Veronica Morcom

A sociocultural view of learning positions teachers as mediators, to teach a curriculum that reflects what is valued by society. But in addition it is proposed that a specific focus on mediating relational agency to support collaboration further builds teacher and students capacities for learning. Peer interaction supports the development of communication, social and emotional competencies required for effective collaborative learning. But a deeper understanding of social and cultural challenges for schools accustomed to a traditional approach is required before change can occur. Relational agency is a two-way process, to become responsive so you can both receive and give support to peers. The data are drawn from three year-long projects conducted by the teacher/researcher with her students and other teachers who were mentored to develop new practices that challenged the status quo at their school. Rogoff's analytical planes are used as a framework to analyse the data and the findings are presented as four case studies related to bullying, conflict resolution, student leadership and teacher mentoring. The evidence-based social practices in this research can be adapted by other teachers interested in mediating relational agency to develop social and emotional skills to support a collaborative classroom (Morcom, 2014, 2015, 2016).

In this paper we examine an intervention, ‘cooperative marbles in a jar’, as illustrative of Vygotsky’s (1999) method of double stimulation. The intervention was part of a larger longitudinal study conducted with primary aged students which aimed to examine how to develop a collaborative classroom where agency of the teacher and students was valued and supported. The first author was the classroom teacher and the second author the co-researcher/university professor who visited the classroom weekly. The teacher/researcher’s role, as a facilitator and ‘guide on the side’, was to allow students to take responsibility for their learning and develop shared understandings about collaborative values. The classroom social practices, such as the weekly classroom meeting and daily social circle, provided opportunities for students to practise these values and to participate in authentic activities to promote social knowledge and sharing of ideas. The focus was on student decision making about the direction of classroom activities and the creation of possible interventions in the development of a collaborative classroom. During weekly classroom meetings students raised issues about friendships, group work and the physical arrangement of the classroom as well as setting up incentive strategies to promote cooperation. The intervention emerged from the weekly classroom meeting discussions. The first stimulation was the problem students identified of their peers not cooperating in groups. The second stimulation was the tool of marbles in a jar which the students developed through discussions in the classroom meeting. Research data sources included regular reflections by students and researchers about the classroom social practices, which were videotaped by the second author, and interviews with the students and their parents. This paper explores how students and the teacher developed this formative intervention and sustained an effective new practice with positive outcomes for students. The significance for teachers of such research lies in developing authentic educational practices that prioritise students’ agency by giving voice to their concerns and having the confidence in students that they can resolve their issues for learning.

Motivational development is conceptualized as the transformation of participation from peripheral to mature participation in a collaborative community of practice. The underlying assumption is that students learn from each other, mediated by the teacher or more capable peers. This paper is based on two larger research projects where the classroom teacher was also the researcher. The teacher made explicit the social practices of the classroom to engage students more fully in activities to develop motivation to work with each other collaboratively. In this paper there is a focus on the social practice of 'the daily social circle' to provide an exemplar of how scaffolding participation in suCh activities allowed students to learn from each other and develop social skills. To further develop these skills student had leadership roles in small social groups with their peers which motivated development towards mature participation. A sociocultural perspective (Vygotsky, 1978) framed the qualitative research as the focus was on how social interactions could be developed to create the conditions for improved participation. Qualitative data included: teacher's observations; student reflections; parent and teacher interviews and student transcripts from the social circle and class meetings, which were collected over a school year. This methodological approach is seldom used in motivation research and makes available holistic data that can provide details ofren missing in traditional approaches to motivational research (Nicholls & Hazzard; Pressick-Kilborn eta!., 2005). Teachers play a significant role in scaffolding positive relationships amongst peer, which can become a motivating factor to develop mature participation.

Veronica Morcom, an experienced primary teacher from WA, presented this workshop. The objectives of the project in which she is involved are to develop: • a common values language that can be supported with observable behaviours for reporting values, and • an appreciation of the importance of values education as fundamental to good schooling. The cluster schools involved in the project current ly use 17 descriptors for ‘attitude, behaviour and effort’ issued by the Department of Education and Training, WA, to report to parents on values. Five core shared values (Curriculum Council, 1998) are incorporated in these reports but teachers have concerns about collecting valid evidence to make consistent judgements (‘consistently, sometimes or seldom’). A cohort group of teachers is using an action research process to examine how to develop a shared values language and collect evidence to report to parents about values. Parents have provided feedback about their understanding of how values are being taught and assessed. The context of the school sites was explored in relation to values education as they do not currently have a ‘whole school approach’. Therefore the project challenges may be perceived to be different from schools that engaged in values education to solve school based problems such as ‘bullying’. The cluster school communities do not perceive a ‘deficit’ that needs to be addressed by values education. Morcom illustrated the work of the teachers, students and their parents to ‘report values to parents’ and engaging all stakeholders to talk about values, and invited feedback from participants to advance the project.