Action Research in Education,in the Era of Liquid Modernity[1]

In the post-Franco context of the 1960s in Spain, we asked ourselves what type of changes were necessary for the teaching profession to respond to the demands of a democratic society. This article reflects the discourse developed over many years within the personal experience of one of those young people who received John Elliott's seminal work back at that time and their intellectual influence in the years since. It is concerned to see to what extent action research makes sense in education, within the context of the cultural change we are immersed in today. The debate about who rules the change can be reformulated today again within the socio-political and cultural context of the present moment of modernity. But the paradox of the change dilemmas cannot be resolved, but constitute the essence of action research; they are its justification. It is argued that a central feature of this new state of modernity is the recognition of uncertainty and deliberation is seen as a basic means to face it. While the structure of the systems tends to reproduce through different means the conventional model of dual systems and professional models based on technical rationality, educational discourse very often emphasises the discourse which emerged in the new age of liquid modernity. This contradiction leads to three possible scenarios, each with important practical consequences on curricular development, on teaching professionalism and on the type of research required. Each of these is considered.     

“The future is ours too”: A training process to enable the learning perception and increase self-efficacy in the use of tablets in the elderly

The generational digital divide can be understood as a response to the physical and psychosocial decline of older people. Recently, there has been interest in reducing the generational digital divide because of societal costs, and several studies state that tablets seem to help the elderly due to usability and functions that easily fulfill the elderly’s needs to be connected, independent, and autonomous: It could increase the elderly’s well-being. This article presents a training program that increases self-efficiency and enables the learning perception and use of tablets. A qualitative-dominant co-occurrent mixed-methods design was used to assess the perception that the participants (50 participants over 65 years of age) had of their own learning process and success in the course, as well as their digital self-efficacy. The results appear to partially reflect previous research; moreover, perceived changes in self-efficacy and learning can be tied to three core themes—empowerment, integration, and autonomy.     

Integrative Geragogy: Part 1: Theory and Practice of a Basic Model

ABSTRACT

Geragogy as a part of gerontology seems to be established in aging societies. Also, geragogy as a form of education for elderly people, learning in the third age, is nowadays an integrated part of agogy. On the other hand, the increase in the number of people of the fourth age, the oldest of the old, handicapped elderly people in nursing homes, is hardly considered in the geragogical discussion. Integrative geragogy in the field of care facilities is given only marginal consideration. In this article we want to present integrative geragogy as a basic part of educational gerontology. We present it as interacting closely with therapeutic education and social work, dealing especially with potentials of the oldest of the old and mentally handicapped elderly people. An outline of the international discussion and the history of geragogy in Germany shows the state-of-the-art in geragogy today. A specific theory and praxeology of integrative geragogy is also presented.     

机电产品人机性能与使用舒适性的关系

在当今社会,随着科学技术的发展,社会工业化程度得到了空前的提高。任何一种机电产品,使其有效地进行作业不仅取决于操控它的人,更取决于产品的优化设计,这就是设计要有以人为本的设计理念。现在,人的价值越来越高,以人为本的设计观念越来越受到人们的推崇,因此人机工程学被引入到机电产品设计中来。只有做到机电产品的人机性能与使用舒适性的和谐统一,才能真正达到社会和经济效益的最大化,因此机电产品人机性能与使用舒适性的关系就显得尤为重要。     

Effects of Intergenerational Interaction on Aging

The world population pyramid has changed shape. However, this does not mean that societies have changed their negative concept of old age. Our study proposes an intergenerational service-learning program with 179 university students and 101 slightly depressed elderly people. The results show that the elderly people who interacted improved in well-being. Those interacting with the young people tended to lower their stereotyped perception of themselves, while the others tended to augment it. The young people tended to moderate their stereotypes of the elderly with or without interaction.     

The Information Content of Employee Awards

Employers often provide awards to employees to induce greater effort. Although a merit award system may increase effort and productivity, it may also produce unintended consequences if it provides new information to the labor market that enables outside employers to differentiate workers more accurately by their effectiveness. In this paper, I present evidence on the signaling effects of merit awards received by school principals in Chicago using regression discontinuity design methods. I find that principals who just exceeded the threshold for a merit award are over twice as likely to exit their school the year after winning compared to principals who fell just short of the award threshold, consistent with the notion that the labor market views the award as a signal of principal effectiveness. Difference-in-differences estimates show that the award program incentives increased achievement, highlighting the importance of program modifications that reduce the loss of more effective school leaders.     

