Editorial

This general issue contains six articles in English, six in French, which we have organized thematically, as well as two Notes from the Field. It is in this general issue that we will say adieu and express our huge thanks to our five French editors. (We will introduce our new editorial team in an issue to follow—French and English editors both). First, we turn to introducing the contents of the present general issue.

The first four articles look critically as well as creatively at issues of inequity: Rodrigues on street art concerning Indigenous women and girls; Gillies’ analysis of race science as integral to anti-racist education; Mackey on integrating decolonizing education within culturally responsive pedagogy; and Almanssori on teaching to gender-based violence. We then step back with Bourgeois and Tarif to consider construction of (an initial) teacher identity and what that involves, before turning to Mamprin to think with teachers what exemplifies workplace well-being. The next three articles address a particular situation that teachers (and students) confronted—pandemic-inspired remote teaching and learning—which became entangled with larger questions of teacher identity and community (Thurber et al); (un)equitable practices in rural education (Kettley & Mitton), and, returning to fundamental questions, to probe technological tools for their ability to convey ‘cognitive presence’ (Petit et al). How can we engage adolescents in meaningful philosophical dialogue about salient issues, like these in this issue or other questions important to young people? Aimé et al offer some thoughts based on discussions with nineteen secondary students. Tortochot and Moineau look at the difference that introduction of an industrial partner made to teaching and learning in the classroom. We conclude our line-up of articles with Duval, who brings us back to the vital matter of young children and where schooling starts: how can teachers equip children with the executive functions they will need in transitioning to the next step of their learning journey, Grade 1? Finally, Allaire, Laferrière and Nadeau-Tremblay, in their Note from the Field, offer some stimulating thoughts on what researchers themselves have learned over the years through the process of conducting research. For his part, Krause speaks to the power of reverse-engineering in teaching Math to pre-service teachers. Brief synopses of the various articles and of the Notes follow.

Rodrigues is a second-generation settler of European descent who, as a journalist, first became sensitized to how dominant narratives harm Indigenous women and girls. The article focuses on how street art can disrupt these narratives. Based on a four-year research project grounded in feminist public pedagogy, Rodrigues interviewed female street artists. The article selects four works of street resistance for closer analysis: a Wall of Femmes-created stencil of Theresa Spencer, former chief of Attawapiskat First Nation, during her hunger strike; the mural Indigenous Womxn Rising by Chief Ladybird and Mo Thunder Bedard; Natalie King’s (Anishinaabe) ‘heart berry’ mural; and Red Bandit’s No Silence While My Sisters Suffer. Rodrigues points to the important educational role that such street art can play in challenging untenable narratives of Indigenous girls and women.

Gillies draws on textual analysis of literature on the history of scientific racism to review key conceptual building blocks of race: racial categories, racial hierarchies, White male intellectual superiority, and racial purity. Subsequently, Gillies discusses pivotal historical stages that led acclaimed scientists to denounce race science in the mid-twentieth century. Gillies’ main argument is that learning about the history of race is an essential component of effective anti-racist teacher education, as this knowledge assists with understanding and recognizing who can be racist and who benefits from racism, how school-based racist practices comes to be and finally, addressing anti-racist curricular connections.

Utilizing qualitative narrative research through a critical race lens, Mackey adds to the missing analysis of actions attempted within education in Nova Scotia and across North America when implementing culturally relevant pedagogy (CRP). Through telling the stories of preservice and in-service teachers, Mackey highlights the need for educators, educational leaders, and policy makers to embed decolonizing steps in implementing CRP so as to overcome systemic racism in education. Mackey argues that without such decolonizing steps, efforts to implement CRP will fail.

Almanssori tackles Ontario secondary teachers’ degrees of comfort in teaching to preventing sexual violence. A survey was conducted with 105 public school teachers; most of the participants were women. Almanssori found that while teachers agreed about the importance of teaching to respectful relationships (e.g., discouraging sexist jokes), a sticking point was gender-based violence, shown in part by teachers’ responses to how uncomfortable they would feel in witnessing and intervening in school-based sexual violence scenarios, especially at the higher ends of the spectrum (sexual coercion and rape). Almanssori points out that education on healthy sexual practices cannot be seen as separate from gender-based violence education.

Bourgeois and Tarif examined the construction of identity in late modernity with the professional engagement of teachers at the beginning of their careers. Their study is based on the trajectories of 14 new Quebec teachers. The results notably show the persistence of a career model envisaged over the long term.

