In‐Text Questions: A Note on an Experiment in Instructional Design

The use of instructional design is increasingly being discussed in the distance education and higher education literature. This paper reports an experiment in which self study questions are inserted in the text of lecture note material for external students. An evaluation revealed that students who received notes with in‐text questions were no different from those who received the standard lecture notes as judged by both performance and attitudinal criteria. Possible reasons for the perverse findings are given and it is concluded that professional instructional design assistance would be of value to subject matter experts.     

A Lesson on Sex Roles

This paper analyses a lesson on sex roles which took place in a seventh‐grade classroom (12–13 year olds) as part of a humanities course in an Australian coeducational secondary school. It shows how routine instructional practices can combine with conventional knowledge and theorising to confirm notions of inequality rather than challenge them. The use of sex role theory, with its embedded biological assumptions, and the initiation‐reply‐evaluation format which ensures that the teacher is in control of the lesson topic and procedure, combine to produce a lesson in which what the pupils hear is a confirmation of the fact that women and men are not equal. The teacher's intention to teach a lesson about equality is thus undermined by his own theorising and his teaching technology. The analysis is undertaken to show the ways in which unwary teachers can sustain inequitable gender relations even when this is contrary to their intentions.     

Influences of the learning environment of a Regional University Campus on its international graduates

Staff and students at small regional campuses often consider them to be a learning environment with many advantages. Students can benefit from the opportunities for enhanced access to staff provided by factors such as small classes and a compact campus. International students from non-English-speaking backgrounds are one group for whom these factors can be particularly helpful in their adjustment to a new society as well as in their continuing study program. This belief is tested in the study described in this paper. Factors identified by international students as influencing their learning at a small campus situated a considerable distance from the state capital indicate strengths to be built on and celebrated and areas that call for the development of strategies to improve the quality of that learning environment. Former international student graduates were surveyed concerning their perceptions of their regional Australian university experience and the professional preparation it provided. Other Australian higher education institutions, particularly those with regional campuses, can make use of the insights gained through the study: as well as having implications for the provision of a quality learning experience and environment for all students, not only international students, they also have a bearing on international marketing strategies.     

Factors Associated with General Partner and Relational Uncertainty within Early Adulthood Sibling Relationships

Guided by the theoretical concept of uncertainty, the present study was an exploratory investigation of general partner and relational uncertainty within sibling relationships. Undergraduate and graduate student participants responded to a written survey utilizing scales measuring general partner uncertainty, relational uncertainty, extent of topic avoidance, and various relational and demographic items. Results revealed that siblings experience significantly more partner uncertainty than relational uncertainty, although both uncertainty types were experienced at low to moderate levels. Further, differing levels of partner and relational uncertainty were associated with frequency of sibling contact, but not with sibling dyadic gender composition. Finally, both general partner and relational uncertainty were significant predictors of levels of general topic avoidance, although neither uncertainty type predicted romantic/sexual relationship topic avoidance levels. Theoretical implications for uncertainty management are discussed in light of the unique sibling relationship.     

EXPANDING RATIONALITY: THE RELATION BETWEEN EPISTEMIC VIRTUE AND CRITICAL THINKING

A bstract .  In this essay, Ryan Bevan explores the pedagogical implications of taking virtue epistemology as the philosophical foundation of educational theory rather than following the instrumentalist approach that is currently dominant. According to Bevan, the critical thinking strategies characteristic of instrumentalism generally work to further the vocationalization of educational discourse as well as the cultivation of unreflective moral agents. He contends that critical thinking should be expanded beyond its rationalist criteria to focus on the process of inquiry. Such a virtue epistemology approach, according to Bevan, has the potential to uncover and change fundamental misconceptions that pervade current theoretical assumptions by encouraging learners to engage in a more inclusive inquiry that draws out alternative perspectives. Bevan concludes that citizenship education in particular can benefit greatly from this more expansive theory with concrete pedagogical implications.     

Impact attenuation provided by shin guards for field hockey

Low-energy impact testing of hockey shin guards was carried out using a drop test impact rig and a new physical setup protocol. Two brands of shin guards were impacted once (2.6 J, 3.3 J; without and with a sock), and impacted three times (3.3 J; with a sock). The peak force and impulse of a single impact increased with increasing impact energy (by approximately 30 and 7%, respectively) whilst repeated impacts increased the peak force and decreased the impulse (by approximately 70 and 3–9%, respectively, between one and three impact events). The presence of a sock attenuated impact force to a greater extent than the guards alone, at both impact energies. As a sock is usually worn over hockey shin guards, its presence contributes to enhanced protection to the lower limb.     

Rethinking agency as an assemblage from change management to collaborative work

The movement towards inclusion comes together with a neoliberal audit mentality whereby individuals are held responsible for the transformations. The Special Educational Needs Coordinators (SENCOs) are seen as ‘change agents’ whose task it is, to support teachers in adapting their approach to optimise the chances for children with special needs in regular schools. In this paper, we want to problematise the ‘responsibility-blame discourse’ and look differently at agency. By using a diffractive methodology based on collaborative work, in which we have used material images of the workplace of the SENCO, and read-the-data-while-thinking-with-theory, we deconstruct the individualisation of agency. The SENCOs are no longer seen as separate individual humanist subjects where agency is solely lodged in the body of an individual agent [Barad, K. 2007. Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning. Durham: Duke University Press] but the SENCOs are part of the intra-active entanglement of multiple agencies, of an assemblage. This re-conceptualisation of agency leads to a different approach to inclusion, in which the participants in any encounter can work as part of the assemblage to develop communities capable of re-thinking practice and transforming it into a place where children with special needs become legitimate members of the school.