Determinants of underachievement as perceived by gifted,above‐average,and average black students 1

This study examined determinants of underachievement as perceived by 148 Black fifth‐and sixth‐grade students in an urban school district. Explored were the respective influences of social, psychological, and cultural determinants of underachievement as perceived by Black students in three different academic programs (gifted, above‐average, and average). Students were placed into groups based on profiles of achievement behavior (Types I through V) and compared relative to their perceptions and attitudes. Findings from the statistical analyses (frequency analyses, t‐tests, analyses of variance, and multiple regression) suggest that psychological factors played the greatest role in underachievement or poor achievement motivation, and that underachievement behaviors were noted among all students, irrespective of their academic program. Implications and recommendations are suggested for educators working with gifted, above‐average, and average Black students in urban areas.     

Computer: The use of computer‐mediated communication in training students in group problem‐solving and decision‐making techniques

Abstract

A cost‐effectiveness analysis of training Army National Guard soldiers by audio teletraining technology was conducted. The trainees were n = 225 soldiers nationwide. About half of the trainees received training in a three‐week Unit Clerk Course through traditional residence training, and the remainder received the same instruction through audio teletraining. Objective performance data were collected from written tests on sixteen of the forty‐seven tasks taught. The percentage of trainees in the audio teletraining group that reached criterion (93%) on the first test was significantly higher (by statistical test) than the residence group (85%). In comparing costs, the audio teletraining group had lower training costs per trainee. Projected on an annual basis, the Army National Guard can save $292,404 per year through the use of audio teletraining for the Unit Clerk Course.     

The structure and function of academic self‐concept in gifted and general education students

Using structural equation modeling techniques, this exploratory study investigated the differences in the factor structure of academic self‐perceptions in a sample of gifted students and within a general population of students. The factor structure exhibited partial measurement invariance, suggesting that two of the items on the factor work differently in the gifted sample than in the sample from the general population. The gifted sample demonstrated higher academic self‐perceptions than the general school sample and higher self‐reported GPAs than the general school sample. However, the relationship between academic self‐perceptions and self‐reported GPA was invariant across groups. For both gifted students and the general population of high school students, GPA and academic self‐perceptions were moderately and positively related. Therefore, although there are large mean differences between gifted students and the general population of students on the academic self‐perceptions scale, the structure of the relationship between academic self‐perceptions and GPA was similar.     

Japan’s educational practices for mathematically gifted students

This study documents the inclusive, deliberate, and unintended educational practices in Japan for mathematically gifted students. It also aims to identify various schools’ strengths and challenges in improving the mathematics education of these students. Case studies with multisite designs were undertaken in five middle schools selected using purposive sampling. Mathematics education practices – assessed in terms of assessment, mathematics instruction, support and interventions, and teachers’ collaboration – guided the data collection and analysis. The primary goal of this study was to describe current school practices and identify common strengths and challenges (including outlier practices across schools) which were valuable in generating conclusion regarding how certain practices might lead to different student and/or teacher outcomes.     

The effect of technology-supported collaborative problem solving method on students’ achievement and engagement

Education and Information Technologies - This study aimed to determine the effect of web 2.0 technologies supported collaborative problem solving method on students’ achievement and...     

Design‐based science and real‐world problem‐solving

Design‐based science (DBS) is a science pedagogy in which new scientific knowledge and problem‐solving skills are constructed in the context of designing artifacts. This paper examines whether the enactment of a DBS unit supported students’ efforts to construct and transfer new science knowledge and ‘designerly’ problem‐solving skills to the solution of a new real‐world design problem in a real‐world setting. One hundred and forty‐nine students participated in the enactment of a DBS unit. Their understanding of the curricular content was assessed by identical pre‐instructional and post‐instructional written tests. They were then given a new design problem as a transfer task. There was a statistically significant increase on scores from pre‐test to post‐test with an effect size of 1.8. There was a stronger correlation between the scores of the transfer task and those of the post‐test than with those of the pre‐test; we use this finding to suggest that the knowledge that was constructed during the unit enactment supported the solution of the transfer task. This has implications for the development of science curricula that aim to lead to the construction of knowledge and skills that may be useful in extra‐classroom settings. Whether participation in consecutive enactments of different DBS units increases transfer remains to be investigated in more depth.     

