Proof constructions and evaluations

In this article, we focus on a group of 39 prospective elementary (grades K-6) teachers who had rich experiences with proof, and we examine their ability to construct proofs and evaluate their own constructions. We claim that the combined “construction–evaluation” activity helps illuminate certain aspects of prospective teachers’ and presumably other individuals’ understanding of proof that tend to defy scrutiny when individuals are asked to evaluate given arguments. For example, some prospective teachers in our study provided empirical arguments to mathematical statements, while being aware that their constructions were invalid. Thus, although these constructions considered alone could have been taken as evidence of an empirical conception of proof, the additional consideration of prospective teachers’ evaluations of their own constructions overruled this interpretation and suggested a good understanding of the distinction between proofs and empirical arguments. We offer a possible account of our findings, and we discuss implications for research and instruction.     

Perceived research environment,motivation, and academic interest in research: a social-cognitive perspective

International Journal for Educational and Vocational Guidance - Using social-cognitive career theory as a framework, we investigated whether research self-efficacy and outcome expectations mediated...     

Personality correlates of faculty and course evaluations

This study explored the interactions of classroom experiences and selected student and faculty personality variables in faculty and course evaluations. University instructors from five disciplines and their students participated in the study. Students completed the Locus of Control Scale, Mehrabian Achievement Scale, Instructor Evaluation Form, and a semantic differential scale to assess course content and structure. Pearson and canonical correlations indicated that a student's need to achieve is significantly related to faculty evaluation. Similarly, evaluation of course content and structure was significantly related to student personality variables.     

Electronic in-class course evaluations and future directions

This study sought to determine whether an evaluator conducting electronic course evaluations in person in a classroom increased response rates. At a large public university in the United States, course evaluations were being conducted electronically, attaining a response rate of <50% over several semesters. At the end of the Spring 2015 at this university, an evaluator entered several classrooms having a total enrollment of 273 students and guided students through the process of completing course evaluations using their mobile devices. A response rate of 78.4% was achieved. The process described in this study provides evidence that response rates can be increased in similar circumstances. In addition, several ways the technology described could be used in the future for course evaluation are discussed.     

Naturalistic case studies exploring social-cognitive mechanisms,and some methodological issues in research on problems of teachers

The argument is advanced that research could be more effective for use by teachers and simultaneously more scientific, in the sense that it would emulate the historical process of the development of quantitative science, if it were (1) of the form referred to as naturalistic case studies and (2) oriented toward discovering the cognitive and social interaction mechanisms that underlie the learning processes in classrooms. The limitations of individual case studies of children with difficulties learning in school are examined and some practical approaches to interventionist case studies done in classrooms are considered. It is proposed that the standard view of quantitative research in the social sciences derives from the physics curriculum rather than from the history of physics. This view also mistakenly places higher priority on finding predictive linear relationships among measurements rather than qualitative understanding of mechanisms, which could guide researchers toward useful quantitative research. The researcher who has not yet penetrated the world of the individuals being studies is in no firm position to begin developing predictions, explanations, and theories about that world.     

Gathering faculty teaching evaluations by in‐class and online surveys: their effects on response rates and evaluations

This study compares student evaluations of faculty teaching that were completed in‐class with those collected online. The two methods of evaluation were compared on response rates and on evaluation scores. In addition, this study investigates whether treatments or incentives can affect the response to online evaluations. It was found that the response rate to the online survey was generally lower than that to the in‐class survey. When a grade incentive was used to encourage response to the online survey, a response rate was achieved that was comparable with that to the in‐class survey. Additionally, the study found that online evaluations do not produce significantly different mean evaluation scores than traditional in‐class evaluations, even when different incentives are offered to students who are asked to complete online evaluations.     

Children's evaluations of retaliatory aggression

The present study examined how 5-10-year-old children's judgments of retaliation were affected by its severity relative to the initial provocation and by the causal nature of the initial provocation. 72 boys and girls first received information about property-damaging provocations that were portrayed as accidental, foreseeable, justifiably intended, or unjustifiably intended in nature. They were subsequently informed that the victim responded with interpersonal aggression or with a verbal reprimand. Children's perceptions of the causal nature of the provocation and their naughtiness and punishment judgments of the retaliator were assessed. 2 major findings were obtained, both of which were unrelated to age. First, children's perceptions of the initial provocation were more differentiated than has been reported in the past, but these perceptions did not correspond uniformly to the manipulations of causality. Second, although children's evaluations of the retaliator were not an inverse function of their own perceptions of the initial provocation, they did vary systematically according to these perceptions and the extremity of the retaliator's response.     

