Levels of knowing in ethnographic inquiry

Many texts that offer guidance to beginning researchers suggest that the competent ethnographer, while attempting to portray participants’ ways faithfully and accurately, should also demystify the research process through open revelation, self‐monitoring, and self‐evaluation. This paper illustrates the complexities of ethnographic inquiry by examining critically a study of literacy‐related activities of nursery school children and their teachers. Four stages of researcher development are proposed and described as a heuristic device in order to trace and expand issues germane to ethnographic research. The paper attends to some current concerns about contemporary discourse on research methodology, particularly how to make sense of the content‐specific issues that surface as a result of research, and also the experience itself of doing the research.     

Guanxi and school success: an ethnographic inquiry of parental involvement in rural China

This study examines the differential patterns of school success of rural students as a result of China’s market transition. The process dimension, how families from different social backgrounds within rural society get involved in rural schooling and how this contributes to the inequality of school success within rural society, is investigated. The data analysis suggests that schools as institutions provide few official channels for rural parents to participate in rural schools and help their children to achieve school success. This raises the importance of families’ strategic initiatives to employ guanxi within family, community and between school and family. These make the point that guanxi and their employment have become an important mechanism for social inclusion and exclusion in the competition for advantages in school success in post-socialist China.     

Experimental inquiry and naturalistic inquiry: An evaluation

In recent years, questions have been raised about the usefulness of experimental inquiry in educational research and evaluation. An alternative paradigm, called naturalistic inquiry has been advocated by some and appears to be growing in acceptability. In this article, these two approaches are described and compared using illustrations from two science education research projects. Several strengths and limitations of each inquiry style are identified. Investigators are urged to seriously consider both paradigms in planning research and evaluation studies.     

Assessing metacognition in an online community of inquiry

Metacognition is an important aspect of human intelligence and higher learning. There is the recognition that metacognition is not just a private internal activity but also socially situated. In this context, the purpose of this research is to develop and validate a metacognitive construct that provides the opportunity to assess metacognition in online discussions. Furthermore, the Community of Inquiry (CoI) theoretical framework provided the conceptual coherence to construct, operationalize and interpret metacognition in an online collaborative inquiry. The results provided evidence of metacognition indicators in student discussion postings and the frequency of these indicators increased over time.     

区域教育史研究的本土化思考

区域教育史研究的本土化,相对于国家主义而言,以揭示区域教育发展的历史个性和历史内在脉络为使命。要实现这一目标,研究者应强化区域教育研究的本土意识,注重探讨本土问题,构建一个本土教育历史发展的解释系统。     

Academic literacies: the word is not enough

For Academic Literacies, the world is textually mediated; written texts and what informs them reveal elements such as subject-discipline practices. Furthermore, multi-modalities, for example, visual representation, inform written text, and multiple methods of inquiry, including interviews, shed light on written text production. In this article we argue that the word is not enough, and non-textual elements must also be considered. From multiple-discipline focused research, we present data from interviews and focus groups with Design and Nursing lecturers that explored student success holistically, not solely through, or for, written text production. We highlight non-textual elements key to both student success, and written text production, such as ‘empathy’, the ‘visual’, the ‘non-verbal’, and also the inability of text to reveal certain key features. We argue that rather than solely prioritise text, Academic Literacies approaches can more effectively help students succeed by holistically considering non-textual elements.     

Yellow marigolds for Ochun: An experiment in feminist ethnographic fiction

The following text is an extract from Nightgowns from Cuba, a novel-in-progress. The novel is a mix of autobiography, ethnography, and fiction. It examines the lives of three generations of women in a Jewish-Cuban family as seen from the perspective of an Afro-Cuban woman who was employed by the family as a domestic worker in the years before the Cuban revolution of 1959. The extract focuses on the delicate relationship that developed between Regla, the maid, and her employer Naomi, a Jewish immigrant and socialist from Poland, as the two women encountered each other in a small rural town in Cuba in the late 1930s. In the last section, Regla comments on the return to Cuba, in the 1990s, of Fanny, the granddaughter of Naomi, who is in search of her family's history and believes that Regla has access to memories that no one in her own family can pass on to her. The theme of the narrative is the transcultural exchange of stories between women and how memory travels and is conserved in strange and unexpected ways. The religion of Santeria is the cosmological setting of the story and the deity of Olokun, who inhabits the depths of the ocean and cannot be represented in visual form, haunts the narrative, which ties together Jewish-Cuban and Afro-Cuban histories and desires.     

