中国与新加坡初中学段“数与代数”领域内容标准的比较研究

1引言 新加坡中小学生在TIMSS中取得了优异的成绩,由此新加坡的数学教育倍受各国数学教育工作者的关注．再者,中国和新加坡同属东亚儒家文化圈,文化背景有许多相似之处,两国都极为重视基础教育．藉此,本文试图对中国于2001年颁布的《全日制义务教育数学课程标准（实验稿）》（以下简称中国《标准》）和新加坡于2006年颁布的《中学数学课程提纲》（以下简称新加坡《提纲》）中的“数与代数”领域的内容进行比较．     

中国近代民族主义的再思考--"中国近代史上的民族主义学术研讨会"综述

为推动学术界对民族主义问题研究的深入,2006年1月7-8日,中国社会科学院中国近代思想研究中心、北京师范大学中国近代文化研究中心、湖南师范大学中国近现代史研究所联合主办了“中国近代史上的民族主义”学术研讨会。这也是国内学术界第一次就“中国近代史上的民族主义”举行学术研讨会。来自史学、哲学、文学、民族与人类学界的40多位学者出席了会议。不同研究领域的学者从不同的视角出发,对中国近代史上的民族主义做了多样性的解读,涉及中国近代民族主义的诸多问题。一、“民族主义”、“近代民族主义”及思想渊源研究近代中国的民族主义…     

2006—2016年义务教育均衡发展研究的计量化分析——基于CNKI期刊数据的分析

笔者对2006—2016年,我国有关义务教育均衡发展研究的文献进行分析发现:研究成果在数量上与质量上都有很大的发展,为我国义务教育事业做出了不小的贡献,推动了我国义务教育的均衡发展。但这其中仍然存在一些不足,如研究内容需要加深,研究成果仍缺乏创新活力,研究方法和手段需要更多元化等。今后应增强创新意识,拓宽研究视角,增加研究深度,不断拓展研究领域并对研究成果进行更好地应用。     

基于网络的远程实验室研究:国内13年研究回顾

远程实验作为远程教育的重要组成部分,越来越受到广大教师和学者的关注和推崇.为了更好地了解国内该领域的研究发展态势,采用内容分析法,对2000年到2012年中国知网(CNKI)上有关文献,从“文献总量、实验室数量、实验系统类型”三个方面进行量化分析.在此基础上,对已有的远程实验从实验对象的真实性、系统控制模式、实验内容类别、应用层次四个维度进行分类,简单地评述了远程实验研究特点,描述出目前研究领域的发展趋势,为远程实验的发展提供了一些参考和借鉴.     

2010～2013年国内高校教师职业倦怠研究综述

近年来。我国高校教师所面临的压力越来越大。职业倦怠现象也越来越突出。通过对2010～2013年国内学术界所进行的较为重要的高校教师职业倦怠研究进行梳理和分析,发现4年间国内关于高校教师职业倦怠问题的研究成果无论从数量上看还是从质量上看都有大幅提升。而且研究对象分布广泛,研究方法不断朝科学化发展。     

中新初中数学教科书习题情境的比较分析——以“数据集中趋势”为例

数学情境化设计在数学课程构建中愈显重要.以中国、新加坡现行的初中数学教科书为分析文本,选取两国教科书共有的"统计与概率"领域中的"数据的集中趋势"一节(Averages of Statistical Data一章)的习题为研究对象,对习题情境的类型、真实性两方面进行横向比较.发现两国习题情境设计具有一定的相似性和差异性:两国习题情境分布均侧重个人情境和职业情境,情境真实性均以非真实情境为主;中国情境习题数量远远少于新加坡情境习题数量,并且中国在这节内容上没有设置无情境的习题,而新加坡无情境习题占比23.2%;在真实情境设置上,中国出现了让学生亲自收集数据、做调查的习题,而新加坡教科书没有设置.由此,给我国教科书"统计与概率"领域的习题情境设计带来一些启发:合理分配习题情境类型,适当增加习题数量;加强习题情境的真实性,保持调查研究类习题.     

