East Asia is a most dynamic region and its fast developing higher education and research systems are gathering great momentum. East Asian higher education has common cultural roots in Chinese civilization, and in indigenous traditions, each country has been shaped in different ways by Western intervention, and all are building global strategies. Shared educational agendas combine with long political tensions and rising national identities. Hope and fear touch each other. What are the prospects for regional harmony-in-diversity? How do internationalization and indigenization interplay in higher education in this remarkable region, where so much of the future of humanity will be decided? Experts from Australia, China mainland, Hong Kong SAR, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, the UK and Vietnam probe these dynamics, with original perspectives, robust evidence and brilliant writing. Changing Higher Education in East Asia deepens our understanding of internationalization and globalization agendas such as world-class universities and international students. It takes readers further, exploring the role of higher education in furthering the global public and common good, world citizenship education, the internationalization of the humanities and social sciences, geopolitics and higher education development, cross-border academic mobility, the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on regional student mobility, and future regionalization in East Asia.

The ‘knowledge turn’ in curriculum studies has drawn attention to the central role that knowledge of the disciplines plays in education, and to the need for new thinking about how we understand knowledge and knowledge-building. Knowing History in Schools explores these issues in the context of teaching and learning history through a dialogue between the eminent sociologist of curriculum Michael Young, and leading figures in history education research and practice from a range of traditions and contexts. With a focus on Young’s ‘powerful knowledge’ theorisation of the curriculum, and on his more recent articulations of the ‘powers’ of knowledge, this dialogue explores the many complexities posed for history education by the challenge of building children’s historical knowledge and understanding. The book builds towards a clarification of how we can best conceptualise knowledge-building in history education. Crucially, it aims to help history education students, history teachers, teacher educators and history curriculum designers navigate the challenges that knowledge-building processes pose for learning history in schools.

In this book, John O’Regan examines the role of political economy in the worldwide spread of English and traces the origins and development of the dominance of English to the endless accumulation of capital in a capitalist world-system. O’Regan combines Marxist perspectives of capital accumulation with world-systems analysis, international political economy, and studies of imperialism and empire to present a historical account of the ‘free riding’ of English upon the global capital networks of the capitalist world-system. Relevant disciplinary perspectives on global English are examined in this light, including superdiversity, translanguaging, translingual practice, trans-spatiality, language commodification, World Englishes and English as a Lingua Franca. Global English and Political Economy presents an original historical and interdisciplinary interpretation of the global ascent of English, while also raising important theoretical and practical questions for perspectives which suggest that the time of the traditional models of English is past. Providing an introduction to key theoretical perspectives in political economy, this book is essential reading for advanced students and researchers in applied linguistics, World Englishes and related fields of study.

The debate over whether class size matters for teaching and learning is one of the most enduring, and aggressive, in education research. Teachers often insist that small classes benefit their work. But many experts argue that evidence from research shows class size has little impact on pupil outcomes, so does not matter, and this dominant view has informed policymaking internationally. Here, the lead researchers on the world’s biggest study into class size effects present a counter-argument. Through detailed analysis of the complex relations involved in the classroom they reveal the mechanisms that support teachers’ experience, and conclude that class size matters very much indeed. Drawing on 20 years of systematic classroom observations, surveys of practitioners, detailed case studies and extensive reviews of research, Peter Blatchford and Anthony Russell contend that common ways of researching the impact of class size are limited and sometimes misguided. While class size may have no direct effect on pupil outcomes, it has, they say, significant force through interconnections with classroom processes. In describing these connections, the book opens up the everyday world of the classroom and shows that the influence of class size is everywhere. It impacts on teaching, grouping practices and classroom management, the quality of peer relations, tasks given to pupils, and on the time teachers have for marking, assessments and understanding the strengths and challenges for individual pupils. From their analysis, the authors develop a new social pedagogical model of how class size influences work, and identify policy conclusions and implications for teachers and schools.

A complementary volume to Dilly Fung’s A Connected Curriculum for Higher Education (2017), this book explores ‘research-based education’ as applied in practice within the higher education sector. A collection of 15 chapters followed by illustrative vignettes, it showcases approaches to engaging students actively with research and enquiry across disciplines. It begins with one institution’s creative approach to research-based education – UCL’s Connected Curriculum, a conceptual framework for integrating research-based education into all taught programmes of study – and branches out to show how aspects of the framework can apply to practice across a variety of institutions in a range of national settings. The 15 chapters are provided by a diverse range of authors who all explore research-based education in their own way. Some chapters are firmly based in a subject-discipline – including art history, biochemistry, education, engineering, fashion and design, healthcare, and veterinary sciences – while others reach across geopolitical regions, such as Australia, Canada, China, England, Scotland and South Africa. The final chapter offers 12 short vignettes of practice to highlight how engaging students with research and enquiry can enrich their learning experiences, preparing them not only for more advanced academic learning, but also for professional roles in complex, rapidly changing social contexts.

Over the last three decades, a significant amount of research has sought to relate educational institutions, policies, practices and reforms to social structures and agencies. A number of models have been developed that have become the basis for attempting to understand the complex relation between education and society. At the same time, national and international bodies tasked with improving educational performances seem to be writing in a void, in that there is no rigorous theory guiding their work, and their documents exhibit few references to groups, institutions and forces that can impede or promote their programmes and projects. As a result, the recommendations these bodies provide to their clients display little to no comprehension of how and under what conditions the recommendations can be put into effect. The Education System in Mexico directly addresses this problem. By combining abstract insights with the practicalities of educational reforms, policies, practices and their social antecedents, it offers a long overdue reflection of the history, effects and significance of the Mexican educational system, as well as presenting a more cogent understanding of the relationship between educational institutions and social forces in Mexico and around the world.

The history of the UCL Institute of Education is one of persistent renewal. Since its founding in 1902 as the London Day Training College, through its establishment as a university institute and merger with UCL, the IOE has constantly grown into new areas of learning and social research. As a locus for leadership, it has exerted influence upon the nature and direction of education nationally and internationally. Drawing upon a wide range of sources, the connections between internal history and external historical developments are sensitively teased out. The result is an elegantly written history, characterised by substantial scholarship and analysis, and enlivened by illustrations and anecdote. The pages of this book are peopled with some of the most influential, and at times controversial, figures of education, including Sidney Webb, Cyril Burt, Susan Isaacs, Sophie Bryant, Richard Peters, Basil Bernstein, Ann Oakley, Celia Hoyles and Stephen Ball. Two new chapters extend Richard Aldrich’s text to 2020. These examine the extraordinary years of growth in the early 2000s, followed by a period of consolidation, merger with UCL and subsequent expansion. The IOE is unique in successfully pursuing a world-leading research agenda while also supporting a wide range of teacher education, having an impact in London, across Britain and the world.