Thirty-six things to do with a poem

At the 1980 conference of the National Association for the Teaching of English at Warwick University, a group of teachers considered the classroom teaching of literature. It seemed to the group that poetry was rarely popular with pupils in the schools that they knew, and that a checklist of ideas for teaching poetry might be helpful. The list is introduced here by the group's leaders, Geoff Fox and Brain Merrick. Specific contributions were also made by Graham Baldwin, Barbara Bleiman, Roz Charlish, Dave Klemm, Colin Padgett, and Andrew Stibbs.Geoff Fox and Brian Merrick have both taught in secondary schools and now work in the School of Education of Exeter University. They divide their time between teaching literature and method to student teachers and working alongside teachers in schools and on courses.     

Twenty-four things to do with a book

During a summer workshop course, a group of teachers in British Columbia recently considered ways of encouraging the response of readers in their classes. Time was limited, and their ideas reflect a sustained brainstorming session rather than an attempt to produce a definitive list. More-idiosyncratic ideas which depended upon the peculiar skills of individual teachers have been omitted, as have highly specific illustrations relating to particular books. A dance drama version ofWatership Down, for example, was not seen as a readily transferable classroom activity.The suggestions below are for individual work, for work in pairs, groups, or with the whole class. The Canadian teachers were concerned to confirm a climate in which books were readily handled, shared and exchanged as a central and regular practice of the class.Geoff Fox has taught in secondary schools in both England and America. He has been Visiting Professor at Harvard University and the University of British Columbia and is on the staff at Exeter University. He has collaborated on several books, both for the classroom and for teachers, and is Secretary to the U K Editorial Committee ofCle.     

How to do things with words: Speech acts in education

Abstract

Originating from philosophy and science, many different ideas have made their way into educational policies. Educational policies often take such ideas completely out of context, and enforce them as general norms to every aspect of education; even opposing ideals make their way into school’s curricula, teaching techniques, assignments, and procedures. Meanwhile, inside the actual classrooms, teachers and students are left in limbo, trying to comply with, techniques, evaluation forms and a growing technical educational vocabulary. Here I would like to propose an antidote to this absurdity by reminding us what teachers and students already know. Such an antidote can be found in J. L. Austin’s speech act theory. In this paper, I propose we revisit speech act theory and treat it as an educational theory. That might help us dismantle false dichotomies troubling education for decades. The point is not that the discussion over educational policies and priorities should stop, but that it should be kept in appropriate perspective. A modified speech act theory can help us facilitate such a perspective.     

谈如何搞好课堂教学改革

教学质量是学校的生命线，搞好课堂教学改革是提高教学质量的保证。笔者认为要扎实有效地搞好课堂教学改革，必须做好以下四方面的工作：①科学划分学习小组是搞好课堂教学改革的前提。②培养学生良好的学习习惯是搞好课堂教学改革的基础。③科学评价激励是搞好课堂教学改革的关键。④精心进行教学设计是搞好课堂教学改革的保障。     

Coping with dyslexia in the regular classroom: Inclusion or exclusion

The article begins with an historical review of the many attempts to cope with learning disabled and other handicapped children in schools, especially in regular classrooms. Children with dyslexia are reportedly the majority of individuals with learning disabilities. Most researchers have reached concensus that dyslexia originates with specific impairment of language processing. Although it would seem necessary for educators, especially those who teach the primary grades, to understand the structure of the English language and the alphabetic writing system, there is evidence that teachers are not required to have such command of language and how to teach it. The need for establishment of a comprehensive, interdisciplinary teacher education and training program will be discussed. This would include a core body of knowledge, relevant skills, and an understanding of methods, attitudes and values of participating disciplines. Without appropriate changes in teacher preparation it is doubtful that inclusion in regular classrooms will provide much educational benefit for the dyslexic population in our schools.     

Doing different things or doing things different: exploring the role of action learning in innovation

The notion of action learning driven innovation is explored with reference to three action-learning projects carried out in the last year and a proposed multi stakeholder project starting in 2016. The authors also provide an account of ‘innovation’, including its rationale and characteristics, and argues for its particular suitability in the practice of action learning.     

