Development of knowledge about the use of cues to aid prospective retrieval

Retrieval cues can be used to help one remember to perform tasks in the future and to relocate objects in the environment. However, in both tasks there are requirements for a retrieval cue to be effective as a mnemonic aid. For example, the cue must be associated with the target item, but it must not be ambiguous, and it must be appropriately placed. 2 studies assessed children's ability to evaluate the communicative quality of retrieval cues. In Study 1, 5-9-year-old children and adults evaluated the potential effectiveness of cues to remind themselves. In Study 2, 4-9-year-olds evaluated the potential effectiveness of cues for relocating hidden objects. Patterns of results were similar in both studies: young children first learned that the retrieval cue should be associated with the target and should be encountered for retrieval to occur. However, children often overlooked problems with the potential informativeness of the cues, such as ambiguity, and did not anticipate that such cues might be misinterpreted in the future. Children's difficulty in estimating their information needs may be related to their difficulty in monitoring their current comprehension state.     

Joint storybook reading and joint writing interventions among low SES preschoolers: differential contributions to early literacy

This study compared two interventions: one focusing on language and storybook reading and the other on alphabetic skills and writing. Seventy-one preschoolers aged 3–5 from a low SES township in central Israel (35 in the reading program and 36 in the writing program) participated in evaluation of the interventions. Twenty-four untreated preschoolers served as a control group. The children were tested twice, at the beginning and at the end of the school year, in: phonological awareness, word writing, letter knowledge, orthographic awareness, listening comprehension, receptive vocabulary, and general knowledge. Both programs involved games and creative activities. The writing program encouraged letter knowledge, phonological awareness, and functional writing activities. The reading program utilized 11 children's books for focusing on language and exploring major concepts raised by these books. Results indicated that children in the two literacy programs progressed significantly more than the control group on phonological awareness and orthographic awareness. However, the joint writing group significantly outperformed both the joint reading group and the control group on phonological awareness, word writing, orthographic awareness, and letter knowledge. We also found that children as young as 3–4 years gained from literacy programs as much as did older children, aged 4–5, on all the measures assessed in our program.     

Identifying at‐risk preschoolers: The discriminant validity of the differential ability scales

The discriminant validity of the Upper Preschool Level of the Differential Ability Scales (DAS) was studied using 32 at‐risk preschoolers (females = 14, males = 18) with a mean age of 57.28 months (SD = 4.43) and 30 normal preschoolers (females = 13, males = 17) with a mean age of 56.40 months (SD = 6.46). The results indicated that the DAS was an excellent measure to use when trying to differentiate between at‐risk and normal preschoolers. The DAS could reliably identify, better than chance, whether a child was at‐risk or normal. Specifically, the General Conceptual Ability score was found to be approximately 77% accurate in correctly classifying at‐risk from normal preschoolers. In addition, the use of the DAS in an abbreviated format by selecting specific core and/or diagnostic subtests during the preschool screening process was strongly supported. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

On the Goals of Epistemic Education: Promoting Apt Epistemic Performance

Recent years have seen a surge in educational efforts to foster the development of learners’ epistemologies. Our 1^st aim is to problematize some current assumptions about the goals of epistemic education and to argue that existing models of lay or expert epistemologies cannot directly translate into educational goals. Our 2^nd aim is to present a fresh integrative analysis of the goals of epistemic education based on both philosophical arguments and empirical research. Synthesizing these sources, we propose that the overarching purpose of epistemic education is to promote learners’ apt epistemic performance, defined as performance that achieves valuable epistemic aims through competence. We identify 5 key aspects of epistemic performance that are important to achieving this goal: engaging in reliable cognitive processes that lead to the achievement of epistemic aims, adapting epistemic performance to diverse situations, metacognitively regulating and understanding epistemic performance, caring about and enjoying epistemic performance, and participating in epistemic performance together with others. Each of these aspects involves competent engagement with epistemic aims and value, epistemic ideals, and reliable epistemic processes. Our analysis can help educators plan and evaluate epistemic education and suggests ways in which current curricula might be better designed to promote epistemic growth.     

Epistemic Perspective and Online Epistemic Processing of Evidence: Developmental and Domain Differences

Relations between epistemic perspective and online epistemic processing of evidence when reading a text were examined. Thirty-seven young adolescents and 24 graduate university students were asked to read and think aloud with two texts, one in the history domain and the other in the science domain. Participants also completed a prior-knowledge test and an instrument assessing their epistemic perspective. Results showed that participants who exhibited an evaluativist epistemic perspective and high prior knowledge used the epistemic standard of scientific research more than participants who held a nonevaluativist epistemic perspective. Furthermore, an age-related developmental difference was observed, with adults using the epistemic standard of scientific research more than young adolescents. Domain differences were observed in both participants’ epistemic perspectives and online epistemic processing. Participants overall engaged in online epistemic processing of evidence more in the history topic than in the science topic.     