Balancing federal and local evaluations of federally-funded programs

Some researchers have suggested that both federal and local studies of early childhood programs could be improved by delegating a portion of the responsibility for federally funded national evaluations to the local level so that local project staff have important roles in national studies. This article describes some of the ways in which the federal government has decentralized the responsibility for national evaluations of federally-funded early childhood programs, the methods used in local evaluation studies, and the strengths and weaknesses of centralized and decentralized national evaluations.     

正确认识引文分析及其对核心期刊的评价功能

引文分析是文献计量学中一种基本的分析研究方法,由于其分析方法、统计手段、测定结果的客观性,从而被广大科研人员所认知和接受;又因其在测定核心期刊时的一定优势,又使得核心期刊逐渐被广大科研人员、研究机构、高等院校以及科研管理部门所认同和接受.但人们在认识和接受的同时,也使得它在某种程度上走入误区,我们对此应给予关注.     

Principal holistic judgments and high-stakes evaluations of teachers

Results from a sample of 1,013 Georgia principals who rated 12,617 teachers are used to compare holistic and analytic principal judgments with indicators of student growth central to the state’s teacher evaluation system. Holistic principal judgments were compared to mean student growth percentiles (MGPs) and analytic judgments from a formal observation protocol. The correlations of a holistic principal rating with teacher MGPs and observation protocol scores were 0.22 and 0.32. Teachers selected as most successful at increasing student achievement had a mean MGP that was a full SD higher than did teachers selected as least successful, and a mean observation protocol score that was 1.35 SDs higher. Holistic principal judgments appear to be much more strongly influenced by observations of teachers’ classroom practices than they were by evidence of growth in student achievement.     

Expectancy theory outcomes and student evaluations of teaching

As student evaluation of teaching (SET) instruments are increasingly administered online, research has found that the response rates have dropped significantly. Validity concerns have necessitated research that explores student motivation for completing SETs. This study uses Vroom's [(1964). Work and motivation (3rd ed.). New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons] expectancy theory to frame student focus group responses regarding their motivations for completing and not completing paper and online SETs. Results show that students consider the following outcomes when deciding whether to complete SETs: (a) course improvement, (b) appropriate instructor tenure and promotion, (c) accurate instructor ratings are available to students, (d) spending reasonable amount of time on SETs, (e) retaining anonymity, (f) avoiding social scrutiny, (g) earning points and releasing grades, and (h) being a good university citizen. Results show that the lower online response rate is largely due to students’ differing feelings of obligation in the 2 formats. Students also noted that in certain situations, students often answer SETs insincerely.     

Self-efficacy and achievement behaviors

In this article self-efficacy research is reviewed in domains relevant to education. Research addressing cognitive skills, social skills, motor skills, and career choices has shown that self-efficacy is an important construct that helps to explain students' learning and performance of achievement-related behaviors. Research also has identified variables that are associated with educational contexts and that signal to students how well they are achieving or making progress in learning. These task-engagement variables include models/social comparative information, goal setting, attributional and performance feedback, strategy instruction, cognitive processing, and reward contingencies. A suggested future self-efficacy research agenda might include maintenance and generalization of changes in self-efficacy, the identification of additional task-engagement variables, instrument development and validation, integration of efficacy information from diverse sources, developmental influences on self-efficacy, and teachers' sense of efficacy.     

Do examinations influence student evaluations?

This paper measures the impact of timing on student evaluations of teaching effectiveness, using a dataset of close to 3000 observations from Erasmus School of Economics. A special feature of the data is that students were able to complete on-line questionnaires during a time window ranging from one week before to one week after the final examination. This allows for the isolation of the effect of the examination on student evaluations. Among students who subsequently pass the exam, we find little difference between pre- and post-exam ratings. Among students who fail, evaluation scores are significantly lower after the exam on a number of items. Our evidence is compatible with a self-serving bias in student evaluations, but does not indicate that students seek revenge on instructors through lower ratings.