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Homework: What’s the Point?

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of LEARNING

Volume 17, Number 10

Homework: What’s the Point?

Heather Dwyer Sadlier

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Homework: What’s the Point?
Heather Dwyer Sadlier, University of New England, ME, USA

Abstract: Homework comes bearing baggage: myriad definitions, interpretations, applications, and
outcomes, both positive and negative. Throughout the twentieth and now twenty-first centuries,

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homework has been a “given,” a nearly nightly ritual for many students and their families, with both
intended and unintended consequences. Ensuring homework effectiveness starts with teachers asking
and answering the question: what’s the point? This question takes the perennial homework discussion
beyond the quantitative question of “how much homework” and delves deeply into more qualitative
questions. Unless we give weight to the “why,” we will continue to measure homework’s merits by
comparing “apples to oranges,” and underemphasize both the effective practices to employ and the
pointless practices to abandon in this recurring debate.

Keywords: Homework Practices, Learning Goals, Backward Planning, Differentiation, Motivation,

Essential Questions, Project-based Learning, Home-school Learning Partnerships

I
N THIS ERA of standards-based learning goals and differentiated curricula, effective
homework practices must be purposefully defined, educationally defensible, and
thoughtfully designed to meet learning goals, not principally to match the minutes
mandated by a school district’s homework policy.

Homework Pros and Cons

Homework comes bearing baggage: myriad definitions, interpretations, applications, and
outcomes, both positive and negative. Throughout the twentieth and now twenty-first centur-
ies, homework has been a given, a nearly nightly ritual for students and their families, with
both intended and unintended consequences. Intended consequences for students and their
families may include (1) practicing material already presented by the teacher in class; (2)
previewing upcoming material to prepare students for in class lessons; (3) applying skills
learned in class to a new problem or situation; (4) producing products that synthesize a unit’s
or semester’s worth of learning; (5) fostering communication and supportive partnerships
with parents/guardians; and (6) developing study skills and independent learning skills in
students. Unintended consequences for these same stakeholders can include (1) creating
stress between students and their parents/guardians; (2) confusing students with different
instructional methods employed by family members with the best of intentions but little
knowledge of best practices; (3) limiting students’ time for family, community, and extra-
curricular activities; (4) causing student burnout and boredom regarding a particular subject
or learning in general; (5) encouraging cheating; and (6) exacerbating socio-economic-based
inequalities that impact student achievement. A literature review conducted by the Queensland
Department of Education and the Arts (2004) noted similar consequences.
Cooper’s (2001) evaluation of multiple studies that looked at amount of homework and
achievement across grade levels revealed the following: when the amount of homework

The International Journal of Learning

Volume 17, Number 10, 2011, http://www.Learning-Journal.com, ISSN 1447-9494
© Common Ground, Heather Dwyer Sadlier, All Rights Reserved, Permissions:
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THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF LEARNING

done by students was compared to subsequent achievement, high school students benefitted
the most, junior high students’ benefits were about half that of the high school students, and
the effects of homework on achievement for elementary students were negligible. Since not
all homework is created equal, going beyond measuring minutes mandated by policy to ex-
amining the more qualitative dimensions of homework practices helps teachers make informed
pedagogical decisions about how to enhance the educational outcomes of homework assign-
ments for students.

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How can teachers maximize homework’s benefits and mitigate its more negative outcomes?
Depending upon the nature of the more qualitative characteristics of required tasks, a student
may benefit from, and be fully engaged with, a well-crafted homework assignment that ex-
ceeds a school’s policy-prescribed time limits for her/his grade level, or already frustrated
and/or bored five minutes into a poorly conceived assignment. To be effective, homework
requires the same educationally defensible learning goals and carefully differentiated design
teachers utilize when creating successful class lessons, plus strong learning partnerships
between teachers, students, and parents.

