Students’ Perspectives on LGBTQ-Inclusive Curriculum

Implementing curriculum that is inclusive of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning (LGBTQ) people has the potential to create an equitable learning environment. In order to learn more about students’ experiences of LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum, 26 high school students with diverse racial/ethnic, sexual, and gender identities were recruited from the Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) Network in California. Students participated in focus groups conducted by telephone by GSA staff, sharing their experiences of LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum in school. Qualitative coding methods, including grounded theory, were used to identify themes and interpret students’ responses. Data revealed that LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum was most often taught in social sciences and humanities courses as stand-alone lessons. LGBTQ-inclusive curriculum rarely met standards of social justice education, though opportunities for critical conversations about systemic oppression regularly emerged. For instance, teachers often failed to intervene in LGBTQ bullying and missed teachable moments conducive to inclusive curriculum. Some students learned positive LGBTQ lessons and highlighted the ways such curriculum reflected their identities and created a supportive school climate. Implications for equitable education are discussed.     

Students’ and teachers’ perspectives about quality of engineering education in Portugal

Quality in higher education is a subject of increasing importance. This idea can be supported by looking at different sources, namely, the scientific literature, national and transnational governments’ policies, such as those emerging from the Bologna Process. Also, the internationalisation of higher education and, within it, students’ and staff mobility among institutions, has brought to the agenda the quality issue, particularly with regard to the teaching and learning process. Several authors argue that the meaning of quality depends on who defines it. This article focuses on a study that looks at how teachers and students in higher education institutions, in Portugal and in the domain of Engineering, see the quality issue. Data was collected through interviews to teachers (six) and students (38) in two different Portuguese institutions. The results indicate that, although teachers and students refer to the same dimensions that influence quality, they have different perspectives about their importance. From the point of view of the authors, this discrepancy requires some pedagogical actions in the context where the study was developed and, also, further research to see if the same tendency exists in different settings.     

Australian academics’ perspectives on quality and accountability

Abstract

Universities have been challenged as teaching as well as research institutions. On the one hand, universities have been required to teach more students and pay more attention to quality of teaching and educational programmes; on the other hand, there has been increasing focus on faculty research performance. This paper examines whether these are conflicting demands, or whether university faculty are able to fulfil these requirements simultaneously. In Norway, the number of university students almost doubled between 1987 and 1995. Norway is, therefore, a sound case to examine the impact of massification on university research.     

Re-imagining roles: using collaborative and creative research methodologies to explore girls’ perspectives on gender,citizenship and schooling

Often girls are the objects of the camera’s lens and subjects of the researcher’s gaze. This article describes a qualitative study using a collaborative, creative and critical methodology to explore girls’ perspectives on gender, citizenship and schooling. The seven adolescent girl participants used Photovoice to engage with their roles as girl-citizens. Despite Canada’s international reputation as a leader in gender equality, evidence reveals that challenges still prevent their full participation, particularly in formal politics. This research raises questions about what life is like for girls and women in Canada beyond the rhetoric and global rankings, and adds to the often disconnected bodies of literature on girlhood, citizenship and education.     

Students’ perspectives of early assessment tasks in their first-year at university

Assessment plays an important role in first-year students’ transition to university, influencing how they learn. Poorly designed assessment can be demotivating and may even cause students to withdraw from university. An early low-stakes assessment task is recommended in first year, to provide information to students and staff on student progress, provide students with a positive experience and help them prepare for future assessments. This paper reports on first-year students’ experiences of two different early assessment tasks for two disciplines, one using an online quiz and the other a ‘research challenge’ that served as a precursor to writing an essay. The paper also presents lecturers’ reflections on what they learned, what they would change and the implications for others planning early assessment tasks for first years. Finally, ideas for future research are provided.     

Building a Common Platform on Students’ Participation

This article sets out to examine how school science activities can encourage students’ participation while supporting a specific science content. One ordinary class with 12-year-old students was chosen and their regular classroom work was studied without intervention and with a minimum of interference. Lessons were video filmed, transcribed and analyzed focussing on the participants’ speech acts. It was found that students’ initiatives and experiences were important parts of their participation. The results show how students’ participation was orchestrated with a science content by means of four different kinds of activities. The activities are called ‘individual inventory of experiences’, ‘building a common platform of experiences’, ‘sharing new experiences’ and ‘concluding a common platform’. The activities form a foundation for participation in human biology topics. For example, to ‘build a common platform of experiences’ seems to level out students’ different prerequisites for participating in subsequent tasks. Furthermore, to ‘conclude a common platform’ implied a checkpoint of the shared new experiences. The activities support students’ tentative use of scientific words as well as their learning of what counts as knowledge in the school science setting. However, it can be questioned if the time spent on each separate activity is necessary or if similar achievements could be made even if some activities were integrated. The question is open for further research.

