Connecting past and present through case-comparison learning in history: views of teachers and students

History education frequently aims at developing active citizenship by using the past to orientate to the present and the future. A pedagogy for pursuing this aim is making connections between the past and the present by means of comparing cases of an enduring human issue. To examine the feasibility and desirability of this case-comparison teaching approach, students (n = 444) and teachers (n = 15) who participated in an implementation study conducted in the Netherlands were questioned about their experiences and views. Results show that both students and teachers felt that case-comparison in the context of an enduring human issue is feasible and not more complex than the usual history teaching in which topics are studied separately without explicitly making comparisons between past and present, even if some students thought that taking account of episodes from different historical periods concurrently required an extra learning effort. Both students and teachers believed that connecting past and present in history teaching enhances engagement and meaning making. They suggested a curriculum combining the case-comparison approach with the type of history teaching they were accustomed to. Mixed methods were used for data collection. Implications for further research on case-comparison learning in history are being discussed.     

Keep Your Eye on the Ball: Investigating Artifacts-in-Use in Physical Education

The purpose of this article is to develop a method of approach that can be used to explore the meaning and use of artifacts in education by applying a socio-cultural perspective to learning and artifacts. An empirical material of video recorded physical education lessons in Sweden is used to illustrate the approach in terms of how artifacts in different ways can play a part in meaning making processes in physical education. The illustration from the video recordings shows that a ball can be constituted as a great toy and that in the practice of physical education being physically active and an active participant in a certain game is regarded as reasonable. However, it also illustrates that the ball can be constituted as a lethal projectile and a pupil positioned as lazy and unwilling. In the article we argue that empirical studies of artifacts-in-use using visual methodologies are both important and valuable, challenging physical education teachers’ reflections about the role of artifacts in their teaching.     

体育隐性课程的教学实践应用

本文对体育教学中隐性体育课程的概念、实现体育教学目标过程中的作用和意义进行了论述,旨在通过对体育隐性课程的探讨,运用到体育教学之中,从而有效地指导体育教学工作,继而为高校的体育教学改革和体育课程建设提供理论依据。     

Technology-enhanced learning and teaching in higher education: what is ‘enhanced’ and how do we know? A critical literature review

The term technology-enhanced learning (TEL) is used to describe the application of information and communication technologies to teaching and learning. Explicit statements about what the term is understood to mean are rare and it is not evident that a shared understanding has been developed in higher education of what constitutes an enhancement of the student learning experience. This article presents a critical review and assessment of how TEL is interpreted in recent literature. It examines the purpose of technology interventions, the approaches adopted to demonstrate the role of technology in enhancing the learning experience, differing ways in which enhancement is conceived and the use of various forms evidence to substantiate claims about TEL. Thematic analysis enabled categories to be developed and relationships explored between the aims of TEL interventions, the evidence presented, and the ways in which enhancement is conceived.     

Approaches to professional development of teachers in Scotland: pedagogical innovation or financial necessity?

Background: In a context of significant educational change and financial constraint, this paper explores ways to develop teacher learning. A recent review of teacher education (Teaching Scotland's Future: Report of a review of teacher education in Scotland, Donaldson 2011 Donaldson, G. 2011. Teaching Scotland's Future: Report of a review of teacher education in Scotland, Edinburgh: Scottish Government.  [Google Scholar]) coincided with two factors impacting on teaching and learning in Scotland. Firstly, the implementation of a new curriculum entitled ‘Curriculum for Excellence'. This new curriculum is underpinned by a philosophy of active learning, self-evaluation and reflection for all teachers and pupils. The second factor, impacting on teaching and learning, is the cuts being made in education because of financial constraints in the wake of the recession. These cuts include reductions in local authority support staff and opportunities for professional development.

Sources of evidence: This paper explores effective models of professional development for teachers and draws on principles of learning in the twenty-first century and the premise that what is known about how people learn should be applied to pupil and teacher learning. It also draws on a range of policy documents published in Scotland 2001–11 that impact on curriculum innovation and teacher education.

Main argument: The implementation of the new curriculum and the review of teacher education both focus on improving the quality of teaching and learning in Scottish schools and both offer opportunities for innovation for teachers and pupils. Both also require radical changes in ways of working for everyone. To implement the new curriculum, teachers have to change the ways they work requiring innovative models of continuing professional development to be designed not only to meet the demand for teacher learning but to make the best use of the limited funds.

Conclusions: It is argued that the cuts in funding may act as a catalyst for pedagogical change in professional development with increased reliance on school-based professional development. Empirical evidence collected during a research study in Scotland, which analysed feedback about curriculum reform, is used to illustrate both the need for improved professional learning opportunities for teachers and the benefits of facilitated school-based professional development.     

The Power of Inquiry as a Way of Learning

Since the publication of The Boyer Commission Report (1998), inquiry-guided learning, has acquired a certain cachet and is often suggested as a universal answer for various teaching and learning ills, particularly in research universities. However, while the report focused on inquiry-guided learning, it defined the term only generally or chiefly by anecdote. Twelve years later confusion still exists about what inquiry-guided learning really is and how to do it, whether in a single course or across the curriculum. This article offers a review of representative literature on inquiry-guided learning as well as guidelines for classroom and curriculum practice to address this confusion and to offer clarity.     

