Objectives and Purpose of a comparative study of Australia and England

How do educators in the contested fields of English and literacy “find a balance between external expectations, contemporary pressures, professional aspirations, and personal values”? (O’Sullivan, 2016, p. 65).

The purpose of this research was to create new understandings about the impact of educational reform on teachers’ professionalism, their pedagogies, and their beliefs about their subject of English, focusing on English teachers in New South Wales (NSW) and across England.

Globally teachers have been experiencing strong external pressures, reductions to autonomy and constraints on their creativity (Goodwyn, 2013, 2016) especially in a subject area like English where teachers have deep convictions about the vital importance of engaging students in local, immediate ways, untrammelled by nationalistic agendas.

The identity of English teachers in Australia and England has marked similarities, characterised by passionate attachments to teaching literature (Goodwyn et al, 2015), a student centred ideology, essentially a Personal Growth model (Goodwyn, 2017, 2018) strongly inflected by viewing students as meaning making agents who adopt a critical literacy perspective on texts and language (Goodwyn, 2004, 2005). We do not propose a particular definition of English here but reference the elusive nature of the subject, characterised vividly in

John Dixon’s seminal work ‘Growth through English’ as “The quicksilver subject”, a dynamic and fluid substance, moving and flowing, filling all available spaces.

There are also differences of emphasis, critical literacy having more influence in Australia and cultural analysis in England. Both countries place a significant emphasis in schools and universities on the Literary Heritage of Britain.

n England an increasingly strong governmental intervention places a very narrow focus on a narrowly traditional view of ‘The English Literary heritage’, a view is not shared by English teachers. In Australia there has been a fierce debate about the role of literacy in relation to subject English, intensified by the national testing of literacy skills.

Another marked commonality in Australia and England is increasing surveillance and regulation, leading to deep teacher dissatisfaction, with many leaving the profession. The project was therefore designed to address many common traditions and issues extant in the two countries but paying close attention to differences and to individual teacher’s experiences.

• O’Sullivan, K-A. & Goodwyn, A.C. (2021). Subject English for future students: the visions of English teachers in NSW and England. Submitted to English in Australia.
• O’Sullivan, K-A. & Goodwyn, A.C. (2020). Contested territories: English teachers in Australia and England remaining resilient and creative in constraining times. English in Education. 54,3, 224- 238.
• Goodwyn, A. (September 2019) Adaptive agency: some surviving and some thriving in interesting times. Invited Paper to English Teaching Practice and Critique – special issue on teacher agency. Vol, 18. Issue 2. pp. 21-35.
• Goodwyn, A. [2019] English teachers as researchers, from reflecting on practice to researching into practice. The English Magazine. pp. 46-48, Summer 2019.
• Goodwyn, A. (2019) From ASTs to Leading Practitioners: new opportunities for expert teachers of English. The English Magazine. pp.26-28. Spring, 2019. London, NATE.
• Goodwyn, A. (2017). From Personal Growth (1966) to Personal Growth and Social Agency – proposing an invigorated model for the 21st Century, English in Australia, 52(1), 66-73.

Keywords: Secondary English teachers; Adaptive agency, professional identity, policy, resilience.