Affordances and Constraints of Using the Socio-Political Debate for Authentic Summative Assessment

This article reports from an empirical study on the affordances and constraints for using staged socio-political debates for authentic summative assessment of scientific literacy. The article focuses on conditions for student participation and what purposes emerge in student interaction in a socio-political debate. As part of the research project, a socio-political debate was designed for assessing student competences of scientific literacy in classroom practices. The debate centred on a fictive case about a lake where a decline in the yield of fish had been established. The students were assigned the task of participating in the debate from appointed roles as different stakeholders. Data were collected with video recordings of the enacted student debates. Student participation was analysed with the theoretical framework of communities of practice. The results show that multiple conflicting purposes of the socio-political debate as an assessment task emerged. The emergent purposes were (1) putting scientific knowledge on display versus staying true to one's role, (2) putting scientific knowledge on display versus expressing social responsibility, (3) putting scientific knowledge on display versus winning the debate, and (4) using sources tactically versus using sources critically. As these purposes emerged in classroom practice, tensions between different ways of enacting participation in the debates became manifest. Based on these findings, this article discusses the affordances and constraints for using a socio-political debate for classroom-based assessment of scientific literacy and argumentation in terms of validity, reliability and affordability.     

Mind the gap: Holocaust education in Germany,between pedagogical intentions and classroom interactions

The injunction to learn from history is a key feature of German debates over the politics of memory and history, which, since the end of World War II, have been seen primarily pedagogical. Thus, state schools were asked to serve as society’s central location for memory and learning. Research on history education has rarely addressed questions about how instruction on the history of National Socialism (NS) plays out in practice, about how ambitious educational goals are implemented at the level of actual instruction, or about the challenges that teachers and students face when they are asked to address such a morally fraught topic. This paper presents findings from a qualitative study that explored these issues using analyses of concrete classroom experience. The paper is based on four carefully selected case studies. The first looks at how a contemporary account of the issue and its moral implications are handled in the classroom. The second examines the consequences for classroom discussion of a discrepancy between teacher expectations and student interpretations of an excerpt from Hitler’s Mein Kampf. The third also addresses a discrepancy, focusing on the institutionalized generation gap in school. Finally, the fourth case shows how instructional communication benefits when participants assume a reciprocal, though not always articulated, consensus opinion on NS. The interpretation of the cases illustrates how both the organizational framework of schools and the specific conditions of classroom interaction shape the treatment of NS. Classroom interactions are strongly influenced by the quirky, often unexpected, ways that students appropriate knowledge—ways that often conflict with the intended content of the lesson and with public expectations for the treatment of Germany’s past. The analysis reveals a tension between the under-moralization and the over-moralization of teaching the Holocaust, and a tension between the need to represent the crimes of NS adequately, and to fulfill the goals of moral education.     

On Defending Controversial Viewpoints: Debates of Sixth Graders About the Desirability of Early 20th‐Century American Immigration

Sixth‐grade students with and without mild disabilities participated in an eight‐week project‐based investigation about immigration to the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Students' investigations were designed to promote their understanding of the perspectives of immigrants and Americans who opposed immigration, as well as the “ways of life” that gave impetus to immigration and often resulted in conflict between these groups. At the conclusion of these investigations, students were assigned the role of the immigrants or opponents of immigration and were asked to debate the desirability of immigration to the United States during this historical period. The primary focus of this article is on the opportunities afforded by, and the limitations of, these classroom debates. The debates promoted high levels of engagement and equal participation by students with and without disabilities as well as by boys and girls. Analyses of content and structure showed that students' discourse was influenced by the knowledge they gained during their investigations, but the use of this knowledge was shaped by the competitive rhetorical goal of defending a particular viewpoint. Later rounds of the debates were more balanced and drew more on the breadth of available knowledge than did earlier rounds. Overall, the debates were more typical of everyday arguments than academic arguments. The implications of our findings for the design of instructional opportunities in the social studies in inclusive classrooms are discussed.     