Phenomenology and Physical Education

Abstract

Physical education is often justified within the curriculum as academic study, as a worthwhile activity on a par with other academic subjects on offer and easy to assess. Part of the problem has been that movement studies in physical education are looked upon as disembodied and disconnected from its central concerns which are associated with employing physical means to develop the whole person. But this, Merleau-Ponty would say, is to ignore the nature of experience and to consider the cognitive aspects of our perceptual experience in isolation from the personal meaning gained when looked at from the ‘inside’ or participatory perspective of the moving agent. In this sense, physical education has lost meaning for some students because our embodied relationship with the world is not an external or contemplative one. Phenomenology, according to Merleau-Ponty, is significant for physical education because it highlights what it is like to be embodied and recognises the role corporeal movement and embodiment plays in learning, in, by and through physical education. What makes this account educationally significant for physical education is that the whole person should benefit by the experience, as it includes an emphasis on all three educational domains (the psychomotor, the cognitive and the affective), rather than as separate physical and mental qualities that bear no relation to each other.     

Professional ethics education for future teachers: A narrative review of the scholarly writings

This article provides a narrative review of the scholarly writings on professional ethics education for future teachers. Against the background of a widespread belief among scholars working in this area that longstanding and sustained research and reflection on the ethics of teaching have had little impact on the teacher education curriculum, the article takes stock of the field by synthesizing viewpoints on key aspects of teaching ethics to teacher candidates—the role ethics plays in teacher education, the primary objectives of ethics education for teachers, recommended teaching and learning strategies, and challenges to introducing ethics curriculum—and maps out how opinions on these matters have evolved over the three decades since the initial publication of Strike and Soltis’ seminal book, The Ethics of Teaching. In light of the review’s results, the article identifies critical deficits in this literature and proposes a set of recommendations for future inquiry.     

Rethinking Formalisms in Formal Education

I explore a belief about learning and teaching that is commonly held in education and society at large that nonetheless is deeply flawed. The belief asserts that mastery of formalisms—specialized representations such as symbolic equations and diagrams with no inherent meaning except that which is established by convention—is prerequisite to applied knowledge. A formalisms first (FF) view of learning, rooted in Western dualist philosophy, incorrectly advocates the introduction of formalisms too early in the development of learners’ conceptual understanding and can encourage a formalisms-only mind-set toward learning and instruction. I identify the prevalence of FF in curriculum and instruction and outline some of the serious problems engendered by FF approaches. I then turn to promising alternatives that support progressive formalization, problem-based learning, and inquiry learning, which capitalize on the strengths of formalisms but avoid some of the most costly problems found in FF approaches.     

探究学习模式在中学体育教学中的应用研究

2001年,我国正式启动了以《基础教育课程改革纲要（试行）》为标志的新一轮基础教育课程改革。大力提倡培养学生的独立性和自主性,引导学生质疑、调查、探究。探究学习模式成为我国新一轮基础教育课程改革的重点之一。本文首先阐述了在中学体育课学习中采用探究学习模式的意义。其次,从让学生真正成为学习的主体,让学生在创造性活动中学习,加强中学体育教师素质培养等方面,对如何在中学体育教学中应用探究学习模式提出了自己的建议和看法,具有一定的参考价值。     

Online communication and interaction in distance higher education: A framework study of good practice

Distance education requires an instructional design approach that can lead to educational transformation. This is characterised by advanced flexibility, learner autonomy and extensive use of digital technologies to enhance learning outcomes. The main feature of such methodology is the physical distance between teaching staff, peers and educational institutions. Various technological tools are used to bridge this distance and improve communication and interaction. This article attempts to review the literature in the field, with the aim of highlighting strategies for enhancing communication and interaction in online learning environments. After discussing the theoretical framework for online communication and interaction, the authors outline the factors involved in creating well-structured, interactive and dynamic online courses and programmes for higher education students. The article explores the multi-dimensional aspects of communication in online learning environments and the differing forms of interaction involved. Using qualitative methods, the authors’ aim is to produce a framework to help tutors and instructional designers develop more effective online courses in higher education. In addition, this article may be of value to researchers and scholar-practitioners interested in communication issues, to online learning designers, and to institutional managers recruiting teaching staff for online educational courses.

