Implementing Peer Assessment in a Post-Secondary (16–18) Physics Classroom

This study explores the implementation of peer assessment with a group of students studying physics at Advanced level in a post-secondary school in Malta. The study that draws on action research methodology looks at how the views of students regarding peer assessment evolve as they engage with peer assessment. The research involved the actual implementation of an apprenticeship model of peer assessment and looked at the issues faced by the students. The results of the study show that students were very much immersed in a traditional assessment culture and needed to be trained to develop peer assessment skills. Student concerns related to fairness, regarding their abilities as assessors and dependence on the teacher as ‘expert’ remained unchanged as the students engaged with peer assessment. Successful implementation of peer assessment therefore requires a re-examination of the role of student and teachers as assessors within a safe learning environment.     

The golden lady: the storied life of a multilingual teacher and author of supplemental reading materials in a marginalized South African language

Personal narratives can be powerful venues for understanding human experiences. In this paper, we tell the story of Lutanyani, a Black South African multilingual teacher and author of supplemental reading materials in a marginalized South African language. Through various word images, we convey the role of language, in particular written language, in Lutanyani’s life. For Lutanyani, writing serves as ‘a healing process’ in two ways: (1) as a linguistically empowering venue that affirms and shifts his linguistic identity from outsider to insider, and (2) as a backward‐ and forward‐looking means to reconcile his past and reconstruct a message of hope for intermediate‐grade students throughout South Africa. This study has implications for classroom practices in the USA as well as development work in international settings.     

Knowledge‐building or a Free‐for‐all? A Prolegomenon to an On‐line Creative Writing Class

Abstract

It can be argued that media studies has already defined itself too narrowly in terms of the communications media and that it takes too little account of the impact of new technologies on the lives and activities of young people. Here David Collins, a Research Fellow of the University of Sheffield, who is investigating the uses of information technology in relation to special educational needs, considers the potential of microcomputers in the context of music teaching.     

Electronic Graphic Organizers for Learning Science Vocabulary and Concepts: The Effects of Online Synchronous Discussion

This study investigated the content learning of fourth graders (N?=?92) randomly assigned to complete electronic Frayer Models on life science vocabulary by themselves or while engaging in synchronous online discussions with a partner. The use of the graphic organizers was interspersed with other science activities. After seven weeks, all students significantly improved their science content knowledge (d ≈ 0.60), but the two treatment groups did not demonstrate significantly different performance after controlling for pretest abilities. Path analysis revealed the rubric scores on students' organizers were more strongly predictive of the posttest science benchmark in the online discussion group than the independent group, suggesting that collaboratively completing Frayer Models may help bolster the relationship between reading and science.     

Helping Pre-Service and Beginning Teachers Examine and Reframe Assumptions About Themselves as Teachers and Change Agents: “Who is Going to Listen to You Anyway?”

The focus of this article is how to ensure (beginning) teachers’ needs as practitioners are part of the discursive dialogue in physical education teacher education programs. We consider the relationship between ‘structure’ and ‘agency,’ teachers as ‘change agents’ and refer to ‘workplace learning’ as we examine the extent to which the social structure of the school and the teaching profession, and?/?or the capacity of the individual to act independently, ultimately determines a teacher's behaviour in reaction to teaching expectations. We are interested as physical education teacher education faculty in how we (1) strive to help pre-service teachers examine and reframe assumptions about themselves as teachers and change agents, and (2) examine taken-for-granted school practices and processes. We share ways that physical education teacher education programs could encourage pre-service teachers agency and the relationship between initial teacher education and induction.     

THE FELLOWSHIPS OF THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF RELIGION IN HIGHER EDUCATION

This article explores the interaction between the work and lives of five religious qualitative researchers whose research studies investigate both culture and religion. The ways their personal backgrounds, experiences, and values affect their choice of research topics and their relationships with research participants and with data, are revealed through the stories they tell about their work. Implications are drawn both for the conduct of qualitative, cultural study and for religious education.     

Religious experience as an aim of religious education

This article presents a model for religious education based on three central elements. First, it is argued that religious experience, or direct experience of the Divine, is an essential part of a full religious life, that religious experience is based in, enabled by and examined against, the body of knowledge in a given religion, and that religious experience is itself a form of knowing. Second, it is suggested that there be three sets of aims in religious education curriculum: knowledge aims, moral value aims and spiritual aims, the last of which encompasses religious experience, which religious education should aim to encourage and facilitate among students. Third, the teacher is presented as the central factor in such facilitation, and the pedagogical and personal characteristics of this ideal teacher are described.