国内传统英语韵律特征研究综述——兼及与国外相关研究的比较

本文通过对1995年以来二十年间(1995~2013)国内学者对英语韵律特征的研究进行统计和分析,得出以下结论:1.研究内容涉及英语韵律特征定义的界定及作用,韵律特征的习得及其与性别、语速、韵律短语的整体性感知和输入、输出频次之间的关系,韵律特征的声学参数以及特定句式中的特征;2.研究数量呈波动上升趋势,且2006年之后增长显著;3.研究方法以思辨为主,辅以少量实证研究。同时,通过对上述诸方面国内外相关研究的比较,笔者发现国内研究存在的主要问题:数量虽在2006年后呈显著增长,但较之于国外,仍相对较少;实证性研究凤毛麟角;韵律与句法、韵律与程式语、韵律与语用学等跨学科跨领域的研究较少。这些均应引起学界的足够重视。     

回顾与前瞻:我国高校教师专业发展问题研究十年——基于2005—2014年国内高校教师专业发展的文献资料

自2005年以来,高校教师专业发展问题已引起学术界的广泛关注。十年来,有关这一问题的研究主要围绕其概念内涵、发展目标、影响因素、模式与策略五个方面展开。基于对文献的梳理发现:已有研究在数量和质量上都有显著上升,且关于该问题的理论观点已较为成熟;关于该问题的研究仍存在不足,如研究内容低水平重复,研究方法单一,研究视角狭隘等;今后研究可从拓宽研究视角、丰富研究层面、增加研究对象、引入研究方法上取得突破。     

贺卫光:裕固族研究目前正处于历史上最好的时期——裕固族文化精英书面访谈系列之三

贺卫光是国内外学术界知名的裕固族研究专家。在访谈录中,他指出,裕固族研究目前处于历史上最好的时期,年轻学者层出不穷预示着裕固族研究将迎来一个进一步提升研究水平的时代机遇,这将使裕固族研究在国际学术界有更多的声音。作为本族资深学者,他希望年轻一代裕固族学者在扎根本族深厚沃土的同时,具有更广阔的国际视野。     

国外旅游业与气候变化研究进展

有关旅游业与气候变化的研究日益受到国外学者的重视,逐渐成为一个重点研究领域,并取得了一定研究成果。文章通过对国外相关文献进行归纳和整理,总结了气候变化对旅游业的影响、旅游业对气候变化的作用和应对气候变化的措施等内容。文献分析表明国外运用多学科的方法系统地研究了旅游业与气候变化这一主题,在研究内容和研究深度上都有一定的突破,值得国内学者借鉴。     

Educational action research in Singapore: to prove or improve?

The rise of educational action research amongst schools in Singapore can be attributed to the government's belief that educational research and reform can improve school performance and help Singapore keep pace with the impact of globalization. However, against a backdrop of neo-liberal educational reform where efficiency, accountability and demonstrable outcomes are valued, the underlying intent of the action research projects would seem to be inconsistent with the emancipatory intent normally associated with action research. A systematic review was conducted of 71 action research projects submitted to a local educational conference in 2006. Of concern to us is how action research has been narrowly interpreted and recruited simply as an evaluative tool with the emancipatory potential largely ignored. The paper is theoretically framed by governmentality and performativity to explore the embedded power relations that may “fabricate” the action research projects. The findings and discussions suggest a need for the government, schools and teacher-researchers to reflexively question the current expectation of action research and to be clear about its broader purpose.     

An examination of school accountability from the perspective of Singapore school leaders

School accountability is such a familiar concept in many education systems that questions about what it actually means and entails are rather uncommon, especially to busy practitioners on the ground. This paper reports a research that examines each of the questions of what and to whom Singapore schools are accountable, from the point of practitioners holding leadership positions in Singapore schools. This research was a qualitative study with a sample of 36 vice-principals. This analysis was enriched and interpreted with a literature-based discussion, which pointed out the implications of the research findings. According to the findings, the participants felt that Singapore schools were accountable for students’ holistic development; site, funding and staff management; national survival and nation building; and humanity and the future. Singapore schools were accountable to students, parents, country and citizens, and themselves. Interestingly, for a system that was reputed for its academic achievement, none of the participants mentioned examination results directly but referred to the importance of holistic education. The findings also suggested an inseparability of the concepts ‘accountability’ and ‘responsibility’ in the participants’ minds.     

