Children’s concept of probability as inferred from their binary choices—revisited

Children had to choose one of two urns—each comprising beads of winning and losing colours—from which to draw a winning bead. Three experiments, aimed at diagnosing rules of choice and designed without confounding possible rules with each other, were conducted. The level of arithmetic difficulty of the trials was controlled so as not to distort the effects of the constituent variables of proportion. Children aged 4 to 11 first chose by more winning elements and proceeded with age to choices by greater proportion of winning elements. There were some indications of intermediate choices by fewer losing elements and by greater difference between the two colours. Distinguishing correct choices from favourable draws, namely acknowledging the role of chance in producing the outcome and insisting on the right choice, grew with age. Children switched rather early from considering one dimension to two; they combined the quantities of winning and losing elements either additively by difference or, with age, mostly multiplicatively by proportion. Guided playful activities for young children, based on this research, are suggested for fostering acquisition of the basic constituents of the probability concept: uncertainty of outcome, quantification by proportion, and the reverse relation between the chances of complementary events.     

Drawing Weighted Directed Graph from It＇s Adjacency Matrix

This paper proposes an algorithm for building weighted directed graph, defmes the weighted directed relationship matrix of the graph, and describes algorithm implementation using this matrix. Based on this algorithm, an effective way for building and drawing weighted directed graphs is presented, forming a foundation for visual implementation of the algorithm in the graph theory.     

Comparisons between Liang Shiqiu’s and Zhu Shenghao’s Hamlet from the Perspective of Translator’s Subjectivity

For the Chinese versions of Hamlet, Liang Shiqiu’s and Zhu Shenghao’s translations can be called the classic. Because the two great translators have their own choices, their versions differ a lot. In the translating process, translator’s subjectivity plays an important role and it is one of the major reasons for emerging different translation. The thesis mainly talks about Liang Shiqiu’s and Zhu Shenghao’s different versions from the perspective of translator’s subjectivity by comparison.     

Evaluating taught postgraduate awards from the student’s perspective

There is a need for a questionnaire designed specifically to evaluate taught postgraduate (TPg) awards for quality assurance or enhancement purposes. Comparison of undergraduate and TPg awards suggests that as the former have broadened their ambit to better nurture generic graduate attributes, TPg awards have concentrated on advanced specialised knowledge and skills. Those enrolling in TPg programmes are often mature part-time students working in a field associated with the subject studied. A set of interviews with TPg students revealed that they had clear expectations of the knowledge and skills they were expected to acquire from their studies and were able to comment critically on curriculum design. This made it clear that instruments designed for undergraduate degrees would not be suitable. Therefore, a TPg questionnaire was designed based on a model derived from a qualitative study, which adopted a grounded theory approach to collect views from 21 part-time TPg students from seven programmes offered by six institutions in Hong Kong. The conceptual model underpinning the questionnaire design was tested using structural equation modelling. As the results showed a good fit to the data, the validity of the questionnaire was confirmed. Use of the instrument in a routine quality assurance exercise across a university revealed that results from the questionnaire were highly diagnostic, so providing constructive feedback for curriculum reform.     

Didactic competencies of teachers from the learner’s viewpoint

Teacher competencies can be researched in many different ways. In the present article they are studied from the learner’s viewpoint. The article presents results of the extensive project “Teacher Education for New Competencies for the Knowledge Society and the Role of these Competencies in Educational Goal Attainment at School”, carried out at the Faculty of Arts of the University of Ljubljana, with the financial support of the Slovenian Ministry of Education and Sport. We present the results of the learner’s judgement of the teacher’s didactic competencies. We formed a questionnaire with which we operationalised teacher competencies with the purpose of measuring the teacher’s efficiency of instruction. In order to achieve the goals of modern instruction it is important to engage both models: learner‐centred and teacher‐centred education. The research showed that elements of the traditional instruction model are more frequently used than the model that demands a changed learner role.     