Views on College Students’ English Learning Motivation

This paper aims at exploring college students’ English learning motivation to language learning, including effort, interest, and attitudes. To some extent, it is very important to perform activities in language learning classes. On the one hand, teachers should do every effort to develop students’ keen interest in English study so as to foster their intrinsic motivation. On the other hand, they should set up new goals for students and feedback properly in order to build confidence in English learning. In a word, it is essential for English teachers to understand students’ motivation of English learning so as to save time and teach more efficiently.     

Students’ Views on Difficulties in Learning Histology

The aim of this study was to provide a better understanding of the main difficulties hindering undergraduate biology students in learning histology. The study utilized a self-administered questionnaire which included three closed-ended and two open-ended questions: (1) if students had difficulty in learning about each tissue type; (2) what might be the problem in learning about the tissue at hand; (3) which topics were the most difficult; (4) what were the possible reasons that made image identification of tissue types difficult; and (5) how to improve the course curriculum from a student perspective. The survey was administered to 139 undergraduate biology students enrolled in a histology course, of which 101 surveys were completed and analyzed both qualitatively and quantitatively. The topics that students experienced the most difficulties with were: nervous tissue, plant tissues, bone tissues, and glandular epithelial tissue. The main reasons students experienced difficulties with these tissue types, according to the students themselves, were the nature of the topic, grasping the terminology used, and insufficient teaching time. Students suggested the adoption of strategies such as: teaching based on practical tasks; reducing the content of the histology curriculum; adding anatomy subjects; and making histology education more interesting.     

Challenge or boredom? Gifted students’ views on their schooling

Eight hundred seventy‐one academically gifted students from nine school districts in North Carolina were asked whether the classes they were taking challenged them and whether their schools’ climate and programs were appropriate and meeting their needs. The students generally agreed that special Academically Gifted and mathematics classes challenged them, but only about half of the students reported a similar satisfaction with their Science, Language Arts, and Social Studies classes. Consistent themes stated by the students about the curriculum's lack of challenge included a slow pace, too much repetition of already mastered information, inability to move on after mastering the regular curriculum, few opportunities to study topics of personal interest, and an emphasis on the mastery of facts rather than the use of thinking skills. Current policies of exclusive heterogeneous grouping at the Middle School level may have impacted the particular dissatisfaction of students from this group. Recommendations include the design of a more differentiated curriculum with a menu of service options and a teaching staff that has been properly prepared to deliver such curriculum.     

Practitioners’ perspectives on the purpose of environmental education

Since the 1980s, scholars have suggested that environmental education (EE) has a ‘definitional problem’ represented by a multiplicity of perspectives that have critically impacted its discourse, practices, and outcomes. This study sought to investigate how North American EE practitioners from backgrounds ranging from formal and non-formal institutions think about their work. We focused on folk narratives and emerging urban environmental concerns of community education rather than reliance on academic opinion alone. Using Q methodology, the study identified five distinct perspectives that appear to represent different ways of prioritizing EE outcomes. All five perspectives were concerned with promoting sustainable living and improved human well-being, but the nuances suggest that an individual who adheres strongly to one may feel someone holding a contrasting perspective is working at cross-purposes. The authors suggest that understanding these perspectives can help reduce misunderstanding within the EE field.     

Different children’s perspectives on their learning environment

This article reports and discusses findings from an ethnographic case study, aiming to gain a deeper understanding of how different children perceive their learning environment in the first grade of primary school, with regard to social as well as academic aspects. The theoretical framework is based on an interactional perspective, where children’s learning and development are considered to take place in a dynamic and ecological system. The reported results are based on interviews with 16 children, and observed teaching situations during the first year of primary school. Research among children demands special ethical considerations, such as how to avoid questions and interest from the researcher affecting the position of children being vulnerable in some way. The findings show that, within a group of children, facing a similar learning environment, there are significant differences between the experiences expressed. The findings presented support the importance of listening to children when planning educational settings. Listening to and taking into account the children’s different voices is an essential part of research and education that strives for inclusion, learning and well-being of all children.     

