http://ir.mksu.ac.ke/handle/123456780/5966 2026-04-24T07:54:27Z http://ir.mksu.ac.ke/handle/123456780/6375 School Leadership and Educational Change in Singapore Wong, Benjamin; Hairon, Salleh; Ng, Pak Tee There is great interest internationally to understand the success of the Singapore education system in the light of its strong and consistent results in international tests, such as PISA, TIMSS and PIRLS. Singapore ranks consistently among the top few countries for Reading, Mathematics and Science (OECD 2014). Interestingly, while some might have previously attributed the good results to rote learning and memorisation, the results of PISA 2012 have offered a different complexion to the issue. When students were assessed on twenty-first-century skills such as problem-solving and flexibility in thinking, Singapore once again performed well (MOE 2014). Notwithstanding its success, the Singapore education system is changing to help prepare its students for the more complex and demanding socio-economic environment of the twenty-first century. It continuously evolves to ensure that their students are well placed and well prepared to meet the emerging demands of a knowledge-driven global economy (MOE 2010; 2013). Under the 1997 umbrella vision of Thinking Schools, Learning Nation (TSLN), many initiatives were subsequently launched. These included National Education (NE), a four-phased ICT Masterplan and the Teach Less Learn More (TLLM) reform. These, and many other initiatives, reflected the system’s transformation to shift the focus of learning from quantity to quality (Ng 2008). Today, the Singapore education system continues its evolutionary path of change by adopting a student-centric, value-driven education paradigm. It aspires to achieve (Heng 2012a): 2019-01-01T00:00:00Z http://ir.mksu.ac.ke/handle/123456780/6371 Mapping Global Theatre Histories Pizzato, Mark A. Initial Questions, Terms, and Goals 1. Why study theatre history today—when information about the past is readily available on the Web and we are often more concerned about the present and future in our current “postmodern” era? It is important for artists to know the history of their art form. But are there other ways to benefit, too, from a deep yet global sense of theatricality and its many histories (or her-stories)? 2. We all engage in creative play as children, gaining a fuller sense of self (or possible selves) through imaginary interactions with others, sometimes with big people watching, providing a larger symbolic framework. Peers, parents, and other adults also model the roles we take, offering implicit scripts and explicit directions, along with costumes, props, and settings for meaningful identities. This play-acting as children and later in life involves our family, neighborhood, schools, and other communities, yet also television, movies, and interactive online media—expanding the arenas of our self and other awareness. It may also involve “deep play,” which performance theorist Richard Schechner explains as mischief, rebellion, games, and gambling with serious risks. Degrees of joyful or deep play continue from our youth into adulthood through formal theatre, sports, and videogames, on various stages with boundaries and rules. 2019-01-01T00:00:00Z http://ir.mksu.ac.ke/handle/123456780/6362 An Anthology of London in Literature, 1558–1914 Hiller, Geoffrey G.; Groves, Peter L.; Dilnot, Alan F. This anthology brings together extracts from some of the finest writing in English on the subject of that ancient and fascinating city, chosen from the period in which the London we now know was mainly created: the three-anda- half centuries that separate the accession of Elizabeth I from the onset of the First World War, which transformed it from a large town still intimately connected to the neighbouring countryside to the sprawling metropolis of an empire that covered a quarter of the globe. London has always been more than a place to live and work: always the cultural heart of England, for example, and always larger by at least an order of magnitude than any other city in Britain—indeed, for much of this period the largest city in the world. But beyond this, London is a city of the mind, an imaginary space haunted by the great mythopoeic cities of Western culture: Rome, Athens, Babylon, Jerusalem. This is why it has kindled the imagination of some of the greatest writers of English, and why it forms the subject of this anthology. The 142 extracts, which are in all but one case in modernised spelling and punctuation (though including traditional punctuational aids to scansion), are annotated (simple one-word glosses are incorporated into the text in square brackets) and grouped into four sections by historical period, being numbered within those sections: cross-references will take the form “[2.14]” or “(see [4.27])”. Each extract has a brief head-note, and references to the head-note of an extract are indicated by “HN”. References to footnotes will take the form “(see [2.20], n.107)”. 2019-01-01T00:00:00Z http://ir.mksu.ac.ke/handle/123456780/6360 A Course in Rasch Measurement Theory Andrich, David; Marais, Ida This book has arisen from two postgraduate level courses in Rasch measurement theory that have been taught both online and in intensive mode for over two decades at Murdoch University and The University of Western Australia. The theory is generally applied in the fields of education, psychology, sociology, marketing and health outcomes to create measures of social constructs. Social measurement often begins with assessments in ordered categories, with two categories being a special case. To increase their reliability and validity, instruments are composed of multiple, distinct items which assess the same variable. Rasch measurement theory is used to assess the degree to which the design and administration of the instrument are successful and to diagnose problems which need correcting. Following confirmation that an instrument is working as required, persons may be measured on a linear scale with an arbitrary unit and arbitrary origin. The main audiences for the book are graduate students and professionals who are engaged in social measurement. Therefore, the emphasis of course is on first principles of both the theory and its applications. Because software is available to carry out analyses of real data, small hand-worked examples are presented in the book. The software used in the analysed examples, which is helpful in working through the text, is RUMM2030 (Rasch unidimensional models for measurement). Although the first principles are emphasized, much of the course is based on research by the two authors and their colleagues. The distinctive feature of Rasch measurement theory is that the model studied in this book arises independently of any data—it is based on the requirement of invariant comparisons of objects with respect to instruments within a specified frame of reference and vice versa. This is a feature of all measurement. Deviations of the data from the model are taken as anomalies to be explained and the instrument improved. The approach taken is to provide the researcher with confidence to be in control of the analysis and interpretation of data, and to make professional rather than primarily statistical decisions. Because statistical principles are necessarily involved, reviews of the necessary statistics are provided in Appendix D. 2019-01-01T00:00:00Z