Discriminatory attitudes toward intercultural communication in domestic and overseas contexts

Drawing from social identity theory and its categorization process, the present study crossexamines Japanese students’ contrastively different attitudes toward Asians and European (-looking) people in two different contexts: (1) Japanese students in the overseas English language school context who perceive a sense of solidarity with other Asian, particularly Korean, students in the presence of European students and (2) Japanese students’ yearning for ‘white English’ speakers in Japan and their disregard for Asian and African-looking students on campus. Based on primary data and literature knowledge base, the present study argues that Japanese students’ inclination to make friends with other Asian friends in English speaking countries is context-bound and once they return to their less multicultural home country, their intact yearning for the Imagined West is rekindled. Further discussions are provided for those involved in international education and foreign language education as well as English-as-a-world-language education in postsecondary education.     

The effects of the cooperative learning method supported by multiple intelligence theory on Turkish elementary students’ mathematics achievement

In the present experimental study, the effects of the cooperative learning method supported by multiple intelligence theory (CLMI) on elementary school fourth grade students’ academic achievement and retention towards the mathematics course were investigated. The participants of the study were 150 students who were divided into two experimental (used CLMI) and two control groups (used traditional method). “Mathematics Achievement Test,” “Teele Inventory for Multiple Intelligences” and “Personal Information Form” were used as the measurement instruments of the study. The findings of this research have indicated that CLMI has a more significant effect on academic achievement than the traditional method. Yet, regarding the retention scores, CLMI has not significant effect on retention.     

The curriculum as a tool for inclusive participation: Students’ voices in a case study in a Portuguese multicultural school

Portuguese schools in urban areas became multicultural during the 90s. Some students are quite distanced from the school culture. Many repeat grades. The curriculum emerges as a means of (re)organizing school practice, so that it is designed to foster inclusion. It is a tool for social mediation between the culture and knowledge of teenagers, and academic ones. It shapes the interactions between participants, cultural tools and knowledge. The principles of inclusive schooling promote the respect for diversity, underlining the need to listen to all voices of a learning community. According to the sociocultural approach appropriating knowledge and developing competencies is a complex process. Interactive practices shape students’ academic performances. Collaborative project work has been used to promote students’ engagement. This action-research project developed an alternative curriculum in a class (grades 5 and 6) from a poor and multicultural school in Lisbon. A follow-up investigated the impact of the educational changes on the learners’ participation in school and in social practices, and on their future life. We aim at analyzing this alternative curriculum process by focussing on students’ narratives. Results highlight improvements in students’ academic and social competencies. Changing practices during compulsory education facilitated achievement and resulted in a better socialization.     

Student attitudes toward learning,level of pre-knowledge and instruction type in a computer-simulation: effects on flow experiences and perceived learning outcomes

Attitudes toward learning (ATL) have been shown to influence students’ learning outcomes. However, there is a lack of knowledge about the ways in which the interaction between ATL, the learning situation, and the level of students’ prior knowledge influence affective reactions and conceptual change. In this study, a simulation of acid-base titrations was examined to assess the impact of instruction format, level of prior knowledge and students’ ATL on university-level students, with respect to flow experiences (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990) and perceived conceptual change. Results show that the use of guiding instructions was correlated with a perceived conceptual change and high levels of “Challenge,” “Enjoyment,” and “Concentration,” but low sense of control during the exercise. Students who used the open instructions scored highly on the “Control flow” component, but their perceived learning score was lower than that for the students who used the guiding instructions. In neither case did students’ ATL or their pre-test results contribute strongly to students’ flow experiences or their perceived learning in the two different learning situations.     

Student Flow Between Community Colleges: Investigating Lateral Transfer

The traditional unidirectional (“linear”) postsecondary path from high school to a community college to a 4-year institution into the workforce represents accurately a decreasing proportion of the pathways actually taken by students through higher education. Instead, students increasingly exhibit patterns of enrollment that take them through multiple postsecondary institutions, both within levels of the higher education system (e.g., multiple community colleges, multiple 4-year institutions) and across levels (e.g., movement back and forth between community colleges and 4-year institutions). These “swirling” patterns of enrollment are widely recognized by scholars of higher education, but they remain poorly understood. In this study, I employ data that address 89,057 first-time students in the California community college system to answer a number of key questions concerning lateral transfer between community colleges, which, according to prior research, constitutes one sizeable component of student “swirl”. Building on the very limited work on this topic, I examine whether the reported high prevalence of lateral transfer holds true under a more stringent operational framework than that employed in prior work. I explore whether lateral transfer is primarily an artifact of students enrolling simultaneously in multiple community colleges, sometimes called “double-dipping”. I investigate the timing of lateral transfer from several different perspectives to determine how lateral transfer fits in students’ progress and development. Finally, I probe the relationship between students’ level of academic investment in their current community college and the risk of lateral transfer.     