The role of number words in preschoolers’ addition concepts and problem‐solving procedures

Preschoolers’ conceptual understanding and procedural skills were examined so as to explore the role of number‐words and concept–procedure interactions in their additional knowledge. Eighteen three‐ to four‐year‐olds and 24 four‐ to five‐year‐olds judged commutativity and associativity principles and solved two‐term problems involving number words and unknown numbers. The older preschoolers outperformed younger preschoolers in judging concepts involving unknown numbers and children made more accurate commutativity than associativity judgements. Children with conceptual profiles indicating a strong understanding of concepts applied to unknown numbers were more accurate at solving number‐word problems than those with a poor conceptual understanding. The findings suggest that an important mathematical development during the preschool years may be learning to appreciate addition concepts as general principles that apply when exact numbers are unknown.     

The effects of computer programming on high school students’ reasoning skills and mathematical self-efficacy and problem solving

In this paper we investigate whether computer programming has an impact on high school student’s reasoning skills, problem solving and self-efficacy in Mathematics. The quasi-experimental design was adopted to implement the study. The sample of the research comprised 66 high school students separated into two groups, the experimental and the control group according to their educational orientation. The research findings indicate that there is a significant difference in the reasoning skills of students that participated in the “programming course” compared to students that did not. Moreover, the self-efficacy indicator of students that participated in the experimental group showed a significant difference from students in the control group. The results however, failed to support the hypothesis that computer programming significantly enhances student’s problem solving skills.     

Social and socio‐mathematical norms in collaborative problem‐solving

Based on the notions of social and socio‐mathematical norms we investigate how these are established during the interactions of pre‐service teachers who solve mathematical problems. Norms identified in relevant studies are found in our case too; moreover, we have found norms related to particular aspects of the problems posed. Our results show that most of these norms, once established, enhance the problem‐solving process. However, exceptions do exist, but they have a local orientation and a relatively small influence.

En s'appuyant sur les concepts des normes sociales et ‘socio‐mathématiques’, nous avons étudié comment ces normes se sont établies au cours des interactions entre les enseignants et les étudiants en activité de résolution des problèmes mathématiques. Aux résultats de la recherche apparaissent d'une part les mêmes normes qui ont été déjà remarquées à d'autres recherches relatives et d'autre part des normes liées plus particulièrement aux problèmes posés. Les résultats de la recherche montrent que dans la majorité des cas les normes aident le processus de la resolution des problèmes. Il existe bien sûr des exceptions, mais elles ont une influence et une orientation locale.

Basierend auf den Begriffen der sozialen und sozio‐mathematischen Normen untersuchen wir, wie diese in die Interaktionen von angehenden Lehrern beim Lösen von mathematischen Problemen einfliessen. Normen, welche in relevanten Studien identifiziert werden, wurden in unserem Fall ebenfalls gefunden. Wir haben ausserdem Normen gefunden, welche sich auf bestimmte Aspekte der Fragestellungen beziehen. Unsere Resultate zeigen, dass die meisten Normen, sind sie einmal etabliert, die Problemlösungsprozess verbessern. Es bestehen zwar Ausnahmen, doch diese haben eine lokale Orientierung und einen relativ kleinen Einfluss.

Basados en las nociones de la norma social y sociomatemática, estamos investigando cómo se establecen dichas normas durante las interacciones de los profesores en pre‐servicio, que resuelven problemas matemáticos. Las normas identificadas en estudios relevantes también se encuentran en nuestro caso; de hecho, hemos hallado normas relacionadas con aspectos particulares de los problemas expuestos. Nuestros resultados demuestran que la mayor parte de estas normas, una vez establecidas, mejoran el proceso de solución de problemas. Sin embargo, existen también excepciones pero éstas tienen una orientación local y una relativamente menor influencia.     

Using teacher ratings of social behavior to differentiate gifted from non‐gifted students

This study investigated the effectiveness of teacher ratings of student social behavior in differentiating a group of 81 elementary‐age gifted students from a control group of 81 age and gender matched non‐gifted students. The School Social Behavior Scales, a recently developed set of rating scales that assesses both social competence and antisocial behavior, was used for the ratings. Gifted students were rated as having significantly higher levels of social competence and lower levels of antisocial behavior than the comparison group, and the individual scores of the gifted students were significantly skewed in the direction of better social‐behavioral adjustment. The findings also indicated the presence of a small subset of gifted students who appeared to have extremely poor social competence and high levels of problem behaviors. The results are compared to previous research on the psychosocial development of gifted children, and important areas for future research on this topic are recommended.     

