The development of national standards for adult educators in Namibia

Since gaining independence from South Africa in 1990, Namibia has placed considerable emphasis on education, including adult learning. As a means of improving the quality of adult learning, the Namibian Ministry of Education commissioned the development of national standards in 2010 to express competency requirements for adult educators. Particular attention was paid to the views of adult learners who participated through thirty focus groups. The participatory process revealed that the work of an adult educator is more complex and demanding than had previously been appreciated. The required competencies were categorised under four headings: (1) Knowledge as an adult educator, (2) Practice as an adult educator, (3) Relationships as an adult educator and (4) Ethics and professionalism as an adult educator. The Namibia Qualifications Authority, acting under its legislative mandate of setting occupational standards for occupations, jobs, posts and positions, approved the national standards in 2011.     

Exploring How to Model Formative Assessment Trajectories of Posing‐Pausing‐Probing Practices: Toward a Teacher Learning Progressions Framework for the Study of Novice Teachers

A robust body of evidence supports the finding that particular teaching and assessment strategies in the K‐12 classroom can improve student achievement. While experts have identified many effective teaching and learning practices in the assessment for learning literature, teachers’ knowledge and use of “high leverage” formative assessment (FA) practices are difficult to model in novice populations. By employing advances in construct modeling, the theoretical underpinnings of learning progressions research, and four principles of evidence‐centered design, teacher educators along with psychometricians can test hypotheses about teacher learning progressions. Utilizing an FA moves‐based framework, the article examines how beginning teachers’ posing, pausing, and probing practices align with five key strategies of FA. Examples of construct maps, instructional tasks, and turns of talk analysis using scoring guides are provided from an empirical study of novice science preservice teachers in a high‐needs school district.     

The Relationship of Essay and Multiple-Choice Scores With Grades in College Courses

Essay and multiple-choice scores from Advanced Placement (AP) examinations in American History, European History, English Language and Composition, and Biology were matched with freshman grades in a sample of 32 colleges. Multiple-choice scores from the American History and Biology examinations were more highly correlated with freshman grade point averages than were essay scores from the same examinations, but essay scores were essentially equivalent to multiple-choice scores in correlations with course grades in history, English, and biology. In history courses, men and women received comparable grades and had nearly equal scores on the AP essays, but the multiple-choice scores of men were nearly one half of a standard deviation higher than the scores of women.     

Experiential education at the graduate level: A perspective on faculty role and development

Adult development is an implicit component of graduate education. Yet, this idea is often ignored as traditional programs continue to view graduate education as largely a process of intellectual growth, usually detached from other life experience. Sponsored experiential learning provides one context through which adult developmental and intellectual goals may be simultaneously recognized and pursued. Required are a recognition of new roles for faculty and new efforts to help faculty in implementing these roles. The issues surrounding faculty role and faculty development are addressed in the context of a nontraditional graduate program which maximizes opportunities for the use of experiential learning.Dr. Byxbee is Program Director for the Saint Mary's College Graduate Programs in Human Development, Education, and Educational Leadership. He has consulted widely on the topic of nontraditional program development and has recently been active as a consultant to Latin American Educators on the topic of Nontraditional Education and Public Service Administration.     

Father/Male Involvement in Early Childhood Programs: Issues and Challenges

Currently there is tremendous support in the U.S. for increased parental involvement in early childhood settings. In addition, societal attitudes have changed recently, so that men are now expected to be much more involved in childrearing activities than in the past. Taken together, these two shifts in societal attitudes suggest the time is right to encourage greater father/male involvement in early childhood programs. However, such outreach efforts will face challenges. Based on the Men & Kids project in Urbana, Illinois, this paper identifies several specific challenges early childhood educators face as they explore ways to encourage greater levels of father/male involvement in their programs, along with preliminary suggestions for overcoming them.     

Control of pecking response form in the pigeon: Topography of ingestive behaviors and conditioned keypecks with food and water reinforcers

In Experiment 1, the form of keypecks produced in an autoshaping procedure with food or water reinforcers was compared with that of eating and drinking responses. Because the responses involve a number of different effector systems, several elements of response form were measured, including peck force and duration, gape, and eye closure. Gape was the only measure to reliably distinguish between both ingestive responses and between conditioned keypecks reinforced with food or water. With either reinforcer, keypecks had greater force than did ingestive behaviors. In Experiment 2, a transition between two forms of keypeck was produced by manipulating deprivation and reinforcer conditions. Some measures appeared to vary in a dichotomous manner between two discrete response forms; gape showed a gradual and continuous change involving the production of intermediate forms of the response. It was concluded that the control of conditioned response form involves theconstruction of the response from movements produced by several effector systems, each with potentially different sources of control.     

A new model of concept teaching and learning

Current models of instructional design assume that concepts are (a) classifying rules, (b) components of a more complex network or schema in memory, and (c) evaluated/taught by classification performance. Based on current research and theory, however, concepts should be viewed as conceptual tools rather than classification rules. Concepts may be schemas or networks in themselves, as a complex arrangement of declarative, procedural, and inferential knowledge. Concept learning may be measured by concept use and inferences as well as classification and taught via analogies, learning strategies, use/inference practice, and rational-set generators.