不作为与大作为:转型期的电大定位

经过27年的发展,电大进入到改革发展的关键期。在进行了回首历史,温故知新;纵横思考,审慎定位;冷静面对,有所不为;顺应时代,大有作为;理顺关系,和谐发展等诸方面分析论述后得出:转型期的电大定位,必须处理好不作为与大作为的辩证关系。     

What do two-year-olds know about the sizes of things?

Knowledge about the sizes of things is an integral part of object concepts. In 5 experiments, we examined 2-, 3-, 4-year-olds' and adults' internalized representations of the sizes of buttons, plates, and shoes. We found that 3- and 4-year-olds had accurate knowledge of the typical sizes of buttons and plates. 2-year-olds' knowledge of plate and button sizes was more fragile; however, they demonstrated accurate internal representations of the sizes of shoes. The studies provide new empirical evidence about the young child's knowledge of the sizes of 3 everyday objects. The findings also suggest that the size of an object may be more accurately represented if its size is highly relevant for the object's intended function.     

Conceptions of Contemporary European Universities: to do research or not to do research?

The article examines the extent to which the notion of a publicly-funded university as an institution engaging in both teaching and research is likely to be sustained in the European higher education space of the future, given the variety of pressures (including funding and mass higher education) on such a conception of a university and changes in how national governments regard the purposes of higher education. Relevant literature on the changing purposes of universities is reviewed. For illustrative purposes, the article uses an example of recent legislation, the 2004 Higher Education Act, in England, whereby research degree awarding powers are no longer a pre-requisite for the conferral of university status. The position in England's higher education system with regard to research and teaching is contrasted with that of a second UK country, Scotland, which has contrasting policies on teaching and research in universities. The article examines the research-teaching debate from the perspective of individual academics, universities and policy-makers, using recent empirical data where available. It is suggested that whilst academics and their institutions (for different reasons) may be in favour of retaining a link between teaching and research and may resist changes to this, policy-makers faced with rising demands on the public purse may see such links as suited only to an academic elite. Such pressures apply equally to other member countries of the European Higher Education space, so the outcomes of this policy debate about the centrality of research and teaching to universities have many implications for the future shape of European higher education.     

Terror(ism) in the classroom: censorship,affect and uncivil bodies

This paper examines an event in a US secondary classroom where a Muslim student was disciplined for reading lesbian erotica in class. While many students read and exchanged erotica in the school, this student in particular was targeted for a disciplinary hearing. I explore this as an affective event, a moment of sensation and excess, to think about how the taken-for-granted dramas of the classroom might be manifestations of larger scale events and geopolitical forces. Here post-9/11 practices of surveilling and managing Muslim bodies and ambivalent affects around Muslim women coalesced to escalate an ‘event.’ As mainstream media increasingly report incidents of Islamophobia in schools, educational research needs pay heed to the experiences and voices of Muslim students. Here a student’s outspokenness, agency, and animated affect were positioned as insubordinate and deemed threatening to the sanctity of the school. Incivility and dissent, rather than insubordinate, are important affects to make space for in secondary schools, particularly for students of color. This paper also explores several concepts in relation to qualitative research including data as affect, affective pedagogies, and glitch methodologies.     

The Fourth-Year Experience: Impediments to Degree Completion

Undergraduates who persevere to the fourth year of their academic careers have invested a great deal of time, effort, and financial resources in their education. In spite of the effort, many do not succeed in graduating. Students from an entering class of first-time, full time freshmen from a large urban university were tracked through their undergraduate careers in an ex post facto study in search of correlates to degree completion. Stopping out, taking developmental classes, receiving an F, dropping to part time, and withdrawing from classes were all associated with failing to complete for students still enrolled in their fourth year.     