The effects of students' cognitive styles on conceptual understandings and problem‐solving skills in introductory mechanics

The purpose of this study was to determine if there are relationship among freshmen students' Field depended or field independent (FD/FI) cognitive style, conceptual understandings, and problem solving skills in mechanics. The sample consisted of 213 freshmen (female = 111, male = 102; age range 17–21) who were enrolled in an introductory physics course required for science education prospective teachers. Data collection was done during the fall semesters in three successive years. At the beginning of each semester the Force Concept Inventory (FCI) and the Group Embedded Figure Test (GEFT) were administered to assess students' initial understanding of basic concepts in mechanics and FD/FI tendency of students, respectively. After completion of the course, the FCI and the Mechanics Base Line Test (MBT) were administered. The results indicated that students conceptual understanding were not statistically related to their FD/FI cognitive styles for both pre and post results. However, their problem‐solving skills were statistically related to their FD/FI cognitive style. The findings of the present and previous studies are compared, and the possible effects of the present studies on previous studies on teaching, learning and assessment for introductory mechanics are discussed.     

The impact of different teaching methods on students’ arithmetic and self‐regulated learning skills

The present study examines the effect of three different structured methods, traditional, independent and problem‐solving, of teaching children arithmetic in the beginning of 7th grade in Sweden, age 13 years. The progress made by these students is presented by measures of their arithmetic ability, calculation and quantitative concept, as well as their self‐regulated learning skills in mathematics, characterised as internal and instrumental motivation, self‐concept and anxiety. The results will be discussed with reference to a socio‐cultural perspective. This study has a split‐plot factorial design with time as within‐subject and type of intervention as a between‐subject factor. The results show that there are no significant differences between teaching methods when assessing arithmetic in total and calculation. Students’ progress in quantitative concepts is significantly better if teachers teach traditionally or with a problem‐based curriculum. In order to develop aspects of self‐regulating learning skills, the results show that pupils would benefit in a traditional or problem‐solving curriculum. Problem‐solving seems to be more effective than traditional and independent work for students’ internal motivation. Traditional work and problem‐solving are more effective than independent work for students’ self‐concept.     

The event‐related low‐frequency activity of highly and average intelligent children

Using time‐frequency analysis techniques to investigate the event‐related low‐frequency (delta: 0.5–4 Hz; theta: 4–8 Hz) activity of auditory event‐related potentials (ERPs) data of highly and average intelligent children, 18 intellectually gifted children, and 18 intellectually average children participated the present study. Present findings show that intellectually gifted children had significantly larger delta activity than their normal peers in mismatch negativity (MMN) component, while in P3a component, which originates from stimulus‐driven frontal attention mechanisms during task processing, intellectually gifted children had both significantly larger delta and theta activities than their normal peers. The present findings further supported that low‐frequency brain activity could be regarded as the basis of intelligence and cognitive functions, and spectral EEG time‐frequency analysis technique should be used to explore some new aspects of brain activity relating to intelligence.     

The problem of education‐based discrimination

While the research, theory and policy literature on race, class and gender discrimination in education is extensive, the problem of education‐based discrimination itself has been widely overlooked. Indeed, the dominant ideologies of meritocracy and human capital (into which we are inculcated throughout our lives by schools, media and the state) proclaim that higher levels of education are and should be linked with greater reward. In a world where education is regularly invoked to legitimate inequality, it can appear nonsensical even to raise concern about education‐based discrimination as a matter of social injustice. We need, however, to challenge those who have taught us not to see what has essentially become an elephant in our living room. Otherwise, we will find ourselves unable ever to use our public systems of education for universal emancipation and empowerment.     

Assessing and tracking students’ problem solving performances in anchored learning environments

The purpose of this randomized experiment was to compare the performance of high-, average-, and low-achieving middle school students who were assessed with parallel versions of a computer-based test (CBT) or a paper-pencil test (PPT). Tests delivered in interactive, immersive environments like the CBT may have the advantage of providing teachers with diagnostic tools that can lead to instruction tailored to the needs of students at different achievement levels. To test the feasibility of CBT, students were randomly assigned to the CBT or PPT test conditions to measure what they had learned from an instructional method called enhanced anchored math instruction. Both assessment methods showed that students benefited from instruction and differentiated students by achievement status. The navigation maps generated from the CBT revealed that the low-achieving students were able to navigate the test, spent about the same amount of time solving the subproblems as the more advanced students, and made use of the learning scaffolds.