How teaching the English Revolution (or not) became a landmark debate in German history didactics

ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on the development of history teaching in West Germany from the 1970s onwards. When in the early 1970s the relevance of history – both as an academic discipline and as a school subject – was challenged, this led to fierce debates as a multitude of new concepts were being developed. One of these was Annette Kuhn’s revolutionary concept of teaching history which immediately came under attack. This debate – and others – had far reaching consequences. At first glance it was a debate about how to model objects like the English Revolution in a way to make them suitable for the history classroom. At second glance, however, this debate revolved around fundamental issues like the role of history in school, the relation between social sciences and didactics, and history’s relevance for today in general. The debate and its eventual outcome are explained within the framework of Bourdieu’s field theory. The study re-examines the consequences of this debate. In discussing alternatives to Kuhn’s approach, it shows how debates forced upon traditional history led historians to readdress the essentials of historical thinking and thus to gain new theoretical strength which resulted in a stronger position for history at universities and schools as well as in history didactics. This resulted in a specific construction and role of Geschichtsdidaktik in Germany which helps to explain why there is a difference in comparison to other countries.     

Providing for student voice in classroom management: teachers’ views

Recent research indicates that teachers would prefer to allow for more student voice in classroom discipline decision‐making than is currently the case. This paper identifies factors that teachers suggest inhibit them from implementing their ideas of best disciplinary practice. It also examines which classroom discipline issues teachers are willing to submit to student voice. Among the most important inhibitors of best disciplinary practice identified by almost 300 Australian secondary teachers were: too many things to do; classroom size and layout; and a lack of support from the school administration. When presented with 30 varying management issues, an independent group of approximately 250 primary and secondary teachers nominated classroom conventions (e.g. tidiness of the classroom) and issues related to teaching and learning (e.g. seating arrangements) as those that they were most prepared to negotiate with students. In contrast they would prefer to concentrate the power of decision‐making in their own hands when managing issues pertaining to safety of students and moral issues such as racial and sexual discrimination.     

论新时期大学生的诚信教育

当前,大学生中存在着严重的诚信缺失现象,加强大学生的诚信教育,是高等院校十分迫切和重要的问题。造成大学生诚信缺失的原因与其自身素质、学校德育缺乏实效、社会约束机制不健全有关。强化大学生的诚信教育,一要使学生深刻理解其内涵,二要使诚信教育进入课堂,三要建立大学生诚信档案,四要广泛开展诚信道德教育实践活动。     

学生发展理论在学生事务管理中的应用——美国学生发展理论简介

美国大学对学生发展理论的研究有着近百年的历史。美国学生发展理论包括个体与环境、社会心理、认知和价值观和整合型理论四个基本类型。这些理论分别从社会学、心理学、生态学等角度来解释学生成长和发展规律,理论研究的重点逐步从着眼于学生发展的某一特定方面转移到学生的总体发展上。近二三十年来,由于学生群体的不断变化,美国对女性学生、同性恋学生以及其他弱势群体学生的研究逐步增加。学生发展理论深刻影响了美国的学生管理实践,为学生宿舍管理、学务咨询、心理咨询等重要的学生事务管理领域提供了理论指导。     

Advanced Placement Academy: Case Study of a Program Within a School

The focus of this study was the first year of implementation of the Advanced Placement Academy (APA), a program within a high school providing honors and Advanced Placement coursework for high-ability African American students with previously limited access to rigorous courses. The qualitative investigation explores practical solutions from perspectives of school, classroom, and individual students. Data included document review; administrator, teacher, and student interviews; and classroom observations. Themes identified were academic, guidance, and social and emotional supports. Constructing this rigorous program required time, resources, and expertise coupled with strong leadership, a person in charge. APA created a small, caring community, building student belonging. The community included key persons intensely focused on students and what they need to achieve; e.g., culturally responsive, differentiated instruction. Students from bleak educational backgrounds require more time to develop academic talent and skills and confidence of likely success. Exposure and enrichment builds student motivation for hard work.     

