When Mastery Goals Meet Mastery Learning: Administrator,Teacher, and Student Perceptions

Few studies have examined the impact of mastery learning on mastery goal structures or even on students’ motivation more generally. In this study, we examined one middle school that implemented a schoolwide mastery learning system, conducting interviews with a sample of administrators (n = 3), teachers (n = 4), and students (n = 9) to determine how the system was envisioned by the school leadership, implemented by the teaching staff, and perceived by the students. We used deductive qualitative analysis (DQA) to determine visions, practices, and perceptions aligned with achievement goal theory. Results indicated that evaluation practices have the greatest potential to undermine other positive motivational impacts of mastery learning–based instruction. Implications and transferability for research and practice are discussed.     

The impact of an international field experience on preservice teachers

This study addresses the question, “What is the impact of an international field experience on preservice teachers?” and corroborates many of the findings of a similar study by Willard-Holt [(2001). The impact of a short-term international experience for preservice teachers. Teaching and Teacher Education, 17, 505–517]. In May 2005, 15 teacher education students from the US completed a 4-week international practicum, working in the classroom with teachers and students at a private international primary through secondary (K12) school in Rome, Italy. Data include preservice teachers’ reflections and comments collected from their personal journals, focus groups with supervisors, observation notes, a final reflection paper, course evaluations, and a questionnaire completed 1 year after the experience to assess any lasting impact the trip may have had on them as individuals and future teachers. While there were a few negative experiences, the results indicate that overall the benefits included both professional and personal changes, such as increased confidence, a better appreciation and respect for differences of others and other cultures, and an awareness of the importance that feedback and reflection play in professional and personal growth. The article concludes with recommendations on how to improve such experiences to enhance the personal growth and cross-cultural competency of preservice teachers.     

The educational trajectory of Newly Arrived Migrant Students: Insights from a structural analysis of cultural capital

ABSTRACT

Background: The recent influx of Newly Arrived Migrant Students (NAMS) in Western-European societies poses important educational questions about how best to support migrant students within the education system.

Purpose: We sought to study how elements that are associated with cultural capital – namely a sense of entitlement and strategic knowledge – have relevance to NAMS’ educational trajectories. In studying the process of how cultural capital relates to educational careers, this study argues for a general shift from a resource-focused approach towards a strategy-focused approach to cultural capital.

Sample: We collected data from 33 NAMS from six secondary schools in a city in Flanders (the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium). A maximum difference approach was used: this allowed comparison of NAMS who followed the most academic track (general track) and the least academic track (vocational track) in secondary education in Flanders.

Design and methods: We undertook 33 in-depth biographical interviews during which the NAMS reconstructed their educational trajectories. Data were analysed qualitatively. We used structural approach analysis to identify each narrative’s core structure. These structured fragments were then thematically coded.

Results: Within the categories ‘a sense of entitlement’ and ‘strategic knowledge of the education system’, the analysis detected differences in strategies of action between pupils in the general track and in the vocational track.

Conclusion: The findings offer insights that could support the development of better strategies to guide and support NAMS in education. As NAMS’ integration in the educational system appears to be a stretched and slow process of orientation, studying their trajectory has the potential to deepen our understanding of known mechanisms of the reproduction of inequalities in education.     

General Communication

James Hartley, ed. The Psychology of Written Communication (New York: Nichols Publishing/ London: Kogan Page, 1980— E12.00/$30.00)

Michael Emery and Ted Curtis Smythe, eds. Readings in Mass Communication (Dubuque, Iowa: Wm. C. Brown, 1980—price not given, paper)

Benjamin M. Compaine's A New Framework for the Media Arena: Content, Process and Format (address above—$23.40)

Rick D. Pullen's Mass Media Law in California (Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/Hunt, 1979 —$9.50, paper)

Marshall McLuhan, Kathryn Hutchon and Eric McLuhan's Media, Messages and Language: The World as Your Classroom (Skokie, Ill.: National Textbook Co., l980—price not given, paper)

Mieke Ceulemans and Guido Fauconnier's Mass Media: The Image, Role and Social Conditions of Women–A Collection and Analysis of Research Materials (Paris: Unesco/New York: Unipub, 1979—price not given, paper)

Managers' Entertainers' and Agents' Book by Walter E. Hurst (revised ed. of No. 6 in the series, 92 pp.)

How to Be a Music Publisher by Walter E. Hurst (revised ed. of No. 11 in the series, 74 pp.)

Copyright Registration Forms PA and SR by Walter E. Hurst (this is a new title, No. 16 in the series, 73 pp.)

How to Sell Your Song by Walter E. Hurst and Don Rico (this is another revision , No. 18 in the series, 95 pp.)     

Sale and value of radio stations

Appraisal of a broadcasting station for the purpose of sale is an activity involving considerable risk and even more guesswork. It is very hard to determine value, particularly when the purchase price is determined more by intangible assets and prospects than real property, and a cursory examination of the public record of the purchase price yields insufficient information about these prospects, assets and attributes.

Most of the important information desirable is available, however, in the public records of the Federal Communications Commission, on file in Washington. Obtaining the desired information from these records requires considerable effort, from first finding out just what is available and then performing the time‐consuming task of abstracting from the records. In this activity, knowledge of FCC procedures is a valuable asset. In the report that follows, data were gathered by Dr. Walter B. Emery, former FCC staff member and presently Professor in the Television and Radio Department of Michigan State University, while spending much of the summer of 1960 at the FCC under a research grant from Michigan State University. The correlational analyses and composition of the report were conducted by Dr. Paul J. Deutschmann, Director of the Communications Research Center at Michigan State University.     

I Will Not Fail: How African American Preservice Teachers Succeed on Licensure Exams After Initially Failing

Research indicates that preservice teachers who pass professional readiness exams through multiple retakes are less likely to pass content area exams. This qualitative study focused on three African American preservice teachers whose success cuts against this trend. Findings revealed participants engaged in targeted preparation, used a range of unconventional and test wiseness strategies, sought information and resources from their advice networks, and strategized for optimal test space and time between failing and passing the exam.     

Winter is Coming: Forecasting the Impact of edTPA on Black Teachers and Teachers of Color

This article traces how high-stakes teacher exams have shaped the career entry opportunities for Black teachers and makes recommendations for the emerging era of high-stakes performances exams brought about by the edTPA. We begin our analysis in the 1980s and the testing for competencies movement during which scholars critiqued the rising use of high-stakes standardized licensure exams as gatekeepers into teacher education programs. Although the most severe predictions from this crisis moment did not come to fruition, we ask what it can tell us today about exams like the edTPA and how it may impact Black teachers. We outline three findings from the emerging edTPA scholarship in response to this question: (1) mixed and alarming results from edTPA racial bias reviews, (2) institutional resources and unequal distribution, and (3) how the exam may constrain or permit justice. We make recommendations for teacher education programs and for scholars conducting research at the intersection of edTPA and racial bias.