Type of Writing Task and College Students' Meaning Making Following a Romantic Breakup

In this study, the authors examined the potential effects of type of writing task (loss/gain vs. general prompt) on the narrative content offered by college students (N= 41) who experienced romantic breakup. Qualitative analyses indicated differences based on type of writing task. Students who received the loss/gain prompt exhibited more cognitive, balanced, and complex responses, whereas those who received the general prompt offered more emotional and factual accounts of their experience.     

‘Get real – we can't afford kindergarten’: a study of parental perceptions of early years services

The Australian Early Childhood Universal Access Agreement stipulates all children three and a half years of age and older access to 15 hours of a quality early childhood education programme. While most states and territories in Australia have a 90% or higher attendance rate, in 2010, in Queensland the attendance rate was a comparative 40%. This study explores parental perceptions of barriers to early years services in Queensland, Australia. Using content analysis, it explores comments from an online forum with 65 self-selected participants. Findings provide important insights for policy-makers interested in improving the quality of, access to, and participation in, early childhood education. Parents perceived the cost, limited number of places and small hours of kindergarten as the main barriers to accessing quality early childhood care in Queensland. Furthermore, they questioned the actual necessity of kindergarten programmes. Therefore, if the goal is to improve kindergarten attendance rates, it is important to gain an understanding of the reported perceived barriers in order to reduce these in the future.     

Don’t Silence “the Dinosaurs”: Keeping Caution Alive With Regard to Social Work Distance Education

Distance education (DE) in social work programs and studies on its comparable effectiveness with face-to-face education continue to increase. Yet not all faculty are convinced of the results, and this study explores why. Three case studies indicate that reservations center on valuing the process of learning and nonverbal communication. Issues regarding duty of care to families to be served by future social workers primarily educated in a virtual classroom also matter significantly. The trend toward DE may be inevitable, but this does not mean that educators should not voice their concerns; their skepticism has merit, and they have a responsibility to be vocal.     

Teacher Candidate Dispositions: Perspectives of Professional Expectations

This study describes a programmatic effort to examine dispositions perceptions of teacher candidates entering the profession. Study participants included 114 master's level teaching candidates in their first semester of a nontraditional teacher education program. Teacher candidates scored themselves on a department disposition rubric designed to evaluate their professional behaviors and wrote reflective rationales to support their scoring. Results indicated that candidates positioned themselves as no fault, accepts fault, and assigns fault in writing their rationales. These positions were used as lenses to analyze candidates' positioning in relation to the program and faculty expectations. Candidates' disposition performance rationales relied on their novice status, the demands of work and family, and an admitted minimalist approach to some course demands. Insights gained from the study may allow teacher education faculty to better understand and support candidates' dispositional growth and development.     

Emotionally Intense Science Activities

Science activities that evoke positive emotional responses make a difference to students’ emotional experience of science. In this study, we explored 8th Grade students’ discrete emotions expressed during science activities in a unit on Energy. Multiple data sources including classroom videos, interviews and emotion diaries completed at the end of each lesson were analysed to identify individual student's emotions. Results from two representative students are presented as case studies. Using a theoretical perspective drawn from theories of emotions founded in sociology, two assertions emerged. First, during the demonstration activity, students experienced the emotions of wonder and surprise; second, during a laboratory activity, students experienced the intense positive emotions of happiness/joy. Characteristics of these activities that contributed to students’ positive experiences are highlighted. The study found that choosing activities that evoked strong positive emotional experiences, focused students’ attention on the phenomenon they were learning, and the activities were recalled positively. Furthermore, such positive experiences may contribute to students’ interest and engagement in science and longer term memorability. Finally, implications for science teachers and pre-service teacher education are suggested.     

‘I know how to read longer novels’ – developing pupils' success criteria in the classroom

Assessment for Learning (AfL) is an established learning and teaching strategy. The authors identify issues with the effectiveness of its application in the classroom. Having noted a theoretical shift from teacher-generated to pupil-generated success criteria, the authors were keen to explore how this could be realised in practice. They developed a model based on AfL principles, which they introduced to a class of Year 5 pupils. They found that, whilst pupils can identify their own success criteria, a number of issues need to be considered by the innovative teacher.     

A written language intervention for at-risk second grade students: a randomized controlled trial of the process assessment of the learner lesson plans in a tier 2 response-to-intervention (RtI) model

In a randomized controlled trial, 205 students were followed from grades 1 to 3 with a focus on changes in their writing trajectories following an evidence-based intervention during the spring of second grade. Students were identified as being at-risk (n?=?138), and then randomized into treatment (n?=?68) versus business-as-usual conditions (n?=?70). A typical group also was included (n?=?67). The writing intervention comprised Lesson Sets 4 and 7 from the Process Assessment of the Learner (PAL), and was conducted via small groups (three to six students) twice a week for 12 weeks in accordance with a response-to-intervention Tier 2 model. The primary outcome was the Wechsler Individual Achievement Test-II Written Expression Scale. Results indicated modest support for the PAL lesson plans, with an accelerated rate of growth in writing skills following treatment. There were no significant moderator effects, although there was evidence that the most globally impaired students demonstrated a more rapid rate of growth following treatment. These findings suggest the need for ongoing examination of evidence-based treatments in writing for young elementary students.     

Investigating imagination as a cognitive space for learning mathematics

Our work is inspired by the book Imagining Numbers (particularly the square root of minus fifteen), by Harvard University mathematics professor Barry Mazur (Imagining numbers (particularly the square root of minus fifteen), Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 2003). The work of Mazur led us to question whether the features and steps of Mazur’s re-enactment of the imaginative work of mathematicians could be appropriated pedagogically in a middle-school setting. Our research objectives were to develop the framework of teaching mathematics as a way of imagining and to explore the pedagogical implications of the framework by engaging in an application of it in middle school setting. Findings from our application of the model suggest that the framework presents a novel and important approach to developing mathematical understanding. The model demonstrates in particular the importance of shared visualizations and problem-posing in learning mathematics, as well as imagination as a cognitive space for learning.

Use of astronomical literature—A report on usage patterns

In this paper we present a number of metrics for usage of the SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS). Since the ADS is used by the entire astronomical community, these are indicative of how the astronomical literature is used. We will show how the use of the ADS has changed both quantitatively and qualitatively. We will also show that different types of users access the system in different ways. Finally, we show how use of the ADS has evolved over the years in various regions of the world.