Collaborative action research for middle grades improvement

Technology’s rapid evolution applies constant pressure to educational organizations, suggesting a need to continually re-envision schools for the digital age. Yet educators often struggle to understand the growing chasm between students’ out-of-school and in-school technology lives. This gap is particularly noticeable during the middle grades years, when home technology use increases dramatically. The purpose of this research was to examine the experiences of teachers and students engaged in collaborative action research for middle school improvement in technology-rich settings. We begin by outlining our theoretical framework, emphasizing Fletcher’s Ladder of Student Involvement. We then describe our case-study design and methods. Findings are organized by action research components and a discussion of key themes follows. Finally, we consider the implications of this study for action research as a means of student involvement and teacher learning.     

A present absence: undergraduate course outlines and the development of student creativity across disciplines

While recent scholarship has suggested that colleges and universities have an obligation to help cultivate students’ creativity, existing evidence suggests that this priority is infrequently and imperfectly realized in practice. In order to further examine the potential prevalence of this gap, the present study conducted a qualitative analysis of all publicly available undergraduate course outlines from one Canadian university for the 2013–2014 academic year. Using a modified version of an existing analytical tool, we scrutinized syllabi from across academic disciplines for explicit and implicit references to student creativity, understanding these texts as significant locations at which meanings about teaching and learning are enacted. Based on this analysis, we argue that creativity occupies a relatively circumscribed position in many ways – particularly in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics disciplines, but may nonetheless be fostered through the deployment of relevant activities. Implications for the development of student creativity are considered.     

Professional Learning through Reflection promoted by Feedback and Coaching (PROFLEC) in Cyprus

This article focuses on the implementation of the Professional Learning through Reflection promoted by Feedback and Coaching (PROFLEC) project in Cyprus. The project aimed to provide valid and reliable feedback to school leaders and support them to interpret this into meaningful practice. A three-step-process, involving a self-assessment inventory and individualized feedback reports, workshops, and coaching sessions was employed. Results suggest that feedback and coaching can be effective learning strategies in school leaders’ professional development programmes. Findings are discussed in light of the potential of these two strategies for future developments of such programmes within the particular setting.     

Supporting students with impairments in higher education: social inclusion or cold comfort?

This paper uses a discursive analysis to examine the experience of ‘inclusion’ from several stakeholder groups in one university. The research team included disability support staff at the institution, external disability consultants and academic researchers. A critical focus group investigation centred on four groups: students who were identified as having an impairment (SWIs), academic staff (teachers), administrators and students who did not identify as having an impairment (non‐SWIs). Interviews had facilitators with both research and disability expertise. Groups recounted different experiences of inclusion. SWIs, drawing on a rights discourse, emphasised a lack of resourcing and barriers created by the teaching staff. In contrast, teachers, administrators and (to a lesser extent) non‐SWIs emphasised the importance of social inclusion, reflecting discourses around needs and humanist notions of care and support, which largely seemed to miss the core of SWI concerns about recognition of their technical competence. For all groups, questions around disclosure of disability were of greater concern than tensions between needs and rights or the recent publication of a Code of Practice for the higher education sector. The findings challenged some of the researchers’ own assumptions, with unexpected implications for practice.     

Supporting inclusion in early childhood settings: some possibilities and problems for teacher education

Aotearoa New Zealand, like other countries, has legislation and policies that support inclusion and promote the participation of all children and families in early childhood education. We might expect therefore to see a culture of inclusion resonating through policy and practice in early childhood settings. There are early childhood teachers who support such legislative and policy goals, who are committed to inclusion, and who are developing more inclusive early childhood services. Yet, it is also evident that discrimination and exclusion is experienced by many. Teacher education plays an important role in supporting inclusion and assisting teachers’ development of knowledge, skills and attitudes that will support them to teach all children. In this paper, we write as a group of teacher educators and demonstrate the challenges we took up to move beyond traditional approaches to inclusive education and to open up theoretically and practically diverse possibilities for thinking and doing inclusion differently in early childhood teacher education.     

