Extending Language Through Play

Dorothy Jeffree and Roy McConkey, research fellows, Hester Adrian Research Centre, Manchester University, taught Noni, a mentally handicapped three year old, to use verbs and extend her expressive language     

合作装扮游戏与儿童语言发展

合作装扮游戏是幼儿园自由活动中最为突出的游戏形式,有大量研究致力于合作装扮游戏与学前儿童语言发展之间关系的探讨.早期的研究指出,合作装扮游戏为学前儿童提供了发展特定语言能力的机会.后期的研究将焦点放在元交际技能上,指出元交际技能既有帮助儿童进行装扮游戏中的互动与合作的功能.还与儿童未来的学业成就与社会成功相关.     

The Impact of Teacher-Directed and Child-Directed Pretend Play on Cognitive Competence in Kindergarten Children

The goal of our research was to study different forms of organization of pretend play on children's cognitive performance in a mixed-age environment. We studied two forms of management of the playing process: (a) teacher-directed play with simultaneous involvement of all children in the classroom, where the teacher plays the dominant role in the education process directing children's activity, and (b) child-directed play in various small groups. Twenty-six observations were performed on 51 children in two mixed-age classrooms. The mean age of the children was 4.6 years, with age span from 3 to 6 years. Data were collected regarding children's affective and cognitive behavior according to generally accepted taxonomies: Bloom for the cognitive domain, and Krathwohl for affective domain. We found a significant increase in cognitive manifestations during direction of the playing process in groups compared with frontal management of the lesson (113.1 ± 12.1 vs. 45.7 ± 10.3, mean ± SEM, p < 0.0001), which is related with better employment of the powerful education engine of the free-play children.     

Equitable Written Assessments for English Language Learners: How Scaffolding Helps

This study investigated the effects of the use of scaffolds in written classroom assessments through the voices of both native English speakers and English language learners from two middle schools. Students responded to assessment tasks in writing, by speaking aloud using think aloud protocols, and by reflecting in a post-assessment interview. The classroom assessment tasks were designed to engage students in scientific sense making and multifaceted language use, as recommended by the Next Generation Science Standards. Data analyses showed that both groups benefitted from the use of scaffolds. The findings revealed specific ways that modifications were supportive in helping students to comprehend, visualize and organize thinking, and elicit responses. This study offers a model for both sensitizing teachers and strengthening their strategies for scaffolding assessments equitably.     

Block Talk: Spatial Language During Block Play

Spatial skills are a central component of intellect and show marked individual differences. There is evidence that variations in the spatial language young children hear, which directs their attention to important aspects of the spatial environment, may be one of the mechanisms that contributes to these differences. To investigate how play affects variations in language, parents and children were assigned to 1 of 3 conditions: free play with blocks, guided play, or play with preassembled structures (Study 1). Parents in the guided play condition produced significantly higher proportions of spatial talk than parents in the other two conditions, and children in the guided play condition produced significantly more spatial talk than those in the free play condition. Study 2 established baselines of spatial language during activities not involving spatial materials. Proportions of spatial words were lower than those in any of the conditions of Experiment 1. In sum, interaction with blocks naturally elicits elevated levels of spatial language, especially in the context of guided play, suggesting simple‐to‐execute educational interventions.     

德昂语中词的移位现象

汉语存在名词移位,其移位受格的驱动。而德昂语的移位主要体现在特殊疑问词、动词和名词的移位,当移位现象产生时,名词移位后导致句法的功能由主动语态向被动语态转换,但是特殊疑问未发生句法功能和词形的变化。本文通过对德昂语中陈述句、否定句、一般疑问句、差比句的基本词序分析,揭示德昂语中名词、动词、特殊疑问词在句中移位的条件,进一步探讨了德昂语移位的类型特征。     

Enhancing Quality in Online Learning: Scaffolding Planning and Design Through Proactive Evaluation

A major issue confronting educators is the extent to which they wish to conform to so-called paradigm shifts in teaching and learning. In the contemporary world of tertiary education these shifts embrace both pedagogy (from instructivist to constructivist) and technology (from classroom to online). As teachers and learners are faced with the potential of these new learning environments, the extent to which learning outcomes are achieved remains a high priority and subject to a wide range of evaluation strategies. Conventionally, evaluation has been positioned at the end of the instructional development cycle, to assess first whether or not the creative effort achieved the original product goals and second whether or not the desired learning outcomes were realized. In the context of online teaching and learning environments, however, the level of understanding teachers, learners and developers have of the medium can impact the ultimate effectiveness of the product. This paper articulates an additional dimension to post-development evaluation processes in proposing proactive evaluation, a framework that identifies critical online learning factors and influences that will better inform the planning, design and development of learning resources. This notion of proactive evaluation advocates resource development being undertaken where all planning activities are assessed against the evaluation criteria that would normally be applied during formative assessment. By performing these evaluation checks proactively, online learning resources will, in principle, work first time as all relevant factors and issues will have been considered and resolved. More importantly, for those participants who are new to online environments, proactive evaluation will perform a scaffolding and professional development role by enhancing online teaching or learning competencies.     

