The 'science of performance' model of school change this book proposes, to enable equitable academic outcomes for culturally and linguistically diverse children, is based on a specific process of research and development in local contexts and on assumptions about teachers, teaching, and research.

Stuart McNaughton is Professor of Education and Director of the Woolf Fisher Research Centre at The University of Auckland.

Preface

Acknowledgments

1. Ongoing optimism, persistent pessimism and their roots
2. Weighing up the evidence
3. Explaining our limitations
4. Optimism in the detail.
5. Problems for an Optimist - Matthew effects
6. What is being effective? Accelerating and distributing achievement
7. Summer learning
8. Sustaining change
9. Scaling up
10. Understanding the contexts for effective teaching
11. A science of performance: Research and development partnerships
12. Building more effective schools: Notes on a cautious optimism