Research and publications

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Open Access
Abstract: Experiential Learning through Digital Storytelling (review)
(2011-02-23T21:30:40Z) Anderson, Kenneth Howard
Open Access
Advancing Black Inclusion and Addressing Anti-Black Racism in the Faculty of Education: A Reflection on Progress, Challenges, and Opportunities
(2022-06-09) Barrett, Sarah; Dove, Nicola
This report, written by the Special Advisor to the Dean on Black Inclusion and Anti-Black Racism (2021-2022) and Research Assistant to the Special Advisor provides a snapshot of the ways in which our Faculty has worked to address issues related to Black Inclusion and Anti-Black Racism and also create a record of what the Black members of our Faculty’s community identify as next steps.
Open Access
Between art and testimony: Transforming oral histories of Holocaust survivors into young adult fiction and creative non-fiction.
(Oral History Forum/Forum d’histoire oral, 2012) Krasny, Karen
Works of historical fiction and creative non-fiction written about the Holocaust continue to occupy an important place in both the literary and history curricula in K to 12 schools. In discussion with author Kathy Kacer, I describe the particular challenges of transforming oral testimonies of Holocaust survivors into young adult (YA) narratives including the ways in which these narratives are mitigated by the adult desire to educate and protect and by the undeniable influence of the publication of the diary of Anne Frank. By taking up the problem of bearing literary witness as a mode of pedagogical address through Spargo’s notion of vigilant memory and his reformulation of Levinasian ethics into terms of mourning, I demonstrate how oral histories directly or indirectly embedded in YA Holocaust narratives, might address the epistemological consequences of the Holocaust, specifically for invoking an ethical and social responsibility for the other through a resistance to consolation as a conventional form of commemoration.
Open Access
Comparing University: A Case Study between Canada and China
(Palgrave Macmillan, 2004) Lang, Daniel; Zha, Qiang
Open Access
Continuing Collaborative Knowledge Production: Knowing when, where, how and why
(Journal of Intercultural Studies, 2001) Haig-Brown, Celia
This paper questions assumptions about conducting research based in programs developed to serve communities which have traditionally had restricted access to the university. Grounded in an off-campus Master of Education initiative, it raises a number of ethical considerations. The questions addressed are as follows. (1) When does one move to doing research on a project which has been a satisfactory collaboration between a university and a community? (2) How is an academic to think about a collaborative project which will not, or perhaps cannot, become a site of research? (3) Where, in the space between community members’ focus on the local/specific and an academic’s focus on the global/theoretical, is it appropriate to share what has been learned? (4) Why should members of a First Nations/Aboriginal community (read any traditionally excluded group) participate in a piece of research destined for the world of academe?
Open Access
Coordinating policy layers of school fundraising in Toronto, Ontario, Canada: An institutional ethnography
(2019) Winton, Sue
In this article, I report findings from an investigation into the politics and coordination of school fundraising in the Toronto District School Board (TDSB) in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Theoretically grounded in institutional ethnography and critical policy analysis, the study began from the standpoint of parents asked to give money to their children’s school(s). I show how provincial and TDSB funding, parent involvement, fundraising, and school council policies organize parents’ experience of school fundraising. I also explore how participating in fundraising enables parents to meet neoliberal expectations of a “good parent” and how through their efforts to secure advantages for their children, fundraising parents are accomplices in the privatization of public education. I conclude by discussing possibilities for intervention into the social organization of school fundraising in Toronto schools.
Open Access
Creating spaces: testimonio, impossible knowledge, and academe
(International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 2003) Haig-Brown, Celia
This article examines what it means to engage seriously with speech and writing events, such as testimonio, articulated by people whose theoretical base lies primarily in experience outside the walls of academe. I argue that we dismiss such unfamiliar scholarship to the detriment of all involved. If we are truly committed to learning, then we must expose ourselves to language forms and cultural norms that are different from those with which we are familiar. We must learn from them how to acknowledge the limits of our analysis and how to find “impossible knowledge” in unaccustomed places.