Bringing Life-Education up to Date

Life-education has been a widespread phenomenon from very early times. Since the beginning of humanity, people have lived and learned. It is natural that as human life has spread, so has education. However, some people are ahead of their time, and some are behind. There are people today who are still living several hundred years in the past and are receiving education that is several hundred years out of date. The purpose of expanding the educational movement is to teach those who have fallen behind to leap into the present. To be contemporary people, we must have contemporary knowledge, learn contemporary skills, perceive contemporary problems, and use contemporary methods to build our strength. Time progresses ceaselessly. If we are to continue to be up to date, we must participate in contemporary life using the latest tools; otherwise, we will fall behind in a few years. We must, therefore, grasp the key to contemporary civilization if we wish continually to discover its treasures and guarantee its unending flow. This key is the living use of language and symbols and a progressive scientific method. The greatest imperative of the universal education movement is to transfer this key from the hands of the minority to those of the masses.     

城市回族老年人主观幸福感及影响因素——以宁夏银川市为例

老年人的主观幸福感是老年人生活质量好坏的关键。本研究采用问卷法对宁夏回族自治区银川市292名回族老年人进行了调查,对城市回族老年人主观幸福感的整体状况进行了初步了解。研究发现:1)城市回族老年人总体上对自己现在的生活感到很满意;2)城市回族老年人在婚姻状况、受教育水平上无显著差异,而在性别、职业和身体健康状况上则存在显著差异——城市回族老年女性比城市回族老年男性的主观幸福感程度高;职业是阿訇的城市回族老年人之间的主观幸福感高于职业是工人和干部的城市回族老年人的主观幸福感。     

DEVELOPING EDUCATIONAL SERVICES FOR OLDER ADULTS AND THOSE WHO WORK WITH THEM

The results of a community college's efforts to develop a range of educational services for the aging are presented. Cultural, educational, and recreational activities provided within a college setting and through a network of neighborhood centers are described, as well as continuing education and in‐service training programs for persons who work with the elderly. The processes and problems involved in planning, organizing, and administering such a comprehensive program for the elderly in an educational institution are described and discussed.

The authors attempt to demonstrate that a wide range of opportunities exists for colleges and universities in most localities to develop a variety of services that can enhance the quality of life of the elderly. Their central message is that it is possible to accomplish a lot with quite limited resources if available resources are used well. A variety of educational services to a large number of older persons and to people who work with them was generated by a small initial grant. This grant enabled the college not only to begin to identify the educational needs of the elderly in a particular locality but also to locate a wide range of available resources (money, people, facilities) that could be used immediately to provide services.     

The Importance,and the Challenges,to Ensuring an Inclusive School Climate

Although three articles in this special issue address three very different social groupings—gender, ethnicity, and academic needs—they all highlight why inclusion is important for students’ healthy development. The authors make specific suggestions for how schools might promote a more inclusive and welcoming climate for their students. Ultimately, all of the authors recognized that positive intergroup contact is necessary for students to feel included at school but will not simply occur because students have the opportunity to interact. Rather, it is necessary for teachers to be active in establishing prosocial and inclusive classroom norms. This will likely be both the best way to create inclusive schools and the biggest challenge.     

PROJECT INSIGHTS: AN EVALUATION OF A COMMUNITY VISION EDUCATION PROJECT FOR OLDER ADULTS

Project InSights is a community vision education and outreach program designed to utilize trained older adult volunteers to educate their peers about age-related vision loss and the benefits of vision rehabilitation for people who are visually impaired. Volunteers conduct programs that motivate attendees to maintain their vision health and provide information about available services and resources in the community. The overall goal is to prevent unnecessary functional disability among older adults with vision impairment. Peer education is based on the assumption that people are more likely to listen to their contemporaries, and Project InSights uses this approach. A nine-month evaluation of Project InSights was conducted to determine program effectiveness, volunteer and attendee satisfaction, and suggestions for program modification. Data were gathered from two perspectives--program attendees and volunteers--via telephone interviews and evaluation forms completed by program attendees. Program attendees (90 % ) stated that they learned something new that could help them or someone they know who has a vision problem. Volunteers (98 % ) would recommend others to become an InSights volunteer because they are providing an important service. Results indicate that Project InSights was viewed as a valuable community resource by all involved.     

