Marijuana Use in Suburban Schools Among Students With Learning Disabilities

Although much research exists on adolescent marijuana use, few studies have examined marijuana use in school settings. Students experiencing academic and social difficulties at school, such as those receiving special education services, may be more at risk for school-related substance use. Nevertheless, virtually no research has examined this problem. This study assessed the prevalence of marijuana use at school and the perceived availability and consequences of using marijuana in school among students with learning disabilities. The results showed that 15 percent of students reported using marijuana at school, and that marijuana was easily obtained. Most students perceived marijuana to be harmful to their schoolwork, and many non-users felt unsafe and angry when drugs were present at school.     

Web design and learning in agri-environmental education: A UK case-study

Abstract

The development of websites was traditionally an occupation for those that possessed an in-depth knowledge of computer systems and programming languages. The advent of ‘user-friendly’ web development software in recent years has made this process less select. The Environmental Challenges in Farm Management project is an educational website developed by a team of non-web specialists both for third-level education and the agricultural community. This paper outlines the design, development and use of the site, and makes recommendations to those new to the task of putting web-based learning on-line, based on the experience gained during the project.     

Metacognition and control of study choice in children

Middle childhood may be crucial for the development of metacognitive monitoring and study control processes. The first three experiments, using different materials, showed that Grade 3 and Grade 5 children exhibited excellent metacognitive resolution when asked to make delayed judgments of learning (JOLs, using an analogue scale) or binary judgments of knowing (JOKs, ‘know’ or ‘don’t know’) without the target being present. (The delayed method used here also results in excellent metacognitive resolution in adults). In three subsequent experiments after making JOLs the children were asked to choose which items they would like to restudy to optimize learning. We then either honored or dishonored the children’s restudy choices, and tested their memory performance. In Experiment 4, honoring the children’s choices made no difference to final recall performance. Experiments 5 and 6 showed that when the computer, rather than the children, chose the items for restudy based on theoretical constraints proposed by the Region of Proximal Learning model of study time allocation, the children’s recall performance improved. In all three experiments, Grade 3 children’s choices were random. Whereas the Grade 5 children showed some indication of a metacognitively guided strategy of choosing the lowest JOL items for study, it did not, consistently, improve performance. Apparently, accurate metacognitive monitoring is largely in place in middle childhood, but is not yet converted into effective implementation strategies. This dissociation between metaknowledge and its implementation in choice behavior needs to be taken into account by educators aiming to design interventions to enhance learning in children at this age.     

Collaborative knowledge construction in digital environments: Politics, policy, and communities

How individuals share information with respect to politics and policy in networked research environments is an area ripe for interdisciplinary study. In this analysis, I explore some of the more current and salient research findings from several disciplinary literatures (communications, computer science, organizational behavior, information science, and public policy) to examine how current research perceives the influence of technology-aided communications on policy-making conversations. I suggest that a community-centric view, which takes into account online and offline group affiliations and their related power dynamics, is just as important as an individual-based unit of analysis. This understanding points to directions for the thoughtful creation of digital resources that appropriately reflect and support inter- and intra-group knowledge-sharing behavior.     

To refer or not to refer: Evaluation for special education

The authors are with the School of Education, University of Alabama, Birmingham, AL.     

Valuing the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

Over recent years the Canadian government has struggled to determine how muchmoney should be spent on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), itspublic service broadcaster. At the same time, regulators and CBC managementhave struggled with what types of programming services it should provide.Traditionally, the citizen's role in public broadcasting decision making hasbeen limited to an occasional submission at a hearing or a response to apublic opinion survey. However, willingness-to-pay stated preference choiceexperiments could be an effective, low cost means of obtaining more detailedcitizen's input. Here, we report findings from a national survey of Canadianhouseholds in which contingent valuation and choice experiment data are usedto estimate use and non-use values of the various programming servicesprovided by the CBC. The results are used to address policy and programmingissues facing the organization.     

English and the Knowledge Economy: A Critical Analysis

This article focuses on knowledge economy discourse and considers the appeal of this discourse to English educators. Knowledge economy discourse is defined as a mode of thought and expression that assumes a broad-based economy driven by innovation will soon emerge in the USA. This discourse, it is argued, offers English teachers solutions to some of the problems they face in an age of testing and economic turmoil. Specifically, the discourse offers ways of imagining and justifying lessons that reject standardisation in favour of innovation and inquiry. Because the economy anticipated in the discourse is unlikely to arrive, however, teachers might abandon knowledge economy discourse in favour of discourses that offer more practical and more effective ways of addressing socio-economic contradictions.