Maximising the awareness and impact in policy and practice of a multi-method research exploring the classwork of primary-school teaching assistants

除此之外，该奖学金旨在提高我的博士学位及其在众多受众（例如政治家和学者）中的使用意识。为此，将利用学术出版物、会议和播客讲座。在描述下一个奖学金的目标之前，我将发表一份博士论文摘要。我的博士研究的是国际上教学从业者（TAs）的课堂作业，他们在SEND儿童的主流教育中发挥着至关重要的作用，而教师则管理着整个班级的教育。虽然现有的许多研究都是针对那些培训有限的助教的国家，他们的角色主要是帮助有SEND的孩子，但我的研究是在一个背景下进行的（意大利），为助教提供了丰富的培训，并与教师平等地承担了整个班级的责任。通过对意大利小学助教的课堂观察和对其他31位助教的访谈，该研究表明：a)助教用SEND方式指导孩子，并且很少进行全班教学。b)尽管训练有素，但他们并没有有效地用SEND来支撑孩子的思维——他们给孩子提供解决任务的答案，限制了他们的思维和学习。此外，他们缺乏对儿童如何最好地学习的关键社会文化原则的认识，例如通过将完成任务的责任转移给他们来培养他们的思维。因此，分享博士学位的奖学金计划将有助于对相对未开发的研究背景的现有知识做出贡献。此外，它还将披露一个具有国际影响力的助教实践理论框架的更新版本。这将细致入微的博士研究结果添加到现有的TA解决方案目录中，作为TA的实用策略（例如为学习者提供乘法表以支持轻松完成任务）。它告诉助教如何根据上述社会文化原则设计有效的指导，即所谓的“脚手架”。尽管是基于少数助教的经验，但由于意大利助教的统一就业条件和培训，分享博士研究结果也可能对意大利政策制定者产生重要影响，从而对像博士学员这样训练有素的助教的教学产生负面影响。其中，似乎有必要在教师培训中加入更多关于儿童发展的社会文化原则的培训，以及现有的充足的教学方法课程（例如，通过使用我的脚手架框架）。这可能会提高助教对他们的实践对儿童学习和实践教学的影响的认识。虽然这一政策含义与意大利的情况密切相关，但审查教师和助教培训的国家也可能从中受益（例如，英国）。此外，该奖学金将开展新的研究，以解决以下问题：“小学教师认为有效的脚手架实践的技术特征是什么，以支持SEND儿童的学习？”为了解决这个问题，我将依靠以下方法：a)一个未经探索的合作研究设计，其中8名小学助教和我将对研究问题主题进行两次焦点讨论（FG）。首先，我将使用fg来展示我的脚手架框架。接下来，助教们将介绍他们有效的教学实践的例子来更新这一点。b)与我的博士学位（英国小学教育）不同的研究背景的分析，从而有可能促进细致入微的助教课堂作业和发现。稍后，我将在书面文件中概述结果。参与者将审阅并修改。它的最终版本将通过参与者的学校网站分享，以潜在地影响更广泛的实践者群体的实践。

Among other things, this fellowship aims to increase awareness of my PhD and its use amongst multiple audiences (e.g., politicians and scholars). To this end, academic publications, conferences, and podcast talks will be used. Before describing the next fellowship's aims, an abstract of my PhD will be produced. My PhD explored the classwork of teaching practitioners (TAs) internationally playing a crucial role in the mainstream education of children with SEND while teachers manage whole-class education. Whilst much of the existing research has targeted countries using TAs with limited training and a role focused on only assisting children with SEND, my study was carried out in a context (Italy) providing TAs with wealthy training and whole-class responsibilities equally to teachers. Drawing from classroom observations of a TA and interviews with 31 other TAs in Italian primary schools, the study suggested that: a) The TAs instructed children with SEND and infrequently managed whole-class instruction. b) Regardless of being well trained, they did not effectively scaffold the thinking of children with SEND - they supplied children with answers to solve tasks, limiting their thinking and learning. Also, they demonstrated a lack of awareness of a key sociocultural principle as to how children best learn, such as fostering their thinking by transferring them the responsibility of task completion.Thus, the fellowship plan of sharing this PhD will contribute to existing knowledge of a relatively unexplored research context. Also, it will disclose an updated version of an internationally influential theoretical framework of TA practices. This adds the nuanced PhD findings as to TA practical strategies (such as providing the learner with a multiplications table to support easy task completion) to an existing catalogue of TA solutions. It informs TAs about designing effective instructions, known as "scaffolding", according to the sociocultural tenet above. Despite being based on the experience of a few TAs, sharing the PhD findings might also have important implications for Italian policymakers due to uniform employment conditions and training of Italian TAs, whereby negatively impacting the teaching of highly trained TAs like the PhD participants. Among these is the seeming need to include more training on sociocultural principles of child development in the training of TAs, alongside its existing ample provision of courses on teaching methods (e.g., by using my scaffolding framework). This might improve TAs' awareness of the effect of their practice on children's learning and their teaching in practice. Though this policy implication is germane to the Italian context, countries reviewing the training of teachers and TAs might also benefit from this (e.g., the UK).In addition, this fellowship will conduct new research addressing this question: "What do primary-school TAs perceive are the technical features of effective scaffolding practices to support the learning of children with SEND?" To deal with this, I will rely on the following: a) An unexplored collaborative research design, wherein eight primary-school TAs and I will have two focus discussions (FG) on the research question topic. Firstly, I will use the FGs to present my scaffolding framework. Next, the TAs will describe examples of their effective teaching practices to update this.b) The analysis of a different research context than in my PhD (UK primary education), thus potentially promoting nuanced TA classwork and findings. Later, I will outline the results in a written document. The participants will review and modify it. Its final version will be shared via the participants' school websites to potentially shape the practices of a wider group of practitioners.