人民行动党与新加坡政治——新加坡前国会议员白振华访谈录

白振华先生,1947年生于新加坡,1988年至2001年任新加坡国会议员,曾任新加坡政府国会教育委员会副主席和新闻与艺术委员会副主席。他活跃新加坡政坛13年,从事社区和政治活动长达25年,荣获新加坡共和国总统颁赐的公共服务奖章。白先生现任美国投资基金集团主席、新加坡胜利书业集团董事经理、新加坡华德集团主席,是中国人民的老朋友与好朋友。白先生时常撰写政治和经济方面的文章,对中国政治经济、海峡两岸问题、新中两国的友好关系和新加坡政治经济问题发表独到的看法。2006年9月和12月,我校政治与管理科学学院教授孙景峰博士就人民行动党与新加坡政治问题两次对白先生进行了访谈,为我们了解人民行动党与新加坡政治提供了第一手材料。在此刊出,供对新加坡感兴趣的各界人士参考。     

K2 Children's Learning of National Identity in Singapore

In May 1991, a quasi-experimental research study was launched to investigate Singapore K2 children's learning of national identity and the effect of parental involvement in the learning process. A specially designed and pilot-tested 43-item questionnaire was used to interview a sample of 329 K2 children randomly selected from the participating education centres and kindergartens. A 4-week intervention (five 20-min lessons plus one home-based exercise each week) was implemented after the pre-test had taken place in early July 91. The same sample of children was interviewed again in mid August, after the celebration of National Day on 9 Aug 91. The post-test scores showed there was an increase of the awareness as well as fondness of Singapore as their nation among the children in the study. The research design and findings of data analyses are presented and discussed in this paper.     

Singapore’s educational policy through the prism of student voice: recasting students as co-agents of educational change and ‘disrupting’ the status quo?

This paper examines the implementation of Singapore’s landmark policy, ‘Thinking Schools, learning Nation’ (TSLN), in developing ‘thinking students’ through the prism of student voice. In the context of twenty-first century education and the growing importance of student voice in education, this paper argues that the time might be right to ‘disrupt’ Singapore’s education status quo and incorporate meaningful student voice in education policies. Instead of perceiving students as mere subjects of educational policy enactment, and seeing policy as something that is done to them, it should be reconceptualised as something which is done with them; importantly, students should be recast as key co-agents of educational change, consistent with TSLN’s reconceptualization of learners as ‘thinking students’. Basing its arguments on findings from a qualitative case study of students’ perceptions and schooling experiences of critical thinking in TSLN, this paper considers the case for the inclusion of significant student voice in Singapore’s educational policy reforms. It fills gaps in research on student voices in Singapore’s educational reforms and TSLN’s research from students’ perspective. The paper suggests that the inclusion of student voice in educational reform might be the next landmark step in ‘disrupting’ its educational landscape after the ‘big bang’ of TSLN.     

Dialogue's Impact on the Quality of Relationships

This paper presents the findings of an action research that examines teachers' perception of the quality of dialogue and how it impacts on the quality of relationships in a primary school in Singapore. The paper explores how school leaders can facilitate dialogue and also discusses the issues and factors that affect teachers' perception of dialogue. Analysis of the data obtained through a questionnaire and face-to-face interviews shows that the more favourable the perception of dialogue amongst teachers, the more favourable is their perception of the quality of relationships in the school. The implication for school leaders is that by developing a higher quality of dialogue, a better school climate is fostered. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Exploring Learners’ Conceptual Resources: Singapore A Level Students’ Explanations in the Topic of Ionisation Energy

This paper describes findings from a study to explore Singapore A-level (Grades 11 and 12, 16–19 yr old) students' understanding of ionisation energy, an abstract and complex topic that is featured in school chemistry courses. Previous research had reported that students in the United Kingdom commonly use alternative notions based on the perceived stability of full shells and the ‘sharing out’ of nuclear force, but that such ideas tend to be applied inconsistently. This paper describes results from the administration of a two-tier multiple-choice instrument, the ionisation energy diagnostic instrument, to find (1) whether A-level students in Singapore have similar ways of thinking about the factors influencing ionisation energy as reported from their A-level counterparts in the UK; and (2) how Singapore A-level students explain the trend of ionisation energy across different elements in Period 3. The results indicate that students in Singapore use the same alternative ideas as those in the UK, and also a related alternative notion. The study also demonstrates considerable inconsistency in the way students responded to related items. The potential significance of the findings to student understanding of complex topics across the sciences is considered.     

