The book-gifting programme, the Letterbox Club, was developed as a response to the increased interest in ways of improving the educational outcomes of children in out-of-home care. By reporting quantitative and qualitative findings from a Swedish trial, and compiling findings from previous British evaluations, the purpose of this paper is to…

Teaching practicum experiences, including those in international contexts, are based on partnerships between institutions and host schools, and the partnership between the pre-service teacher, the cooperating teacher and the university supervisor. This article explores the relationship between pre-service teachers and cooperating teachers in an…

Concerns about new teachers' capacity to address diversity in their classrooms are growing in many parts of the West, and there is some consensus that one aspect of the problem is the narrow range of cultural and social backgrounds from which teacher candidates are drawn. Yet a minority of socially aware teachers, from all backgrounds, continue to…

Several studies have reported significant relationships between children's season of birth and measures of their academic success (i.e., the "season of birth effect"). Whereas most of these studies were cross-sectional, the current study uses growth curve modelling to analyse longitudinal data on 3,187 children in Flemish primary…

The commercialisation of schools is a controversial issue, but very little is known about the actual situation in UK schools. The aim of this study was to investigate, with particular reference to health education and health promotion, commercial activities and their regulation in primary schools in the Yorkshire and Humber region of the UK. A…

The two recent (2003) international surveys of pupils' attainments were uncoordinated, overlapped considerably, were costly and wasteful, especially from the point of view of England where inadequate response-rates meant that no reliable comparisons at all could be made with other countries. The surveys were conducted by the OECD (Programme of…

This article aims to provide both an account and an assessment of the most significant policies adopted by New Labour on primary schooling since its victory in the election of 1997. A secondary intention is to determine what these policies reveal about New Labour and its political project. A key policy objective in New Labour's two terms of office…

This paper traces the development of teacher education policy during the first two terms of the New Labour government. It argues that there is substantial evidence to support the claim that during their two terms of office, New Labour forged a policy on teacher education that was distinctively different from the Conservative administrations that…

This paper explores the policy of single-sex classes that is currently being adopted in some schools as a strategy for addressing boys educational and social needs. It draws on research in one Australian government, coeducational primary school to examine teachers' and students' experiences of this strategy. Interviews with the principal, male and…

Over the last decade, there has been an increasing drive towards the promotion and development of enterprise education in Scottish schools. This has involved much debate about the nature of enterprise and how it may be addressed and applied within primary and early secondary school settings. The recent renewed interest in citizenship education and…

The formative Assessment for Learning proposals outlined by Black and Wiliam (e.g. Black et al. , 2002 ) have been well publicised. Since 2002, in its Assessment is for Learning programme, the Scottish Executive Education Department (SEED) has been exploring ways of bringing research, policy and practice in assessment into closer alignment using…