Living Memories of Womanlishness/Womanish and Womanism: Finding Voice on the Heels of Thinkers and Do-ers

When I received an e-mail from Roland (Sintos Coloma) about participating in the 50th celebration of the American Educational Studies Association (AESA), I did not hesitate to agree to do so. What I did not envision, at the time, is how difficult and complex this process of writing an article for the special issue of Educational Studies is. I have several titles and introductions filed under the proverbial t because nothing felt fiery, engaging, or like me. I knew that living memories is a must, in light of 2017's conference theme: “Memory, Remembering & Forgetting: (Re)Envisioning Educational Worlds.” However, my spirit and soul were hungry for (what?); but I couldn't name the missing ingredient(s).     

Beginning to read in Vietnamese: kindergarten precursors to first grade fluency and reading comprehension

Reading and Writing - Measures of decoding and oral language have been shown to predict early reading comprehension across a wide variety of languages, though the timeframe and strength of the...     

Social perspective taking: a benefit of bilingualism in academic writing

The task of writing arguments requires a linguistic and cognitive sophistication that eludes many adults, but students in the US are expected to produce texts that articulate and support a claim—simple written arguments—starting in the fourth grade. Students from language-minority homes likewise must learn to produce such writing, despite their relatively limited experience with the English language, reflected in the availability of smaller mental lexicons and more restricted syntactic constructions. Yet some features of bilingual children’s cognition, such as precocious development of theory of mind and strong metalinguistic awareness, might support the crafting of arguments in writing, where the explicit consideration of multiple points of view can serve to strengthen one’s case for a claim. In this study we examine the incidence of social perspective-taking acts in the argumentative essays of language-minority and English-only students in Grades 4–6 and find that language-minority students match or surpass the English-only students on two critical measures of perspective taking (perspective acknowledgment and perspective articulation). We also explore possible links between students’ use of perspective taking in their argumentative essays and a validated formal measure of the same skill, uncovering different relationships between them in the two language groups. Links to previously attested bilingual advantages and to the development of argumentation are discussed.     

A framework for implementing and teaching the social and ethical impact of computing

This article describes the work of Project ImpactCS, which was initiated to define the core content and pedagogical objectives for integrating social impact and ethics into the computer science (CS) curriculum. Over a three year period the project will address three major problems that hamper the implementation of across-the-board curriculum change: the lack of a well-specified definition of what the core content and learning objectives should include, the lack of a strategy for adapting and adopting existing materials that address the core topics into the existing CS curriculum, and the lack of awareness and expertise on the part of most CS faculties regarding the need and methodology for presenting such material in their courses. This report provides the conceptual frame-work and describes the learning objectives, called knowledge units, for defining a new content area in the computer science curriculum. It also discusses strategies and innovative pedagogical techniques for implementing the knowledge units into the curriculum.     

Development and evaluation of the conceptual inventory of natural selection

Natural selection as a mechanism of evolution is a central concept in biology; yet, most nonbiology‐majors do not thoroughly understand the theory even after instruction. Many alternative conceptions on this topic have been identified, indicating that the job of the instructor is a difficult one. This article presents a new diagnostic test to assess students' understanding of natural selection. The test items are based on actual scientific studies of natural selection, whereas previous tests have employed hypothetical situations that were often misleading or oversimplified. The Conceptual Inventory of Natural Selection (CINS) is a 20‐item multiple choice test that employs common alternative conceptions as distractors. An original 12‐item version of the test was field‐tested with 170 nonmajors in 6 classes and 43 biology majors in 1 class at 3 community colleges. The test scores of one subset of nonmajors (n = 7) were compared with the students' performances in semistructured interviews. There was a positive correlation between the test scores and the interview scores. The current 20‐item version of the CINS was field‐tested with 206 students in a nonmajors' general biology course. The face validity, internal validity, reliability, and readability of the CINS are discussed. Results indicate that the CINS will be a valuable tool for instructors. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 39: 952–978, 2002     

The Critical Role of Vocabulary Development for English Language Learners

English language learners (ELLs) who experience slow vocabulary development are less able to comprehend text at grade level than their English‐only peers. Such students are likely to perform poorly on assessments in these areas and are at risk of being diagnosed as learning disabled. In this article, we review the research on methods to develop the vocabulary knowledge of ELLs and present lessons learned from the research concerning effective instructional practices for ELLs. The review suggests that several strategies are especially valuable for ELLs, including taking advantage of students' first language if the language shares cognates with English; ensuring that ELLs know the meaning of basic words, and providing sufficient review and reinforcement. Finally, we discuss challenges in designing effective vocabulary instruction for ELLs. Important issues are determining which words to teach, taking into account the large deficits in second‐language vocabulary of ELLs, and working with the limited time that is typically available for direct instruction in vocabulary.     

Effects of Nature (Greenspace) on Cognitive Functioning in School Children and Adolescents: a Systematic Review

Educational Psychology Review - There is growing interest in understanding the extent to which natural environments can influence learning particularly in school contexts. Nature has the potential...     

The Conceptual Nature of Gain in Vocabulary Research: An Analysis of Vocabulary Data from Schoolchildren

Two ways of measuring change are presented and compared: A conventional “change score”, defined as the difference between scores before and after an interim period, and a process-oriented approach focusing on detailed analysis of conceptually defined response patterns. The validity of the two approaches was investigated. Vocabulary knowledge was assessed by means of equivalent multiple-choice tests administered before and after an intervention, and four characteristic responses were observed: Words consistently not understood; words inconsistently understood; learned words; and words consistently understood. The results showed that inclusion of the category “words consistently not understood” offered a “truer” gain score than did the conventional change score. It captured more variance from age and cognitive constraints and appeared educationally more reliable from an assessment-for-teaching-perspective.     

Hong Kong parents and their children’s music training: measurement properties of the Parental Involvement in Music Training Questionnaire

Many Hong Kong-Chinese parents are active in their support for their children’s music training. To better understand this support, the Parental Involvement in Music Training Questionnaire (PIMTQ) is designed to measure the variability in parental involvement in their children’s music training. This study begins by exploring the factor structure of the PIMTQ and then establishes its measurement properties using Rasch modelling. Two hundred and ninety-five Hong Kong-Chinese parents completed a Chinese version of the 42-item instrument with principal components analysis of the responses showing seven factors. However, Rasch modelling showed that two of the five factors (Family Music Background and Family Music Interest) are unable to reliably predict variability in parent responses. We conclude, however, that the remaining five factors (Parental Support Toward Music Training, Parental Expectations, Home Music Environment, Music Programme Support and Attitude Toward Music) of the PIMTQ can be used as subscales to measure the involvement of Hong Kong-Chinese parents in their children’s music training.