A single-question qualitative bachelor’s programme evaluation

Conventionally, quantitative surveys are used for student evaluations in higher education, but the validity of this practice has been questioned. In the present study, we investigated a qualitative method for evaluating a bachelor’s programme. Forty-one first-year students and twenty-eight third-year students on a bachelor’s programme in Public Administration were asked to answer a single question in relation to their programme: ‘What could have been done in order to support your learning?’ The students provided rich responses of a depth and breadth not attainable through conventional surveys, making this method worthwhile for educational development at the programme level. The responses focused on students’ own learning rather than on judgement of teacher performance. The results indicate that the students underwent a transition from the first to third year, suggesting a shift in needs. For example, first-year students asked for direct interaction, whereas third-year students asked for feedback on accomplishments. Practical applications are discussed.     

‘Drawing the Leaves Anyway’: Teachers Embracing Children’s Different Ways of Knowing in Preschool Science Practice

This study explores if and how teachers combine practices of science and of preschool (children 1–5 years old) into preschool science practice. Views of knowing may differ between science practices, traditionally associated with masculinity and rationality, and preschool practices, traditionally associated with femininity and caring. Recognising this, we have chosen to focus on how teachers’ talk constructs and relates to possible ways of gaining knowledge and reaching explanations of phenomena in preschool science. The analysis builds on two concept pairs often associated with gender as well as knowing: objective-subjective and logical-intuitive. The analysed material consists of 11 group interviews where preschool teachers talk about activities concerning science content. Our results show that several ways of knowing are possible in work with science content in preschool. These include ways of knowing more associated with subjectivity, such as ‘individual liking’ and ‘whole-body perception’, as well as more associated with objectivity, such as ‘noticing differences and similarities’. Furthermore, the results show that the teachers’ talk moves readily between possibilities associated with femininity (subjective and intuitive) and masculinity (objective and logical). This indicates that the teachers in this study have found ways to handle science in preschool that goes against presumed tensions between science and preschool practices. The results contribute to more nuanced ways of describing and thinking about science in preschool and pave the way for further development of science education in early childhood education.     

‘Drawing and playing are not the same’: children’s views on their activities in Icelandic preschools

Play is an important part of early childhood education and has been defined from different perspectives and paradigms. However, definitions of play have been studied more from adults’ perspectives than from those of children themselves. This ethnographic research, with children aged three to five years and built on sociological constructs, will explore children’s views on play in two preschool settings in Iceland. Video-stimulated recordings were used to support children’s conversations about their different activities in the settings, to explore which activities they considered play. Most of the children said that they were playing when they took on roles and could decide what to do with the material. When the children were preparing the play or were drawing, they usually said they were not playing. These findings add to the understanding of play from children’s perspectives and are valuable to the research field and for educators working with young children.     

Towards the real-time evaluation of collaborative activities: Integration of an automatic rater of collaboration quality in the classroom from the teacher’s perspective

This paper presents the integration of a real time evaluation method of collaboration quality in a monitoring application that supports teachers in class orchestration. The method is implemented as an automatic rater of collaboration quality and studied in a real time scenario of use. We argue that automatic and semi-automatic methods which provide assessments of collaboration quality or detect disorders and anomalies in collaborative activities should be further used to assist class monitoring. To that end, we study the routine of teachers when they monitor computer-supported collaborative activities with respect to the size of the classroom and the support of an automatic rater. We focus on the way the rater affects their task and how it can be further used to empower the practice of teachers.     

Standards and assessment: coherence from the teacher’s perspective

We sought to understand how teachers’ perspectives on standards-based instructional practices, classroom assessment, and external testing do or do not show coherence and alignment. Based on survey methods (n?=?155) and interviews with a sample of secondary school teachers (n?=?9) in a large urban district in the USA, we explored general trends and individual teachers’ viewpoints. Our results suggest that the teachers’ instructional use of standards, classroom assessment preferences, and beliefs about the test-driven system are moderately correlated. Interview data provide insight into reasons teachers hold beliefs that do or do not fit well into a coherent assessment system.     

Forecasting the Future of Self-producing Marketing from Prince William’s Marriage

Self-producing marketing is a kind of classical and effective marketing measure;recently it has drawn more and more attention and won wider application.This paper will start from Britain’s prince William’s wedding on April 29th,2011 and analyze the self-producing marketing in marriage.Moreover,adjusted to the current marketing environment,the paper will forecast the development trend of self-producing.     