Open Access
Culturally Responsive Teaching: Stories of a First Nation, Métis, and Inuit Cross-Curricular Infusion in Teacher Education
(Leading English Education and Resource Network (LEARN), 2014-08-01) Vetter, Diane; Haig-Brown, Celia; Blimkie, Melissa
This paper explores how the work of the infusion of First Nation, Métis, and Inuit traditions, perspectives, and histories at York University’s Faculty of Education Barrie Site unfolds in practice. It also highlights the learning experiences of pre-service teachers, the majority of whom were non-Aboriginal. Using narrative accounts of practice in faculty and practicum classrooms, the authors elaborate on a set of guiding principles to highlight their practical application by demonstrating what their implementation looks like in local school classrooms. They subsequently describe the challenges faced by faculty and pre-service teachers as they moved theoretical knowledge into practical settings.
Open Access
Deaf children creating written texts
(Gallaudet University Press, 2000) Mayer, C.; Akamatsu, C. T.
Open Access
Early adolescents' perceptions and attitudes towards gender representations in video games
(Journal of Media Literacy Education, 2020-07-21) Liu, Helen
This study investigated adolescents’ perception and attitudes towards gender representation in video game covers, and the degree to which these depictions may influence their notions on gender and identification. Seventeen participants ranging from ages 12 and 13 participated in semi-structured interviews to explore this topic. This study’s conceptual framework encompassed social cognitive theory, gender schema theory, and cultivation theory. Findings suggest that gender representation in video games does influence the majority of participants’ notions of gender. However, there are differences between how males and females’ approach, interpret, and respond to this type of media. Findings also showcased that evidence of implicit bias was detected in both male and female participants, demonstrated through inconsistencies in their responses. Finally, the findings revealed a significant lack of identification from the majority of participants with video game characters, as many participants were able to clearly distinguish between simulated and real-life experiences.
Open Access
Emergency Distance Learning during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Final Report
(2021-01-31) Barrett, Sarah Elizabeth
The report summarizes the findings of a mixed methods study of teachers’ experiences transitioning from face-to-face to emergency distance learning during the COVID-19 pandemic school closures in Ontario Canada. Teachers were surveyed in May/June 2020 (n = 764) and then fifty were interviewed in June/July/August 2020. Findings suggest that the biggest consequence of the shift to emergency distance learning, for both teachers and students, was a disruption in established relationships. The report contains descriptions of how teachers handled the transition, professional development, assessment, student engagement, parents and parenting. Recommendations for future emergency situations are provided.
Open Access
Evolution of new teachers' beliefs about teaching STSE: Report to school boards
(2013-08) Barrett, Sarah Elizabeth
This longitudinal multi‐case study followed four new science teachers over the course of five years. Its purpose was to examine the ways in which new science teachers integrate science‐technology‐society-environment (STSE) and inquiry‐based work into their teaching. I am particularly interested in new science teachers not only because of my work with prospective science teachers at York University’s Faculty of Education but also because this is a group that is simultaneously expected to usher in new and innovative approaches to teaching while receiving very little subject‐specific professional development to support their efforts (Luft, 2007).
Open Access
Foreign Impacts on Japanese and Chinese Higher Education: A Comparative Analysis
(2004) Zha, Qiang
Two forces shaped Japanese and Chinese systems of higher education. These include the impact of foreign influences on the basic academic model; and the indigenization of the universities as part of the national development processes that took place in each country. Japan and China share significant similarities in the patterns and process of their adoption of foreign influences. This essay, however, discusses through comparison the underlying differences behind the perceived similarities between the two countries in borrowing and adopting foreign forms of higher education. The author argues that Japan followed a bifocal approach to the appropriation of foreign ideas in relation to the development of its higher education system. China, in contrast, adopted a go it alone policy, as it was unwilling or unable to abandon some of its deeply held traditional beliefs. The author therefore concludes that Japanese higher education succeeded in drawing a distinction between imported innovations and original ethos, while Chinese higher education failed to adapt innovative foreign models to its traditional patterns.
Open Access
Increasing the Representation of Black Faculty Members at York: Report and Recommendations by the Joint Subcommittee of Employment Equity and Inclusivity.
(2020-01-09) Barrett, Sarah; Dua, Ena; Fallah, Mazyar; Idahosa, Pablo; James, Carl; Pillai Riddell, Rebecca
The Joint Sub-Committee on Employment Equity and Inclusivity has been charged with providing recommendations to the JCOAA on how best to increase the number of Black faculty members at York University. As an outcome of the 2018 negotiations between York University and YUFA, the Joint Subcommittee on Equity and Inclusivity was struck with a mandate to make recommendations on how the University can most effectively increase the representation of Black faculty at York.