What they think, what they know, what they do: Rural secondary teachers’ motivational beliefs and strategies

This research examined how rural high school teachers’ beliefs and perceptions of themselves, their students and the challenge of motivation influence their strategic classroom and interpersonal motivating practice. Participants were 13 teachers in three rural, public high schools in two US states. Teachers’ beliefs about motivation generally, and their students’ motivation specifically, reflect a position favouring need and willingness to intervene for unmotivated students. However, their self-perceptions reflect a relatively weak efficacy to intervene successfully. Generally, teachers’ prevalent choice of strategies aligned with their perceptions of reasons that students were undermotivated. In contrast, some teachers’ narratives of actual efforts to motivate a specific student were inconsistent with their self-reported philosophies and style of motivation, and with their general statements of how they would motivate students who needed it. These findings suggest implications for design of teacher education and inservice teacher professional development.     

Motivation and Self-regulation in Community College Transfer Students at a Four-year Online University

ABSTRACT

Motivation and self-regulation were examined in a sample of community college transfer students enrolled in a 4-year, online university. The relation between motivation and self-regulation and students’ performance was examined, as was the association between these learner characteristics (i.e., motivation and self-regulation) and sociodemographic factors (e.g., marital status, employment status). Motivation was found to be significantly correlated with both semester and cumulative grade point average (GPA), while associations between self-regulation and performance were more limited. Further, motivation was found to be a significant predictor of semester GPA in a model controlling for sociodemographic factors and prior achievement. Motivation and self-regulation were also found to differ according to students’ sociodemographic status. For instance, transfer students with children under 18 were found to have significantly higher levels of motivation than nonparents. Those employed full-time had lower levels of self-regulation than did their nonemployed peers. Implications for further research on community college transfer students and online learning are discussed.     

The angiogenetic effect of intramuscular administration of b-FGF and a-FGF on cardiac muscle: The influence of exercise on muscle angiogenesis

Abstract

Although angiogenetic therapy using recombinant growth factors holds much hope for the treatment of ischaemic diseases, there are still many unanswered questions, including the method of administration, the correct dose of these factors, and the duration of the therapeutic approach. Exercise has also been suggested to induce neovascularizaiton in muscles. We evaluated the angiogenetic effects of the intramuscular administration of basic-fibroblast growth factor (b-FGF) and acidic-fibroblast growth factor (a-FGF) in rat heart, compared with rats who exercised daily. In conclusion, both the intramuscular administration of b-FGF and exercise increased significantly angiogenesis in the heart in contrast to the intramuscular administration of a-FGF, which was ineffective.     

The microcycle of inflammation and performance changes after a basketball match

Abstract

Basketball incorporates intense eccentric muscle activity that induces muscle microtrauma and an inflammatory response. This study investigated time-dependent inflammatory and performance responses during a weekly microcycle after a basketball match. Twenty elite-standard players underwent a trial that comprised a match followed by a 6-day simulated in-season microcycle. The trial was preceded by a control condition that did not have a match. Blood sampling and tests of maximal-intensity exercise performance and muscle damage occurred before each condition, immediately after the match and daily thereafter for 6 consecutive days. The match induced marked increases in heart rate, lactate, ammonia, glucose, non-esterified fatty acids and triglycerides. Performance deteriorated for 24–48 h after the match, whereas knee flexor and extensor soreness increased for 48 and 24 h post-match, respectively. Inflammatory (leukocytes, C-reactive protein, creatine kinase activity, adhesion molecules, cortisol, uric acid and cytokines) and oxidative stress (malondialdehyde, protein carbonyls, oxidised glutathione, antioxidant capacity, catalase and glutathione peroxidase) markers increased for ~24 h and subsided thereafter. Reduced glutathione declined for 24 h after exercise. These results suggest that a basketball match elicits moderate and relatively brief (~24–48 h) inflammatory responses, is associated with marked but short-lived performance deterioration, but is less stressful than other intermittent-type sports.