Form and Function——An Overview

Long before,the research of form has already entered its heyday,but the study of function is a somewhat new branch of language study.This essay is an attempt to take a brief look at the most significant distinction between"form and function",and then aims at making clear the definition of"form and function"in discourse analysis.     

China’s Strategy for the Internationalization of Higher Education: An Overview

Over the past decades, the internationalization of higher education in China has had considerable achievements, and has contributed to the current transformation of the Chinese system into one of the largest and arguably most promising ones in the world. Setting the Chinese experience in an international context, this article assesses the latest developments. It argues that China’s internationalization of higher education is part of a much larger process of cultural integration between China and the West. From this perspective, it concludes that although China’s recent developments deserve to be noted, China has a considerable distance to go before its aspirations to create truly world-class universities are fulfilled.     

Special relativity — An exoteric narrative

Some time earlier¹ we treated our readers to an exoteric narrative of special relativity’s kinematics in which we shunned the use of mathematical formulas. However, the simple and concise account presented then has left quite a few questions open, and we now present the promised sequel to supply the requisite answers.     

Cross‐cultural Collaboration in Special Teacher Education: An arena for facilitating reflection?

The present study explored how cross‐cultural collaboration involving university lecturers from Norway (the North) and Egypt (the South), and student‐teachers from Egypt, can be an arena for facilitating student‐teachers’ reflection and for challenging student‐teachers’ preconceived beliefs and perspectives about disability and education. The findings, based on interview data, showed that an emphasis on reflection, exploration and evaluation rather than on drills and repetition was both unexpected and unfamiliar for most of the Egyptian student‐teachers. Some of the Egyptian and some of the foreign lecturers were able to encourage student‐teachers to reflect, although some of the foreign lecturers had a tendency to lecture as they had done at home. Lecturers who wanted to pursue teaching methods that enhanced reflection needed to prioritise time for this, even if the majority of the student‐teachers asked for more information, more facts and for presentations of “the right methods” for teaching learners with disabilities. As the findings in this study illustrate, the partner in the North carries a major responsibility for critically considering the request for expertise because the participants in the South may not necessarily question and challenge the authority of well‐educated professionals from the North. It may not be sufficient for lecturers and supervisors to be well‐qualified practitioners within their home culture. They should be context sensitive, have an inquiring and accepting attitude, and experience challenges, encounters and exposures in the project country over time. Competence in approaches in teacher education is also required, although this meta‐competence may not be explicitly requested by those concerned.     

Are Pupils in Special Education Too "Special" for Regular Education?

In the Netherlands special needs pupils are often referred to separate schools for the Educable Mentally Retarded (EMR) or the Learning Disabled (LD). There is an ongoing debate on how to reduce the growing numbers of special education placements. One of the main issues in this debate concerns the size of the difference in cognitive abilities between pupils in regular education and those eligible for LD or EMR education.In this study meta-analysis techniques were used to synthesize the findings from 31 studies on differences between pupils in regular primary education and those in special education in the Netherlands. Studies were grouped into three categories according to the type of measurements used: achievement, general intelligence and neuropsychological tests. It was found that pupils in regular education and those in special education differ in achievement and general intelligence. Pupils in schools for the educable mentally retarded in particular perform at a much lower level than is common in regular Dutch primary education.     

Management of Education — An Industrial Comparison

Abstract

This paper aims to discuss the increasing pressure on the continued existence of the Honours Project in its present form. The author uses the recent changes implemented on the BA Business Studies Degree at Coventry University as a case study to illustrate the need for continuous sensitivity to environmental pressures and specifically for a proactive approach to anticipate future necessary change to the structure, supervision and assessment of the Project. Increasing student numbers emphasise the relatively high cost in resource terms of supervising projects; increasing levels of competitiveness and changing work patterns in industry highlight the demand for independent, self‐disciplined graduates with good problem solving skills, the main attributes the Honours Project aims to promote; and advances in technology such as cheap, powerful and readily available word processing and publishing software, computerised easily accessible research and publication databases, and the ubiquitous ‘Internet’ give unprecedented access to information and the ability to easily present projects and assignments to a higher standard than was possible even five years ago. The paper incorporates the results of a survey carried out specifically with regard to BA Business Studies Degrees within Business Schools in the ‘New University’ sector (Polytechnics prior to 1992) in the UK.     

