? Are you interested in learning more about how your research can have an impact in schools and classrooms? Join this ICSEI pre-conference for a unique opportunity to discuss your research with leading scholars and peers, build networks and gain new knowledge.

Educational research can provide important ways for teachers and leaders to improve in their own practice while having a strong impact on student learning.
Unfortunately, there is often a disconnect between the research and the understanding of that research by practitioners.

In this ICSEI forum, which is of particular interest to PhD students in educational science, Dr. Peter DeWitt will give his keynote lecture: ”Educational Research: Making it practical so it can be impactful”.

The lecture will point out how researchers can make their research more practical, and how to best get it into the hands of practitioners.

In his lecture, Dr. DeWitt will highlight a number of topics that are highly relevant for scholars who would like their research to make an impact in the field of practitioners, such as: Research versus practice? Why should practitioners use your research? How is your research any better than what they are presently doing in their classrooms or schools? Why is it that what we learned at University is not what we can immediately begin using when we start teaching? How can researchers get their research into the hands – and minds – of practitioners?

Roundtable meetings

Following the keynote, participants will join small roundtables, based upon their areas of research and interest. The roundtable meetings will be mentored by veteran ICSEI members, providing the participants to ask questions and discuss relevant topics with the group.

Each roundtable will discuss one of the following topics:

  • Educational Research: Making it practical so it can be impactful.
  • Exploring research methodology
  • Publishing your work/research
  • Exploring research writing
  • Exploring Theoretical Frameworks
  • Using social media to share your work/research

Sign up for the roundtables can be found on this form.

Who can attend?

The Foundation Years Researcher and Practitioner Forum is open for participants at ICSEI 2019, and especially invites PhD students and others with a particular interest in this topic and format.

Practical information

Pre-conference: The Foundation Years Researcher and Practitioner Forum
Time: Wednesday, January 9th
Place: ICSEI 2019 venue, Stavanger Forum
Fee: 20 AUD (+ ICSEI conference fee)
Registration:
If you are signing up for ICSEI, select the option “Early Career / Post Graduates Forum” (section 9 on the registration form).
If you have already signed up for ICSEI, go to the Registration page (section 3, “Conference Registration”) and click on the last option in that section that says “Adding to Registration”.
Sign up for the roundtables can be found on this form.

 

President’s message

Welcome to ICSEI, and to the ICSEI Stavanger Congress.

As ICSEI’s current President, I am delighted to welcome you to our community and this Congress.

ICSEI is unique in bringing together a growing community of researchers, educators and policy-makers every year, face-to-face, in an International Congress to discuss and debate ideas, evidence, practices and strategies that help make schools and other educational institutions more effective for all those that they serve.

Despite our name, we are more than a Congress, as we also offer opportunities to participate in some very active ongoing networks of professional interest, publications and website communication such as the ICSEI Digest and ICSEI Express.

Behind the scenes, the ICSEI Board and its Executive is working extremely hard on behalf of all the members to make ICSEI even more effective for you and all that you represent – promoting increased diversity and generational renewal in the membership, the roster of speakers, and the focus of our discussions and publications.

We are beginning to build a professional development platform to increase impact and income alike in order to provide better services. We are taking our Congresses to parts of the world we have never been before to open up dialogue and learning across cultures and systems.

In coming to Norway and Stavanger, the 2019 Congress will be engaging with a high performing educational system that is a global leader in early-childhood education, a great believer in public education for public good, one of the world’s highest ranking nations on indicators of happiness and well-being, and a culture that embraces and enjoys nature and environmental sustainability – including in education. In Norway, they say, there is no such thing as bad weather. There is only bad clothing.

The Norwegian Congress will feature keynote speakers including Maggie McDonnell, the Global Teacher Prize Winner for 2017, Professor Amanda Datnow from the University of California, San Diego – an international thought leader on professional learning communities, educational policy and educational change; Jan Egeland, a foremost advocate of human rights; and Oxford University Professor, Kathy Silva, a living legend in the field of early childhood studies.

There is no better place, probably, for us all to think about the connection between equity, diversity and sustainability than Norway. It does not have all the answers, but this Congress will pose the important questions:

How do we provide success for all children, not just a few or even the majority?

How do we make our educational processes responsive to and inclusive of all cultures, including the indigenous cultures?

How do we lay the best possible foundations for learning, achievement, wellbeing and identity from the earliest years of life?

How do we engage learning with the natural world and connect education more effectively, every day, to the world around us and of which we are a part?

How do we also engage our teachers and leaders fully in this great quest without bleeding them dry and burning them out?

In this Congress and this community, we work across disciplines, borders, roles and identities to address these compelling questions that affect everyone.

In ICSEI, we move towards and engage others instead of turning against or aside from them. We support and promote knowledge and evidence over opinion and ideology. We uplift the people we serve in order to uplift the people who serve them.

Two years is a short time to serve as President, and the Stavanger congress will mark my last days in this role, but working as a team with the Past President, Michael Schratz and the President Elect, Kim Schildkamp, as well as with a distinguished and hard-working Board, and a dynamic Congress Committee, we have been able to achieve so much together and over time than any one of us could have done alone.

Sustainability is about collaboration more than competition, about diversity rather than standardization, about conserving and renewing people’s energy not wearing them out, and about considering how all our actions – the schools we choose, the places we teach, the innovations we support – affect everyone else, especially the least advantaged.

It’s hard enough to be successful. It’s harder still to be sustainable. Let’s figure out how to do that together.

I am honored to serve as President and look forward to meeting many of you in Stavanger.

Andy Hargreaves
ICSEI President

Facts and Figures about Education in Norway

  • Of a population of over 5 million, more than 1,1 million people are currently undergoing education or training. In addition to this 223 000 are undergoing higher education (2015).
  • The pupil-teacher ratio in primary and lower secondary schools is 17 pupils per teacher. Schools with fewer than 100 pupils have an average of 11 pupils per teacher.
  • Compulsory education in Norway lasts 10 years. There are currently 624,000 pupils enrolled in public and private primary and lower secondary schools
  • 9 out of 10 children of kindergarten age attend kindergarten. A total of 283,600 children are enrolled in kindergarten.
  • 92 per cent of all 16 to 18-year-olds are enrolled in upper secondary education or training.
  • There are significant differences between boys and girls in terms of the study programmes they choose in upper secondary education. Girls make up 85 per cent of all pupils following the Healthcare, Childhood and Youth Development programme
  • In 2015 Norway spent NOK 150 billion on kindergartens, primary and secondary education.
  • A pupil in upper secondary education costs an average of NOK 155,100.
  • 10 per cent of young people aged between 20 and 24 are neither in education nor in employment. This is lower than most Nordic countries.