Migrant preschool children's school readiness and early elementary school performance

Little is known about the early educational performance of children in migrant farmworker families. The authors examined the school readiness and early school success of 289 four-year-old preschool children of migrant families attending Redlands Christian Migrant Association centers. Children's school readiness was assessed and public school records were used for longitudinal follow-up. Children improved on age-4 school readiness domains, and although some struggled with emergent English literacy, many performed well on school readiness measures and later coursework. Children quickly became proficient in oral English, and had above-average school attendance. Many scored low on high-stakes tests; however, typically well enough for grade promotion. Students in the sample were comparable to similar students in poverty. School teachers and administrators should have high expectations for students from migrant families because many of them do stay in the public school system, and appear to be quite resilient despite many challenges they face.     

Metacognitive knowledge in children at early elementary school

In metacognition research, many studies focused on metacognitive knowledge of preschoolers or children at the end of elementary school or secondary school, but investigations of children starting elementary school are quite limited. The present study, thus, took a closer look at children’s knowledge about mental processes and strategies in early elementary school aiming to extend findings on the respective age period. Therefore, at first, a new test that can be administered in group settings and that assesses a broad concept of children’s metacognitive knowledge in early elementary school was evaluated. Furthermore, analyses on the structure of metacognitive knowledge were carried out in cross-sectional as well as longitudinal analyses. In a longitudinal design, the new test instrument was administered to 870 children at the end of first grade and again one year later (N?=?720). Item Response models were used to evaluate the construct validity of the test. Test characteristics were checked based on different fit statistics, test fairness, and discriminant validity. In summary, the test exhibited good psychometric properties. Analyses on the dimensionality of the assessed metacognitive knowledge revealed that different strategies seemed to form rather distinct dimensions of metacognitive knowledge. However, these dimensions showed a rather homogeneous development from first to second grade. Impacts of the findings on theoretical considerations and on the theoretical understanding of metacognitive knowledge and further analyses with metacognitive competence data are discussed.     

Effects of transition from elementary school to junior high school on early adolescents' self-esteem and perceived competence

Early adolescents' self-esteem and perceived competence in the cognitive, social, and physical domains were examined across the transition from elementary school to junior high school. Self-esteem and perceived social and physical competence were either stable or increased for most children. Cognitive competence was unchanged. It was concluded that, in general, early adolescents' perceptions of self-esteem and competence are not adversely affected by the transition.     

Paradise elementary school

This paper is a fictionalized account of the development, within an elementary school, of four distinctive schools-within-schools. Questions and issues arising in developing such programs are discussed, the theme of each of these four is described, and advantages that staff find in the arrangement are presented.     

Assessing elementary school support for inquiry

Increasingly in elementary schools, there has been a focus on the influence of school-level factors on students’ learning. The way in which the learning environment is organised in schools and classrooms is likely to influence students’ opportunities to carry out inquiry. Most studies have focused on the effects of the amount of schooling, rather than effects attributable to support for inquiry in the school context. This study clarifies aspects of school contexts that support inquiry at the school level and describes the development of an inventory to assess school contexts. The Primary School Characteristics Inventory has three components named Motivation for Student Inquiry, Organisational Structures to Support Inquiry and Structures to Support Inquiry Strategies in School. The instrument was effective for identifying schools with varying levels of support for inquiry, suggesting that some schools might need to modify the school context if students are to carry out inquiry in a self-directed way.     

构建本科层次新型小学教师教育体系--基础教育新师资专业化培养的新举措

教育全球化是当今世界发展进程中无法阻挡的历史潮流.根据全球化时代教师教育的特征和我国基础教育改革与发展过程中新师资供求关系的结构性变化,教师教育尤其是本科层次小学教师教育面临着新的困境.创新和构建既具有中国西部边疆少数民族地区特色又能与国际教育接轨的新型小学教师教育体系,是云南省楚雄师范学院初等教育系多年来探索实践的主要课题.这个具有西部民族地区特色和职前职后一体化专业特色的教师培养体系,对高师院校本科层次小学教师教育具有极大的借鉴意义和社会应用价值.     

Proportions in elementary school

Proportion problems were given to pupils in grades 3, 4, and 5. The number structure of the problems was kept at an elementary level and the contexts were varied. The success rates were high, which shows that young children have some understanding of the concept of proportion. Elementary strategies based on addition were often used. Familiarity with the use of ratios in the context, the presence of a mixture, and the use of manipulatives were context variables that influenced performance. The abilities required to solve proportion problems in various contexts were essentially independent from each other. The cognitive characteristics that predict success were found to be different from those that predict use of multiplicative strategies.     