Epistemic obstacles and the marriage of fantasy to rigor: A response to suchting

Reality is difficult to know because the projection of reality onto experience creates misleading similarities and differences. Also, the projection is one-to-many in the appearance-to-reality direction, a fact that prevents us from reasoning from appearance to reality. The mode of thought that is associated with the Galilean revolution in science is a response to these epistemic obstacles. Its main characteristic is a marriage between imagination and formalization. This mode of thinking is as universal within post-Galilean science as the epistemic obstacles it is designed to overcome, but it is not salient in either common sense or Aristotelian science.     

Child care for preschoolers with autism: An exploration of mothers' beliefs,decision-making,and knowledge

Forty mothers of preschoolers with autism were interviewed about their children's child care programs and about factors that influenced program selection. Mothers also rated the importance of program features, their knowledge of the care settings, and their frequency of involvement in their children's settings. These mothers of children with autism had many of the same concerns as mothers of typically-developing children: they valued safety; warm, loving, and competent caregivers; and cleanliness. However, these mothers were also concerned about program features that might be especially important for their special-needs children, such as a focus on adaptive skills, the availability of special services, and an individualized program. In spite of relatively low levels of search behavior (e.g., visiting settings before making a decision) and uncertainty about some characteristics of their children's programs, mothers reported high involvement in activities such as field trips, parent-teacher conferences, and observing in the classroom. We highlight the need for additional research in this area.     

中学语文教学中文学鉴赏能力的培养

文学鉴赏能力是语文教学的重要内容,它既丰富了学生的精神世界,也提升了学生对文学作品的理解能力,对学生语文素养的形成也是非常有益的。本文简要介绍中学语文教学中培养学生文学鉴赏能力的意义,并探究了具体的教学策略。     

Name writing and letter knowledge in preschoolers: Incongruities in skills and the usefulness of name writing as a developmental indicator

In this study, 114 preschoolers (M age = 53 months) completed a battery of literacy assessments to explore the interplay between name writing and letter knowledge in early literacy learners. Name writing was significantly related to children's letter knowledge, and the relationships were moderate to high. However, many children exhibited an incongruity in name writing and name-specific letter-recognition skills (i.e., they could write their names but not recognize the letters in their names, or recognize the letters in their names but not write them). When these two groups were contrasted statistically, the children with superior name-specific letter recognition (but poorer name writing scores) had significantly higher letter knowledge scores than the children with superior name writing scores (but poor name-specific letter-recognition scores). Writing one's name, in itself, did not appear to correspond to a literacy advantage. Thus, with regard to the recommendation that name writing be used as a literacy assessment tool in preschool, the results from this study suggest that name writing should be used as a measure of mechanical skill only and should not be used as a means to assess children's conceptual knowledge (of letter names, letter sounds, or the alphabetic principle).     

Collaborative pedagogy: 3-year-olds bring pedagogical cues into alignment with analogical reasoning to extract generic knowledge

European Journal of Psychology of Education - Although there is wide evidence on young children’s category learning, questions concerning how cognitive mechanisms and social mediation work...     

Epistemic schemes and epistemic states. A study of mathematics convincement in elementary school classes

The paper introduces an interpretative framework that contains a characterization of epistemic schemes (constructs that are used to explain how class agents themselves are able to gain convincement in or promote convincement of mathematical statements) and epistemic states (a person’s internal states, such as convincement or certainty related to the person’s beliefs and to the schemes that explain them); a taxonomy for the epistemic schemes is also proposed. On the basis of the interpretative framework, an analysis is made of an excerpt of a regular elementary school class, a school level at which explicit mathematics reasoning rarely arises. The paper contends that teachers and students use schemes based on reasons in order to make mathematical statements credible, but that they also resort–perhaps unconsciously–to epistemic schemes that are governed by extra-rational considerations.     

论理想和信念及其在认识中的功能——主体认识结构中的非理性要素研究

理想和信念是与人的认识活动密切相关的精神现象。人们通常认为它们只同理性认识相联系,实际上它们是既同理性认识相联系,又同非理性认识相联系。经过理性思考而形成的理想、信念是理性的;未经过理性思考而盲目接受的理想、信念就是非理性的。     

Survey of the states: special education knowledge requirements for school administrators.

