One divorce can create two step-families, and as the pool of men and women available for remarriage grows the increase in step-families outstrips the rate of divorce. In 1981, 29.1% of all marriages in Australia involved one or both parties who had been previously divorced.
Outside schools, on buses, at church, in parks, in the homes of friends and neighbours, in shopping centres, in the street, and in a day-care centre we asked young children about their joys and fears. Back in our Diploma of Teaching (2nd Year) class we recorded and quantified and graphed and analysed the replies.
Most children in school learn the meanings of more than a thousand new words each year. Yet few teachers deliberately set out to drill their pupils systematically on selected word lists. Nor do children consult their dictionaries a thousand times a year. Even if they did, it is unlikely that they would remember what they read so that it became a permanent part of their lexicon.
What is fairness?
NZCER concentrated on
(a) access (pre-school to continuing education);
(b) content and teaching style;
(c) allocation of educational resources;
(d) outcomes, e.g., qualifications; ability to participate in society and in decision-making; to respond to change with confidence.
Psychological health depends upon the nature of the work which a person undertakes. In addition to workers in paid jobs, mothers work in their domestic roles, volunteers in community projects are working, members of an amateur football team or a choir work during practice and in public performance, and a person works in the garden or in decorating the kitchen.
Schools, according to the traditional view, prepare individuals for life in a society - as citizens, parents, workers, and moral agents. In recent years, however, some theorists have sought to limit the schools' role to providing people to create and sustain wealth. Those who think about education in this economic way are often referred to as The New Right. They have a clear solution to educational problems: to privatise education systems wherever possible. The vehicle for this is the voucher system.
Despite thousands of words in curriculum reviews and plenty of new ideas we still have teachers out front, work on the blackboard, children in rows, uniforms, examinations . . .
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New Zealand's Minister of Education outlines why he considers change must take place, what changes are needed, and how they will be brought about.
'He needs so much time - what do I do with the other 30?' The question is not obstructive, not reactionary, not symptomatic of laziness and it revolves around a collection of seemingly insoluble problems.
Given that handicapped children need more individual attention to make progress; given that many need short regular doses of instruction; and given that the intellectually handicapped benefit from more prompting, more over learning and a generally more rewarding teaching situation, how best can ordinary classroom organisation be modified to accommodate these needs?
Placing handicapped students in the regular classroom is the beginning of an opportunity to influence handicapped students' lives deeply by promoting constructive relationships between them and their non-handicapped peers. Like all opportunities, however, mainstreaming carries the risk of making things worse as well as the possibility of making things better. If mainstreaming goes badly, handicapped students will experience increased stigmatization, stereotyping, and rejection. Even worse, they may be ignored or treated with paternalistic care.
Many words used to describe disability are outdated, inaccurate and stem from fears and misconceptions. These words are not consistent with the reality of being disabled or the way people with disabilities view their lives. They create attitudinal barriers which are often more handicapping than the actual disability. Because of their extremely negative connotations, many of these words support arguments for allowing the death of newborn disabled babies, newly disabled people and people in nursing homes.
