The relationship between bilingual proficiency and self-esteem

Proposing that bilingual proficiency should produce a more favorable attitude toward bilingualism and should enhance one's self-esteem, the authors compared 57 bilingual and 67 unilingual students from grades 9, 10, and 11, measuring their opinions about bilingualism and their self-esteem. The bilingual students are substantially more favorably disposed toward bilingualism than the unilingual students are. On the Janis-Field scale of self-esteem, the bilingual students show greater self-esteem than the unilingual students. The largest differences between the groups are on questions that measure self-confidence and social ease; differences are less pronounced on questions about self-worth and about shyness. We speculate that bilingual proficiency offers some psychological advantages to students who achieve it.     

The library's role in the continuing education of health professionals

Health sciences librarians have historically viewed disseminating information to health professionals as a major role. Typically, they have provided individualized services and are among the professions that help health professionals further their education after finishing formal education. Another group directly involved in health professional continuing education is continuing education (CE) providers who offer ongoing learning through group activities. These two professions often reached the same audiences in the past, and their different approaches--individual and group--were complementary. Health professionals who needed information immediately or who wished individual learning used the library while those who wanted to hear eminent colleagues tended to use CE meetings or seminars; some did both. The librarians and CE providers rarely interacted, but this is now changing. With the introduction of personal computers, medical librarians have expanded their responsibilities to include formalized classroom instruction. At the same time, CE providers have increased their scope beyond formalized group instruction into individualized education. Librarians and CE providers can either collaborate and share their expertise or they can compete against each other.     

Piagetian structuralism and learning: Reflections on two decades of educational application

In light of salient measurement and evaluation issues a content analysis approach was chosen to assess the value and problem of applying Piagetian theory to early childhood education. Focal changes in implementation were analyzed with emphasis upon the so-called unique contributions of the theory to teaching goals, beliefs, understandings, and practices. Structuralism was compared favorably with learning theory in providing a conceptual basis for educational application. The inherently dialectical nature of Piaget's views of knowledge presents an intuitively appealing albeit conceptually and methodologically abstract approach to educational innovation. It was concluded that applying Piagetian theory to education, in agreement with these special developmental dynamics, involves an interactively changing theory and data base as teachers and children develop over time.     

Children’s reactions to failure: Implications for education

European Journal of Psychology of Education -