Measuring perceptions of school learning environments for younger learners

Learning Environments Research - Students’ perceptions of the learning environment play an important role in their academic achievement and social lives. While most measures of school...     

Strength in Numbers: A Model for Undergraduate Research Training and Education in the Social and Behavioral Sciences

This study describes a new approach to undergraduate science training that offers an alternate model to the national objective of scaling up scientific research interests and capabilities among undergraduate students. With this new focus, we seek to more effectively bring scientific research methods and experiences to larger numbers of students in non-elite educational circumstances. Our model has been designed and implemented, at the John Jay College and the Borough of Manhattan Community College, both of which are part of the City University of New York (CUNY), where we have a majority non-White and economically disadvantaged student body. We have successfully engaged large numbers of undergraduate students by linking multiple classes in the social and behavioral sciences to build collective cross-disciplinary research projects that give every enrolled student an opportunity to receive high-quality research training and create cumulative data sets over years that are cumulative, collaborative, and of professional value.     

Student Academic Dishonesty: The Potential for Situational Prevention

Approximately one-half to three-quarters of university students commit some form of cheating, plagiarism, or collusion. Typical university responses are policy statements containing definitions plus punishment procedures. This paper collates a portfolio of strategies and tactics that seek to design-out, deter, and discourage academic misconduct. It finds many routine tactics exist, from silence and the use of large halls for major exams, to restrictions on electronic devices. Others are less consistently adopted, such as splitting lengthy exams in two to discourage washroom-visits where cheating takes place. The portfolio of tactics is framed in the context of crime opportunity theory and the 25 techniques of situational crime prevention. It is proposed that more consistent application of tactics focusing on environmental design, curricular design, and class management offer significant potential for reducing misconduct. Future research should seek to evaluate and enhance such interventions.     

Is plagiarism changing over time? A 10-year time-lag study with three points of measurement

Are more students cheating on assessment tasks in higher education? Despite ongoing media speculation concerning increased ‘copying and pasting’ and ghostwritten assignments produced by ‘paper mills’, few studies have charted historical trends in rates and types of plagiarism. Additionally, there has been little comment from researchers as to the best way to assess changes in plagiarism over time. In this paper, we discuss the relative strengths and weaknesses of research designs for assessing changes in plagiarism over time, namely cross-sectional, longitudinal, and time-lag. We also report the results of our own time-lag study of plagiarism. We assessed self-reported engagement in, awareness of, and attitudes towards plagiarism in three comparable groups of students at the same university on three occasions, each separated by five years (2004, 2009, and 2014). The data from our study paint an encouraging picture of increased understanding and reduced occurrence of several forms of plagiarism, with no upward trend in verbatim copying or ghostwriting. We suggest that technological and educational initiatives are counteracting the potential for increased plagiarism from online sources.     

Teachers' Self-evaluation of Knowledge,Skills and Personality Characteristics Needed to Manage Change

For some time, change has been the driving force in language teaching and learning. This seems to be even truer today than it was in the past, and seems set to be even more so in the future, which raises the questions of how to identify what is known and what is needed by teachers managing the changes, and how to address any needs. In this study, we asked 35 experienced secondary school teachers of English in Hong Kong to rate their own change-related knowledge, skills and personality characteristics, to find out how they would rate themselves in the various areas, and to consider whether such information can be of use in identifying change-related support needs. The results show that the teachers self-assessed some of their change-related knowledge, skills and personality characteristics as more and some less developed than others. Reasons are put forward to explain these different ratings, and ways in which such information might be used to identify teachers' change-related needs are discussed.     

Interpersonal skill-building for instructional developers

Although competence in the area of interpersonal skills has long been recognized as important by those in the instructional development (ID) profession, few academic programs instruct students in those skills. As they enter the field, students from such programs soon discover that it takes more than ID skills to be an effective instructional designer-developer. Positive interaction with SMES, clients, and colleagues soon emerges as equally important to getting the job done successfully. In an attempt to provide training in interpersonal skill-building, a course was implemented at Syracuse University's Area of Instructional Design, Development and Evaluation. The main goal of this course was for students to gain competence and confidence in their ability to interact with people. This article provides information about and insight into the content and activities of this course and personal reactions of the students who participated in it.