Facilitating Preschoolers’ Scientific Knowledge Construction via Computer Games Regarding Light and Shadow: The Effect of the Prediction-Observation-Explanation (POE) Strategy

Educational researchers have suggested that computer games have a profound influence on students’ motivation, knowledge construction, and learning performance, but little empirical research has targeted preschoolers. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to investigate the effects of implementing a computer game that integrates the prediction-observation-explanation (POE) strategy (White and Gunstone in Probing understanding. Routledge, New York, 1992) on facilitating preschoolers’ acquisition of scientific concepts regarding light and shadow. The children’s alternative conceptions were explored as well. Fifty participants were randomly assigned into either an experimental group that played a computer game integrating the POE model or a control group that played a non-POE computer game. By assessing the students’ conceptual understanding through interviews, this study revealed that the students in the experimental group significantly outperformed their counterparts in the concepts regarding “shadow formation in daylight” and “shadow orientation.” However, children in both groups, after playing the games, still expressed some alternative conceptions such as “Shadows always appear behind a person” and “Shadows should be on the same side as the sun.”     

“Is that paper really due today?”: differences in first-generation and traditional college students’ understandings of faculty expectations

Success in college is not simply a matter of students demonstrating academic ability. In addition, students must master the “college student” role in order to understand instructors’ expectations and apply their academic skills effectively to those expectations. This article uses data from focus groups to examine the fit between university faculty members’ expectations and students’ understanding of those expectations. Parallel discussions among groups of faculty and groups of students highlight important differences regarding issues of time management and specific aspects of coursework. We find definite incongruities between faculty and student perspectives and identify differences between traditional and first-generation college students. We argue that variations in cultural capital, based on parents’ educational experiences, correspond to important differences in each group’s mastery of the student role and, thus, their ability to respond to faculty expectations. The conclusion discusses the theoretical and practical implications of considering role mastery a form of cultural capital.     

Dissonance in first-year students’ reflections on their learning

This paper presents the findings of an interview study of first-year engineering students’ approaches to study. Data is presented to illustrate the construct of “dissonant study orchestration” as it is manifested in the everyday academic reality of these students’ learning behaviour. This data is theorised within a student’s-experiences-oflearning framework and patterns of study approach considered atypical of or theoretically undesirable within, the model used to determine them are presented and discussed. Individual-level, qualitatively different patterns of “dissonant” orchestration are articulated. The conclusion to the paper argues that the qualitative distinctions apparent amongst dissonant approaches present particular challenges to academic practitioners whose aim is the improvement of these students’ learning behaviour.     

Students’ Persistence in a Distributed Doctoral Program in Educational Leadership in Higher Education: A Mixed Methods Study

The purpose of this mixed methods sequential explanatory study was to identify factors contributing to students’ persistence in the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Distributed Doctoral Program in Educational Leadership in Higher Education by obtaining quantitative results from surveying 278 current and former students and then following up with four purposefully selected typical respondents to explore those results in more depth. In the first, quantitative, phase, five external and internal to the program factors were found to be predictors to students’ persistence in the program: “program”, “online learning environment”, “student support services”, “faculty”, and “self-motivation”. In the qualitative follow up multiple case study analysis four major themes emerged: (1) quality of academic experiences; (2) online learning environment; (3) support and assistance; and (4) student self-motivation. The quantitative and qualitative findings from the two phases of the study are discussed with reference to prior research. Implications and recommendations for policy makers are provided.     

The Rhetoric of Care: Preservice Teacher Discourses that Depoliticize, Deflect, and Deceive

How teachers “care” for students is a well-established line of inquiry in educational research, but the ways such “care” may function as symbolic violence have received scant attention. In this ethnographic investigation of classroom disciplinary interactions, the characteristics and functions of preservice teachers’ care discourses are examined. By translating deficit discourses into expressions of praise for students’ nonacademic talents, the participants’ rhetoric of care effectively shifts blame for failure from teacher to student. The preservice teachers’ expressions of care also function to veil the power being produced in such rhetoric, to frame the teacher as victim when said care is rejected, and to reverse the carer/cared-for dynamic when teachers’ attempts to inspire academic progress are unsuccessful. Implications for teacher education and teacher development are provided as are suggestions for how to recognize and implement more authentic forms of care.     