Making it work: teachers’ perspectives on inclusion

This qualitative study was designed to investigate teachers’ perceptions of the impact of inclusion of children with special needs on their classes. Twenty participants were randomly selected from the 25 teachers who had volunteered for the study. These teacher participants completed a survey which was composed of 62 items dealing with attitudes and perceptions, incentives for encouraging inclusion, and concerns from a classroom perspective. From these 20 participants, five teachers were then randomly selected for interviews. Findings revealed that some of the teachers’ primary concerns were planning time, meeting the needs of all students, and ongoing professional development to respond effectively to the increasingly diverse needs of students in the classroom.     

Teachers’ perspectives on integration of visually impaired children

ABSTRACT

The aim of this article is to show the result of research into the situation of the integration of visually impaired children in Seville (Spain). This work refers to both classroom and peripatetic teachers’ perspectives. We have worked with four peripatetic teachers and nine classroom teachers from Seville. We have used qualitative methodological procedures for data collection and analysis. The results indicate that classroom organization is the most important problem in integration, and within this problem the relationship between classroom and peripatetic teachers becomes a fundamental issue.     

Deliberative Teaching: Effects on Students’ Democratic Virtues

Since the early-2000s, deliberative democratic theory has influenced the debate on teaching. Proponents of deliberation in education have argued that deliberative communication as a teaching model enhances both subject knowledge and democratic virtues among students. However, empirical support for this assumption is weak. The aim of this article is to empirically test the assumptions made by the proponents of deliberative teaching. This study uses a field experimental research design. The study was carried out in a civics course in Swedish upper-secondary schools in both vocational programs and programs preparing students for ensuing studies. To some extent, the results support the hypothesis derived from deliberative theory. Deliberative teaching seems to enhance democratic virtues among students in vocational programs.     

Factors Impacting on Students’ Readiness for Higher Education

This article reports on a study that examined the readiness levels of students in the South African context. Particularly, the study explored the differences between various students’ academic proficiency, support mechanisms, motivational levels and overall integration with the university. A quantitative approach was used and 117 full-time first-year National Diploma in Human Resource Management students from the Nelson Mandela University (formerly known as Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University) participated in the study. This study therefore focused on one student cohort at a particular higher education institution (HEI). The findings revealed that a combination of cognitive and non-cognitive variables influences student readiness and success. Even though HEIs have implemented interventions, the level of student readiness remains low. It was noted, however, that students who scored high on the variables were more likely to succeed in higher education.     

Classroom Observation on Developing Students’Competence in SEIB

China’s entry to WTO and China’s 2008 Olympic Games have widely opened the door to the outside world.Tal ents with business knowledge and excellent oral English are urgently needed.For students in English major,we give the course of Spoken English for International Business(SEIB) to improve their abilities in SEIB.The author aims to use the methods like classroom observation,interview,questionnaire survey to observe and compare two classes and two teachers to explore the rela tions between students’competence development and teachers’with different levels and teaching practice,and to gain some enlightenment on students’competence developing in SEIB from the study.     

Hands-on Activities and Their Influence on Students’ Interest

This study investigates the influence of hands-on activities on students’ interest. We researched whether students with experience in specific hands-on activities show higher interest in these activities than students without experience. Furthermore, the relationship between the quality of the hands-on experience and interest in the respective activity was examined. In total, 28 typical hands-on activities of biology education were considered. The activities were divided into the categories experimentation, dissection, work with microscopes, and classification. A total of 141 students from the 11th grade completed questionnaires on interest in the hands-on activities, their experience with each activity, and the quality of the respective experience. Students’ interest in experimenting, working with microscopes, dissecting and classifying tends to benefit from performing hands-on activities. However, findings indicated that the performance of various hands-on activities can influence students’ interest differently. For seven hands-on activities, we identified a positive effect of hands-on experience on interest, while in one case, practical work appeared to have influenced students’ interest negatively. However, for most hands-on activities, no effect of experience on interest was found. The quality of hands-on experiences showed positive correlations with interest in the respective hands-on activities. Therefore, this paper argues in favour of designing biology lessons that allow for experiences with hands-on activities that also interest students. Our findings underline the necessity of investigating the effects of various hands-on activities in a differentiated manner.     

Strategies for Effective Comments on Students’ Written Assignments

Abstract:Comments on students’assignments are important for English course.The loopholes in teachers’working schemes-comments of their students’written assignments are the clues around which the paper spreads.In the process of teaching,some English teachers pay so much attention to the contents taught in class but ignore the comments on students’written assignments.Consequently,it is not applicable for students to correct their mistakes in time and they probably make the same mistakes repeatedly.