Education in a bi/multilingual setting

Group bilingualism is typically the result of ethnic groups in contact and competition, where one group becomes bilingual, a concomitant condition of the degree of integration. The nature of the relationship is influenced by 1) the origin of the contact situation 2) the degree of enclosure and 3) the degree of control by dominant groups. Migrant groups tend to shift languages after some generations of bilingualism; colonized and annexed groups tend to shift languages at a much slower rate. Bilingual education may have the goal of language maintenance or induced language shift. The paper closes with a discussion of the development of bilingual education from this perspective.     

Examining Twitter Content of State Emergency Management During Hurricane Joaquin

Those tasked with disseminating life-protecting messages during crises have many factors to consider. Social media sites have become an information source for individuals during these times, and more research is needed examining the use of specific message strategies by emergency management agencies that may elicit attention and retransmission. This study examines Twitter content concerning Hurricane Joaquin. Content analysis of tweets from state emergency management accounts was performed to provide an overview of the content and stylistic elements used in tweets associated with the event. The findings are discussed in the context of both past research on the matter and implications for emergency management agencies responding to high-consequence events.     

To Infinity and Beyond: Reducing Textbook Costs Through Librarian/Faculty Collaborations

As subject and distance learning librarians, we have a special interest in supporting our faculty and their needs as they explore alternative and more affordable textbook options for their students. In an increasingly digital environment, there are a wealth of resources available at little or no cost to students. Unfortunately, finding these resources can be challenging and time consuming for faculty. This is where librarians step in. Through careful planning and collaboration with faculty, we can help transition course reading to online and open resources. Librarians can assist in this process by helping faculty identify appropriate resources, helping integrate resources into online learning environments, and providing support for student access to materials. This paper will describe this process from start to finish, utilizing our experience supporting a faculty member with an Ethnobotany course textbook as it was transitioned to an online textbook option.     

Structuring contexts: pathways toward un-obstructing race-consciousness

Abstract

This research is situated in second-wave White Teacher Identity studies and investigates the ways context structures a high school English teacher’s white identity, practices, and race-consciousness. Working with detailed data and vignettes from a single case study, the author highlights the teaching of a unit on the Holocaust. Using the required Holocaust curriculum as a unit of analysis, the author illustrates how the teacher is structured to minimize and dismiss broader discussions of institutionalized and systemic oppression and violence, and particularly those contributions offered by a student of color in her classroom. The author argues that understanding the role contexts play in obstructing race-consciousness can help fill interpretive gaps between race-conciousness and what, on the surface, might appear to be a teacher’s race-evasiveness.     

The inseparable role of emotions in the teaching and learning of primary school science

In this paper, we seek to explore the inseparable role of emotions in the teaching and the learning of science at the primary school level, as we elaborate the theoretical underpinnings and personal experiences that lead us to this notion of inseparability. We situate our perspectives on the complexity of science education in primary schools, draw on existing literature on emotions in science, and present arguments for the necessity of working towards positive emotions in our work with young children and their teachers. We layer our own perspectives and experiences as teachers and as researchers onto methodological arguments through narratives to emerge with a reflective essay that seeks to highlight the importance of emotions in our work with children and their teachers in elementary school science.     

‘I took this picture because … ’: accessing teachers' depictions of change

Background: Achieving teacher change and the lofty goals of educational reform initiatives necessitates professional development (PD) designed to help teachers rethink their practice. A key implication for physical education, therefore, is that PD must be organized in ways that utilize teachers' voice, providing opportunities for teachers to build or extend their own capacity to engage in ongoing learning. Yet, while the desired outcome of PD is capacity-building resulting in teacher change, teachers' needs and interests remain largely ignored.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the potential of using participatory visual methods as a pedagogical and methodological tool to facilitate teacher articulation of change. Specifically, we sought to understand teachers' depictions of their own change.

Theoretical framework: The project was grounded in constructivist learning theory as the pedagogical use of visual methods provided teachers a way to understand, interpret, and think about the curriculum change and their teaching.

Participants and setting: Four physical education teachers, all female, were the participants.

