Extreme Programming: The Student View

Students in two offerings of a software engineering course were asked to write opinion papers regarding the use of Extreme Programming (XP) in an undergraduate computer science curriculum. The majority opposed the use of XP as the preferred life-cycle model for the project in that course, but they did support introducing some of the practices of XP in selected courses. They felt that unit testing and coding standards should become part of the introductory programming courses, but other practices should be deferred to specific project-oriented courses, or not introduced at all. Two pilot studies provided additional insights that are consistent with the students' opinions.     

Effecting School Change: The Halton Approach

ABSTRACT

Two related but distinct questions are often asked by educators as they try to make their schools more effective. These are: “Which of the many activities that we do have greater benefits for students?” and, “How can we make our schools better than they are now?” The first question focuses specifically on the impact of schools on student outcomes and the characteristics of effective schools, whereas the second addresses the implementation of change and school improvement. This article addresses the research related to these two questions and describes the application of this research in a large school district in Ontario, Canada.     

Assessing levels of student understanding in pre-service teachers using a two-cycle SOLO model

This paper reports the findings of an exploratory study concerning the development of higher-order conceptual understanding of Teaching Games for Understanding (TGfU) among physical education pre-service teachers. The development of such understandings has been seen as problematic among pre-service teachers (Randall, 2003 Randall, L. 2003. Preservice teachers' understanding of teaching games for understanding approach to content delivery. Avante, 9(1): 49–61.  [Google Scholar]). An analysis of the responses given in a high- stakes examination of 165 pre-service physical education teachers was used to investigate varying levels of understanding in TGfU pedagogy. This paper reports specific examples of student responses in a written high-stakes examination and justifies how a two-cycle structure of the observed learning outcome (SOLO) model can discriminate between the demonstrations of surface and deep conceptual understandings.     

Sport studies

The sport-for-development movement has grown exponentially in the last decade generating increasing academic attention. However, existing research has rarely sought the views of young people despite them being both the main target audience of initiatives and frequently the deliverers. This paper seeks to address young people's absence within research and advocate the importance of engaging them in sport-for-development debates to enhance understanding of current delivery and to improve policy and practice in the future. The paper examines Zambian young people's views of HIV/AIDS peer-led education delivered through sport considering particularly whether young people believe such interventions can encourage empowerment and subsequent behaviour change. The paper outlines the importance of improving understanding of how young people can begin to translate knowledge into agency. The paper concludes with the suggestion that change is more likely if peer-led education through sport programmes are combined with multi-layered interventions directed at all levels of communities.     

A meta-analysis of reading-level match dyslexia studies in consistent alphabetic orthographies

Annals of Dyslexia - We provide a meta-analytic review of all group-comparison studies that used reading-level match design, were conducted in highly consistent European orthographies, included...     

校本教学研究的实践形式

校本教研是推进教学改革和促进教师专业化成长的根本支撑和内在动力。校本教研中,教学型教研,以教为着眼点,以课例为载体;研究型教研,以研为着眼点, 以课题为载体;学习型教研,以学为着眼点,以阅读为主线。提倡教学型教研,防止校本教研神化;提倡研究型教研,防止校本教研泛化;提倡学习型教研,防止校本教研窄化。这三种校本教研的有机结合完整地体现了校本教研的内涵和外延。     

Engaging young students in scientific investigations: prompting for meaningful reflection

This study examined the verbal prompts a tutor used to promote reflection and young students’ responses to these prompts. Seven children (ages 8–12) participated in 260 min of one-on-one tutoring to learn scientific concepts related to gear movement; the tutor spontaneously provided these students with 763 prompts for reflection. Prompts reliably induced reflection: Students responded verbally 87% of the time. Turn-by-turn discourse analysis revealed seven distinct types of prompts and 11 distinct types of verbal responses. High-level prompts were strongly associated with high-level responses. A log-multiplicative association model with two dimensions (temporality and certainty) represented the relationships between prompt and response types; from this model, odds ratios estimated the strength of association between specific pairs of prompt and response types. Findings are discussed in terms of the effects that reflection may have on students’ developing understanding of scientific concepts.     

Positive Effects of Converting a Food and Bioprocessing Analysis Course to an Inquiry‐Guided Approach

Abstract: Food science laboratory courses are traditionally taught as a series of preplanned laboratories with known endpoints. In contrast, inquiry‐guided (IG) laboratories allow students to ask questions, think through problems, design experiments, then adapt and learn in response to unexpected results. This study examined the effects of converting the course, “Analytical Techniques in Food and Bioprocessing Sciences” from a traditional approach (2008 to 2010 data) to an IG approach (2011 data) by assigning teams of 2–3 students a food and a set of 5 analyses to conduct over the course of the semester. Students were required to choose and justify the use of specific methods for each analysis, as well as to develop a supply list and a budget for the semester‐long project. During the semester, students were required to post and discuss their weekly progress with the instructor, teaching assistants, and the rest of the class using an online discussion forum. At the end of the semester, students were required to present the results of their analysis in both oral and written formats. Overall course grades were significantly higher (P≤ 0.05) using IG in 2011 compared to 2010 and 2009, but not to 2008 grades. Numerical course evaluations for the instructor, overall course, and lab, as well as written course evaluations all significantly (P≤ 0.05) improved. This suggests that an IG approach may measurably improve student performance in terms of course grades and the ability to complete semester long projects. It may also increase student satisfaction with the course, as measured by numerical and written end of semester surveys.     

Canadian Communications

MASS MEDIA AND THE CONSTITUTION: AN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SUPREME COURT DECISIONS by Richard F. Hixon (New York: Garland Publishing, 1989—$85.00, ISBN 0-8240-7947-7)

THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF EDUCATIONAL MEDIA COMMUNICATIONS AND TECHNOLOGY edited by Derick Unwin and Ray McAleese (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1988—price not given, ISBN 0-313-23996-7)

KNOWLEDGE INDUSTRY 200: 1987 EDITION edited by Ira Mayer (White Plains, NY: Knowledge Industry Publications, with library distribution by Gale Research, Detroit, 1987—price for latter is $250, ISBN 0-8103-4254-5)

RADIO AND TELEVISION: A SELECTED, ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY, SUPPLEMENT TWO: 1982-1986 by Peter Pringle and Helen Clinton (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press, 1989—$27.50, ISBN 0-8108-2158-3)

THE BROADCAST COMMUNICATIONS DICTIONARY edited by Lincoln Diamant (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1989—$35.00, ISBN 0-313-26502-X)

THE LIBRARIAN'S COMPANION: A HANDBOOK OF THOUSANDS OF FACTS AND FIGURES ON LIBRARIES/LIBRARIANS, BOOKS/NEWSPAPERS, PUBLISHERS/BOOKSELLERS by Vladimir F. Wertsman (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1987—$35.00, ISBN 0-313-25500-8)

INDEX TO JOURNALS IN COMMUNICATION STUDIES THROUGH 1985 edited by Ronald J. Matlon (Speech Communication Association, 5105 Backlick Rd., Bldg. E, Annandale, VA 22003—$40.00, paper, ISBN not provided)

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF INFORMATION SYSTEMS AND SERVICES edited by Amy Lucas (Detroit: Gale Research, 1988—$420 for a three volume set, ISBN for the set: 0-8103-2646-9)

COMMUNICATIONS GLOSSARY (Canadian Law Information Council, 5th Floor, 161 Laurier Ave. West, Ottawa, Ontario KIP 5J2—$30 each in Canadian funds, no ISBN provided)