The dimensions of e-learning quality: from the learner’s perspective

The present study was designed to identify the quality dimensions as perceived by adult learners who had taken one or more e-learning courses offered by higher education institutions in South Korea and to identify and confirm the structural features of these quality dimensions. The results of the exploratory factor analysis arising from a survey of 299 learners revealed that from their perspective, there were seven dimensions in evaluating the e-learning quality: Interaction, Staff Support, Institutional Quality Assurance Mechanism, Institutional Credibility, Learner Support, Information and Publicity and Learning Tasks. And the confirmatory factor analysis with responses obtained from another set of 496 adult learners confirmed a good fit of the seven-factor model to the observed data. While most of these seven dimensions are supported by previous studies, some dimensions, such as technology support, content and evaluation/assessment that e-learning providers had highlighted did not appear to be important for Korean adult learners. Possible explanations for these findings are discussed in relation to learner characteristics, e-learning design, and culture, and further research topics are suggested.     

The Role of Drawing in Young Children’s Construction of Science Concepts

It has been observed that many young children like making marks on paper and that they enjoy the activity. It is also known that children’s drawings are vehicles for expression and communication. Therefore, it would be logical and reasonable for teachers to incorporate children’s drawings into building science concepts. To demonstrate how drawings are utilized to help a child to acquire a science concept, the article first presents a vignette of an interaction between an adult and a 5-year-old boy, focusing on the science concept of the physical characteristics of a spider. It is then followed by several analytical explanations of how drawings build children’s understandings. Not only are the introduced strategies useful for one-on-one interactive communication, but also applicable to a small group of young children. The article ends with the specifics of how these strategies were applied to a group of four children in their acquisition of the science concept of the water cycle.     

‘He’s from Ghana!’ Exploring the Social and Cultural Complexities of the English Classroom

This essay focuses on my experience studying Stephen Kelman’s Pigeon English with Year 9 and the complexities of that particular classroom. It seeks to look beyond the labels that are often imposed on students and to show the importance of examining the particular individuals, both as learners and as people with their own lives outside school. It considers text choice and illustrates how pupils’ cultural and historical backgrounds can play a key role in the social nature of the classroom. It also shows how significant class discussions can be in the development of ideas about literature. The essay then goes on to look at ability judgements and how these can affect learning, considering the value of setting versus mixed-ability grouping.     

On Implicit Information Translation of Shakespeare’ s Works from the Perspective of Relevance Theory:In the Case of Zhu’ s Translation and Liang’ s Translation

The Relevance Theory put forward by Sperber and Wilson not only gives rise to a new research on pragmatics, but also provides a new theoretic foundation for other disciplines. Gutt applies the theory to translation and gives a relevance-theoretic account of translation. The relevance-theoretic communicative model provides rational explanation for existence of the implicit information. The appropri ate treatment of the implicit information is consistent with readers’ cognitive environment and expectation. Human communication de pends on not only the text, but also the inferential context. The adequate contextual effect is derived from the correct judgment and infer ence of the implicit information in communication. Therefore, the translator should match the original author’ s intention with target text readers’ expectation to make sure that they yield adequate contextual effects with appropriate processing efforts. Implicitness is one of the features of Shakespeare’ s works. It is more demanding for the translators to catch and transfer to the target readers the implicit information. Zhu Shenghao and Liang Shiqiu, the two famous translators adopt different translation strategies to deal with the implicit information in the works.     

The primary school’s invasion of the privacy of the child: unmasking the potential of some current practices

Privacy has been defined as “the protective buffer within which people can avoid another party’s taking something from them, keeping watch over them, or entering into their lives in a way that is both unwelcome and undesirable”. It is a premise of this paper that such a position needs to be taken very seriously in contemporary society, and particularly in the case of schools, as school personnel have the capacity to engage in practices which show great disregard for individual and family privacy. This is illustrated in the case of primary school education in the Republic of Ireland. Particular attention is paid to assessment, pedagogical and curricular practices that derive from patterns of systematic and mandatory disclosure that are confessional, performative and public.