Iranian Journal of Comparative Education
Volume:3 Issue: 1, Winter 2020

English language course books written by local writers are officially prescribed textbooks widely used in Iran and India. Although there is a valuable body of research about these course books, further studies may be needed to comparatively assess their quality as an educational material. This study limits its scope to two textbooks series, namely, the Prospect, and English Standard since both of them are nation-wide textbooks which fully play the roles of course books described in the related literature. The method of analysis was based on a critical discourse analysis framework inspired by Van Dijk's (1998, 2001) socio-cognitive model and Kress and Van Leeuwen's (1996) multi-functional model to facilitate investigation of both textual and meta-textual aspects of the textbooks. The results showed that both textbook series follow similar ideological foundations in terms of promoting a product-based prescriptive and static approach to socio-cultural values through investing on stereotypical "Self" while ignoring otherness. The findings implied that lack of a process-oriented approach to ideological underpinnings of socio-cultural values and codes is a threat to raising inter-cultural understanding in terms of using English as an international language and inter-ethnic awareness of the students who live in multi-ethnic and religiously, culturally, linguistically diverse communities in India and Iran.

The purpose of this study is to investigate reflective experiences of primary school specialist teachers in two Kurdish cities of Paveh (Iran) and Sulaymaniyah (Iraq) in order to identify and explain reflective topics. The research method is qualitative comparative using narrative approach, the level of analysis is “district “and the level of observation is “individual”. The strategy of "similar systems, similar outputs" was used to select countries under study and sampling method was convenience sampling. Data collection tool was in-depth interview and data analysis method is thematic analysis. This article is divided into several sections: In the Introduction section, past and current situation of the Iranian educational system, the importance of lived experiences and narratives of teachers, and the reasons for the comparison of the lived experiences of the teachers in these two cities are discussed. In the second part, the research method is explained. The third part refers to the research results. The findings of the research showed that the themes that are the main organizers of teachers'' narratives in both societies are largely influenced by the active role of social systems. Also, five universal themes (Cognition, learning, teaching, evaluation, and classroom management) were identified in the deeper narratives of teachers. From a comparative perspective, the research findings showed that the similarities of teachers'' lived experiences are high in both communities and minor differences can be ignored.

The purpose of this study was to compare main goals of art curriculum in primary education in Brazil, Greece, Iran and South Korea. The qualitative comparative research method used and data were collected through upstream and national education documents, research reports and articles in scientific journals. In addition to Iran, Brazil, Greece, and South Korea were purposefully selected as the sample of the study. For analyzing and comparing the data, a four-step model of Bereday (description, interpretation, juxtaposition and comparison) was used. The results show that the four countries have similarities in areas such as development of creative thinking, acquaintance with famous artists and their works, recognizing the beauty of nature, developing handicraft skills, using artistic materials and tools, expressing emotion and expression through art. The differences between these countries are in the areas of how students participate in artistic experimentation, particular attention on visual arts and art as a intercultural exchange tool.

The main purpose of this study was to evaluate the components of learning organization at Kabul University from perspective of faculty members and students. This research is applied in terms of purpose and is a survey research. Stratified Random Sampling Method was used and 350 faculty members and students were selected based on Cochran formula. Peter Singe’s questionnaire was used to collect data. The research findings showed that the level of realization of the components of the learning organization in the Kabul University was moderate. At the same time, given the ranking of indicators, attention to the components of "shared vision" and "team learning" is a higher than "mental pattern", "systematic thinking" and "personal mastery". Overall, the research findings highlight the need for the university's planners and administrators to pay more attention to the characteristics of learning organizations.

The current paper aims at investigating talent management models to provide Iran's human resources ‎system with lessons. This research paper is a qualitative comparative research based on understanding similarities and ‎differences in talent management models. Data was collected using theoretical sampling (data ‎saturation) method. Content analysis method was applied to analyze the main components of the well-‎known talent management models. Induction Analysis was performed in qualitative content data ‎analysis. Accordingly, the current paper introductory section contains information about the ‎importance of talent management, research underlying factors, current status of talent management in Iran's ‎human resource management system, and research objectives and questions. The research method is ‎explained in the second section. Third section begins with research results with a brief ‎introduction to talent management models assessing the similarities and differences. The final part of ‎the paper is conclusion. The findings show that models can be classified into three general ‎categories: individual-oriented, organization- oriented and environment-oriented, according to the emphasis of the ‎components. The findings also show designers overlook role of cultural components in talent ‎management. According to findings, it is suggested that courses be designed for all graduates in the education system - and in particular in the Iranian higher education system - to explain concept of talent and role of elites. It is also suggested that the human resource management system pay more attention ‎to environmental factors (non-organizational factors) such as culture, religion, and language, with ‎positive or negative impacts on talent management in Iranian society. ‎

The main goal of present study is to compare content of Fifth Grade mathematics textbooks of Iran and International schools based on critical thinking components. The research method was a comparative using content analysis approach and statistical population and sample included all Fifth-grade mathematics textbooks of primary school of Iran and two International Schools in Tehran. To collect data, the content analysis form based on the components of Lipman's critical thinking was used. To determine formal and content validity, the researchers have used perspective of five experienced math teachers of primary schools and three university professors in the field of curriculum. The reliability coefficient of the research instrument was determined using Holste formula and it was for Iran and International schools equal to 0.89 and 0.84. Data analysis also showed that the content of Iran and International math textbooks are active up to 73% and 88% respectively. The research findings show that in mathematics textbook of Iran, components of critical thinking are unbalanced, which means that attention is more on necessary components of critical thinking such as questioning. However, the components related to analysis ability and high levels of critical thinking have received less attention. According to the findings of the research, the authors of the mathematics textbooks in Iran are suggested to improve content of math book, to provide a suitable ground for cultivating critical thinking of pupils.