School experiences of transgender and gender diverse students in Australia

Over the last decade, there has been an increase in global and local policy protections on the basis of gender identity and expression in education and a recent spate of coverage of transgender students on Australian television and news media. This paper explores the school experiences of Australian transgender and gender diverse students', with particular consideration of recognition of their gender identity in documentation, experiences of puberty and sexuality education, treatment by staff and students, and other forms of provision. It reports on the findings of a 2013 study which combined a survey of 189 transgender and gender diverse Australian students aged 14–25 years, with 16 online interviews with members of this group. The study was informed by a community advisory group which included a range of transgender, gender diverse and intersex people. Findings include both quantitative and qualitative data, detailing a trend towards more disruptive, fluid and inconsistent identifications by members of this student group, and a diversification of their needs at school. Student advocacy on topics including sexuality and puberty education was shown to be common and also useful in improving individual well-being and social outcomes. We offer some reflections towards more useful school practices and future research.     

For Science and Self: Youth Interactions with Data in Community and Citizen Science

In youth-focused community and citizen (YCCS) youth in classrooms and community-based programs produce data that scientists, resource managers and community members will use. This “nested” data situates learners’ scientific activity within larger datasets, projects, and communities, with consequences for youth agency. To document opportunities for agentive learning with data in YCCS, we report on how youth interact with data across eight school and community-based project sites and how youth talk about their data and work. From analysis of 54 participant interviews, we found that youth perceived the data they produced as being used for: (1) broader scientific work, (2) their own learning, and (3) community endeavors. Nested uses of data were most meaningful when youth interacted with end users, were exposed to the larger datasets to which they contributed, or took action linked to data. Not all youth saw, believed, or valued that data would be used by others. Framing of task and purpose, nature of engagement with community users, data production protocols, and level of emphasis on youth-identified questions may contribute to youth perceptions and can foster or undermine conditions for learner agency. The results shed light on when and how conditions for expansive learning and agency get established.     

Improving Campus Climate to Support Faculty Diversity and Retention: A Pilot Program for New Faculty

We report on a series of pilot programs that we developed and carried out to support the success and satisfaction of new faculty, particularly faculty of color. We hope that others committed to retaining and supporting underrepresented faculty can apply our learning from this pilot project, as a whole or in part.Fred P. Piercy, Ph.D. (University of Florida), M.Ed. (University of South Carolina), B.A. (Wake Forest University) is the Department Head of the Department of Human Development at Virginia Tech. His professional interests include family therapy education, HIV social science research and prevention, and family intervention for adolescent drug abusers. Valerie Giddings, Ph.D., M.S. (Virginia Tech), B.S. (Bennett College) is the Associate Vice Chancellor for Lifelong Learning at Winston-Salem State University. Her professional interests include anthropometry and apparel fit, cultural aesthetics for apparel, and diversity issues in higher education. Katherine R. Allen, Ph.D., M.A. (Syracuse University), B.S. (University of Connecticut) is a Professor in Human Development at Virginia Tech. Her interests include family diversity over the life course, adult sibling ties in transition, and persistence of women and minorities in IT majors. Benjamin Dixon, Ed.D. (University of Massachusetts), M.A.T. (Harvard University), B.Mus.Ed. (Howard University) is the Vice President for Multicultural Affairs at Virginia Tech. His interests include diversity, multicultural education, ethical pluralism, and equity and inclusion issues related to organizational management and development. Peggy S. Meszaros, Ph.D. (University of Maryland), M.S. (University of Kentucky), B.S. (Austin Peay State University) is the William E. Lavery Professor of Human Development and the Director of the Center for Information Technology Impacts on Children, Youth, and Families at Virginia Tech. Her interests include positive youth development, leadership issues, female career transitions, and mother/daughter communication. Karen Joest, Ph.D. (Virginia Tech), M.S. (Chaminade University), B.S. (Indiana State University) is an Assistant Professor of Child and Family Studies at the State University of New York, College at Oneonta. Her interests include adolescents exposed to domestic violence, use of qualitative research, and use of technology and feminist pedagogy     

Grammar and the lexicon: developmental ordering in language acquisition

Recent accounts of language acquisition propose that the knowledge structures that comprise language develop within a single, unified system that shares computational resources and representations. One implication of this approach is that developmental relations within the system become central to theorizing about language acquisition. Previous work suggested that lexical development preceded grammatical development, a developmental ordering with strong theoretical implications. One purpose of the current article is to test this developmental ordering hypothesis. Results showed that children (aged 16-30 months) developed lexicon and grammar synchronously. The second purpose is to demonstrate a recently developed method for testing developmental ordering, the nonlinear-mapping approach, and show how the method can be extended to capitalize on multiply determined developmental systems, such as language.     

Quasi-static mechanical behaviour of soils used for natural turf sports surfaces and stud force prediction

The quasi-static testing of soils used in natural turf pitches yields key parameters in soil modelling, including elastic moduli, Poisson’s ratio and Mohr–Coulomb parameters for shearing resistance and cohesion in soil. The bulk strength of a Sand soil used in the construction of elite sports surfaces was found to increase initially and then decrease with increasing water content due to apparent cohesion effects. For a Clay Loam soil, more common in recreational facilities, shear strength decreased with water content. Reducing density resulted in a reduction of shear strength and elastic moduli in both soils due to reduced packing of particles reducing particle–particle contact surface area. The effect of roots on the shear strength of a Sand soil was not significant but reduced elastic moduli significantly. Horizontal forces measured during running and turning in a biomechanics laboratory were in good agreement with forces predicted using a simple quasi-static soil model for coarse-grained (Sand) soils although this was not the case with the Clay Loam soil.     

Language and reading development in children learning English as an additional language in primary school in England

Children learning English as an additional language (EAL) are a growing population of learners in English primary schools. These children begin school with differing levels of English language proficiency and tend to underperform in relation to their non-EAL peers on measures of English oral language and reading. However, little work has examined the developmental trajectories of these skills in EAL learners in England. EAL learners and 33 non-EAL peers in Year 4 (age 8–9 years) were assessed at three time points over 18 months on measures of oral language (vocabulary, grammar and listening comprehension), phonological processing (spoonerisms and rapid automatised naming) and reading skills (single-word decoding and passage reading). At t1, EAL learners scored significantly lower than non-EAL peers in receptive and expressive vocabulary (breadth but not depth), spoonerisms and passage reading accuracy. Contrary to previous research, no significant group differences were found in listening or reading comprehension skills. With the exception of passage reading accuracy, there was no evidence for convergence or divergence between the groups in rate of progress over time. After three years of English-medium classroom instruction, EAL learners continue to underperform relative to their non-EAL peers in breadth of English vocabulary knowledge. This discrepancy in vocabulary knowledge does not appear to narrow as a result of regular classroom instruction in the run up to the final stages of primary school, pinpointing vocabulary as a key target for intervention.     

Vocabulary learning

This article addresses the question of how to account for the growth in vocabulary knowledge that occurs during the elementary school years. Areas examined include the ways that word meanings are communicated, direct teaching of meanings vocabulary instruction as a part of reading instruction, and deriving and learning word meanings from verbal context. Taken singly, neither direct instruction of meanings nor learning word meanings from context seems to account all that well for the growth in vocabulary that is thought to occur.