A Library Perspective: Data Wranglers in LibraryLand: Finding Opportunities in the Changing Policy Landscape

T. Scott Plutchak, director of Digital Data Curation Strategies, gave a talk about managing data, managing expectations, and opportunities to manage your institution in the move to make research data accessible. An historic view of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the funder’s mandates, and other policy formations set the stage for the discussion of the role of the library in this institutional challenge. In his new role at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Plutchak operates at The Edge of Chaos, with “data wranglers”— concerned parties from a variety of disciplines who all have an interest in data management and who come together to share ideas and move closer to an innovative solution.     

Enhancing the early student experience

This paper is concerned with identifying how the early student experience can be enhanced in order to improve levels of student retention and achievement. The early student experience is the focus of this project as the literature has consistently declared the first year to be the most critical in shaping persistence decisions. Programme managers of courses with high and low retention rates have been interviewed to identify activities that appear to be associated with good retention rates. The results show that there are similarities in the way programmes with high retention are run, with these features not being prevalent on programmes with low retention. Recommendations of activities that appear likely to enhance the early student experience are provided.     

Shorter notices

Thomas, Mike and Thomas, Sally (1981) On Our Own TWO Feet, Books 6 to 8 (Settling In, Safe and Secure, Around and About). Horton, M. (1980) The Second Reading and Writing Book. A Handbook for Teachers and Parents to Use with Children. Edwards Reading Test (1980) Heinemann Educational Books.     

The incidence of depressive symptomatology in juvenile sex offenders with a history of abuse

Depressive symptomatology was assessed in a sample of 246 male juvenile sex offenders using the Beck Depression Inventory. Of these participants, the racial composition was black = 147, Hispanic = 62, Caucasian = 34. Three adolescents elected not to identify their racial origin. Subjects were divided according to their self-reports of having been sexually or physically abused. The mean Beck score across all subjects was 14.3, a value markedly higher than published norms and indicative of mild depression. Forty-two percent of subjects attained scores indicative of appreciable depressive symptomatology. A history of sexual or physical abuse was significantly related to high Beck scores; abused subjects had a mean Beck score of 16.4, as contrasted to 12.3 for nonabused subjects (Wilcoxon test: z = 2.82; p less than .005). This relationship was apparent across all racial groups. While Hispanic subjects tended to have higher Beck scores and Caucasians lower scores, racial differences were not statistically significant. Results indicate that juveniles who have committed sexual crimes, particularly those with a history of abuse, should be evaluated for depression.     

A complex dynamic systems perspective on teacher learning and identity formation: an instrumental case

ABSTRACT

Scholars have called for new conceptualisations of teachers’ learning that capture the complex, contextualised, and dynamic nature of professional growth. In this article, we describe the Dynamic Systems Model of Role Identity (DSMRI) that portrays teacher learning as inseparable from the complex and dynamic processes by which teachers form their professional identities. The model depicts theoretical and procedural learning about teaching as integrated with other ontological and epistemological beliefs, self-perceptions and self-definitions, purpose and goals in teaching, and perceived action possibilities that constitute the teacher’s professional role identity. After describing the DSMRI, we demonstrate its application with an instrumental case of a science teacher who participated in a professional development (PD) institute designed to foster learning and motivation for implementing student-centred, inquiry-based instruction. DSMRI-guided analysis of pre-, mid-, and post-institute interviews highlighted the role of pre-PD role identities of learner and teacher in the teacher’s PD experiences, which, in turn, fostered both new alignments and new tensions in the teacher’s role identity that promoted an overall change towards a more student-centred teacher role identity. The article demonstrates the utility of the DSMRI for conceptualising teachers’ learning as contextualised and dynamic identity formation processes.     

Investigating the relationships between informal learning and player involvement in digital games

In the last few years, digital games have become increasingly popular with both ‘hardcore’ and ‘casual’ audiences. At the same time, it has been argued that games can be powerful learning environments, since they are seen to encourage active and critical learning through participation in affinity groups and semiotic domains but there is a need for further empirical evidence to explore how this participation occurs and how prevalent it actually is. In addition the effectiveness of games within education indicates mixed results, though it has been suggested that this may indicate that learning through immersive worlds involves a more complex understanding of learning, one that is not so easy to tie to specified learning outcomes. It would seem the area would benefit from research that seeks to develop our understanding of how player involvement and learning come together in this context. This paper presents the preliminary results of a survey carried out in order to explore these issues. The initial findings suggest that how a player identifies as a gamer relates to what they think they gain from their gaming experiences with respect to learning.     

What's a Pregnant Woman to Eat? A Review of Current USDA Dietary Guidelines and MyPyramid

The purpose of this article is to clarify the nutritional recommendations for pregnant women in light of the new Food Guide Pyramid, known as "MyPyramid," along with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2005 and recommendations by the Institute of Medicine. The differences between the Food Guide Pyramid (introduced in 1992) and the more recent, color-coded MyPyramid (introduced in 2005) are discussed. A list of nutritional recommendations for pregnant women is presented, which may serve as a reference for practitioners when counseling pregnant women.     

Phoneme segmentation training: Effect on reading readiness

Recent evidence suggests that the ability to segment words into phonemes is significantly related to reading success, and that training in phoneme segmentation appears to have a positive influence on beginning reading. In this study, we evaluated the effect on reading readiness of phoneme segmentation training in kindergarten. Ninety nonreaders with PPVT-R standard scores of 78 or higher were randomly selected from six kindergarten classrooms and assigned to one of three treatment conditions: a) phoneme segmentation group; b) language activities group (control group I); and c) no intervention (control group II). The phoneme segmentation group received seven weeks of instruction in segmentation and in letter names and sounds. Also for seven weeks, the language activities group received the identical instruction in letter names and sounds and additional language activities. Prior to the intervention, the three groups did not differ in age, sex, race, PPVT-R phoneme segmentation, letter name and letter sound knowledge, or reading ability. After the intervention, the phoneme segmentation group outperformed both control groups on phoneme segmentation and reading measures. This study provides additional strong support for including phoneme segmentation training in the kindergarten curriculum. Clinical suggestions for teachers are included. This project was supported in part by USDE grant # G008630421 and a Syracuse University Senate Research Grant.