Primary‐Secondary Transfer after the National Curriculum

Much recent comment by the Department of Education and Science (DES) and National Curriculum Council (NCC) has suggested that continuity difficulties will largely disappear as a result of the introduction of the National Curriculum. The National Curriculum, however, does not address the main issue — lack of communication between teachers. Any effect it has is likely to be caused by changes in ways in which primary schools are organised to deliver the curriculum — changes which will bring them closer in ethos to the secondary sector.     

“邯郸学步”的定型源流和文化解读

“邯郸学步”在定型源流中经历了邯郸步、学步、失步、学步邯郸、邯郸之失等语词的选择过程,最终因其表意丰富完整、符合现代汉语的语法结构被社会习用而固定下来.历代文献使用“邯郸学步”多讥模仿之失,但亦有学步之难和学步者稀少的感叹,这是对邯郸学步的多重文化解读.     

BROADCAST NEWS AND ELDERLY PEOPLE: ATTITUDES OF LOCAL TELEVISION MANAGERS

The Kogan Attitudes Toward Old People Scale was used to measure local television manager attitudes toward elderly people. Census projections have shown that the elderly population will increase dramatically in the next century. The importance of local television news in the Hues of the elderly makes the study of the attitudes of broadcasters about older people relevant. A national survey of two groups of television managers—general managers and news directors—found that younger news directors had a more positive attitude toward older people, while the older general managers had a less positive attitude.     

Northwest Bureau Directive on the Question of Winter Cadre Training in Subdistricts and Townships (October 6, 1944)

Yenan. New China News Agency cable, September [?] 19 — The entire text of the "Northwest Bureau Directive on the Question of Winter Cadre Training in Subdistricts and Townships" reads as follows: 1. On the basis of reports from the various subregions and of views expressed by non-Party people at a forum in the Yenan subregion, the Northwest Bureau [of the Communist Party] feels that the main weakness of a great many local cadres today is a lack of understanding of policies and an excessive simplification of work methods. These are basic problems in the thought and work style of subdistrict and township cadres today that must be exposed and changed. If this sort of problem cannot be satisfactorily solved, different opinions about Party policies can develop between higher and lower levels, and there is a danger that the policies will not be thoroughly implemented. A proper and suitable solution to this problem, then, is to have local cadres both understand all the policies and laws applicable to local work and be good at uniting the masses and non-Party people to carry out these policies and laws. This is tantamount to solving all the basic problems of Border Region construction, and it is the most reliable guarantee that local work will be thoroughly transformed and that policies and laws will be thoroughly implemented.     

L'évolution technologique,la société et l'éducation

In the first part of this article the author recalls and emphasizes the way in which education and society are interrelated. It is considered impossible to pose a problem of education without referring to the social framework in which its solution is to be found. Education involves preparing the child for tomorrow's world — knowledge of this world being the point of departure of all pedagogic reflection — and at the same time not cutting it off from its roots. Presenting personal experience rather than launching into technical demonstrations the author recalls some of the changes over the past fifty years. The different educational milieus which the child and adolescent encounter, such as family, school and professional life, are affected by such technical changes. As far as the school environment is concerned, technological revolutions modify the relationships between pupil and knowledge, and create new relationships between teachers and pupils as also among pupils themselves. In addition, a new type of creativity has arisen as a result of the utilization of computers and databases. Schools have in fact experienced a series of revolutions which deeply transformed the access to knowledge: books, daily papers and the mass media, informatics. According to the author the book presents the ‘day before yesterday's knowledge’; the daily paper brings you up to ‘yesterday’; radio and television up to ‘today’. Informatics will make the pupil accustomed not only to seek knowledge but also to reconstruct or even construct it. Where does the school stand amidst this vast reconstruction? What is its present role? What will become of the teacher and his new roles? If the school wants to prepare itself for tomorrow's world it has to change radically today.     