Regular education administrators must possess a knowledge of special education to effectively implement P.L. 94-142, and to experiment with and accomplish many of the proposed objectives of the regular education initiative. To determine the existing knowledge base of school administrators in special education and special education law, we surveyed state directors of special education. This article reports the results of the survey, discusses implications, and offers suggestions for improvement.     

Epistemic beliefs and prior knowledge as predictors of the construction of different types of arguments on socioscientific issues

This study investigates whether university students’ epistemic beliefs and prior knowledge about controversial socioscientific issues (SSIs) can predict the different types of arguments that students construct. Two hundred forty-three university students were asked to construct different types of supportive arguments—social, ethical, economic, scientific, ecological—as well as counterarguments and rebuttals after they had read a scenario on a SSI. Participants’ epistemic beliefs and prior knowledge were assessed separately. Results showed that students’ epistemic beliefs and prior knowledge predicted the quantity, quality, and diversity of the different types of arguments the students constructed. In particular, students who held sophisticated epistemic beliefs about the structure of knowledge and exhibited relatively more robust prior knowledge scores, produced arguments of greater quantity, better quality, and higher diversity than students with less sophisticated epistemic beliefs and low prior knowledge scores. Educational implications are discussed.     

Calibration to Task Complexity: The Role of Epistemic Cognition

Abstract

We examined the role of epistemic cognition in calibration to task complexity before and during learning. Sixty-six undergraduate students were presented with two learning tasks—a simple task and a more complex task—in random order. Prior to learning, offline measures of learners’ epistemic beliefs about climate change were taken. An open-ended questionnaire was then used to capture task definitions, goals, and plans. To assess online epistemic cognition and learning strategies used during learning, a think-aloud protocol was employed. Results showed that epistemic beliefs before learning predicted epistemic cognition during learning. Further, results demonstrated that calibration to task complexity before learning was not related to epistemic beliefs but was related to epistemic cognition during learning. These findings suggest that individuals engage in epistemic cognition during learning to better understand the nature of the knowledge to be learned and that this results in better calibration of learning processes to task complexity.     

Epistemic beliefs in action: Spontaneous reflections about knowledge and knowing during online information searching and their influence on learning

In the present study it was investigated whether high school students are spontaneously able to reflect epistemologically during online searching for information about a controversial topic. In addition, we examined whether activating epistemic beliefs is related to individual characteristics, such as prior knowledge of the topic and argumentative reasoning skill; also whether learning from the Web is influenced by epistemic beliefs in action and the ability to detect fallacies in arguments. The participants (N = 64) were students of Grade 13, who were asked to think aloud during navigation. Qualitative and quantitative analyses were performed. Findings reveal that most participants spontaneously activated beliefs about all four dimensions identified in the literature, that is, about the simplicity/complexity, certainty/uncertainty, justification, and source of knowledge, at different levels of sophistication. Most epistemic reflections were about the source of knowledge. Two patterns of contextualized epistemic beliefs emerged and significantly influenced learning from the Web, which was also affected by participants' ability to identify argumentative fallacies.     

Correction to: Epistemic and Political Confrontations Around the Public Policies to Fight COVID-19 Pandemic

Science & Education -     

When to Teach for Belief: A Tempered Defense of the Epistemic Criterion

Michael Hand has defended the “epistemic criterion” for “directive and nondirective teaching” in his 2008 Educational Theory article, “What Should We Teach as Controversial? A Defense of the Epistemic Criterion,” as well as subsequent pieces. Here, John Tillson defends use of the epistemic criterion in the case of what he calls “momentous propositions,” but he rejects two of Hand's key arguments in support of the criterion. This rethinking comes in light of important contributions to the debate made by Bryan Warnick and D. Spencer Smith and by Maughn Rollins Gregory, also published in this journal. Tillson begins the article with an elucidation of the directive/nondirective distinction, and then discusses some limitations of defining the distinction in terms of intention. Next, he draws attention to the problems with the “soft‐directive teaching” method that Warnick and Smith advocate. Finally, Tillson provides an additional argument in favor of the epistemic criterion, an argument also grounded in work by Hand, which places emphasis on imparting knowledge alongside cultivating rationality among our educational aims.     

Deepening the Responsibility: A Social Epistemic Approach to the Ethics of Professional and Technical Writing

This article recommends strategies academics can use to contribute to an issue of great interest in industry: how best to define, measure, and achieve quality documentation. These strategies include contextualizing quality definitions, advocating the use of multiple quality measures, conducting research to identify specific heuristics for defining and measuring quality in particular workplace contexts, and partnering with industry to educate upper management about those heuristics and the benefits of promoting technical communicators to the strategic role of organizational “gatekeepers of quality.”