Gaps in educational outcomes: analysing national examination performance of Singaporean Malay and non-Malay students in the past 20 years

Singaporean students generally perform very well in international tests of mathematics and science. Nonetheless, in multi-cultural Singapore, there exist gaps with the Malays, a minority group in Singapore, systematically lagging behind the other ethnic groups of the Chinese and Indians in many educational performance indicators. While there have been previous qualitative assessments of this issue, rigorous statistical analyses are lacking. In this article, I analyse data from 1991 to 2011 of aggregate percentage passes in national examinations for the different ethnic groups in Singapore. Using time series techniques and regression, I uncovered two major findings. First, the Malay trends in percentage passes for the last two decades were strongly correlated with the non-Malay, national trends. Second, despite the correlation, there remained fluctuations around the national trend by Malay cohorts in the past two decades. Malay cohorts tended to perform better during an upward national trend, but also performed worse during a downward national trend, indicating systematic volatility in performance. The implications of these findings are discussed in the light of current research on educational gaps and three decades of community self-help to improve the educational achievement of the minority Malays in Singapore.     

Provision of early field experiences for teacher candidates in Singapore and how it can contribute to teacher resilience and retention

While teacher retention is a pressing issue for many jurisdictions, Singapore has a relatively low teacher attrition rate. Drawing on the experiences of student teachers from the sole institute for pre-service teacher education in Singapore, this article argues that it is important to expose teacher candidates to a substantial period of school experience as part of the teacher recruitment process. Before they are officially enrolled into pre-service teacher education, the Ministry of Education in Singapore requires all teacher candidates in the Postgraduate Diploma of Education program to go through a compulsory school stint. The authors' research findings show that this exposure to the realities and complexities of teaching can be an important contributor to teacher retention in terms of assessing and promoting teacher candidates’ resilient qualities, such as passion for teaching, self-efficacy beliefs, and positive emotion. In other words, early field experiences can help teacher candidates understand themselves as teachers and assess their own suitability for a teaching career. This study sheds new light on the policies and practices of teacher retention and teacher recruitment strategies.     

Cultural Constructions of Childhood and Early Literacy

This paper is based on the findings of two research teams, working collaboratively, between 1998 and 2000 in four countries: Australia, Singapore, France and England (see David et al 2000). Taking an ecological stance (Bronfenbrenner 1979), both teams adopted a cross‐cultural approach in order to gain a better understanding of the contexts in which young children become familiar with literacy. The team led by Bridie Raban worked in Singapore and Australia, that led by Tricia David in France and England. Early years practitioners in all four countries responded to questionnaires, were observed in action and interviewed. (Information about their training and about entry to primary school in each of the countries is given in the endnote.) In addition, the research teams carried out document analyses on Governmental, research and training literature and teachers’ plans, and discussed their findings with others in positions to be able to ‘authenticate’– or refute – findings. Further data were obtained through group interviews with parents of children attending selected settings involved in the research. Here we provide some of the evidence about the different views expressed by practitioners, our observational findings and analysis of the different pressures relating to literacy experienced in early childhood education and care settings. In each case the learning experiences practitioners provided for children were influenced by a range of factors, such as the contested role of preschools as preparation for schooling. In some settings this preparation was not explicit and practitioners often emphasised the importance of the ‘here and now’ nature of young children’s experiences. Rosenthal’s (2000) framework for exploring ‘collectivist’ and ‘individualist’ cultures in relation to their valued educational practices was applied to our findings, in order to identify how the cultural assumptions about literacy, learning and young children influenced the teaching approaches selected.