MOTIVATIONAL INFLUENCES ON ELDERLY TEST PERFORMANCE

An important reaction to individuals involved in problem solving is that of knowing the accuracy of their responses. Prior research has established that young adults are accurate in estimating correctness to responses on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS). The present study extended these findings to the elderly and also considered whether ability‐extraneous variables (e.g., fatigue) influence either accuracy in judging correctness or IQ score. The WAIS was administered to 44 community‐dwelling elderly citizens in a counterbalanced manner to control for motivational influences. The examinee's IQs and estimations of correctness were measured. Materials included standard WAIS protocols and forms on which the examinees wrote a plus (+) or minus (—) after each response, indicating feelings of correctness as +, or of an incorrect answer as —. Results show that older examinees are highly accurate in their feelings of correctness. Analyses of variance and covariance indicated order of presentation significantly influences accuracy in reporting correctness. While IQ score was not affected by order of presentation, mean performance IQ score was significantly lower than mean verbal IQ score. Findings suggest that older persons seem uncomfortable with ambiguity and seem to possess an unrealistic fear of failure. Persons involved in educating the elderly should strive to assist in the reevaluation of unattainable goals. By having more realistic goals and early successes in a program, the older learner can reduce unpleasant emotional states and is more likely to remain in a program.     

Immigrant teachers: stories of self and place

Teachers’ lives have been the focus of much recent research on teaching, and we now have rich, detailed understandings of how teachers develop a ‘teaching self,’ in the context of concrete details of biography, school settings, relationships and educational systems within which teachers work. What we lack is a sense of the teacher in a place—a specific location that holds meaning, that matters to those who inhabit it. The concept of ‘place’ has been neglected in contemporary education, yet it seems to be an important one for postmodern times. This article will examine the stories of immigrant teachers in Israel, people who have undertaken to teach in a culture different from the one in which they themselves were educated. Teachers who have made a transition from one cultural setting to another are likely to have developed an awareness of teaching and schooling in the new culture that other teachers may not have. Their stories reveal what it means in the chosen culture to tell one’s story and give an account of one’s career and work as a teacher. The stories of seven immigrant teachers, in dialogue with the researcher’s story, highlight losses and gains in the journey toward a new teaching self, and reveal something of what the process of finding or making a place for oneself—both in the new culture and as a teacher—is like.     

PUBLIC EDUCATION ABOUT NORMAL FORGETFULNESS AND DEMENTIA: EFFECTIVENESS OF A SYSTEMATICALLY DEVELOPED INFORMATION BROCHURE

Earlier research revealed that many elderly people in The Netherlands are worried about their forgetfulness and are afraid of incipient dementia. Until now, no systematic research has been conducted on the effects of public education about normal forgetfulness and dementia, and therefore an information brochure was developed and evaluated. The main function of this brochure was to reassure people who were unnecessarily worrying about possible dementia. A second function was to motivate people to seek professional help when this seemed advisable. Sixty‐two percent of all respondents (307 of 400) who had been worried about dementia before reading the brochure said that their anxiety decreased or disappeared after reading it; approximately 3% became more worried after reading the brochure. A cognitive test battery was administered to 104 people to determine whether their increased or decreased anxiety was justified. Thirty subjects had low test scores, yet 16 of these subjects had been reassured by the brochure that their forgetfulness was nothing to worry about. This group was characterized as experiencing fewer problems in daily life as a result of their forgetfulness and as having a higher internal locus of control. Seventy‐four subjects performed well on the cognitive tests, yet 18 of them had remained worried about their forgetfulness after reading the brochure. Anxiety for heredity of dementia could be a possible explanation for their persistent concern. Although many people were reassured by the brochure, the results also show that it is important to evaluate information brochures used as intervention instruments—in one third of the present sample, the effects of the brochure were not in accordance with its goal.     

Sustainability and the learning virtues

Learning is important to sustainability—but how? On the dominant sustainable development picture, various kinds of learning are seen as instrumental to one’s behaving responsibly towards future generations, within a framework of present actions and ecological consequences. This whole picture of future‐oriented responsibility is radically flawed, fundamentally misrepresenting our creative engagement in change. It grossly exaggerates our powers to predict and control and licenses an endemic bad faith in the construction of sustainability goals supposedly derived from obligations to the future. This process is not only the opposite of genuine learning, but is very likely to ensure practical failure. In contrast, a model of ecological responsibility that might work will have learning not as a subsidiary and instrumental feature, but right at its core. The only way in which one really comes up against the constraint of the future is by acknowledging the demands of active learning—critical self‐awareness, exploratory‐creative commitment, and a robust tolerance for uncertainty—as virtues. The paper develops this account of the learning virtues in detail, and shows how embodying their practice across all our institutions and activities constitutes the only kind of responsibility to the future which we can genuinely exercise.