Tools for pedagogical inquiry: the impact of teaching thinking skills on teachers

This paper explores the idea of thinking skills approaches as tools for pedagogical inquiry and in so doing seeks to develop the link between the promotion of inquiry‐based learning, which is a central tenet of thinking skills, and inquiry‐based teaching as an approach to professional development and school improvement. The first part of the paper examines the impact of teaching thinking skills on teachers by drawing upon a systematic review of research evidence. The second part of the paper sets the characteristics identified in the context of research into teachers’ development and considers the contribution of a pedagogy based on thinking skills approaches to continuing professional development.     

New research paradigms in instructional technology: An inquiry

In this paper, we review the current state of research paradigms in the field of instructional technology from the perspective of research standards and paradigms recommended by Leslie J. Briggs in the early 1980s. Our analysis of articles published in Educational Technology Research and Development from 1992 to 1996 revealed that relatively few research paradigms were used and that studies did not, for the most part, adhere to Briggs's (1984) Culture Four standards. Perhaps the most startling result was that more than half the articles published were not empirical studies at all. We discuss some reasons for these findings and suggest that instructional technology (IT) researchers make a renewed commitment to Briggs's standards. IT researchers can again advance knowledge in the field in significant ways by collaborating with partners in the field and focusing on questions related to instructional design processes, questions that require the use of more developmental research methods. She is President Elect of AECT and will assume the presidency in February 2000.     

An ethnographic eye on religion in everyday life

There are many pitfalls associated with teaching about religions. One such pitfall entails the risk of presenting religions as stereotypical monolithic systems; that is, all who belong to a particular religious tradition think and act in the same way. I like to call this sort of stereotyping the ‘robotic tendency’ because it has a habit of reducing practitioners to robot-like beings that uniformly perform identical actions. This article concerns how the adoption of what I have termed an ‘ethnographic eye’ can help educators to avoid both unfortunate stereotypes and the robotic tendency when teaching about religions.     

An investigation of teacher impact on student inquiry science performance using a hierarchical linear model

Teachers play a central role in inquiry science classrooms. In this study, we investigate how seven teacher variables (i.e., gender, experience, perceived importance of inquiry and traditional teaching, workshop attendance, partner teacher, use of technology) affect student knowledge integration understanding of science topics drawing on previous research. Using a two‐level hierarchical linear model, we analyze year‐end knowledge integration performance of 4,513 students taught by 40 teachers across five states. Results indicate that students of teachers who value inquiry teaching strategies have significantly higher levels of knowledge integration understanding than those of teachers who believe in traditional teaching methods. In addition, workshop attendance and having a partner teacher teaching the same unit in the same school also have a positive impact on students' knowledge integration levels. The results underscore the importance of professional development and collegial support in enhancing student success in inquiry science. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 47:807–819, 2010     

对当前学校体育运动会的探讨与研究

长期以来 ,由于受传统习惯及大型运动会的影响 ,学校体育运动会在其组织形式、项目选择、参加人数情况上存在着许多问题 ,非常不利于学生身体素质的全面发展 ,也对学校体育的健康发展有一定的影响。因此 ,加强学校体育运动会的改革是非常必要的     

Assessing impact of institutional studies

A three-dimensional model which relates time, action, and audience components has been developed to assess impact of institutional studies. Elements of the models are: short, intermediate, and long-range time components; acceptance, nonresponse, and rejection actions; and primary, secondary, and tertiary audiences.A variety of criterion measures and instruments have been identified to assist in the model implementation. A research impact gram (RIG) is offered as a comprehensive graphic analysis mechanism for the model. Data analysis limitations are noted for each of the model components.Suggestions for further research are offered.     

Assessing the impact of financial education programs: A quantitative model

Prior studies disagree regarding the effectiveness of financial education programs, especially those offered in the workplace. To explain such measurement differences in evaluation and outcomes, we employ a stochastic life cycle model with endogenous financial knowledge accumulation and investigate how financial education programs optimally shape key economic outcomes. This approach permits us to measure how such programs shape wealth accumulation, financial knowledge, and participation in sophisticated assets (e.g. stocks) across heterogeneous consumers. We apply conventional program evaluation econometric techniques to simulated data, distinguishing selection and treatment effects. We show that the more effective programs provide follow-up in order to sustain the knowledge acquired by employees via the program; in such an instance, financial education delivered to employees around the age of 40 can raise savings at retirement by close to 10%. By contrast, one-time education programs do produce short-term but few long-term effects. We also measure how accounting for selection affects estimates of program effectiveness for those who participate. Comparisons of participants and non-participants can be misleading, even using a difference-in-difference strategy when the common-trend assumption is unlikely to hold. Random program assignment is needed to evaluate program effects on those who participate.