National Planning Meeting for the Connecting Lives and Learning (CLL) Project

ANSN personnel from Perth, Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide recently attended a planning day in Adelaide facilitated by Andrew Bills, the ANSN CLL Project Leader, at the University of South Australia, to consider how the social justice challenges emanating from two Australia Research Council projects, ALIGN and CLL, could be transformed into new ANSN work with schools and systems personnel nationally.

Ann King from the ALIGN project and Associate Professor Rob Hattam from the University of South Australia, who has led the CLL project since its inception, provided conceptual overviews of both projects, with the ANSN team then moving into strategic planning work in the afternoon.

In essence, Andrew writes, both projects paint a grim picture about life in secondary schools. The current research into Australian schooling confirms that “after all is said and done, it is what actually happens between teachers, students and their engagement with knowledge that produces learning” (Hattam, 2007). The research from both of these projects confirms the centrality of pedagogical practice as the site of innovation if schools are to improve student learning.  It also indicates that schooling’s structures and cultures are currently not promoting the centrality of pedagogy and are struggling to be attuned to young people’s lifeworld choices in relation to school, work and social life patterns. 

Potential National CLL Hub work was then identified with joined-up work involving Ann King's ALIGN group of schools around Sydney, Gavin Grift's Curriculum Planning Hub in Melbourne and schools in challenging contexts that Leith Hogan has been working with in Perth offering immediate conversational space for CLL work to begin. The CLL website has also received interest form DECS in South Australia and 20 South Australian schools wishing to pursue the pedagogical challenge of doing middle schooling work within the CLL big ideas frame.

To view or download a Powerpoint presentation that offers an overview of the key learnings from the CLL project see below
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Conceptualising CLL.ppt129 KB