Graduating as a ‘native speaker’: international students and English language proficiency in higher education

The current concern about low levels of English proficiency among international students who graduate from degree courses – that students’ English language skills are not being developed during their higher education experience – reflects negatively on the quality of Australian higher education and its graduates. More careful selection of students and increased use of English language testing are among the solutions put forward. These debates over English language proficiency tend to construct English language as a skill that can be applied in any context and ‘native‐speaker’‐levels of language ability as essential for employment. Within such a formulation international students can only ever be defined as in deficit. Drawing on socio‐cultural theories of language learning and academic literacy, alternative understandings of language proficiency in internationalized higher education are explored. Improved communication skills among graduates are likely to be achieved through a better understanding of issues beyond classroom instruction, such as barriers to social integration with native‐speakers, which reveal many international students unable to access adequate levels of language experience. Without wider perspectives on the debate over English language proficiency in higher education, the many benefits of having international students in higher education institutions are obscured by negative attitudes and unrealistic expectations.     

“A”不再“优秀”

对成绩优异的学生通过光荣榜和奖学金进行鼓励是美国教育的基本传统。这一想法的初衷就是校方通过公开的方式对优秀的学生进行鼓励。受到表彰的学生的自豪感油然而生,并且以他们为榜样,可以激励其他学生更努力地学习。一般而言,学校就是一个小社会,你也可以将学生的成绩称为他们在教室里的资本。     

Expanding assessment methods and moments in history

History courses at The University of Auckland are typically assessed at two or three moments during a semester. The methods used normally employ two essays and a written examination answering questions set by the lecturer. This study describes an assessment innovation in 2008 that expanded both the frequency and variety of activities completed by 182 undergraduates taking a course on the history of African‐American freedom struggles. All week‐by‐week tutorial assignments were collected for textual analysis to see if students were moving beyond the recollection and regurgitation of facts (surface learning) and instead were dealing with the deeper historical issues. The quality of student work coupled with our own classroom observations indicate that innovative assessment methods at regular moments during the semester made a positive difference to the student learning experience.     

Smith, Hume and the Moral Imagination: Sympathy and Social Justice

In this article, the author argues that there is still much to learn from the moral theories developed by two eminent philosophers, John Smith and David Hume, that can contribute to enhancing the sensibilities of students in classroom discussions about a range of moral and social justice issues. He argues that when school students are afforded the opportunity to imagine the circumstances of those persons suffering various forms of social marginalization, they can gain a heightened awareness on the affective and practical implications of social injustice, and feel more compelled to transform the unacceptable inequities they encounter. He suggests that encouraging students to use their moral imaginations and sensibilities will invoke a sympathetic response that raises their collective consciousness on the moral importance of attempting to create a more compassionate, benevolent and equitable society.     

Theoretical triangulation as an approach for revealing the complexity of a classroom discussion

In this paper we explore the value of theoretical triangulation as a methodological approach for the analysis of classroom interaction. We analyze an excerpt of a whole‐class discussion in history from three theoretical perspectives: interactivity of the discourse, conceptual level raising and historical reasoning. We conclude that using theoretical triangulation enables us to relate the perspectives of the teacher, the students and the domain to each other, which provides us with deeper insight into the complex phenomenon of classroom interaction. The analyses reveal the complexities the teacher faces when trying to elicit and promote collaborative knowledge construction and the dilemma of promoting student participation, on the one hand, and deepening the quality of reasoning, on the other.     

Judging plagiarism: a problem of morality and convention

This paper considers the problem of plagiarism as an issue of morality. Outrage about student plagiarism in universities positions it as dishonesty and a transgression of standards. Despite this, there has been little work analysing the implications of positioning plagiarism as a moral matter in the making of judgments about plagiarism and academic dishonesty. This paper sets the scene by reviewing research about the characteristics of students who cheat and analysing student and lecturer differences. It then discusses perspectives from moral behaviour, moral philosophy and moral reasoning. The paper concludes that emotion and reason are brought to moral judgments, and so makes a case for those who are making judgments about plagiarism to reflect on whether they are faced with a matter of morality or convention. Greater awareness of the domains of convention and morality, the issues of justice and care, the roles of emotion and reason and what is involved in making judgments, will open ways of understanding reactions to plagiarism so that better ways to deal with accusations and make judgments can be developed.     