Determining Defensible Outcomes

Ensuring homework effectiveness starts with teachers asking and answering the question:
What’s the point? This question takes the perennial homework discussion beyond the
quantitative question of “how much homework” and delves deeply into more qualitative
questions. Unless we give weight to the “why,” we will continue to measure homework’s
merits by comparing ‘apples to oranges,’ and underemphasize both the effective practices
to employ and the pointless practices to abandon in this recurring debate.
Although generally on different sides of the homework debate, Kohn (2006) and Marzano
& Pickering (2007) agree that assigned homework should meet students’ learning goals, not
merely satisfy homework policies that dictate a grade level’s time-on-task. Without a plan,
homework devolves into the universally disparaged “busywork,” prescribed principally to
obey the Ten-minute Rule1, upon which many school districts base their homework policies.
This is spurious justification for giving homework to students:

Homework in most schools isn’t limited to those occasions when it seems appropriate
and important. Rather, the point of departure seems to be: “We’ve decided ahead of
time that children will have to do something every night (or several times a week).
Later on we’ll figure out what to make them do.” (Kohn, 2007, para. 5)

Keeping “The Point” in Mind

Backward planning (Grant & McTighe, 2005) is a pedagogical approach that forces educators
to start with the (end) point in mind. Teachers identify the essential questions that will be
answered, the enduring understandings that students will grasp by the end of the unit, and
then write lesson plans and select activities for learning linked to these targeted outcomes.

1
The “Ten-minute Rule” mandates homework minutes per grade: 10 minutes multiplied by the student's grade
level per night of assigned homework is the most common policy guideline.

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 HEATHER DWYER SADLIER

This more considered pedagogical protocol runs counter to what has been the status quo
approach to homework:

[S]tandardized “homework policies” requir[e] teachers to give a certain number of

minutes of homework every day, or to make assignments on the same schedule every
week (for example, x minutes of math on Tuesdays and Thursdays) . . . a frank admission
that homework isn’t justified by a given lesson, much less is it a response to what spe-

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cific kids need at a specific time. Such policies sacrifice thoughtful instruction in order
to achieve predictability, and they manage to do a disservice not only to students but,
when imposed from above, to teachers as well. (Kohn, 2007, para. 10)

Essential questions, which form the foundation for backward planning along with a country’s,
state’s or school district’s learning goals, lead to enduring understandings and contribute to
a curriculum compass that can steer both class work and homework toward defensible
learning targets. According to Wiggins (2007, para. 2), criteria that elevate a question to
the “essential” level include the following:

1. Causes genuine and relevant inquiry into the big ideas and core content;
2. Provokes deep thought, lively discussion, sustained inquiry, and new understanding as
well as more questions;
3. Requires students to consider alternatives, weigh evidence, support their ideas, and
justify their answers;
4. Stimulates vital, on-going rethinking of big ideas, assumptions, and prior lessons;
5. Sparks meaningful connections with prior learning and personal experiences;
6. Naturally recurs, creating opportunities for transfer to other situations and subjects.

“Since each lesson was organized around an essential question . . . most of the new homework
involved reinforcing and transferring learning” (Davis, 2007, para. 3).
Utilizing backward planning and essential questions to craft homework assignments make
it more likely that teachers’ educational purposes are met and that students get “the point,”
leading to greater levels of engagement and productivity.
These clear connections between class work and homework increase students’ understand-
ing of core concepts and the odds that they can successfully apply this knowledge when they
are on their own away from their teachers and other support personnel and resources.
Homework built within the framework of essential questions ensures that assignments will
be worth doing because the work is an integral part of a student’s educational program, not
added on to the school day merely to meet the requirements of the school district’s homework
policy.

Project-based Learning
Project-based homework can help teachers meet both quantitative and qualitative recommend-
ations for purposeful homework, providing opportunities for learning activities that are nat-
urally differentiated and self-leveling. Cooper (2006) found significant evidence of improved
results in students’ achievement when homework material is spread out over several assign-
ments, a given for project-based work, rather than only focused on what was covered in class

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on that specific day. Project-based approaches also put knowledge and skills in real world
contexts, making them much more engaging to students (Edutopia, 2001, para. 1) and offering
readily apparent answers to their inevitable questions: “When will we use this?” and “Why
do we need to know this?” – both, of course, closely related to “What’s the point?”
Curricula that focus on project-based learning are more likely to involve current events
and problem-solving in the classroom, community, state, nation, or world. Students engage
more readily with These “now-focused” topics engage students because they connect more

