Exploring Changes in Home Visitors’ Perspectives in the Context of a Professional Development Activity

Early Childhood Education Journal - Research-based professional development opportunities for early childhood home visitors are valuable to the Early Head Start-Home-Based Option (EHS-HBO) and to...     

Anatomical knowledge retention in third‐year medical students prior to obstetrics and gynecology and surgery rotations

Surgical anatomy is taught early in medical school training. The literature shows that many physicians, especially surgical specialists, think that anatomical knowledge of medical students is inadequate and nesting of anatomical sciences later in the clinical curriculum may be necessary. Quantitative data concerning this perception of an anatomical knowledge deficit are lacking, as are specifics as to what content should be reinforced. This study identifies baseline areas of strength and weakness in the surgical anatomy knowledge of medical students entering surgical rotations. Third‐year medical students completed a 20–25‐question test at the beginning of the General Surgery and Obstetrics and Gynecology rotations. Knowledge of inguinal anatomy (45.3%), orientation in abdominal cavity (38.8%), colon (27.7%), and esophageal varices (12.8%) was poor. The numbers in parentheses are the percentage of questions answered correctly per topic. In comparing those scores to matched test items from this cohort as first‐year students in the anatomy course, the drop in retention overall was very significant (P = 0.009) from 86.9 to 51.5%. Students also scored lower in questions relating to pelvic organs (46.7%), urogenital development (54.0%), pulmonary development (17.8%), and pregnancy (17.8%). These data showed that indeed, knowledge of surgical anatomy is poor for medical students entering surgical clerkships. These data collected will be utilized to create interactive learning modules, aimed at improving clinically relevant anatomical knowledge retention. These modules, which will be available to students during their inpatient surgical rotations, connect basic anatomy principles to clinical cases, with the ultimate goal of closing the anatomical knowledge gap. Anat Sci Educ 7: 461–468. © 2014 American Association of Anatomists.     

Typology of Student Citizenship

Most of the empirical frameworks and theories concerned with the development of citizenship today are quite complex and only provide some guidance for what citizenship education should attend to; they do not provide insight into the actual citizenship of students. We constructed a typology of student citizenship, on the basis of data collected from students. Patterns of scores for the citizenship orientations and citizenship knowledge of students were examined, and four clearly interpretable profiles could be identified (committed citizenship, indifferent citizenship, ordinary citizenship and self-assured citizenship). A sample of 7,768 students from grades 5 to 9 (aged 11–16 years) from 38 primary and secondary education schools participated in this research. The typology was then cross-validated on a separate sample of 15,940 students from Dutch primary and secondary education schools. The types of the citizenship differed depending on the individual demographic characteristics of the students and their level of education. Implications of the typology for citizenship education and future research are discussed.     

Evidence-based policy-making: the usability of the Eurostat Adult Education Survey

This article reflects on European education policy which is driven by benchmarks and indicators. While the European benchmark on adult lifelong learning participation—15% to be achieved by 2020—is measured by the Labour Force Survey, the Eurostat Adult Education Survey (AES) was designed to better understand the topic of adult lifelong learning participation in-depth. This article explores the AES as an instrument to inform policy-makers and whether it provides adequate information to empirically testify participation hypotheses. The article argues that analysis of the AES provides limited understanding of the educational supply side. Furthermore, policy-makers should be aware of methodological and conceptual weaknesses before relying on these data in their policy development.     

Association of “Macho Man” Sexual Attitudes and Behavioral Risks in Urban Adolescents

We examined whether sexual attitudes of adolescents were related to their self-reported sexual risk behavior by analyzing survey data from 1,052 boys and girls aged 14 to 17 years from a low income, urban community. Sexual behavior norms that may increase sexually transmitted infection/HIV risks in youth were sanctioned more by males and by sexually experienced youth, but their attitudes were unassociated with either their age or race/ethnicity. Endorsement was correlated with greater intention to have sexual intercourse among all youth. Among sexually experienced participants, it was associated with earlier sexual debut, more partners, and less intention to use condoms but not with the number of unprotected sexual episodes in the prior six months. Sexual attitudes of youth may conflict with initiation and maintenance of safer sex practices, making them vulnerable to HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. Risk reduction interventions for adolescents should address this.     

Using multidimensional scaling to improve functionality of the Revised Learning Process Questionnaire

The Revised Learning Process Questionnaire has been part of the development of a conceptual understanding of how students learn and what motivates them to engage in particular tasks. We obtained responses from 329 student volunteers at a mid‐sized public university in the southeast USA. We first investigated whether the psychometric properties and latent factor structure of this questionnaire are replicable in a different educational context and with students from a different country than that originally used to create and validate the questionnaire. We found this to be true. Second, we used Profile Analysis via Multidimensional Scaling (PAMS) to improve the diagnostic functionality of the instrument as well as further explore the latent structure of the questionnaire. The factor structure was evident in this solution, but we found that interpreting the latent structure in terms of the dimensions of Strategy and Motive as opposed to the factors of Deep and Surface approaches to be more appropriate for diagnostic use. We also found that PAMS has the inherent ability to assess an individual’s fit within the model, thereby acting as a measure of self‐report credibility. The Strategy dimension was found to have ecological validity through analysing its relationship to academic performance.     

Deaf and hard of hearing students' problem-solving strategies with signed arithmetic story problems

The use of problem-solving strategies by 59 deaf and hard of hearing children, grades K-3, was investigated. The children were asked to solve 9 arithmetic story problems presented to them in American Sign Language. The researchers found that while the children used the same general types of strategies that are used by hearing children (i.e., modeling, counting, and fact-based strategies), they showed an overwhelming use of counting strategies for all types of problems and at all ages. This difference may have its roots in language or instruction (or in both), and calls attention to the need for conceptual rather than procedural mathematics instruction for deaf and hard of hearing students.     

Bilingual effects on cognitive and linguistic development: role of language, cultural background, and education

A total of 104 six-year-old children belonging to 4 groups (English monolinguals, Chinese-English bilinguals, French-English bilinguals, Spanish-English bilinguals) were compared on 3 verbal tasks and 1 nonverbal executive control task to examine the generality of the bilingual effects on development. Bilingual groups differed in degree of similarity between languages, cultural background, and language of schooling. On the executive control task, all bilingual groups performed similarly and exceeded monolinguals; on the language tasks the best performance was achieved by bilingual children whose language of instruction was the same as the language of testing and whose languages had more overlap. Thus, executive control outcomes for bilingual children are general but performance on verbal tasks is specific to factors in the bilingual experience.     

Academic Life and Motherhood: Variations by Institutional Type

This paper explores the interface between work and family at different types of institutions from the perspective of women faculty who are on the tenure track and who are mothers of young children. Such a perspective provides insight into institutional variation on academic life in general, and for new faculty as mothers in particular. A macro view of the findings points to two major concerns: time (and lack thereof) and its impact on the “ideal worker” norms that shape what it means to be a good mother and good professor at different institutional types; and, the idea of “choice” as an illusion.