如何培养小学生数学学习的情感

情感是人的需要是否得到满足产生的一种内心体验，是人对接触到的客观事务的态度的体验。情感伴随着学生学习的全过程，直接影响学生的学习动机、兴趣和效果。教师要用真挚的感情创设一种宽松和谐的学习氛围；活用教材，启迪学生的情感；巧用教材，调动学生的情感；还要采用小组合作、同伴互助的教学形式，激发学生的情感。     

Combined fluency and cognitive strategies instruction improves mathematics achievement in early elementary school

One hundred and seventy-eight second grade students from two states (Georgia and Massachusetts) participated in an experiment in which they were randomly assigned to either (1) a computer program designed to increase fluency in addition and subtraction, (2) a program designed to improve cognitive strategy use for addition and subtraction, (3) a program that combined the fluency and cognitive strategy instruction programs or (4) a control condition. The intervention consisted of 40 half-hour sessions (2 sessions per week for 20 weeks). Prior to the intervention, and immediately following the intervention, the participants were tested on fluency, cognitive strategy use, and mathematics achievement. ANCOVAs indicated that children in the combined fluency and cognitive strategy use condition significantly improved their mathematics achievement in comparison to the control group. When we examined the impact of the intervention as a function of gender, boys appeared to benefit from the intervention, but girls did not.     

Children's literature for the gifted elementary school child

Long range planning for the gifted should not be limited to our present education systems. Today's educational structures do not provide the best opportunities for these youngsters.     

参观日本小学随感

在仙台东北大学国际交流会馆住的许多中国人看来,日本的小学简直可以说是孩子们的游乐场:上课时老师不批评学生,孩子们和老师的关系就是朋友关系,没有家庭作业,班里不设班干部,等等.     

小学语文课堂教学发散性思维训练

培养和发展小学生的创造力是我国当前基础教育改革的重点,也是我国经济发展、社会发展的迫切需要。在相关的理论指导和实践探索的过程中,我们总结出了将学生的发散性思维培养与语文日常课堂教学相结合的训练模式,大大促进了学生创造力的发展,取得了较好的教育效果。     

How elementary school students' motivation is connected to self-regulation

Empirical research reveals that students face difficulties engaging in learning and achieving their goals in a variety of learning contexts. To study effectively, students need to regulate their learning process. In spite of increased understanding of cognitive aspects of self-regulation, motivational aspects of regulation have not yet been thoroughly probed. This study investigates how motivation is connected to self-regulated learning when elementary school students (N = 32) study science in real classroom contexts using gStudy software. This was done by: (1) identifying students' situated motivation during the learning process, (2) analyzing how the students with different motivational approaches activated cognitive self-regulation in authentic learning situations across multiple learning episodes, and (3) complementing the understanding with the students' individual accounts of their motivation regulation during the learning process. The results show that there are qualitative differences in the self-regulation tactics used by the high- and low-motivation students as they study. Motivation is linked closely to active self-regulation.     

如何让小学数学课堂“活”起来

随着人们生活水平的不断提高,越来越多的人开始关注教育。作为教师,我们有必要深入讨论如何让小学数学课堂真正活起来。要让小学数学课堂真正活起来,必须精心设计课堂内容,激发学生学习的兴趣;营造宽松的课堂氛围,激发学生的主体性;科学的评价学生,促进学生学习的积极性。     

Preparing elementary prospective teachers to teach early algebra

Researchers have argued that integrating early algebra into elementary grades will better prepare students for algebra. However, currently little research exists to guide teacher preparation programs on how to prepare prospective elementary teachers to teach early algebra. This study examines the insights and challenges that prospective teachers experience when exploring early algebraic reasoning. Results from this study showed that developing informal representations for variables and unknowns and learning about the two interpretations of the equal sign were meaningful new insights for the prospective teachers. However, the prospective teachers found it a conceptual challenge to identify the relationships contained in algebraic expressions, to distinguish between unknowns and variables, to bracket their knowledge of formal algebra and to represent subtraction from unknowns or variables. These findings suggest that exploring early algebra is non-trivial for elementary prospective teachers and likely necessary to adequately prepare them to teach early algebra.     

Computer assisted counseling — model for the elementary school

Computers are now part and parcel of the instructional process in many elementary schools. In addition to Computer Assisted Instruction, it is possible to utilize the school computer for other educational purposes such as data storage and information retrieval which can conceivably increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the counseling process. The model described in this paper was built so as to provide the school counselor with an instrument which, although based on traditional counseling methods, is immeasurably more accurate in the provision of updated information for diagnostic and other counseling activities and thus contributes to greater counseling efficiency.