Tiers of intervention in responsiveness to intervention: prevention outcomes and learning disabilities identification patterns

Response to Intervention (RTI) models have attracted great attention as an alternative to traditional methods used for identifying students with learning disabilities. A major feature of this approach is the implementation of academic interventions in general education and measuring the student's response to those interventions. A common question that needs to be addressed is the number of stages or tiers of intervention necessary in the Response to Intervention model. This article reviews three studies of RTI that investigate the RTI tiers. Sharon Vaughn and Rollanda O'Connor report on studies using the Standard Protocol approach to RTI. David Tilly reports on using the Problem Solving Model as an RTI model. This article summarizes the results of these three investigations.     

Further evidence that conditioned inhibition is not the mechanism of an extinction cue’s effect: A reinforced cue prevents spontaneous recovery

Previous research has demonstrated that discrete cues presented during extinction of a conditioned response (extinction cues) subsequently reduce spontaneous recovery and the renewal effect. In order to assess whether an extinction cue’s effect is due to conditioned inhibition, the effect of pairing an extinction cue with food on the cue’s capacity to modulate spontaneous recovery was investigated in an appetitive conditioning experiment with rats. Conditioned inhibitors paired with the unconditioned stimulus lose their potential to inhibit responding. The food-paired extinction cue did not lose its potential to reduce spontaneous recovery. In fact, it reduced spontaneous recovery more than did an extinction cue that was not paired with food. The results indicate that extinction cues attenuate postextinction recovery of conditioned responding through a mechanism other than conditioned inhibition. The cue’s action appears to be similar to that of serial negative occasion setters. Theories of spontaneous recovery and the relationship of extinction cues to other modulatory stimuli are discussed.     

Generative aspects of the Computer Based Educational Software System (CBESS)

A system of computer-based instruction (CBI) authoring and delivery tools was developed in which generative CBI techniques were used to dynamically create instructional presentations from content databases during program execution. Three applications using these techniques are examined with regard to trade-offs between case of development and limitations imposed by program specificity: 1) A semantic network was used to represent large bodies of terse facts to be memorized. The need for authors to create large numbers of question screens was avoided by a feature enabling questions and foils to be generated on-the-fly from database assertions as the student programs ran. 2) Technical vocabulary training was accomplished with a generative approach in which an array of student learning activities were automatically generated from a database minimally consisting of technical terms and their definitions. 3) A more difficult program allowed greater interface and lesson control flexibility for creating more sophisticated practice lessons in which new instances were dynamically inserted into templates for questions, anticipated answers and feedback. A common application theme emerging from field-testing the programs was their use in learning resource centers to address specific learning objectives from larger courses.     

THE EFFECT OF SOCIAL DESIRABILITY ON PERCEIVED MEDIA IMPACT: IMPLICATIONS FOR THIRD-PERSON PERCEPTIONS

This study examines variations in perceptions of media influencebased on the locus of impact (self vs. other) and the valenceof the message (pro-social vs. anti-social). After reading oneof four versions of rap lyrics either advocating or condemningviolence or misogyny, 406 undergraduates filled out a surveymeasuring the perceived impact of songs with that type of lyricson themselves and on other students. Results replicated previousfindings of a third-person perception for the anti-social messages.Based on an ego-enhancement motivational explanation, it waspredicted that there would be a reverse third-person perceptionfor the pro-social messages. The findings did not support thishypothesis, and for the pro-social message regarding the treatmentof women, a Lraditional third-person perception was found. However,consistent with the ego-defensive motivational explanation,the size of the third-person perception differential was significantlygreater for anti-social than for pro-social messages. Implicationsof these findings for explanations of the third-person perceptionwere discussed.     

Values in Science: An Educational Perspective

Science is not value-free, nor does it provide the only model of objectivity. Epistemic values guide the pursuit and methods of science. Cultural values, however, inevitably enter through individual practitioners. Still, the social structure of science embodies a critical system of checks and balances, and it is strengthened by a diversity of values, not fewer. Science also exports values to the broader culture, both posing new values- questions based on new discoveries, and providing a misleading model for rational decision-making. Science teachers who understand the multi-faceted relationship between science and values can guide students more effectively in fully appreciating the nature of science through reflexive exercises and case studies.     

