Exploring a Science Teacher’s Uncertainty with Integrating Engineering Design: An Action Research Study

This study examines a fifth grade science teacher’s attempts at integrating engineering design using the construct of uncertainty. Collaborative action research served as a supportive mechanism to uncover and confront the teacher’s uncertainties. Data were gathered through semi-structured interviews, reflections, classroom observations, lesson plans, and student work. Data analysis entailed the use of grounded theory. Findings from this study revealed that teaching science through engineering design is both challenging and problematic. Underpinning the teacher’s pedagogical experiences was the constant force of uncertainty, in various forms, and how her sense of doubt was beneficial rather than problematic.     

The Effects of Videoconferencing,Class Size,and Learner Characteristics on Training Outcomes

ABSTRACT We examined direct and interaction effects of learners' characteristics (cognitive ability, prior knowledge, prior experience, and motivation to learn) and classroom characteristics (videoconferencing and class size) on learning from a 16-week course. A 2times2 quasi-experimental design varied the class size between large (∼60 students) and small (∼30 students) and between traditional classes with the instructor always present and classes taught using a videoconferencing system with the instructor present at each site every other week. Theory regarding instructor immediacy was used to predict that larger and videoconferenced classes would have negative effects on learner reactions and learning, but that highly motivated learners would overcome the negative effects on learning. Interactions between videoconferencing and motivation to learn, and class size and motivation to learn, were found in support of the theory. Research and practice implications are discussed.     

A Review of Engagement with Creativity and Creative Design Processes for Visual Communication Design (VCD) Learning in China

Understanding the enigma of how learners from the Peoples Republic of China enact and engage with creativity and creative design processes can be problematic for VCD educators. Central to the concerns are questions which relate to the relevance of Western creative and creative design process definitions, explanations and models. This review provides an overview and analysis of the literature in this area. Findings indicate challenges attributed to a dearth of empirical evidence from the Asian region. However, a number of studies were found, which enabled learner engagement with creative design process models. Such models may help illuminate complex pictures of learners’ interactions, artefacts, social, cultural and historic forces. The review highlights issues and common areas upon which to build and prompts theoretical and methodological approaches for future creative design process research.     

Pedagogical Signals of Faculty Approachability: Factors Shaping Faculty–Student Interaction Outside the Classroom

Decades of research demonstrate that college students benefit from positive interaction with faculty members, although that same evidence suggests that those interactions are far from common, particularly outside the classroom. Moreover, relatively little is known about which, when, how, and why faculty members choose to engage with students outside of the classroom. Guided by the theory that faculty members use in-class behaviors to signal their “psychosocial approachability” for out-of-class interaction with students (Wilson et al. in Sociology of Education 47(1):74–92, 1974; College professors and their impact on students, 1975), this study uses data from 2,845 faculty members on 45 campuses to identify the personal, institutional, and pedagogical factors that influence the frequency and type of interaction faculty members have with students outside of the classroom.     

Reduce,manage or cope: a review of strategies for training school staff to address challenging behaviours displayed by students with intellectual/developmental disabilities

Members of a knowledge translation and exchange (KTE) research team assessed the training needs of the teaching staff at a school for individuals with intellectual/developmental disabilities (IDD). In response to this need, KTE researchers retrieved peer‐reviewed articles for training staff working with individuals with IDD who exhibit challenging behaviours. These articles were categorised according to the following training content: (1) interventions designed to reduce the frequency of challenging behaviours; (2) appropriate ways to manage challenging behaviours in the moment to promote safety for all parties and/or to terminate the ongoing behaviour; and/or (3) procedures or perspectives relevant to coping with or ameliorating the negative impacts of challenging behaviours on staff. We then examined the training methods (teaching strategies, training duration) involved in teaching the content and assessed the effectiveness of these programmes. Overall, we found that effective training programmes consisted of workshops, practica and feedback on specific skill performance. Some forms of brief training were effective for increasing staffs' knowledge/skills and reducing the frequency of challenging behaviour.     

Differential-associative processing or example elaboration: Which strategy is best for learning the definitions of related and unrelated concepts?

Definitions of related concepts (e.g., genotype–phenotype) are prevalent in introductory classes. Consequently, it is important that educators and students know which strategy(s) work best for learning them. This study showed that a new comparative elaboration strategy, called differential-associative processing, was better for learning definitions of related concepts than was an integrative elaborative strategy, called example elaboration. This outcome occurred even though example elaboration was administered in a naturalistic way (Experiment 1) and students spent more time in the example elaboration condition learning (Experiments 1, 2, 3), and generating pieces of information about the concepts (Experiments 2 and 3). Further, with unrelated concepts (morpheme-fluid intelligence), performance was similar regardless if students used differential-associative processing or example elaboration (Experiment 3). Taken as a whole, these results suggest that differential-associative processing is better than example elaboration for learning definitions of related concepts and is as good as example elaboration for learning definitions of unrelated concepts.     

Inclusive financial literacy education for inspiring a critical financial consciousness: an experiment in partnership with marginalised youth

In the absence of critical inquiry, traditional financial literacy education risks socialising economically marginalised groups into an acceptance of the very power structures that created their marginalisation in the first place. The instructor-facilitator seeking to confront the challenge of promoting critical thinking about a subject widely accepted to be factual and esoteric faces considerable obstacles. Adoption of inclusive pedagogies in the design and delivery of financial literacy workshops offers a means of challenging positivist notions of ‘authentic knowledge’ in finance. This paper brings the socially constructed nature of finance to the forefront and offers reflections on our experience with a series of student-led workshops intended to advance financial literacy and a critical financial consciousness in economically marginalised youth, some of whom have been marginalised by the formal education system as well.