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authentically with students’ lives and interestst. “The core idea of project-based learning is
that real-world problems capture students’ interest and provoke serious thinking as the students
acquire and apply new knowledge in a problem-solving context” (David, 2008, p. 80). This
more compelling learning links the classroom to experiences and resources literally “outside
the box.” Such opportunities to apply learning in meaningful, real-life contexts readily answer
everyone’s “what’s the point?” question with regard to both homework and class work. In
such classrooms, the school walls are porous, with ideas and learning flowing into and out
of classrooms, from and to local and web-based resources to solve problems and complete
projects.2 When teachers make project-based learning an integral part of the curriculum,
homework becomes a natural extension of class work.
Educationally effective projects do not have to be either dramatic or extensive to be effect-
ive. Even mini-projects can generate interest and enthusiasm for homework. The majority
of a class of seventh graders struggled to stay focused on worksheets and other more tradi-
tional homework in a middle school science class. But the same students reacted enthusiast-
ically to the following assignment from their teacher: each student had to measure a family
member’s pulse rate before and after imbibing various beverages. In class the next day, the
students aggregated their collected homework data and drew conclusions from their homework
research projects. The teacher’s learning objectives were achieved, and students were motiv-
ated and on-task, increasing their independent learning and problem-solving skills.
Project-based learning, as aforementioned, keeps it “real,” for students and teachers, and
offers inherently differentiated and motivating options to match the interests and ability
levels of all students. “Project-based work is an approach that teachers have found intrinsically
engaging for students . . . kids who routinely neglected homework behave differently when
working on projects” (Sylvia Rabiner in Darling-Hammond & Ifill-Lynch, 2006, p. 9). When
teachers model and reinforce project-based learning, students get “turned-on” and become
researchers and teachers themselves in this more genuine approach to learning.
Additional challenge is added when the homework time target for a particular grade level
is shared between multiple subject areas, making it all the more daunting for teachers to
make everything fit within the prescribed parameters for the grade level’s “minutes per
night.” Serving as a value-added solution to this time-limit dilemma, outcomes from project-
based learning turn out to be “even stronger when projects and courses fully integrate two
or more subjects, such as English and social studies or math and physics” (Pearlman, 2006,
para. 7). Teachers can work together to create cross-curricular homework assignments that
meet multiple learning objectives and respect the prescribed time parameters. Giving assign-
ments with extended deadlines allows for the longer time blocks project-based work requires.
Teachers can trust that the daily median time-on-task will meet a school district’s homework

2
Find resources, watch videos, listen to teachers and students involved in project-based learning at http://www.eduto-
pia.org, the George Lucas Education Foundation website.

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 HEATHER DWYER SADLIER

policy. With project-based assignments, time is either a non-factor, or the student and her/his
family are more in control.

Differentiating Assignments to Increase “Doability”

In order to ensure that all students have legitimate opportunities for success, it is vital that
teachers take into account their students’ myriad learning styles, abilities, and interests, align

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them with learning objectives, and differentiate homework assignments accordingly (Tom-
linson, 1999). When students’ differences are not taken into account by teachers, assigned
tasks can be too difficult or demand too much time and cause stress and “burn out” or frustrate
students to the point that they give up and submit lower quality, less-than-their-best work
or cheat because they do not believe they are capable of completing the assignment success-
fully and lose their motivation to attempt the assigned work.
Motivation to learn requires self-efficacy, which is not merely a student’s understanding
that a certain behavior will produce a certain outcome, but the student’s absolute certainty
that she or he is capable of successfully executing the behavior it takes to produce that out-
come (Bandura, 1977). Teachers create self-efficacious learners by carefully crafting differ-
entiated assignments, so that all students, despite their “differences,” can have both appro-
priate challenge and opportunity for success. Choice, too, plays a critical role in a student’s
level of motivation for learning and can have a profound impact on homework outcomes. “
. . . how much ownership do students have of their learning? Practically none. It’s not sur-
prising that their interest in learning dissipates and that teachers complain of unmotivated
students” (Wolk, 2008, p. 9). By giving students choice, the chance to have a say in their
own learning, teachers activate powerfully engaging and motivating learning processes.
Embedding choice in homework assignments also offers natural opportunities for honoring
the aforementioned differences in learning styles and abilities and acknowledges the import-
ance of allowing for the expression of students’ multiple intelligences in both learning and
assessment.