Impediments to communication in transition to terminal illness

Viewing themselves in two hypothetical roles-as terminal patients and as family members related to a terminal patient-48 adults were surveyed on their expectations and preferences about how information should be communicated when a terminal illness is first diagnosed. Identifying with the patient role, respondents believed patients should be told the truth immediately and unconditionally. In contrast, respondents indentifying with family members perceived conditions under which the rights of patients should be abridged. In this latter role, male respondents were significantly less likely than males to imagine themselves as able to inform a loved one about a terminal illness. Nevertheless, for both sexes, early childhood experiences communicating about death and dying were found to be a better predictor of the case with which respondents can imagine communicating with a terminally ill loved one than are current adult attitudes and experiences. Regardless of personal ease in discussing death, however, most respondents thought the physician, not family members or other health care professionals, should decide when and how the terminally ill adult should be informed--a noteworthy finding in light of the fact that 83 percent of all respondents consider physicians poorly equipped for this role.     

充分利用专修室 搞好火控装备原理教学

充分发挥新型装备火控系统专修室的作用,在火控系统装备教学过程中指导学员通过示教器材和装备部组件等专修室资源,形象生动地学习装备原理、故障排除及维修方法。解决了以往教学中存在的装备少、结构复杂、易损毁、维修成本高、与部队更新不同步等教学难题,提高了火控装备保障人才的培训质量,收到了良好的教学效果。     

Mothers with mental retardation who do or do not abuse or neglect their children

Mothers with mental retardation with or without a history of child abuse and/or neglect were compared on a number of demographic variables. The reasons why children were or were not removed also were examined. The demographic comparisons showed that while those mothers with such a history generally had higher IQs, they were similar to the mothers without such a history. Twice as many of those with a history of abuse and/or neglect were married, lived independently, and had at least two children, one of which often had problems, in comparison to those without such a history. Examination of the reasons for child removal showed that removal occurred if the mother had a problem in addition to her retardation or if she was unwilling to attend and actively participate in a training program and/or did not have someone who could provide support. If a mother was willing and did attend training and had support, children were either not removed initially or were returned upon evidence that the mother was actively participating. In comparison to those mothers with a history of abuse and/or neglect, those without such a history functioned at a lower intellectual and functional level and were living with a relative who shared child-care responsibilities.     

What’s the body got to do with it? Exploring embodied,political readings in the classroom through poetry

ABSTRACT

This essay attempts to explore the links between politics, poetry, and collective, embodied readings and discussion in the classroom. When my Year 12 class were asked ‘What is Poetry?’, their answers suggested something in the Romantic tradition – of poetry as expressive, individual and emotional. My experience studying poetry with my Year 9 class suggests something altogether different – that studying poetry allows students to have an embodied and collective reading. In the sense that politics concerns the control of bodies, poetry allows the class to read in an embodied sense, thus politically, in a way that assessment criteria and the demands of high-stakes testing, with their focus on individual understanding, do not. Thus, I argue for the study of poetry as essential in terms of recognising students’ political agency – not primarily as exam-takers but as citizens of a country and an Earth they will, to put it grandly, inherit.     

Impediments to change: Applications of coaching in high-school science teaching

This article describes how two coaching models were utilized in an attempt to assist Jonathon, an experienced teacher who had been teaching science for only two years, to improve his science teaching. Because of the numerous difficulties that Jonathon encountered in planning and implementing the science curriculum, school administrators requested assistance from several science educators from a university near the school. In order to assist Jonathon, two coaching models were used over a period of approximately six months. In the first coaching program two high-school teachers were coached by three science educators from the university. In the second coaching program the teachers coached one another. Neither program was successful in improving Jonathon's teaching in the intended manner. The major impediments to change were Jonathon's beliefs about teaching and learning and his relatively poor knowledge of the science content he was to teach. The findings of the study suggest that the coaching interventions require teachers to analyze teaching, reflect on practice, and consider alternative approaches to teaching and learning. Involvement in the coaching programs provided Jonathon with a foundation of knowledge on which sustained improvements in teaching might develop in the future.     

教,就要选择学生不会的去教

一位青年教师是这样教学孟子<鱼我所欲章>的字词句的知识的: 课前,布置学生自读课文,要求把预习时在字词句方面遇到的问题抄在笔记本上.是读音方面的,摘抄句子并在词语下面加点;是解释词或短语意义的,摘抄句子并在词语下面加横线;是整句话不懂的,摘抄句子,不用另加标注.抄写时,在笔记本上隔行写,留下一空行作听课笔记用,并要求在句子前面用阿拉伯字标明词句出自课文的第几自然段.