Factors influencing the career interest of SENCOs in English schools

A named professional with responsibility for overseeing and coordinating the educational inclusion of pupils with special educational needs and disabilities has become an important school role in many countries. In England, the SENCO (special educational needs coordinator) became a mandatory role in 1994, and associated mandatory training was introduced in 2009. A questionnaire survey of 618 in-training and actual SENCOs revealed that their motivating interest in becoming a SENCO varied. An exploratory factor analysis of 32 items covering different interests in the role yielded four interest factors in becoming a SENCO: outward-facing factors (‘inclusion’ and ‘high-quality provision’) and inward-facing factors (‘educational and professional development’ and ‘leadership voice and status’). The outward-facing factors were viewed as more important to respondents than the inward-facing factors. Interest factors did not interact with organisational variables, including age group taught and school quality. Nevertheless, younger SENCOs and those engaged in training were more motivated by educational and professional development. SENCOs holding school leadership contracts were more motivated in developing leadership voice and status compared with their classroom teacher peers. Moreover, there was a significant overall difference with women reporting a higher interest than men across all factors.     

Policy considerations based on a cost analysis of alternative test formats in large scale science assessments

This article compares the costs of four assessment formats: multiple choice, open ended, laboratory station, and full investigation. The amount of time spent preparing the devices, developing scoring consistency for the devices, and scoring the devices was tracked as the devices were developed. These times are presented by individual item and by complete device. Times are also compared as if 1,000 students completed each assessment. Finally, the times are converted into cost estimates by assuming a potential hourly wage. The data show that a multiple choice item costs the least, and that it is approximately 80 times as much for an open ended item, 300 times as much for a content station, and 500 times as much for a full investigation item. The very large discrepancies in costs are used as a basis to raise several policy issues related to the inclusion of alternative assessment formats in large scale science achievement testing. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 37: 615–626, 2000     

Motion Pictures

Richard Bunce's Television in the Corporate Interest (New York: Praeger Special Studies, 1976—price not given, but about $15.00).

Ralph M. Jennings and Veronica M. Jefferson's Television Station Employment Practices, 1975: The Status of Minorities and Women (New York: Office of Communication, United Church of Christ, 1976—price not given, but about $10.00, paper)

Horace Newcomb's Television: The Critical View (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976—$4.00, paper)

Asa Berger's The TV-Guided American (New York: Walker, 1976—$8.95)

Vincent Mosco's The Regulation of Innovations in the Broadcasting Market (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Program on Information Technologies and Public Policy, 1975—$3.00, paper)

James D. Scott's Cable Television: Strategy for Penetrating Key Urban Markets (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Graduate School of Business Administration, 1976—$5.50, paper)

R.W. Chandler's Sparks at Sea: The Experiences of a Ship's Radio Officer (North Pomfret, Vt.: David and Charles, 1973, but only recently released in the U.S.—$9.50)     

‘Muscles for Motherhood’: A Genealogical Analysis of Medicalized Ways of Knowing Female Footballers in New Zealand, 1921 and 1973–1975

ABSTRACT

Michel Foucault argued that females gradually became integrated into the sphere of medical practices through a process which he termed as a ‘hysterization of women’s bodies’ (Foucault, The History of Sexuality, Volume One: An Introduction, New York: Pantheon Books, 1978, 104). In this article, we draw on Foucault to examine how women’s bodies, exercise and motherhood impacted on the historical development of female football in New Zealand within two time periods (1921 and 1973–1975). Employing his genealogical framework, we analyze newspaper reports, historical documents and conducted in-depth interviews to demonstrate how medical/scientific discourses both constrained and enabled the participation of women in football. We conclude that while medical knowledge was used to publicly disqualify the legitimacy of the female footballer in 1921, and hence her abrupt disappearance from the sporting realm, the absence of such medical knowledge in the early 1970s, combined with societal changes associated with second wave feminism, paved the way for the eventual ‘normalization’ of female football in New Zealand.