Data sources: Data sources included (a) participants' digital photographs, (b) photo-elicitation interviews, and (c) field notes from observations of all PD sessions, conference presentations, and multiple lessons taught by the teachers.

Data analysis: Data were analyzed using two distinct yet overlapping processes derived from grounded theory: open and axial coding.

Findings: Visual methods allowed participants to articulate three distinct changes as a result of the curriculum development PD process: (a) changes in practice, (b) changes to interpersonal working relationships, and (c) intrapersonal changes. First, the use of visual methods allowed these teachers to identify four multidimensional student learning-focused changes to their teaching practice: outcomes based instruction, increased and differentiated practice, deliberate focus on the affective domain, and assessment to document learning. Second, changes to interpersonal working relations as a result of the curriculum development were documented. These changes provided the initial forum for collaboration as well as solidarity among the teachers to complete a defined task. Third, empowered by their increased skills and knowledge, these teachers experienced intrapersonal changes as they embraced their roles as teachers, professionals, and leaders. All four teachers expressed increased sense of self as a result of their changes in curriculum, assessment, and approach to teaching.

Conclusions: These teachers accomplished a great deal as they departed from what they knew well to try new practices and strategies. The use of visual methods documented this complex process. This study has several implications for the use of visual methods. The first is their value as a way for teachers to discuss their own learning and reflect on their practice. Second, the use of photographs and associated photo-elicitation interviews served as a valid research tool which successfully accessed teachers' implicit learning. Finally, a combination of methodologies provided different, yet complimentary information about teachers' depictions of change.     

Between the prescribed and the lived in physical education lessons

This study examines physical education (PE) curriculum development in an elementary school. Our goal was to understand the daily construction of a curriculum. We sought to analyse the theoretical and methodological framework and documents that a PE teacher uses each day while putting a curriculum into practice (lived curriculum). The data collection instruments included participant observation, interviews and document analysis. The analytical process revealed the influence of internal and external factors that affect both the authorship and the autonomy of a teacher working on the daily construction of a lived PE curriculum and that create tensions, struggles and conflicts.     

‘Let them see a different path’: social attitudes towards sport,education and development in Sāmoa

Drawing on ethnographic data collected over 12 months of field research, this paper contributes to the growing body of literature on sport for development (SFD) by giving voice to alternative constructions of the educative potential of SFD. It does this by exploring the social attitudes of youth, educators, community leaders and government officials in the Pacific island nation of Sāmoa towards sport, education and development. Imagining sport to be like ‘school outside’, my Samoan interlocutors construct sport as an educative platform that prepares young ‘academically unfit’ men to engage an increasingly global political economy in ways classroom education cannot. Viewing international sport as a form of ‘development education’, my interlocutors perceive the educative value of SFD as being rooted in the potential for sport to help move underperforming boys into transnational flows of remittances to the family. In this way, Samoans perceive sport as enabling ‘at risk’ youth to serve their families, to learn English and to become globally minded, ultimately equipping them with the skills needed to achieve transnational futures once beyond their reach. In allowing a grassroots understanding of SFD to emerge, the paper challenges the assumption that the institutions of sport and education are compatible, mutually reinforcing and complementary. Specifically, viewing sport as an alternative to schooling may serve to reintegrate underperforming young men back into an education-to-employment pipeline, but it also carries important implications for the de-skilling of youth and the perpetuation of their positions of marginality. The paper calls into question the role of education and sport in and for development, highlighting important questions that SFD stakeholders should consider.     

The Quality of Video Games: Subjective Quality Assessments as Predictors of Self-Reported Presence in First-Person Shooter and Role-Playing Games

Based on the Theory of Subjective Quality Assessments, the present study examined players’ assessments of video game design features (qualities) as related to self-reported feelings of presence in role-playing games (RPG) and first-person shooters (FPS). An initial qualitative study with 8 focus groups (Study 1) was conducted to explore important game quality dimensions. Afterwards an online survey was designed to explore the association of those discrete dimensions with recollections of presence (Study 2). Using a quota sample of RPG and FPS gamers in Germany (N = 5,180), survey results show that recollections of presence were associated with positive quality assessments regarding a game’s environment, the player’s interaction with non-playable characters in that environment, and the environment’s.