Understanding Cohesion—Some Practical Teaching Implications

An experiment was conducted with 151 primary school children from three year levels, in a suburban primary school, set in a moderately high socio-economic area. The object of the investigation was to test the understanding of twelve anaphoric pronouns, which were embedded in passages of continuous text. The relationship between the perception of the cohesive items, and general reading comprehension was studied, as was the difference between the performance of girls and boys. A further question related to the understanding of anaphoric items set within direct speech. Results showed a significant relationship between the comprehension of the selected anaphoric personal items and ability in reading, as measured by a standardised test. In the early school years, girls were superior to boys in their perception of the items, but no difference was found at the upper level of the school. Children of all levels found the items set within quoted speech more difficult to comprehend than the items in the rest of the text. Some practical teaching strategies are discussed, and attention is drawn to areas where teachers' awareness of cohesion could prove useful.     

景观设计课程的实践教学探讨

环境艺术专业的景观设计课程是一门以培养综合应用型景观设计人才为目的的专业设计课程,教学内容上必须突出其实践性强的特点。结合国内外相关教学研究和专业教学实际经验,主要从实践教学方式和教学深入两方面探索景观设计课程的实践教学新模式。     

法学实践教学方法设计研究

复合型、应用型法学人才的培养植根于理论教学。但也离不开实践教学,其具有单纯的理论教学所不可替代的特殊功能。完善法学实践教学的关键途径是对法学实践教学方法进行科学设计。这一目标的达成依赖于法学实践教学方法原则的构建,以及体验型、知识型与实战型教学方法的体系设计。     

课堂教学中设问的实践研究

文章介绍了有关Barrows“基于问题学习”的PBL（Problem—Based Learning）教学模式中的教学理念、教学目标、教学过程,并把它与中学二期课改的教学理念与教学目标进行了对比;分析了这一在大学医学教学领域成功运用的教学模式却未被中学课堂教学重视的原因;提出用这一模式来解决二期课改中课堂教学中学习方式的转变的关键问题。而学习方式的转变的关键在于“问题设计”及对教师参与度的把握。文章揭示了当前教材内容的编写与这一教学模式的矛盾,并结合作者多年的高中物理教学中一些成功的教学案例展示了把教材内容问题化的过程。还用举例的方式介绍了教学不同环节问题设计与教师对不同问题进行点拨的具体做法,总结出问题设计的一般原则与运用设问的技巧。     

试论大学生健美操的创编原则与步骤

通过对大学生健美操创编原则与步骤的阐述,向大学生提供了有关健美操创编方面的基本理论与技巧,对培养大学生的创编意识、提高大学生健美操的创编能力及自我锻炼能力具有重要意义.     

Contexts of reading instruction: Implications for literacy skills and kindergarteners’ behavioral engagement

This observational study examined kindergarteners’ (n = 170) exposure to literacy instruction in their classrooms (n = 36), child-by-instruction interactions, and behavioral engagement in relation to literacy skills. Time spent in four instructional contexts was coded according to who managed children's attention (teacher-managed, TM or child-managed, CM), and the content focus (basic skills such as teaching letters and their sounds, or meaning-focused such as discussing a book); children's behavioral engagement and off-task behavior were also coded live five times over the year. Word-reading and phonological awareness skills were assessed in fall and spring. Hierarchical Linear Modeling results indicated that kindergarteners with lower initial skills gained more in word-reading, but not phonological awareness, when they were exposed to relatively more time in TM basic skills instruction. In contrast, more time in CM meaning-focused instruction did not interact with initial skills to predict either outcome. Engagement analyses indicated that students were more likely to be off-task in CM than in TM contexts. Children who spent more time off-task during TM contexts had lower spring scores on both outcomes. Discussion explores the implications of this work for both literacy learning and behavioral engagement in the transition year of kindergarten.     

Effectiveness of paraeducator-supplemented individual instruction: beyond basic decoding skills

A total of 46 children in Grades 2 and 3 with low word-level skills were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 groups that received supplemental phonics-based reading instruction. One group received intervention October through March (21.5 hours), and one group served as a control from October through March and later received intervention March through May (17.5 hours). Paraeducators trained in a standard treatment protocol provided individual instruction for 30 min per day, 4 days per week. At the March posttest, the early treatment (ET; n = 23) group outperformed the controls (late treatment, LT; n = 20) on reading accuracy and passage fluency. Across both groups, second graders outperformed third graders on these same measures. At the 3-month follow-up, the ET group showed no evidence of decline in reading accuracy, passage fluency, or words spelled; however, 3rd-grade ET students had significantly higher spelling skills compared to 2nd graders. The LT group demonstrated significant growth during their intervention in reading accuracy and spelling, but not passage fluency. When we compared the ET and LT groups on their gains per instructional hour, we found that the ET group made significantly greater gains than the LT group across all 3 measures. The results support the value of paraeducator-supplemented reading instruction for students below grade level in word identification and reading fluency.