     

Making the hidden curriculum visible: sustainability literacy in higher education

Despite strong political support for the development of sustainability literacy amongst the UK graduates, embedding sustainability in the higher education curriculum has met with widespread indifference, and in some cases, active resistance. However, opportunities exist beyond the formal curriculum for engaging students in learning about sustainability. Previous research has highlighted the potential of the university campus for experiential, place-based learning about and for sustainability. This has been conceptualised as the ‘informal’ curriculum, consisting of extra-curricular activities and student projects linking estates and operations to formal study. However, the impact of the so-called ‘hidden curriculum’ (the implicit messages a university sends about sustainability through the institutional environment and values) has been overlooked as a potential influence on student learning and behaviour. This article reports on a small-scale research project which utilised a phenomenographic approach to explore students’ perceptions of the ‘hidden sustainability curriculum’ at a leading sustainability university. The findings suggest that helping students deconstruct the hidden campus curriculum may enhance aspects of sustainability literacy; developing students’ understanding about sustainability and creating solutions to sustainability issues, enabling evaluative dialogue around campus sustainability and also self-reflection, which could be transformative and translate into pro-environmental behaviour change. This research is transferable to other contexts.     

The Birth of a Notion: The Windfalls and Pitfalls of Tailoring an SoTL-like Concept to Scientists, Mathematicians, and Engineers

Despite calls for greater agreement in defining the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL), terms that resemble SoTL are proliferating. An NSF-sponsored center for teaching and learning coined its own term, teaching-as-research (TAR), believing it would resonate better with research-active scientists, engineers, and mathematicians. To understand whether this was a wise strategy, we interviewed 43 participants from courses that sought to explain and demonstrate TAR. Our study found that participants defined TAR with varying complexity and that disciplinary concepts generally provided “conceptual handles” for making sense of TAR. However, tailoring a term to particular disciplines entails several challenging tradeoffs.

Contextualised Meaning Making: One way of rethinking experiential learning and self-directed learning?

Experiential learning and self-directed learning are keystone constructs in adult education. This paper examines ideas underpinning these constructs and offers a rethinking of experiential learning and self-directed learning as contextualised meaning making. In exploring this concept, the paper discusses contextualised meaning making as a multi-layered experience incorporating exposed meanings, hidden meanings and unheard voices. These ideas are illustrated by reference to practice in an adult education degree program.     

Policies on and practices of cultural inclusivity in learning management systems: perspectives of Indigenous holistic pedagogies

Online learning has become a conventional term and practice in Australian higher education, yet cultural inclusivity for Indigenous (Indigenous for the purposes of this paper refers to Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples) students is insufficiently reflected in learning management system (LMS) policies and design. This study aims to explore culturally inclusive learning entrenched in Australian university policies on and practices of LMS by applying Indigenous holistic pedagogical values in LMS design. Based on a literature review, we articulate four dimensions: communication, collaboration, community and interculturality for culturally inclusive learning in an online learning environment. By using the dimensions, we critically review policies (n?=?10) and LMS sites (n?=?50). In this review, we argue that there are contrasts of individually heterogeneous and collectively homogeneous approaches, self-focused and community-driven pedagogy, and task-oriented and relational learning. Significantly, the review results indicate that Indigenous holistic pedagogies have a metaphysical strength to be the ontological foundation for cultural inclusivity.     

论隐性课程在大学英语教学中的构建

隐性课程是大学教育中不可缺少的组成部分。从现有的大学英语教学课程看,构建在大学英语教学中隐性课程有着重要意义。因此,如何在大学英语教学中构建隐性课程是值得我们探讨的。该文试图从不同方面提出了构建大学英语教学隐性课程的途径,旨在激起学生学习英语的热情,进而增强学生运用英语的能力。     

浅析英语口语隐性课程的“显性控制”

隐性课程是显性课程的拓展和延伸,是学校教育不可或缺的部分。英语口语隐性课程的“显性控制”,对学生英语口语水平的提高至关重要,对课程组织者提出了更高的要求。本文介绍了英语口语隐性课程的研究背景、涵义和特点,阐述了对其研究的重要性,着重强调如何在教学过程中对英语口语隐性因素加以“显性”控制,为学生创造一个良好的英语口语学习环境,以提高学生的学习兴趣,达到教学目的。     

隐性课程的开发与大学英语教学改革

隐性课程是学校教育实践和教育结果中不可或缺且有效的组成部分.在搞好大学英语课程教学的同时,也应重视与之相应的隐性课程的开发,为学生创设良好的英语学习氛围,从而促进当前的大学英语教学改革.     

Engineering design skills coverage in K-12 engineering program curriculum materials in the USA

ABSTRACT

The current K-12 Science Education framework and Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) in the United States emphasise the integration of engineering design in science instruction to promote scientific literacy and engineering design skills among students. As such, many engineering education programmes have developed curriculum materials that are being used in K-12 settings. However, little is known about the nature and extent to which engineering design skills outlined in NGSS are addressed in these K-12 engineering education programme curriculum materials. We analysed nine K-12 engineering education programmes for the nature and extent of engineering design skills coverage. Results show that developing possible solutions and actual designing of prototypes were the highly covered engineering design skills; specification of clear goals, criteria, and constraints received medium coverage; defining and identifying an engineering problem; optimising the design solution; and demonstrating how a prototype works, and making iterations to improve designs were lowly covered. These trends were similar across grade levels and across discipline-specific curriculum materials. These results have implications on engineering design-integrated science teaching and learning in K-12 settings.