Open Access
Indigenous Thought, Appropriation and Non-Aboriginal People
(Canadian Society for the Study of Education, 2010-01-04) Haig-Brown, Celia
In this article, I explore the question, “What is the relationship between appropriation of Indigenous thought and what might be called ‘deep learning’ based in years of education in Indigenous contexts.” Beginning with an examination of meanings ascribed to cultural appropriation, I bring texts from Gee on secondary discourses, Foucault on the production of discourse, and Wertsch on the deep structures underpinning discourse into conversation with critical fieldwork experiences extracted from years of research and teaching. Ultimately hopeful, I conclude the article with direction from Indigenous scholars on appropriate cultural protocol in the use of Indigenous knowledges by non‐Aboriginal people in educational contexts.
Open Access
Mental Imagery and Affect in English/French Bilingual Readers: A Cross-Linguistic Perspective
(Canadian Modern Language Review, University of Toronto, Mar-08) Krasny, Karen; Sadoski, Mark
We investigated the evocation of mental imagery and affect in English/French bilinguals to determine whether the linguistic demands of reading in a second language (L2) limit readers’ ability to form non-verbal text representations of literary stories. The participants were 26 Grade 11 French immersion students enrolled in a Canadian high school. Each student read two literary stories, one in English and another in French. Next they rated story paragraphs for the degree of either mental imagery or emotional response evoked. Later, students reread the same texts and completed a writing task in which they reported their imagery or emotions in response to the two highest-rated paragraphs. Moderate to high correlations were found between ratings of imagery and emotional response for each story, for two French stories combined, for two English stories combined, and for all stories in both languages combined. Reading times were somewhat longer for the French versions. The patterns of response for both the ratings and the written reports replicate and extend earlier research and suggest that as bilingual readers progress in their ability to read in their L2, reports of imagery and affect become closer in kind and number to those reported in response to reading the same text in their first language.
Open Access
Participants, texts, and processes in second language writing assessment: A narrative review of the literature.
(University of Toronto Press, 2007) Barkaoui, Khaled
Essay tests are widely used to assess ESL/EFL learners' writing abilities for instructional, administrative, and research purposes. Relevant literature was searched to identify 70 empirical studies on ESL/EFL essay tests. The majority of these studies examined task, essay, and rater effects on essay rating and scores. Less attention has been given to the effects of of examinee factors, scoring methods, and assessment contexts. This absence seems mainly to be the result of a traditional concern with controlling for task and rater variability as 'sources of measurement error'. This article argues for viewing these factors as 'sources of variability' that contribute to the richness and uniqueness of the contexts within which writing performance and assessment occur and for taking them into account when interpreting and using essay test scores. The paper concludes with several implications for research and practice.
Open Access
A Pedagogy of the Land: Dreams of respectful relations
(McGill University, Faculty of Education, 2002) Haig-Brown, Celia; Dannenmann, Kaaren
This article arises out of a partnership between an aboriginal community member and a university faculty member whose relational focus is the development of a pedagogy of the land within the Indigenous Knowledge Instructors Program. (Re)creating traditional knowledge with others in contemporary contexts, as their birthright, is the goal of the program. We struggle to communicate and locate this work within an appropriate 'community.' Dreaming of respectful relations, we are committed to thinking through the complexity of such a quest.
Open Access
Rating scale impact on EFL essay marking: A mixed-method study
(Elsevier, 2007) Barkaoui, Khaled
Educators often have to choose among different types of rating scales to assess second-language (L2) writing performance. There is little research, however, on how different rating scales affect rater performance. This study employed a mixed-method approach to investigate the effects of two different rating scales on EFL essay scores, rating processes, and raters’ perceptions. Four EFL teachers in Tunisia rated a set of 24 EFL essays silently and two subsets of four essays while thinking aloud using a holistic scale and then a multiple-trait rating scale. The essay scores were analyzed using G-theory while the think-aloud protocols were coded in terms of Cuming, Kantor, and Power's (Cumming, A., Kantor, R., & Powers, D. (2002). Decision making while rating ESL/EFL writing tasks: A descriptive framework. Modern Language Journal, 86 (1), 67–96.) rater decision-making scheme. The holistic scale resulted in higher inter-rater agreement. Raters employed similar processes with both rating scales. Raters were the main source of variability in terms of scores and decision-making behavior. These findings have implications for writing assessment practices and for further research.
Open Access
The Resurgence and Growth of Private Higher Education in China
(2006) Zha, Qiang