For her part, Mamprin critically reviewed thirty publications on workplace well-being among teachers to better understand conceptual anchoring. At the end of this exercise, thirteen definitions of well-being were used to study this phenomenon among teachers.

Covid would seem to be far behind us, however Thurber, Hirsch and Feldman’s article affords insight into what can happen, at any time, when conditions change, impacting education, drastically shifting teachers’ (and students’) realities. Here the focus is on three discernible shifts on the part of teachers during Covid within three different schools in the Jewish Day School system in Montreal, Quebec. These are all schools in which, as Thurber et al note, a community dynamic is vitally important. The research focused on the question of how a prior sense of community would influence online distance learning. The researchers concluded that while teachers experienced anxiety and frustration, there was also a strong feeling of being part of a community network, one focused on addressing, more: surpassing, the crisis faced.

Change of setting, but not of subject, and where here Kettley and Mitton are concerned (in their scoping review) with the impact of ‘remote’ teaching on rural Nova Scotia and in particular, on how Covid, in the co-authors’ words, simultaneously illuminated as well as amplified the conditions for rural students (including racialized students) of living in poverty. The angle taken, inspired by one of the co-authors, a pre-service teacher who grew up under such conditions and returned for field placements, is that of bearing witness. Thirty-seven studies were selected for inclusion. Because the pandemic both shed light on as well as aggravated inequities, Kettley and Mitton urge others to use their results to improve teacher education for rural education (rural infrastructure; teacher professional communities; digital literacy; pedagogies of care) so as to better equip teachers to face the challenges that rural students faced during Covid and that they continue to face.

On a related note, Petit, Babin, and Desrochers examined how university supervisors (UAS) in Quebec adapted their remote practicum supervision practices to promote cognitive presence among teaching interns. Drawing from interviews with UAS and an e-learning community model, the research explored the different phases of cognitive presence in this remote supervision context. It also identified how tools such as videos, forums, and breakout groups can be used to trigger solution exploration and knowledge integration.

Aimé, Gagnon, Leblanc, Gagnon, Trudeau, and Léonard explored adolescents’ perceptions of weight-based bullying and strategies. Nineteen students aged 14 to 17 participated in focus group interviews, exploring the nature, causes, and consequences of this form of bullying. Analysis of findings suggested that weight-based bullying is often subtle yet has significant effects. The participants emphasized the importance of mobilizing adults and peers to provide emotional support to those targeted, while cautioning against punitive or surveillance-based interventions.

Tortochot and Moineau examined the impact of a didactic approach which introduced an industrial partner to two design teaching-learning situations. The results highlighted the students’ representations of the experiences they lived in addition to characterizing the objects of knowledge of a design pagogy.

In their article, Duval, Montminy, Brault Foisy, and Boucher are particularly interested in the executive functions of children transitioning to primary school and the perceptions and expectations of teachers regarding their socioemotional, behavioral, and cognitive skills during this pivotal period. The results show significant changes in certain executive functions and underscore the importance for teachers to consider the individual developmental needs of students to facilitate a harmonious transition.

In their field note, Allaire, Laferrière, and Nadeau-Tremblay are dedicated to explaining the professional development of researchers through participatory research in the context of a Networked school, while Krause explains how he has successfully engaged pre-service teachers with how to teach mathematical reasoning, using a nifty games-based approach that he calls reverse engineering

It is astonishing the work that French editors have contributed to the MJE/RSEM, such that the journal has truly become a collaborative, shared enterprise: an exemplar certainly within the history of the journal, perhaps within Quebec itself, possibly other jurisdictions. All we know at the RSEM/MJE is that we are truly grateful for the presence over the past several years of: Kevin Péloquin (lead French editor), Carl Beaudoin (co-lead French editor), Chantal Tremblay and Thierry Desjardins. We also take this occasion to properly acknowledge and thank Patrice Cyrille Ahehehinnou. Collectively, the five editors represented four leading universities in Quebec (Université de Montréal, UQTR, UQAM, Laval). Each individual has made their mark on the journal, particularly the lead editors, however we thank all of the editors for their generous commitment of time and thought and wish them well in their future projects. We also take this occasion to once again express our gratitude to McGill’s Dean of Education, Vivek Venkatesh, for his support of the journal and in particular, his funding of a dedicated French copyeditor to streamline publication of several of the articles included in this general issue; we all thank you, Vivek, for advancing the work of the journal!

TERESA STRONG-WILSON, CARL BEAUDOIN, KEVIN PÉLOQUIN, CHANTAL TREMBLAY, & VANDER TAVARES