An Intergenerational Summer Program Involving Persons with Dementia and Preschool Children

ABSTRACT

We implemented an intergenerational (IG) summer program at a colocated site for 2 consecutive summers to maximize continuity and enhance sustainability. We incorporated multiple methods to represent the views of key program stakeholders, including staff and administrators, parents who attended the program, and facilitators’ reports of the experiences of child and adult participants. We generated a list of themes and subthemes from each source and triangulated the data points. Despite the resources invested and the challenges faced, the program was well received and viewed as beneficial. These findings offer insight into the likelihood of sustainability for IG summer programming.     

Listening to children’s voices on intercultural education policy and practice

The overarching purpose of this research is to investigate native and immigrant children’s experiences of intercultural pedagogical practices in Cyprus schools. It also explores their suggestions for the improvement of policies and practices for intercultural education. Last but not least, it examines whether Cypriot and immigrant students share similar or different conceptualisations and understandings regarding the above aspects. To this end, interviews were carried out with 40 pupils, aged 11–12, of five primary schools, which presented high concentrations of immigrant students. On the basis of our analysis of our data, the children appeared to perceive intercultural education in terms of culturally responsive discussions, collaborative learning and language learning.     

Self–Efficacy Pathways Between Relational Aggression and Nonsuicidal Self–Injury

The authors recruited college students (N = 648) and investigated relationships among academic and social self–efficacy, relational aggression from parents and peers, and nonsuicidal self–injury (NSSI). Results indicated that both types of self–efficacy were related inversely to NSSI. Academic self–efficacy mediated the relationship between parental emotional abuse and NSSI, whereas social self–efficacy mediated the relationship between peer victimization and NSSI. Clinical implications of these findings for college counselors are discussed.     

Emotions and values – a case study of meaning-making in ESE

With an interest in the role of emotions and values in students’ meaning-making in Environmental and Sustainability Education a case study was carried out in a Swedish school-class with students, 12 years of age. During a six-week thematic group-work focusing environmental and sustainability issues related to food, the students were observed and interviewed in their daily school practice. The results are presented here through narrative reporting, and analysed with the use of Dewey’s theoretical perspectives on experience, distinguishing three phases in a process: a start, an activity phase and a closure. Martha Nussbaum’s theory of emotions is used to assist in the understanding of emotions and values. The study reports on active and independent meaning-making processes in students’ group work. The results provide examples of students’ meaning-making experiences and the role of emotions and values in them, indicating that more of values are formed and expressed in the concluding phase.     

Effekte videobasierter Trainings zur Förderung der Selbstwirksamkeitsüberzeugungen über Klassenführung im Grundschulunterricht

Self-efficacy in classroom management and knowledge on classroom management are important teacher resources regarding their health. Fostering student teachers in their self-efficacy in classroom management and situated knowledge on classroom management is a promising approach for reducing reality shock at the beginning of in-service teaching. Thus, the present quasi-experimental pre-post control group study investigates whether video-based and practice-oriented coursework in teacher education can promote self-efficacy in classroom management and the professional vision of classroom management. Analyzing own classroom videos as well as analyzing videos from other teachers lead to a significantly higher latent increase in self-efficacy and professional vision than that of a control group. This was only the case for professional vision in a course with own teaching elements but without video analysis.     

Achievement of English as New Language Learners in Monitor Status: A Cross Sector Comparison from Denver

This study uses administrative data to measure the effect of attending a charter school in Denver, Colorado on the achievement of reclassified English as New Language (ENL) students during their monitor period in the mainstream classroom environment. We utilize school choice data from Denver’s Common Enrollment System (CES) to control for each school a family selected entering grade six, a typical time for a structural move, in order to better control of unobserved variable bias. Results indicate charter attendance increases achievement in mathematics and English on state testing. Charter school success in the CES environment provides insights for districts serving large numbers of ENL students.     

Creating Participatory Discourse for Teaching and Research in Early Childhood Science

This paper presents the results of a study conducted with second grade students and pre-service teachers. This study examined the possibilities for engaging children in critical discourse about their classroom science experiences. At the heart of this discussion lies the desire to provide a space for teachers and children to develop relationships and to explore the learning of science together. Themes that emerged include: (1) on-going, focused, critical dialogue between children and teachers supported children in developing agency in the classroom, and (2) on-going conversations created the opportunity for children to reveal their ways of knowing and developing interpretations of the practice of science.     

Reconceptualizing the relationship between universities and schools: a dialectic and polysemic approach

This review essay adds to the conversation to which Allison Skerrett and Hannah Sevian contribute in their article, Identity and biography as mediators of science and mathematics faculty’s involvement in K-12 service. Here we address the need to reconceptualize faculty service in public schools and traditional notions of scholarship. We discuss the importance of transforming university structures that envision service as less important than “scholarship” and “teaching” while mediating hierarchical ideas of what “service” entails. We share a dialectical view of social life and an ethical stance that values polysemy and polyphony both in research and in our daily interactions. Here we employ a dialectical lens that seeks multiple perspectives as we engage in a dialogue about these issues.