Individuality, Context, and the Search for Meaning

A developmental systems approach incorporates clinical perspectives and offers a background for thinking about some of the ways we do research. Recent advances reveal both research opportunities and needs related to fostering child development in a pluralistic, democratic society, 4 topics are addressed that deal with individuality, context, and the search for meaning. First, individuality is discussed wherein our abstract thinking and our quantitative individual differences methods have revealed an urgent need to study the developing person. Second, classification is considered wherein our systematizing efforts reveal a need to understand the interplay among classified features of the person, as well as the particular methods that underlie our classifications. Third, the experiencing of development is discussed, wherein recent advances have revealed new ways of thinking about an individual's nonconscious—procedural and practicing—activities in development, as well as those activities that are conscious. Fourth, the issue of values is considered. Values contribute to our doing research, and we also need to acknowledge their importance as the object of developmental study in 4 children. The appreciation of context, of multiple windows of observation, and of our emotional "centeredness" as human beings who communicate and cooperate with others are crosscutting themes of the essay.     

Technology,teachers, and the search for school reform

Educational technologists have increasingly moved away from direct involvement in the world of the classroom teacher in recent years. The assumptions that technologists and teachers make about educational technology and about teaching now diverge markedly. At the same time, new reform proposals have suggested ways to restructure schools that would enhance the role of teachers as instructional decision-makers and offer them more control over their professional work life. Elements of the reform agenda are characterized, and ways are described in which educational technologists might work together with teachers in pursuit of reform goals. These include: (1) preparation of models for teaching-with-technology; (2) design of intelligent software; (3) creation of technologically based tools to support teachers' professional work and development; and (4) improvement of research about technology in education. Note:An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Annual Conference of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology, Dallas, Texas, February 4, 1989.     

Curriculum,caring for the Earth,and planetary responsibility

PROSPECTS - This text is a simultaneously personal and political commentary on those who inhabit the border between worlds, such as those now at war in a viral assemblage. Starting from a...     

Aging,precarity, and the struggle for Indigenous elsewheres

Abstract

Through the structures and logics of the settler/capitalist state, the aging body can only be viewed as a crisis of decreased labor power and increased social expenditure; an amortization that has only worsened under neoliberalism. As such, this article calls attention to the conspicuous absence of a counter discourse and politics of aging within Native American and Indigenous studies. Within Indigenous communities, elders have always held places of distinction, which not only renders the dearth of theories of aging within Native studies problematic but also deeply limiting to the project of articulating the “decolonial option”. As discussed in the article, Indigenous theories of aging are a critical component of securing alter-Native existences, defined by relations of mutuality, responsibility and reciprocity.     

习惯、习惯法、民间法、国家法的区别与联系、冲突与融合

习惯、习惯法、民间法和国家法是研究中国法治本土化的不可回避的话题,在学术界对这几个概念也反复使用,文章对如何使用这几个概念才最为恰当,并且避免对几个概念的误用的探讨,可以帮助研究者更清晰地研究中国传统的法律文化.     

HyperCard for the Design,Development, and Delivery of Instruction

The innovative software product HyperCard™ introduced in August, 1987, and today distributed free of charge with Apple Computer Incorporated's Macintosh line of computers, has sparked a flurry of interest among computer users. HyperCard represents advanced technology that, in a short time, has been put in the hands of hundreds of thousands of users, including a significant number of instructional designers and performance technologists. This article has three sections that introduce instructional designers and performance technologists to HyperCard. The first section describes just what HyperCard is and summarizes how it works. The second section presents the theoretical background of the program, from the perspectives of both cognitive psychologists and futuristic thinkers in the computing world. Finally, the third section describes three uses of HyperCard: (a) as a database management program, (b) as a vehicle for implementing hypermedia applications, and (c) as an authoring tool. For each of these three functions, the advantages and disadvantages of HyperCard for instructional designers and performance technologists are explored.     

Martin Buber,Hasidism, and Jewish spirituality: the implications for education and for pastoral care

Abstract

There is a legal requirement that schools engage with the spiritual aspects of education, which encompasses pastoral care. This reflects the ethical sensibility that is present in individuals and underlies interactions with Others; and which should be part of the ethos of all educational institutions and especially schools. This is because spirituality is important to leading a moral life and to understanding the Other. The article considers specifically the potential of Jewish spirituality, and uses Martin Buber’s thought, to gain a better understanding of its contribution to education and to pastoral care. In the first part, we comment on the ‘basic words’, I-Thou and I-It, which are connected with Hasidism, the Jewish spiritual movement which had a great influence on Martin Buber. Hasidism understands that it is our duty to find and connect with the ‘divine sparks’, as genuine relations merge with the Divine, and when humans relate genuinely to one another, they relate to God. This is crucial for understanding the superiority of I-Thou relations over I-It relations. In the second and third parts of the article, we consider the implications of this understanding of Jewish spirituality for education and for pastoral care. This is done through highlighting the importance of I-Thou relations if the spiritual aspects of education and of pastoral care are to be encouraged and fulfilled.     