“ . . . allow [students] to choose the product or approach that appeals to them. They
should choose the best product for communicating their understanding of the topic or
text. Students thus discover . . . something about the nature of their own interests, con-
cerns, styles, and intelligences” (Silver, H., Strong, R., & Perini, M., 1997, p. 27).

It goes without saying that there is a distinct difference between what students can do with
and without a teacher’s assistance. These two points on a student’s learning continuum are
commonly referred to as her/his instructional level and independent level. Vygotsky (1978)
identified the two loci as a learner’s actual and potential development and the space in
between as the zone of proximal development, where teachers should target instruction. When
teachers differentiate, they create homework assignments that are accessible at each student’s
independent level. This makes it possible for students to be self-efficacious, successful
learners.
Another difference to take into account is each student’s processing pace: individual stu-
dents may take more or less time than a teacher’s estimate. Engagement with the task, as
well as the assignment’s degree of difficulty will vary from student to student. In addition,
individual students may devote extra time to an assignment, either by choice, when they

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elect to dig deeper, or necessity, when they are in over their heads and struggling to complete
the homework.
When planning homework for students that meets these varied criteria, it is critical that
teachers also factor in the distinct differences between available support for class work versus
homework. In the classroom, teachers can help students learn by consciously teaching
within each student’s zone of proximal development. Furthermore, as trained professionals,
educators are attentive observers, readily available and able to support each learner’s progress

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by scaffolding, i.e. offering targeted, timely assistance for each student, as necessary.
Unfortunately, as previously discussed, the homework playing fields for students are not
level. External to schools, exigent environments await many of students when they leave
classrooms at the end of the day. Less than optimum living situations can compromise stu-
dents’ opportunities for successfully completing assignments (Darling-Hammond & Ifill-
Lynch, 2006, p. 8). Therefore, teachers cannot expect that every student will have readily
available and appropriate assistance with their homework assignments. Teachers must, ac-
cordingly, plan assignments that are accessible and doable at each student’s independent
learning level.

Learning Partnerships
When teachers ask students about the positive and negative impacts of homework assignments
and listen and respond to the answers, these interactions build the classroom community,
readily reveal whether the teacher has differentiated assignments correctly, and create critical
learning partnerships between teachers and students. Establishing and maintaining these
open lines of communication allow teachers to collect real time data from students regarding
homework assignments and to assess the qualitative and quantitative dimensions.
Teachers can solicit this invaluable feedback by regularly surveying their students via in-
formal and formal check-ins, and use the results to make adjustments. After polling her
students, a high school history teacher altered assignments in two of her classes. The assign-
ments were well conceived, but she had underestimated the time required to complete the
tasks. As a result of the changes, the quality of students’ work rose and their stress levels
dropped.
Similarly, asking for and responding to input from students’ families about homework
assignments builds “teacher-parent partnerships for learning” (Allen, 2008) and a feeling of
shared responsibility between school and home. For one mother and her eleven-year old
daughter, math homework always meant a dreaded evening of drill, with a full page of pencil
and paper practice examples to get through before bedtime. But when mother and daughter
transformed the homework task into creating and playing a fraction card game, the learning
became “awesome,” from the daughter’s perspective. The teacher chose to copy and share
the student’s game with the entire class; as a result, everyone in the class developed a better
understanding of the fraction facts in a more engaging and effective way.
To create these critical school-home connections, teachers should regularly solicit feedback
from families and use the results to make homework improvements for both individual stu-
dents and their entire classes. Parents/guardians can serve as invaluable reality checks on
homework assignments when teachers listen to them and tailor assignments accordingly. A
fifth grade teacher credits a parent he met during his first year of teaching with raising his
consciousness about the potential impact of homework assignments on families. He sent

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 HEATHER DWYER SADLIER

each of his students home most afternoons with a packet that included a leveled reading
book and a page of language arts activities he had designed for the students and their par-
ents/guardians to complete together. Mrs. B, mother of one of his fifth graders, stopped by
after school early in the year. The parent complimented the teacher on his creative homework
assignments, and then proceeded to kindly inform him what transpired at her home between
the time she and her co-parent arrived home from work and when bedtime arrived for their
three children.

