Problems of,and support for,beginner educators

Abstract

Beginner educators cannot produce their best work and achieve the objectives of the schools that employed them until they have adjusted to the work they are required to do, the environment in which they are to work and the colleagues and learners with whom they have to work. However, it is well known that the transition from student educator to newly qualified educator can be problematic. The best way of supporting and developing novice educators is a clear understanding of their problems and constructive induction programmes that train and sustain them by addressing these issues. The article therefore focuses on the plight of, and support for, beginner educators. It addresses two questions. First, what are the needs and concerns of beginner educators? Second, what strategies can be offered to support beginner educators that will ease their transition into the classroom and reduce attrition early in their careers?     

Communities,Pollution, and Fight for Survival

Abstract

This study examines differences between university students and permanent residents of an Appalachian community in their attitudes toward the environment and toward proposed local energy related developments. Survey data showed that townspeople (non-student residents) were somewhat more supportive of the proposed energy developments than were students, however students were typified more by detachment from the issues than by opposition to them. It is suggested that differences between students and townspeople in support for local energy developments is not due to environmental attitudes but may be due to economic ties to the local area.     

探究小语种在高校大学生中的普及情况以及求职中的优势——以德语为例

以珠三角高校学生为研究对象,调查并分析所在高校的非英语语种的专业开设及教学情况,以德语为例,探究其教学现状及问题,并提出合理的对策。     

Kierkegaardian Implications of Punishment, Guilt, and Forgiveness for Education

Students have to be punished if they have made a serious transgression. Avoidance of punishment will lead to serious complications. But punishment is inseparably linked with guilt and forgiveness. The inability of individuals to forgive themselves was regarded by Kierkegaard to be an emanation of individual false pride, a kind of vanity. This type of despair, a psychological and spiritual disorder, is a serious and debilitating problem. The inability to escape this despair of forgiveness can lead to a loss of genuine humanness. Unchecked, this despair can lead to unrelatedness of self to itself and fear of the possibility of freedom. Thus the self-knowledge attainable in despair over the forgiveness of an offense would lead to what we would call a successful rehabilitation of the individual and his or her conjunct reintegration into society. Kierkegaard's ideas on punishment are interesting — historically and philosophically speaking — because they represent a softening of a harsh view of punishment by stressing the humanizing aspects of guilt and forgiveness.     

HyperCard for the Design,Development, and Delivery of Instruction

The innovative software product HyperCard™ introduced in August, 1987, and today distributed free of charge with Apple Computer Incorporated's Macintosh line of computers, has sparked a flurry of interest among computer users. HyperCard represents advanced technology that, in a short time, has been put in the hands of hundreds of thousands of users, including a significant number of instructional designers and performance technologists. This article has three sections that introduce instructional designers and performance technologists to HyperCard. The first section describes just what HyperCard is and summarizes how it works. The second section presents the theoretical background of the program, from the perspectives of both cognitive psychologists and futuristic thinkers in the computing world. Finally, the third section describes three uses of HyperCard: (a) as a database management program, (b) as a vehicle for implementing hypermedia applications, and (c) as an authoring tool. For each of these three functions, the advantages and disadvantages of HyperCard for instructional designers and performance technologists are explored.     

Correlations of achievement,completion, interest,and satisfaction for adult learners and reflections on the meaning of success for adult education

This paper discusses two important movements in higher education during the last decade: empirical analysis of educational outcomes and expansion of postsecondary educational opportunities for adults. Evidence is presented that indicates that many of the findings relating educational outcomes to background factors may not be important for adult open-learning programs. A discussion of the correlations that were significant is included as well as possible reasons why more significant findings did not arise. The paper then argues for a wider view of outcomes and a broader conception of success. Categories other than achievement, completion, interest, and satisfaction are presented. Among the student and institutional outcome measures discussed are educational and career development, personal development, community impact, and development of new knowledge.Much of this paper is based on an earlier presentation given at the AERA conference on correlates of success in nontraditional post secondary education in San Francisco, 1976. The author is particularly indebted to John Eggert for his substantive contribution and advice and council in the preparation of this paper. The University of Mid America (UMA) is Principally Funded by the National Institute of Education (NIE). The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of UMA or NIE.     