Using virtual microscopy to scaffold learning of pathology: a naturalistic experiment on the role of visual and conceptual cues

New representational technologies, such as virtual microscopy, create new affordances for medical education. In the article, a study on the following two issues is reported: (a) How does collaborative use of virtual microscopy shape students’ engagement with and learning from virtual slides of tissue specimen? (b) How do visual and conceptual cues scaffold students’ reasoning? Fifteen pairs of medical students participated in two sessions in which the students used a virtual microscope as a diagnostic tool in the context of learning pathology. The slides provided the students with varying levels of visual and conceptual cueing. The sessions were videotaped, and the students’ reasoning while using the microscope was analysed. The students’ written answers were analysed in terms of the findings they made and the diagnoses suggested. At a general level, the results show that students engage actively in this kind of virtually-mediated environment. The visual and/or conceptual cues improve students’ performance, and guide the students’ perception and reasoning in a manner that is productive from the point of view of learning to make clinically relevant observations. Scaffolding students’ reasoning process through cues furthermore assists the students in avoiding the most obvious pitfalls such as overlooking critical areas of a specimen. Overall, visual and conceptual cues improve students’ reasoning in perceptual and cognitive terms, while still allowing space for the making of “relevant mistakes” that may further the students’ diagnostic skills.     

Academic inbreeding: exploring its characteristics and rationale in Japanese universities using a qualitative perspective

This study analyses why and how academic inbreeding as a recruitment practice continues to prevail in Japan, a country with a mature higher education system, where high rates of academic inbreeding endure in most of the research-oriented universities in spite of several higher education reforms. Based on a qualitative analysis, we disclose three characteristics that lead academics to become inbred at Japanese universities. One characteristic—the adoption of “open recruitment processes” in detriment of “closed recruitment processes”—changed over time, limiting academic inbreeding practices, but two other characteristics remained unchanged over time: the “one university learning experience” and the “concentration of doctoral supervisors at the same university”. These latter characteristics represent difficult challenges to be tackled as they are also traditional characteristics of the Japanese higher education system. The research also shows that academic inbreeding practices are a means to assure organizational stability and institutional identity, features perceived as important by Japanese universities. A central challenge for the Japanese universities is then to guarantee these features without needing to rely on academic inbreeding practices to obtain them. However, devising policies to meet this challenge calls for institutional will to change, proactive strategies and time.     

A holistic approach to international students, institutional habitus and academic literacies in an Irish third level institution

This qualitative study examines the interplay between academic staff and international students with regard to developing academic literacies at university. Higher education has traditionally responded to increasing student diversity with the expectation that students will conform to institutional norms or habitus. In this context international students arrive with cultural capital which may not fit such norms, and would benefit from developing their academic literacy, as indeed would home students given an increasingly diverse student body in Irish higher education. Findings reveal a gap between academics expectations and international students’ capabilities. Academic staff remained within the remit of the research in contrast to the 22 international students who were interviewed. They did not separate the totality of their campus experience from academic literacy practices. These ranged from uncertainty around writing in another language to a mismatch between diversity management in class and students’ own expectations. International students found difficulty to making friends on campus which could benefit their integration into the academic literacy practices of their respective disciplines. Findings point towards a whole institution response to student diversity which transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries.     

High School Course-Taking and Post-Secondary Institutional Selectivity

Race shapes many aspects of students’ high school experiences that are relevant to the college admissions process. We examine the racially-specific effects of high school course of study on college selectivity. Using NELS 1988–1994, we test how race and track interactively predict the prestige of the first post-secondary institution attended. We find support for a “redemptive equity model” of college prestige for Latinos, who attend more selective colleges than White students, net of background and academic variables. Asian American students also attend more selective institutions than White students. Results for African-American students are more complicated, in that the colleges they attend are not significantly different from those of Whites, on average. When we exclude students who attend historically Black colleges and universities, however, African-American students attend significantly more prestigious universities than Whites, net of other factors. We also find racially-specific effects of high school course of study, with Latinos, Asian Americans, and African-Americans appearing to benefit more from taking more rigorous academic courses than Whites.     

Using educational software to support collective thinking and test hypotheses in the computer science curriculum

This study analyses the discourse among the teacher and the students, members of three (3) small groups, who learn in the environment of a stand-alone computer. Two educational environments are examined: the first one, a “virtual laboratory” (Virtual scale-DELYS) and the second one, a computer modeling environment (ModelsCreator). The ‘Virtual Scale’ environment provides users with curriculum focused feedback and in that sense it can be categorized as directive. The ModelsCreator environment provides users merely with a representation of their own conception of curriculum concepts, so it can be categorized as an open-ended environment. The goal of this research is to exemplify the way the two educational software environments support (a) the development of collective thinking in peer— and teacher-led discussion and (b) students’ autonomy. The software tools of the “Virtual scale” along with the resources provided for the problem solving created an educational framework of hypothesis testing. This framework did not limit the students’ contributions by directing them to give short answers. Moreover, it supported the students’ initiatives by providing tools, representations and procedures that offered educationally meaningful feedback. Based on the above results, we discuss a new educationally important structure of software mediation and describe the way the two software activities resourced collective thinking and students’ initiatives. Finally, for each type of software environment, we propose certain hypotheses for future research regarding the support of collaborative problem solving.     

