This book examines the connections between policy, school experiences, and everyday activities of children growing up in the global city of Melbourne, Australia. It provides an in-depth consideration of Melbourne primary school children’s lifeworlds, exploring everyday stories and practices inside and outside of school. This includes consideration of the diverse ways that educational “success� may be understood in the context of Melbourne, productively moving beyond a narrow focus only on academic achievement. Situated alongside policy and curriculum analysis, the book draws on research in Melbourne Year 4 primary school classrooms in the form of student-completed surveys, classroom ethnographies, and student responses to a learning dialogues activity, as well as video re-enactments of out-of-school life. Through this it explores key aspects of children’s lifeworlds with a focus on school timetabling and pedagogical encounters, school engagement and belonging, and activities and everyday routines outside of school. This book offers a comprehensive and holistic exploration of children’s lifeworlds in Melbourne, drawing connections between children’s lives inside and outside of school, and the broader policy contexts.  

This book provides a comprehensive account of the educational experiences of students, parents, and educators-transgender and cisgender-in the context of current debates about the inclusion of transgender people in schools. Drawing on critiques of cisgenderism and emphasising the importance of a whole-of-school approach, Transgender People and Education explores complex topics including sexuality education for transgender young people, teaching about gender diversity, the journeys of cisgender parents of transgender children, the experiences of transgender parents and educators in schools, and the role of cisgender administrators, educators, and school counsellors and psychologists in creating inclusive school cultures. Reporting on empirical analyses conducted by the authors, the book makes a unique contribution to thinking about gender diversity in schools and advocates for the broadening of educational approaches beyond narrow gender binaries.

In Home and Away: Mothers and Babies in Institutional Spaces, the authors examine how health design in a psychiatric mother-baby unit can serve the needs of mothers and babies, their families, and the staff. Arguing that while mothers in institutional care are away from their own homes, they need not be away from their babies, the authors show that any examination of built space must consider how the mothers respond to the space and how the space responds to their needs for privacy, rest, routine, and wellness. Home and Away provides a comprehensive account of critical design for mental health, focusing on how health facilities can intentionally promote positive psychological outcomes through the design and use of space.

All too often heterosexual first-time parents are treated as the unmarked norm within research on reproduction. First-Time Parenting Journeys maps out what it means to be situated within the norm, while providing a critical account of how social norms about parenthood shape, regulate, and potentially delimit experiences of new parenthood for heterosexual couples. Based on qualitative longitudinal research, this book tells the story of journeys to parenthood, highlighting the impact of gender norms, moral claims, emotion work, and generativity. While drawing on Australian data, the critical conceptual framework has broader applicability across Western contexts in terms of understanding normative family structures and parenting practices. By focusing on expectations about, and the reality of, new parenthood, it explicates the ways in which institutionalised norms about parenthood are internalised and explores what this can tell us about the broader contours of parenthood discourses.

This book examines connections between policy contexts, school experiences and everyday activities of children growing up in the global city of Singapore. In particular, it explores how Singapore children's everyday experiences inside and outside of school shape their orientations towards educational success. Alongside an analysis of school life and educational policies, it also considers children's out-of-school activities, including leisure, homework, and enrichment activities, and connections between these and their school-based activities. The book draws on empirical data from Primary 4 classes in two Singapore schools in the form of student-completed surveys, classroom ethnographies, student responses to a learning dialogues activity, and a re-enactment of one child's out-of-school life, as well as curriculum and policy analysis. It provides readers with an in-depth understanding of Singapore Primary 4 children's experiences inside and outside of school, including the structure of timetables and pedagogical approaches encountered in school lessons, children's enjoyment of activities inside and outside of school, children's engagement and wellbeing at school, and the impact of Singapore's educational policies on children's learning experiences. Moving beyond a simplistic focus on Singapore children's academic performance in international high-stakes testing, the book offers a comprehensive exploration of their lives inside and outside of school. This holistic approach is unique in the Singapore context and contributes to a greater understanding of children's everyday lives in the city.

This book provides a comprehensive account of the educational experiences of students, parents, and educators-transgender and cisgender-in the context of current debates about the inclusion of transgender people in schools. Drawing on critiques of cisgenderism and emphasising the importance of a whole-of-school approach, Transgender People and Education explores complex topics including sexuality education for transgender young people, teaching about gender diversity, the journeys of cisgender parents of transgender children, the experiences of transgender parents and educators in schools, and the role of cisgender administrators, educators, and school counsellors and psychologists in creating inclusive school cultures. Reporting on empirical analyses conducted by the authors, the book makes a unique contribution to thinking about gender diversity in schools and advocates for the broadening of educational approaches beyond narrow gender binaries.