Action research for instructional improvement: the Bad,the Ugly,and the Good

In the wake of accreditation cycles stressing student outcomes, we believed the reflective and practitioner-centered philosophy of action research a perfect fit for effecting institutional improvements for a four-year grant-funded effort in our urban–suburban community colleges in California. We learned that things were both worse and better than we had imagined. While we had anticipated what we will call ‘the Bad’, the classic budgetary and institutional forces buffeting us, our project, and our institutions, we had not anticipated what we will call ‘the Ugly’. And perhaps because of our grasp of ‘the Bad’, we also had not anticipated what we will call ‘the Good’. We found ourselves challenged to rethink how to encourage colleagues to become reflective practitioners, yet able to appreciate the power of action research to lead to genuine transformation.     

Four-year longitudinal impact evaluation of the Action for Children UK Neglect Project: Outcomes for the children,families, Action for Children,and the UK

Neglect has a devastating impact on children and is the most pervasive form of child maltreatment in the United Kingdom. The study purpose was to establish outcomes for neglected children following structured assessment and intervention to ascertain what worked and why it worked.     

德性之师·率性之师·真理之师——近代欧洲教育家塑造的三种教师形象及其比较

教师形象是教师的教育理念、教育行为、人格品性等外显的综合表现.近代欧洲的三位教育家--洛克、卢梭和第斯多惠,分别在他们的著作中塑造了三种不同的教师形象,即:德性之师、率性之师与真理之师.三种教师形象既兼具师者的共性,又个性鲜明,对于当今时代塑造理想的教师形象有着一定的启示.     

重视数学史数学美数学人文精神教育

本文依据数学教育理论研究及实践和高职教育教学改革的初步探索,从数学史、数学美和数学精神三个层面谈谈高等职业教育的特点和要求,促进职业学校学生的全面发展.     

Education and Learning for the Elderly: Why,How, What

Seventy‐seven children of divorce and their selected grandparents completed questionnaires that included a demographic section, the Family Adaptability and Cohesion Evaluation Scale‐II (FACES II; Olson, Bell, &; Portner, 1982) to assess their relationships, and an instrument designed to identify shared activities and desires in these areas. Partners had similar present and future perceptions of relationship and activity factors. All participants desired future increases in both areas. Grandchildren and grandparents connected emotional bonding with grandparents’ listening, keeping them safe, and gift giving; grandparents also thought a good relationship with the custodial parent was important. Most healthy and least healthy subgroups were identified. Membership in the healthiest group was related to geographic proximity, feminine gender for both partners, and being married and employed full‐time for grandparents. Grandparents who were related by blood to custodial parents, had a good relationship with them, and negotiated their role were more likely to have a healthier relationship. Helping professionals are encouraged to explore these variables as they help family members negotiate the grandparent‐grandchild relationship, use skill training to foster development in areas amenable to change, and use supportive tactics in areas of liability.     

Technology, Narcissism, and the Moral Sense: Implications for Instruction

Numerous researchers (Kohn, 1994; Kottler, 1992; Katz, 1993a, 1995; Streibel, 1994; Tingle, 1992) have recently examined the rise of narcissism in American culture and especially its relationship to education. However, William Damon's (1995) analysis of narcissism, which he frames against the larger dynamic of related social and cultural realities, is particularly engaging, although somewhat ominous:
"Our heightened concern with children's internal mental states has combined with the increased child-centeredness of modern times to create crippling imbalances in children's views of themselves and the world. When we tell children that their first goal is self-love, we are suggesting to them that they are the center of the universe. By contributing further to the already child-centered orientation of modern culture, this emphasis can push a child toward a narcissistic insensitivity to the needs of others. We should not dispute the value of self-love, but we should question its utility as a primary goal in raising and educating children." (p. 77)
Damon's assessment of child-rearing practices offers compelling reasons to reconsider self-love as the central focus of such practices. His comments are additionally significant because they suggest a causative connection between child-centeredness and narcissism and between narcissism and social insensitivity. "In citing these connections, Damon is echoing Christopher Lasch's (1979) equally troubling warning made almost twenty years ago in The Culture of Narcissism —a warning linking the 'culture of narcissism' to numerous dysfunctions within social institutions, including a multiplicity of failings in schooling." (Ryan, 1997, p. 233)