Evaluating Special Education Facilities∗

Surveys of facilities for disabled adults in Australia have indicated that the Activity Therapy Centre, a form of continuing education, was seriously deficient. One approach to improving the effectiveness of ATCs was the development of a formative evaluation procedure which could focus upon information likely to be useful in upgrading the programs offered. The paper describes the principles underlying the evaluation procedure (SEP), its development and application. Modification of SEP has enabled its use in evaluating special school programs as well as ATCs. Finally, the relevance of SEP and its underlying principles to evaluating future TAFE programs for adults with disabilities is discussed.

     

Introduction to Special Issue—STEM Workforce: STEM Education and the Post-Scientific Society

Journal of Science Education and Technology - An assumption is often made that STEM shortages can be remedied by either increasing the number of STEM graduates or...     

Ideological Dilemmas in Special Needs Education: practitioners’ views

Abstract

This study explored what sense groups of educators from Pennsylvania, USA and Northamptonshire, England made of policy issues in the special needs education field. The aim was to find out first, to what extent individual educators recognised the presence or not of dilemmas associated with the identification of pupils with special educational needs, a common curriculum for all, parent‐professional relationships and integration in mainstream classes; and second, whether they believed that these dilemmas could be resolved and how they would resolve them. It was found that educators in both countries saw dilemmas associated with the identification, common curriculum and integration, but not with parent—professional relationships. Resolutions of the dilemmas showed a similar set of contrasting perspectives in both countries. These findings are interpreted as illustrating the ideological nature of the dilemmas which underlie policy issues in special needs education.     

Research in Special Needs Education: Objectivity or Ideology?

Social science, including research into special educational needs, purports to be objective, and much of special needs research falls into the empirical-analytic paradigm which regards human affairs as containing measurable, law-like qualities to be identified and manipulated. It is argued, however, that this may be a flawed assumption and that all researchers need to be aware of the potentially political nature of their position. The sources, for instance, of a physical disability need to be located, not in the physical problem per se , but within the way society seeks to deal with it. Although researchers may like to view themselves as impartial seekers of the truth, it is suggested that research techniques themselves emerge from a theoretical position which reflects their beliefs, values and dispositions towards the world. They also gain, directly or indirectly, from the research process in terms of kudos or academic recognition. A tentative alternative paradigm is presented which attempts to challenge the 'normalisation' approach to teaching those designated as having special needs.     

Privilege,Prejudice, Predicament: “PRC Scholars” in Singapore—An Overview

With the rise of educational mobilities worldwide, students’ experiences of educational sojourn, especially that of the Chinese Mainland students, have come under greater research attention in recent years. Amongst diverse kinds of Chinese students/scholars abroad, this paper focuses on a type that finds themselves in a unique country under equally unique circumstances: Chinese students studying at pre- and undergraduate levels in Singapore under Singapore’s government-sponsored “foreign talent” scholarship schemes. Based on an ethnographic study conducted over a 16-month period in China and Singapore, this paper presents an overview account of these Chinese student-scholars’ sociocultural experiences in Singapore under three headings: (1) privilege—how Singapore’s “foreign talent” policy endows considerable privileges, opportunities, but also responsibilities on these Chinese students; (2) prejudice—how and why these PRC “foreign talents” encounter certain local discourses of discrimination and exclusion; and (3) predicament—how they sometimes experience complex and conflicted feelings about being made Singapore’s “foreign talent.”     

Preliminary Study: Special Education Doctoral Students’ Perceptions of Self-determination

This preliminary study investigated 118 special education doctoral students’ knowledge of and attitudes toward self-determination. In addition, this study examined the relationship between self-determination coursework and special education doctoral students’ perceptions of how well they were prepared for implementing self-determination in their future careers. The results indicated that although the majority of respondents possessed adequate knowledge of self-determination concepts, they reported lacking confidence in identifying how it can be taught and assessed. Most of the respondents indicated that they would integrate self-determination knowledge and skills into their future teaching; however, more than one-half of the doctoral students felt that they were unprepared with regard to the instruction of self-determination. Also, the findings indicated that there were statistically significant relationships between pre-service courses and doctoral students’ perceptions of self-determination. The results of this study showed a gap in current doctoral students’ knowledge about self-determination and confidence related to application within pre-service teaching.