Going Deep into Mechanisms for Moral Reasoning Growth: How Deep Learning Approaches Affect Moral Reasoning Development for First-year Students

The purpose of this paper was to determine the effects of deep approaches to learning on the moral reasoning development of 1,457 first-year students across 19 institutions. Results showed a modest positive relationship between our measures of deep approaches to learning and moral reasoning at the end of the first year of college even after controlling for precollege moral reasoning. After accounting for a host of demographic and relevant student characteristics and for the natural clustering of students, we found that the integrative learning subscale, which captures students’ participation in activities designed to integrate information from varied sources and diverse perspectives, positively affected moral reasoning among first-year students. Implications for researchers and practitioners are discussed.     

Boundary dilemmas in teacher–student relationships: Struggling with “the line”

The teacher–student relationship is viewed as integral to successful teaching and learning but, outside of a few exceptions, ethical boundary issues in this relationship have not been explored. The purpose of this study was to examine teachers' perspectives of their relationships with their students as well as how they described and negotiated relationship boundaries. Findings were organised into a typology of 11 categories of boundaries. The balance between demonstrating care while maintaining a healthy, productive level of control in the classroom was a recurring theme when discussing the boundaries.     

刍议当代大学生恋爱道德问题

当前,大学生恋爱已是高校较普遍的现象和热点问题,而与其伴随的一系列恋爱道德问题不得不引起我们的深思。通过对大学生现行恋爱观及恋爱行为方式出现的道德问题的分析、研究,引导当代大学生树立正确的恋爱观,优化学校、社会、家庭的教育方式,提出解决大学生恋爱道德问题的总体思路和基本途径,在当今具有较强的现实意义。     

Encouraging student engagement in a blended learning environment: the use of contemporary learning spaces

Research shows that some non‐traditional students find the university environment alienating, impersonal and unsupportive. The ‘Quickstart’ project combines traditional lectures and seminars with a sequence of carefully designed online tasks, aimed at lessening the impact of the start of year uncertainties for new students. One thousand students across two geographic locations participated in the programme. The project was evaluated by considering three sources of data: data generated by server statistics of 40,358 successful requests for pages in the first four weeks of teaching; student anonymous responses to an online end of course questionnaire as well as extracts from their reflective journals; and the student experience as viewed through the eyes of a researcher in the classroom. Findings offer insights into how the students blend classroom time with their own time; and student perceptions of their own learning experiences. A collaborative learning experience involving travel to a contemporary learning space (the Tate Modern Art Gallery) mitigated the possible isolating effect of the use of technology; instead the technology enhanced the discussion and participation in activities. The students visited the Tate Modern and then facilitated their discussions by sending each other SMS text messages; they bonded very quickly in the seminar groups, where weekly online tasks that had been prepared individually ‘outside’ the classroom were the focus of group discussion and debate ‘inside the classroom’; their end of semester reflective writing showed very clearly how valuable the early ‘friendship’ groups had been for them settling into university life.     

教师自我表露教学效果的跨文化比较

以180名美国和509名中国师范生为研究对象,采用自编《教师自我表露教学效果问卷》调查和比较中美师范生对教师自我表露教学效果的理解。结果表明,中美师范生认为教师自我表露有助于师生关系的建立和师生之间的交流,对学生的学习具有积极的作用,并有助于促进学生的课堂参与。在"师生关系与师生交流","学生的学习效果"和"课堂参与"三个维度上,美国师范生的得分均显著高于中国师范生。建议在我国教师教育和培训中,注意引导师范生的自我表露意识,建议教师使用积极的自我表露,尽量避免消极的自我表露,采用与教学内容相关的自我表露,并控制自我表露的时间和内容,意识自我表露的数量,真正发挥自我表露作为教学工具的作用。     

Simulations in the Classroom

To assess the effect of debate format on learning, four formats were separately employed in an environmental issues course. Learning was greatest when students wrote about a debate they witnessed, the teacher provided debate questions, and students received a reward for winning. Students valued debates for developing their arguing skills, used the Internet as a primary source, and placed trust in sources based on the author more than on their critical reading of the source.