Tools for Knowledge Analysis, Synthesis, and Sharing

Change and complexity are creating a need for increasing levels of literacy in science and technology. Presently, we are beginning to provide students with clear contexts in which to learn, including clearly written text, visual displays and maps, and more effective instruction. We are also beginning to give students tools that promote their own literacy by helping them to interact with the learning context. These tools include peer-group skills as well as strategies to analyze text and to indicate comprehension by way of text summaries and concept maps. Even with these tools, more appears to be needed. Disparate backgrounds and languages interfere with the comprehension and the sharing of knowledge. To meet this need, two new tools are proposed. The first tool fractures language ontologically, giving all learners who use it a language to talk about what has, and what has not, been uttered in text or talk about the world. The second fractures language epistemologically, giving those involved in working with text or on the world around them a way to talk about what they have done and what remains to be done. Together, these tools operate as a two- tiered knowledge representation of knowledge. This representation promotes both an individual meta-cognitive and a social meta-cognitive approach to what is known and to what is not known, both ontologically and epistemologically. Two hypotheses guide the presentation: If the tools are taught during early childhood, children will be prepared to master science and technology content. If the tools are used by both students and those who design and deliver instruction, the learning of such content will be accelerated.     

Multilevel Assessment for Discourse,Understanding, and Achievement

Evaluating the impact of instructional innovations and coordinating instruction, assessment, and testing present complex tensions. Many evaluation and coordination efforts aim to address these tensions by using the coherence provided by modern cognitive science perspectives on domain-specific learning. This paper introduces an alternative framework that uses emerging situative assessment perspectives to align learning across increasingly formal levels of educational practice. This framework emerged from 2 design studies of a 20-hr high school genetics curriculum that used the GenScope computer-based modeling software. The 1st study aligned learning across (a) the contextualized enactment of inquiry-oriented activities in GenScope, (b) “feedback conversations” around informal embedded assessments, and (c) a formal performance assessment; the 2nd study extended this alignment to a conventional achievement test. Design-based refinements ultimately delivered gains of nearly 2 SD on the performance assessment and more than 1 SD in achievement. These compared to gains of 0.25 and 0.50 SD, respectively, in well-matched comparison classrooms. General and specific assessment design principles for aligning instruction, assessment, and testing and for evaluating instructional innovations are presented.     

Individuality, Context, and the Search for Meaning

A developmental systems approach incorporates clinical perspectives and offers a background for thinking about some of the ways we do research. Recent advances reveal both research opportunities and needs related to fostering child development in a pluralistic, democratic society, 4 topics are addressed that deal with individuality, context, and the search for meaning. First, individuality is discussed wherein our abstract thinking and our quantitative individual differences methods have revealed an urgent need to study the developing person. Second, classification is considered wherein our systematizing efforts reveal a need to understand the interplay among classified features of the person, as well as the particular methods that underlie our classifications. Third, the experiencing of development is discussed, wherein recent advances have revealed new ways of thinking about an individual's nonconscious—procedural and practicing—activities in development, as well as those activities that are conscious. Fourth, the issue of values is considered. Values contribute to our doing research, and we also need to acknowledge their importance as the object of developmental study in 4 children. The appreciation of context, of multiple windows of observation, and of our emotional "centeredness" as human beings who communicate and cooperate with others are crosscutting themes of the essay.     

Role models for pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding

In this column, the editor of The Journal of Perinatal Education discusses how the media provide role models-good and bad-for pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding. There is a critical need for more positive role models that promote natural, safe, and healthy pregnancy and birth. The editor also describes the contents of this issue, which offer a broad range of resources, research, and inspiration for childbirth educators in their efforts to promote natural, safe, and healthy birth.     

ASD Explained for Peers,Parents, and Professionals

Freaks, Geeks and Asperger Syndrome: A User Guide to Adolescence Luke Jackson, 2002 London: Jessica Kingsley ISBN 1-843-10-098-3 Can the parent of a child with autism or Asperger Syndrome ever really comprehend the experiences of their child? As a greater number of cases are identified and more is understood about these conditions, autism and Asperger Syndrome seem to be increasingly commonly understood terms. Despite the clear definitions provided by diagnostic criteria for the conditions (e.g., American Psychiatric Association [APA], 1994), it often remains difficult for professionals, parents and other carers, particularly those who are newcomers to this field, to truly understand the complexities of these conditions with respect to the day-to-day influences upon the affected individual.     

Targets,Assessment for Learning,and Whole-School Improvement

This article develops the idea that there is something of a gap in theory and practice regarding the relationship between whole-school targets and individual targets. I suggest that subject, year or key stage leaders have an important mediating and cohering role to play. I argue that all of the work in schools concerning the use of targets for school improvement, for performance management and for individual pupils' progress, rests on effective assessment for learning. Significant research is referred to in support of six main propositions, and guidance is offered on how they might be implemented.     

习惯、习惯法、民间法、国家法的区别与联系、冲突与融合

习惯、习惯法、民间法和国家法是研究中国法治本土化的不可回避的话题,在学术界对这几个概念也反复使用,文章对如何使用这几个概念才最为恰当,并且避免对几个概念的误用的探讨,可以帮助研究者更清晰地研究中国传统的法律文化.