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The teacher wasn’t a parent himself at that point and admitted he had only the vaguest
notion of how one could balance parenting demands with transporting children to after-school
activities, orchestrating family dinner times, and successfully guiding children through baths
and bedtime books or dealing with more serious parenting challenges. However attractive
and differentiated, the fifth grade teacher’s homework assignments were “over-the-top” for
this family: “It wasn’t going to happen.” Mrs. B. couldn’t, or wisely wouldn’t, sacrifice
family sanity or sanctity in the name of too much homework.
Teachers need to be aware that too much of a good thing is not always wonderful. It’s
also critical that teachers neither assume nor expect that parents/guardians have the time or
requisite content knowledge to be “substitute teachers” each evening for their children. At
all grade levels and in all subject areas, teachers can provide multiple methods – via in-person
conversation, phone calls, mailed communiqués, home visits and/or email – for parents/guard-
ians to provide feedback that informs teachers about the appropriateness of assignments for
their child, both in terms of degree of difficulty and time-on-task. Homework policies that
instruct parents to literally “draw the line” on homework when the required time for the
grade level has been reached can provide important information for teachers, as well.
This inclusive outreach to students’ families builds the all-important, respectful relation-
ships between home and school and offers key answers to the question: “How can schools
meaningfully engage families in supporting student learning?” (Allen, 2008, p. 22). To en-
courage and support these home-school partnerships, teachers can offer guidelines for
“homework helpers” and also define their roles, i.e., to provide encouragement and support,
not “the answers” for the student; to create study space and structure; and to avoid negative,
punitive practices that create “homework hell” for all concerned.3
It is imperative that teachers not equate a lack of interest in or appropriate involvement
in a child’s homework with an absence of care or concern. Parents/guardians “who do not
want the best for [their children] . . . are still the exception” (Moore, 2009). Challenging and
sometimes insurmountable circumstances may handicap parents’/guardians’ efforts to fully
support their children’s learning. Many families deal with overwhelming challenges: poverty,
the economics of un- or underemployment, illness, other family members who require special
attention, the devastation of homelessness, and other traumas and misfortunes.
Keeping the homework playing field level for all students requires that teachers provide
all materials that are necessary for each assignment or, if that is not possible, change the as-
signment so that all students have more equal opportunities to accomplish and excel at as-
signed homework tasks. When teachers ignore socio-economic differences, they privilege
students with resources over students without. It is vital that teachers never assume that
technology of any kind or even the most basic of supplies are readily available for students.

3
Students and their parents/guardians can check the availability of “homework hotlines” for their area of the
country at edutopia.org/homework.

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Students will, understandably, be too proud or embarrassed to request these resources.

Teachers can increase educational equity by allowing these understandings of students’ dif-
ferences to guide the design of assignments and by dedicating in-class time for larger, longer-
range assignments, so that everyone has equal access to requisite resources.

Final Thoughts

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Once students leave classrooms with homework assignments stuffed in backpacks or filed
on their laptops, all bets are off. Whether the assigned homework is of a longer and more
project-focused nature, or shorter, and more practice-focused, there are pedagogical practices
that can support students’ learning.
To increase the likelihood of successful homework outcomes for students, teachers must
pay attention to the same best practices that result in optimal class work outcomes. Backward
planning, guided by essential questions and enduring understandings, ensures that homework,
like class work, will advance students toward specified learning outcomes. Project-based
learning is an exemplar for meaningfully and seamlessly integrating class work and home-
work; it is an approach that naturally engages students with real world problems and easily
extends in-class lessons. Differentiation allows teachers to include students’ abilities and
interests in the curricular calculus and aim assignments at independent learning levels, effect-
ively addressing the fairness factor. Listening to students and families helps teachers recognize
the realities of what students can achieve independently and builds all-important learning
partnerships.
In sum, homework assignments should be driven by sound pedagogy and linked to worthy
learning outcomes. All homework stakeholders – teachers, students, and parents/guardians
– should be able to offer an educationally defensible and individually satisfying answer to
the question: “What’s the point?”

