Learning leadership: becoming an outdoor leader

Recent leadership research has demonstrated a need for better understanding the process of becominga leader because it might be qualitatively different to being a leader. If so, there is likely to be a need for pedagogies designed deliberately to support first-time outdoor leadership experiences and any such pedagogies must be informed by the needs of first-time leaders. Becoming a leader in outdoor educational settings involves moving from the relative equality of being one participant among several in a group to a position of some influence in the group. This paper draws on empirical data from in-depth semi-structured interviews with adult outdoor education (friluftsliv) students in Norway to explore factors influencing initial leadership experiences in a formal educational setting. We found that becoming an outdoor leader involves transformations that can be complicated by the educational setting. We discuss implications for pedagogical approaches to outdoor leadership development in formal education settings.     

A contingency management day program for adolescents excluded from public school

This contingency management adolescent school program integrated vocational training with academic instruction. The students, who were unserved by public education because of emotional handicaps, were afforded an individual treatment program by the staff of the day program. They demonstrated significant gains in educational skills and exhibited an exceedingly low dropout rate, inasmuch as 95% either continued in the program beyond their first year or reentered public school.     

Boys,girls, and microcomputing

In an attempt better to understand why, on the whole, girls are not very interested in computers, we have tried to investigate social representations of technical interest attributed to one or the other gender in primary and junior-high school. The results of the impressions formation test and those of a survey indicate that primary-school pupils consider boys and girls to be equally involved in technical fields and a girl «computer enthusiast» is perceived as a very atractive person. At the junior-high level, students no longer perceive this equality of gender in technical interests and they judge a girl «computer enthusiast» negatively. Moreover, girls themselves consider that too keen an interest in computers is evidence of loneliness and problems with sexual identity. A boy’s involvement with computers does not change his image, whatever the gender or the age of the subjects. Thus, the influence of the normative model of feminine identity can explain in part the drop in interest for computers observed in secondary-school girls.     

Capturing variations in how spelling is taught in primary school classrooms in England

Mastering spelling is important for children to progress in writing. The National Curriculum in England details spelling lists linked to each year group in primary education. Assessment practices also emphasise the importance of teaching spelling. However, to date, little is known about how teachers feel about teaching spelling nor the instructional methods that they use in primary schools in England. This study addresses this gap by investigating approaches to teaching spelling. An online survey was distributed to primary-based teaching staff with roles in supporting teaching and learning. The survey asked for information about the respondents’ teaching experience and school setting, and about their attitudes and approach to teaching spelling. The survey was completed in full by 158 respondents. Approaches to teaching spelling were varied and over two-thirds of the sample highlighted that their school did not have a spelling policy. The importance of explicit teaching of spelling was supported by the majority of teachers. This judgement was more frequent and rated more highly by teachers supporting younger children. Teachers largely reported devising their own spelling resources, highlighted that the curriculum spelling lists lack guidance for teaching spelling strategies and questioned their suitability for pupils of varying abilities. A range of spelling programmes and strategies were recorded. The findings provide insight into universal instructional approaches. Practical implications for teacher training and professional development are discussed.     

Illustrating the Impact of Performance Measurement Systems on Organizational Performance: The Blue‐Green Game

Business students are thoroughly schooled about the importance of measurement systems that, by their very nature, are designed to accurately measure the past performance of organizations, departments, and individuals. This article describes a team‐based, active‐learning exercise that clearly illustrates an additional important and often underemphasized aspect of performance measurement systems—their influence on individuals’ future behaviors and organizations’ future performance.     

Instructional Experiences of Graduate Assistants Implementing Explicit and Reflective Introductory Biology Laboratories

Science education reform documents identify nature of science (NOS) as a critical component of scientific literacy and call for universities, colleges, and K-12 schools to explicitly integrate NOS learning into science curricula. In response to these calls, this study investigated the classroom practices of nine graduate assistants (GAs) who taught expository and inquiry laboratories that implemented an explicit and reflective (ER) pedagogy to teach NOS. The purpose of this qualitative study was to better understand the experiences that enabled or inhibited GA implementation of an ER strategy in a college setting. The findings revealed that achieving quality implementation in this setting was very difficult. Factors such as GAs' ability to foster meaningful classroom discussions, laboratory logistics (e.g. lack of time and supplies), and the value undergraduates and GAs saw in learning about NOS were identified by GAs and observed by the researchers as barriers to the technique maximizing its potential. Thus, for meaningful infusion of NOS into science curricula, pedagogical support for GAs to manage meaningful classroom discussions in support of NOS or other complex topics is recommended for an ER approach to NOS learning to be successful in college settings.     

Recognition and difference: a collective biography

This paper opens the space of post-qualitative research through an exploration of how acts of recognition and non-recognition work on and through the bodies of individual subjects. Using stories generated in a collective biography workshop and drawing on concepts from Foucault and Butler, and also, in contrast, Barad and Deleuze, the paper explores the way these different epistemologies intra-act with ways of seeing/reading/being recognizable subjects.     

Farmers’ Visions on Soils: A Case Study among Agroecological and Conventional Smallholders in Minas Gerais,Brazil

Abstract

Purpose: Why do farmers not take better care of their soils? This article aims to give insight into how farmers look at soil quality management.

Design/methodology/approach: It analyses diverse land management practices and visions on soils and soil quality of ten agroecological and 14 conventional smallholder farmers in Araponga, Minas Gerais, Brazil. As agroecological farming (that is, managing soils with minimum use of external inputs) requires more complex knowledge, it is assumed that agroecological farmers would be more knowledgeable on soils compared to conventional farmers. This case study tests the hypothesis that differences in land management practices between agroecological and conventional farmers can be explained by differences in their knowledge on soils.

Findings: The hypothesis turned out to be faulty: agroecological and conventional farmers do not differ in what they know about soils, but how they use their knowledge in their farming strategy. Both groups of farmers have different but rational farming strategies.

Practical implications: Designing policies and measures to make farming more environmentally friendly and more sustainable as two-way knowledge exchange between farmers and science (and not as one-way knowledge transfer from science to farmers), to benefit from vital and context-based farmers’ knowledge and to ensure successful implementation of more sustainable land management practices.

Originality/value: By analysing farmers’ visions on soil quality management and farming strategies, this study shows that farmers’ knowledge is valuable for farmers, for scientific knowledge on soil quality management and for policies which are to be effective and adapted to the local environment.