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  • Publication
    Restricted
    Teaching diverse learners: Conceptualisations and pedagogies of preschool teachers
    (Office of Education Research, National Institute of Education, Singapore, 2020)
    Lim, Sirene May Yin
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    ;
    Zhou, Xiaolei
    This study is relevant in the present climate of concerns about preschool quality (MOE, 2003, 2007, 2008) and supports Singapore‘s ability-driven education system within the national vision of becoming a ―global city‖ (Lim, 2005) and an inclusive society (i.e. ―Singapore 21‖ report). Despite being a private sector, preschools in Singapore have been in the spotlight since the year 2000 when the MOE began to pay greater attention to quality in preschool education by intervening in a number of ways.The key assumption underlying the series of past and ongoing MOE initiatives is that quality preschool education can play a role to equalise or ―level up‖ children from lower socio-economic groups so that they are not disadvantaged in primary school (MOE, 7 Mar 2007). And yet, the definition of quality preschool education remains vague in official discourses and teaching communities. There is much lip service being paid to trendy terms such as ―play-based and interactive‖, or ―engaging and stimulating‖ but what do these actually look like? Do all teachers have common understanding of these supposedly quality practices?
    This study recognizes that Singapore society is becoming increasingly diverse in the 21st century partly due to the continued influx of foreigners, and the widening income gap within its residential population. This diversity is definitely reflected in Singapore preschools. Given the increasing diversity within the populace, this research study‘s focus on teaching diverse learners in the Singapore context is an important contribution to expanding current theoretical notions of human ―diversity‖ and speaking to local and international research on culturally relevant pedagogies for the 21st century, in view of the changing social fabric of this nation.
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  • Publication
    Restricted
    Teaching diverse learners: Conceptualisations and pedagogies of preschool teachers
    (2011)
    Lim, Sirene May Yin
    ;
    ;
    Zhou, Xiaolei
    "Given our interest in advancing teacher inquiry, as well as in exploring preschool teachers' understandings of diverse learners and how to teach diverse learners in Singapore classrooms, the following research questions guided this study: 1. How does this group of effective preschool teachers in Singapore conceptualize and talk about diverse learners in their teaching? 2. How do these teachers' individual conceptualizations of diversity influence their classroom teaching and learning (i.e., teaching practices)?" -- p. 1.
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  • Publication
    Open Access
    Learning through popular music, lessons for the general music programme syllabus in Singapore
    (Office of Education Research, National Institute of Education, Singapore, 2024) ;
    Hilarian, Larry Francis
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    Stead, Peter
    ;
    ;

    This project sought to investigate the identity, role and function of popular music within classroom-based education in Singapore.

    Popular music is characterised by: (i) lnterdisclplinarity (music, dance, poetry, theatre, etc); (ii) It suffuses the lives of school-going youth in their out-of-school curriculum. (iii) Skill acquisition is frequently gained through more informal learning than is usual in institutional settings (Green, 2002). (iv) Participation in popular music by various communities seems to cut across ethnic, religious and age boundaries, which makes popular music participation an interesting study in social integration. (v) Engaging in popular music potentially provides students life-long engagement The impact of popular music in the classroom has not been fully explored.

    Creating, performing and responding to popular music genres arguably act as an apt medium of and for self expression considering the complex nature of an ever-shifting demographic mix and strategies to bring about more effective social integration across communities-of-practice (Wenger 1998) engaging the later cosmopolitan society in Singapore.

    The GMP (2008) document supports the value of popular music beginning with musical skills of composing, improvising and recreating extending to identity formation and multiplicity in identity negotiation in group dynamics (MOE 2008, pp. 7-10). Current broader educational aims are to develop creative, imaginative and socio-culturally well-tempered individuals and popular music has an important educational role to play in this respect. Dairianathan and Lum (2010) have discovered how popular musics re/iterate their place in the music curriculum for music as lived and living space.

    Secondary factors crucial to this research are: (a) to examine the place of popular music in local public and international schools across Singapore, (b) to draw out the intrinsic and extrinsic motivations for school-going youth to be engaged in popular music and (c) to critically examine popular music immersion in relation to the objectives established in the GMP syllabus (MOE 2008).

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