东亚五大城市幼儿园教师工资待遇比较分析

分析深圳、香港、首尔、东京和新加坡五大东亚城市幼儿园教师的工资待遇发现:(1)香港幼儿园教师的工资架构最简单,很难客观反映教师的实际工作表现;深圳和首尔的工资架构最具全面和综合性;东京和新加坡的工资架构相对全面、均衡.(2)东京幼儿园教师的工资水平最高,首尔、香港、深圳随后,新加坡的工资水平最低.(3)从食物购买力角度考察,东京幼儿园教师的实际购买力最强,香港第二,首尔和深圳随后,新加坡最弱.(4)从租房能力角度考察,东京幼儿园教师的实际购买力最强,首尔和深圳随后,香港倒数第二,新加坡倒数第一.针对香港和新加坡幼儿园教师工资待遇偏低问题,研究者建议当地政府进一步完善幼儿园教师工资架构,考虑发放住房、交通、子女教育等津贴,以切实解决幼儿园教师的生活困难,吸引更多优秀人才从事幼儿教育工作.     

Formal Teacher Competence and its Effect on Pupil Reading Achievement

The main aim of this study was to investigate the impact of formal teacher competence on pupils' reading achievement. The data comes from the Swedish participation in PIRLS 2001 in grade 3. Information was obtained from pupils (n = 5271) and teachers (n = 351). The analyses were conducted using 2-level structural equation modeling. Teacher competence was operationalized with multiple observed indicators and defined as a latent variable. Two measures of achievement were used: PIRLS 2001 reading test results and teacher judgement of pupil performance in the Swedish language. The results reveal that teacher competence was positively and similarly related to both achievement measures. No selection effects in terms of pupil socioeconomic status were found. The current study provides evidence for a strong impact of teacher competence on pupil reading achievement.     

The Intercultural Dimension in EFL‐Teaching: A Study of Conceptions Among Finland‐Swedish Comprehensive School Teachers

The overall aim of this study is to deepen our knowledge about the attitudes of teachers at the upper level of the Finland‐Swedish comprehensive school towards the treatment of culture in English foreign language (EFL) teaching. More specifically, the questions are how teachers interpret the concept “culture” in English foreign language teaching, how the cultural objectives are specified and what teachers do to attain these objectives. The study strives to reveal whether or not language teaching today can be described as intercultural in the sense that culture is taught with the aim of promoting intercultural understanding, tolerance and empathy. The empirical data consists of verbatim transcribed interviews with 13 Finland‐Swedish teachers of English at grades 7–9. The findings are presented according to three orientations. Within the cognitive orientation, “culture” is perceived as factual knowledge and the teaching of culture is defined in terms of the transmission of facts. The action‐related orientation sees “culture” as skills of a social and socio‐linguistic nature and the teaching aims at preparing students for future intercultural encounters. Within the affective orientation, “culture” is seen as a bi‐directional perspective. Students are encouraged to look at their own familiar culture from another perspective and learn to empathise with and show respect for otherness in general, not just concerning representatives of English‐speaking countries.     

How Simple is the Simple View of Reading?

According to the Simple View of Reading, reading ability can be divided into decoding and language comprehension. In the present study, decoding and comprehension's contribution to reading ability was studied both in children with reading difficulties and in children with typical reading ability. Decoding and comprehension was further divided into sub-components, and the contribution from non-verbal ability and general processing speed was also studied. The results demonstrated that decoding made the largest contribution to reading ability for children with reading difficulties, while language comprehension contributed the most for children with typical reading ability. The contribution of non-verbal ability was not significant, and general processing speed only made a significant contribution to decoding for typical children. The two factors in the Simple View of Reading, decoding and comprehension, together explained less of the variance in reading ability for children with reading difficulties than for children with typical reading ability.     

Visitation to Natural Areas on Campus and its Relation to Place Identity and Environmentally Responsible Behaviors

This study examined college students’ visits to natural areas on campus and how these visits relate to place identity and environmentally responsible behaviors. The majority (76.5%) of the 115 participants visited the natural areas, and 55.7% of these students visited for a course requirement. Students who lived on campus, were younger, and majored in environmental studies, humanities, or arts made more frequent visits. Among those who had visited the natural areas (n = 88), place identity and environmental responsibility were related to visitation frequency, and were stronger for those who had visited for a course requirement. Place identity mediated the relationship between visiting for a course requirement and environmental behaviors, but did not mediate the impact of visitation frequency.     

The Use of ICT in Education: a survey of schools in Europe

The Survey of Schools: ICT in education commissioned in 2011 by the European Commission took place between January 2011 and November 2012, with data collection in autumn 2011. This article presents the main findings of the Survey based on over 190,000 questionnaire answers from students, teachers and head teachers in primary, lower and upper secondary schools randomly sampled. The article details the analytical framework design and the survey methodology implemented. It then presents the main ‘state of the art’ indicators that have been built, concerning ICT infrastructure and access to it, frequency of students' ICT based activities during lessons, level of teachers' and students' confidence in their digital competences, their opinion about using ICT for teaching and learning, and the school strategies to support ICT integration in teaching and learning. The article also presents the main findings of the exploratory part of the analysis, introducing the concepts of digitally supportive school, digitally confident and supportive teacher and digitally confident and supportive student, estimating their respective proportion at EU level on average and by country and investigating whether high percentage of digitally supportive schools include high percentages of digitally confident and positive teachers and students. A few recommendations for policy making at European, national, regional/local and institutional levels conclude the article.     

Sex education in Spain: the relevance of teachers’ training and attitudes / Educación sexual en España: importancia de la formación y las actitudes del profesorado

Abstract

This research has two main aims: a) the study of Spanish teachers’ training and attitudes towards sex education, as well as the delivery of this subject in classrooms, while also exploring the existence of differences according to personal and professional characteristics; and b) to examine the association between teachers’ training and attitudes, and the extent to which these variables predict the delivery of sex education. A total of 3,695 Infant, Primary, Secondary and High school teachers (66.1% women, 33.9% men) throughout the country completed a voluntary online questionnaire that inquired about their training and attitudes towards sex education, their delivery or non-delivery of this subject in classrooms, and other personal and professional characteristics. Analyses indicate that participants show positive attitudes towards sex education, but that 43.3% are not trained in this issue, and 48.6% do not teach it at school. Some significant differences by sex, educational stage and type of school have been found. In addition, trained teachers show more positive attitudes to sex education. Finally, having more positive attitudes and, to a lesser extent, having prior training, positively predicts the delivery of sex education. These results highlight the importance of reviewing and improving teachers’ training on sexuality and sex education, with particular emphasis on attitudinal contents.