References
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Cooper, H., Robinson, J. C., & Patall, E. A. (2006). Does homework improve academic achievement?
A synthesis of research, 1987–2003. Review of Educational Research. 76(1): 1–62.
Darling-Hammond, L. & Ifill-Lynch, O. (2006). Helping struggling students: If they’d only do their
work. Educational Leadership. 3(5): 8-13.
David, J.L. (2008). Project-based learning. Educational Leadership. 65(5): 80-82.
Davis, S. (2007). Reconsidering homework with understanding in mind. Retrieved from http://www.au-
thenticeducation.org/bigideas/article.lasso?artid=47
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findings. Queensland, Australia.
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MA: Da Capo Press.
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tp://www.alfiekohn.org/teaching/rethinkinghomework.htm

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Marzano, R.J., & Pickering, D.J. (2007). The case for and against homework. Educational Leadership.
64(6): 74-79.
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Pearlman, B. (2006). New skills for a new century. Retrieved from http://cell.uindy.edu/docs/NewS-
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Silver, H., Strong, R., & Perini, M. (1997). Integrating learning styles and multiple intelligences.
Educational Leadership. 55(1): 22-27.
Tomlinson, C.A. (1999). The Differentiated Classroom: Responding to the Needs of All Learners.
Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
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About the Author

Dr. Heather Dwyer Sadlier
Dr. Heather Dwyer Sadlier has a doctorate in Educational Leadership and over twenty-five
years experience in education, including K-12 and university teaching. She conducts courses
for pre-service teachers and bias, harassment, and hate prevention workshops for educators
and students. Her courses, workshops, and research focus on leadership and teaching practices
that convey respect and support for individuals’ myriad differences and increase understanding
between and among the members of various groups. Publications include: College classroom
climate: The professor’s pivotal role (2008), The International Journal of the Humanities,
Volume 6; Breaking down barriers, constructing connections: Strategies for connecting “us”
to “them,” Social Studies and Diversity Education: What we Do and Why We Do It (2009);
and A School Leader’s Conversations: Perceived Impacts on Relationships and School Cli-
mate(2009).

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EDITORS
Mary Kalantzis, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA.
Bill Cope, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA.

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EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD
Michael Apple, University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA.
David Barton, Lancaster University, Milton Keynes, UK.
Mario Bello, University of Science, Cuba.
Manuela du Bois-Reymond, Universiteit Leiden, Leiden, The Netherlands.
Robert Devillar, Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw, USA.
Daniel Madrid Fernandez, University of Granada, Spain.
Ruth Finnegan, Open University, Milton Keynes, UK.
James Paul Gee, University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA.
Juana M. Sancho Gil, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
Kris Gutierrez, University of California, Los Angeles, USA.
Anne Hickling-Hudson, Queensland University of Technology, Kelvin Grove, Australia.
Roz Ivanic, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK.
Paul James, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia.
Carey Jewitt, Institute of Education, University of London, London, UK.
Andeas Kazamias, University of Wisconsin, Madison, USA.
Peter Kell, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia.
Michele Knobel, Montclair State University, Montclair, USA.
Gunther Kress, Institute of Education, University of London, London, UK.
Colin Lankshear, James Cook University, Cairns, Australia.
Kimberly Lawless, University of Illinois, Chicago, USA.
Sarah Michaels, Clark University, Worcester, USA.
Jeffrey Mok, Miyazaki International College, Miyazaki, Japan.
Denise Newfield, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Ernest O’Neil, Ministry of Education, Sana’a, Yemen.
José-Luis Ortega, University of Granada, Granada, Spain.
Francisco Fernandez Palomares, University of Granada, Granada, Spain.
Ambigapathy Pandian, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia.
Miguel A. Pereyra, University of Granada, Granada, Spain.
Scott Poynting, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK.
Angela Samuels, Montego Bay Community College, Montego Bay, Jamaica.
Michel Singh, University of Western Sydney, Sydney, Australia.
Helen Smith, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia.
Richard Sohmer, Clark University, Worcester, USA.
Brian Street, University of London, London, UK.
Giorgos Tsiakalos, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece.
Salim Vally, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Gella Varnava-Skoura, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece.
Cecile Walden, Sam Sharpe Teachers College, Montego Bay, Jamaica.
Nicola Yelland, Victoria University, Melbourne, Australia.
Wang Yingjie, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China.
Zhou Zuoyu, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China.
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