Is there a gap between students’ preference and university presidents’ concern over college ranking indicators?: a case study of “College Navigator in Taiwan”

In order to help students make well-informed choices, reliable college ranking systems with comparable information about higher education institutions worldwide have been welcomed by many students. Because traditional college rankings had many methodological problems, a new type of user-based ranking, called “personalized college ranking” started to develop in many nations in the late 1990s. In 2008, Higher Education Evaluation and Accreditation Council of Taiwan (HEEACT), launched a ranking project called “College Navigator in Taiwan” which developed the first Asian student-based college search engine to provide local and international students with transparent information on Taiwan’s higher education institutions. The main objective of this paper, therefore, is to compare the rational, strategies and pathways for establishing personalized college rankings. In order to analyze the gap between students’ preferences and university presidents’concerns over ranking indicators, HEEACT’s “College Navigator in Taiwan” is adopted as a case study at the end of paper.     

From Opposition to Engagement: Lessons from High Achieving African American Students

Influential research on African American students has examined their school failure in terms of students’ opposition to school achievement. Only a few studies have explored school engagement and success among these students, and even fewer have examined the experiences of high achieving black students. This study illustrates the school context and school processes that high achieving African American students identify as contributing to their academic success. The findings reveal three main school effects impacting the students’ performance: 1) teacher practices, engaging pedagogy versus disengaging pedagogy; 2) participation in extracurricular activities and; 3) the state scholarship as performance incentive. According to the students, teacher practices were the most instrumental school effect benefiting their outcomes. Recognizing the processes that promote high achievement among African American students can help to improve our understanding of student performance, while promoting success among these students. The author wishes to thank Ron DePeter and Tekla Johnson for their comments on a previous draft of this article     

A Comparative Study of Problem-Based and Lecture-Based Learning in Junior Secondary School Science

The purpose of the study is to compare problem based learning (PBL) and lecture-based learning (LBL) in Hong Kong secondary students’ science achievement. Secondary One students were divided into two groups: group A (n = 37), was taught two topics: “Human Reproduction” and “Density” through PBL; group B (n = 38) was taught the same topics by LBL. Multiple choice questions and short structured response items were used to assess students’ academic performance. Pre and post tests were categorized into three domains: knowledge, comprehension and application according to Bloom’s Taxonomy (Bloom 1956). The results of this study suggest first that PBL is at least as effective as LBL in gaining the knowledge required to achieve the syllabus’ learning objectives; secondly, the PBL group shows a significant improvement in students’ comprehension and application of knowledge over an extended time. Seemingly, PBL is favored for knowledge retention compared to a more conventional teaching approach, by these early adolescent children in Hong Kong. An ongoing longitudinal study on students’ interactions will further determine whether students taught through PBL develop improved learning in relation to high order skills, in a local situation which still tends to focus on factual recall but where higher skills are being demanded by systemic reform.     

Professional Responsibility – An Issue for Higher Education?

The aim of this article is to shed light on some aspects of professional responsibility by investigating students’ visions of future work and notions of professional responsibility. The data is based on interviews with samples of freshmen in three educational programmes at the University of Oslo in Norway. The data has been analysed in relation to two thesis claimed by Steven Brint: “The rise of a utilitarian ethos” in higher education and the movement from “social trustee professionalism” to “expert professionalism”. The findings show that the students in our sample do not think of higher education primarily as a means to get credentials that will be useful in the labour marked. An intellectual interest in the discipline is the most prevalent reason for the students’ educational choices. Furthermore our findings support an orientation towards “expert professionalism” rather than “social trustee professionalism”. But, embedded in the perspective of an expert there is an emphasis on ethical knowledge, moral and/or societal responsibility and the wish to do good for others. However, the students’ sense of responsibility seems to be restricted to certain “localism” of their specific occupation. Based on the findings we argue that the students reveal a moral awareness that should be taken seriously by the educational institution in order to foster critical rationality and professional commitments.     

Becoming “Effective” Citizens? Change-Oriented Service in a Teacher Education Program

The authors investigated the impact of 22 pre-service teachers’ participation in a change-oriented service-learning project on their conceptions of citizenship as civic actors and civic educators. The goal of this project was to push students toward adopting more critically conscious and activist conceptions of citizenship as aligned with the needs of a democratic society. Using Eyler and Giles’ (1999) typology of effective citizenship as an analytic framework, we describe how students’ participation in this project led to demonstrated growth along all five dimensions of effective citizenship. Yet, analysis revealed that, despite the project’s change-orientation, students’ conceptions of citizenship failed to move beyond personal responsibility to include enhanced social consciousness and the importance of collective action. Thus, we raise critical questions about what constitutes “effective citizenship” in a democratic society and the role of higher education in preparing teachers to embody and enact such a vision.