Teaching Counseling Through a Semester-Long Role Play

This article describes a semester-long role play of a client by the instructor in an advanced undergraduate counseling seminar. This training method allowed students without counseling experience to actively learn about the issues and challenges of the counseling process.     

Distributed Scaffolding: Scaffolding Students in Classroom Environments

Educational Psychology Review - This paper traces the origins of the scaffolding construct, placing it in its theoretical-historical context. The paper discusses the connection between...     

从词的借用看文化心理与语言发展

将汉英在语言发展过程中对词的借用置于各自的文化心理背景下加以讨论，指出文化心理因素可制约也可推动语言对外来词的使用。随着科技全球化发展，跨语言文化交流的加强，词汇相互借用将越来越强。对文化心理作用的分析将有利于我们正确看待当代外来词语对汉语的影响，有利于巩固和发展本民族文化特性。     

Teaching English Through Play in a Chinese Classroom

Many schools in China focus on memorization of facts for the purpose of performing on standardized tests, causing a lack of enthusiasm among teachers and students. This essay discusses some of the challenges surrounding education practices in China and identifies participatory environment, book-related pretend play, and the use of technology as three components of a playful environment to enhance the quality and endurance of Chinese students in English learning.     

电视剧的语言亟待规范

近年来热播的电视剧都或多或少地存在语言不够规范的问题,这与有关人员对语言规范不够重视和自身的文化修养不高有密切关系,因此,演职人员应注意提高自己的文化修养,有关方面也应采取有效措施促使电视剧语言的规范。     

谈语境对多义词学习的重要性

多义词的具体意义,只能靠语境才能确定,离开语境孤立地看一个词,就很难准确地理解该词的真正含义。语境是确定和理解词义的必要前提,因此,联系上下文、结合具体语境学习词汇是一种有效方法。教师应尽量在语境中讲解词汇,让学生倍加注意多义词的语境关系,真正理解词的确切含义及用法,帮助他们掌握更多必要而常用的多义词,才能有效地扩大词汇量。     

Taking Shape: Supporting Preschoolers' Acquisition of Geometric Knowledge Through Guided Play

Shape knowledge, a key aspect of school readiness, is part of early mathematical learning. Variations in how children are exposed to shapes may affect the pace of their learning and the nature of their shape knowledge. Building on evidence suggesting that child‐centered, playful learning programs facilitate learning more than other methods, 4‐ to 5‐year‐old children (N = 70) were taught the properties of four geometric shapes using guided play, free play, or didactic instruction. Results revealed that children taught shapes in the guided play condition showed improved shape knowledge compared to the other groups, an effect that was still evident after 1 week. Findings suggest that scaffolding techniques that heighten engagement, direct exploration, and facilitate “sense‐making,” such as guided play, undergird shape learning.     

简析哈尼语四音格词构词方式

哈尼语四音格词按照音节重叠和结构关系,可以分为ABBC、ABAC、ABAB、ABCB、AABB、ABCD、CBBC、ABBB、ABCA、ABCC、AABC、AAAB等十二种类型。从构词的角度看,哈尼语四音格词的可以构成为联绵式、复合式、重叠式、非重叠式和配音式等类型,其中重叠式是哈尼语四音格词构词的最主要的形式。     

Scaffolding Analysis: Extending the Scaffolding Metaphor to Learning Artifacts

The scaffolding metaphor was originally developed to describe the support given by a more expert individual in a one-on-one interaction. Since then, the notion of scaffolding has been applied more broadly, and it has been transformed and generalized. Most recently, it has been used by researchers in the learning sciences to describe features and functions of technological artifacts, especially those of educational software. In this article, we present an analytic framework that we believe can guide and systematize these new uses of the scaffolding metaphor. In this new framework, "scaffolds" are not features of artifacts or situations, nor is "scaffolding" something that may be occurring (or not) in a given situation that we observe. Rather, a scaffolding analysis is a kind of comparative analysis that we perform on learning interactions. Because this analysis is comparative, it always produces results that are relative to specific choices that we make in framing the comparative analysis. In this article, we present a theoretical argument for our proposed framework and illustrate the definition by applying it to two software environments.