Educational Achievement of Immigrant Adolescents in Spain: Do Gender and Region of Origin Matter?

This study explores the educational achievement of immigrant youth in Spain employing data from 3 waves of the Longitudinal Study of Families and Childhood (Pànel de Famílies i Infància), a representative sample of children in Catalonia first interviewed at ages 13-16 in 2006 (N = 2,710). Results suggest consistent disadvantage in achievement among first-generation students. Differences in achievement between the second and third generations are apparent in bivariate analyses, but are explained by observable characteristics in multivariate analyses. Gender-specific analyses uncover a large achievement gap between first-generation girls and their third-generation counterparts, but no equivalent gap for boys. Region-of-origin differences are modest, with the exception of Latin American adolescents who exhibit the lowest educational outcomes. The significance of perceptions about school on achievement are discussed.     

Student Decision-Making about a Globally Familiar Socioscientific Issue: The value of sharing and comparing views with international counterparts

This paper focuses on the views of 16–17-year-old science students from England, Germany, Hong Kong and Sweden on whale hunting, and their perceptions of the views of their international counterparts. The students were all provided with the same decision-making task, discussed the issue in small groups and then presented their views on video, which were shared with their counterparts. The findings show that the decision-making task served to deepen and modify students' views across all nationalities, and the students generally valued and learned from the sharing of views with students of the same age from around the world. However, an important discovery was that the German students' opinions often ran counter to those from the other 3 locations, and the paper cautions against making broad-sweeping generalisations about students' views on socioscientific issues.     

English,French and German summaries of major articles in this issue

Science has a role to play in the resolution of many of the issues deemed controversial in all societies. However, evidence of a lack of public confidence in science and scientists as effective problem‐solvers continues to accumulate. This paper speculates that this lack of confidence might in part be due to the way in which science educators present controversial issues. In particular, we argue that current approaches to teaching about controversy do not sufficiently acknowledge the nature of the issues themselves. The paper proposes a set of principles as the basis for a reconceptualization of the teaching of controversial issues and gives an example of how they might be applied.     

Relations Among Two Teachers’ Practices and Beliefs,Conceptualizations of the Nature of Science,and their Implementation of Student Independent Inquiry Projects

In this study we sought to understand factors that shaped teachers’ use of student inquiry projects. We examined, over 3 years, the practices and conceptions of two teachers involved in implementing student inquiry projects. Neither teacher was initially satisfied with her success at supporting student inquiry, but the two had very different responses to difficulties they faced. These responses related strongly to their ideas about how learning should be structured. There was less relation between their stated views about the nature of science and their use of inquiry than was expected. The teacher with espoused views about the nature of science generally in accord with reform documents did not support student inquiry projects that involved actual investigations. The teacher with views on the nature of science less aligned with reform documents worked hard to support student investigations in her classroom. Our findings support the claim that merely learning about the nature of science or about student inquiry may not generate changes in a teacher’s practice. On closer analysis, we found that the two teachers understood aspects of the nature of science from two quite different perspectives, the proximal and the distal. The proximal view of the nature of science was more closely aligned with implementation of actual student investigations. The efforts of these two teachers in implementing inquiry illustrate the dilemmas and challenges they faced as they attempted student inquiry projects.     

El desarrollo del lenguaje en un caso de carencias afectivas graves en la primera infancia

Resumen

Los datos lingüísticos fueron registrados mediante un vídeo en un contexto natural y habitual del niño. Se analiza el lenguaje desde los tres planos lingüísticos, sintáctico, semántico y pragmático. Además, para observar el nivel de desarrollo lingüístico, se comparó la producción del lenguaje del sujeto estudiado con la de otro niño cuyo desarrollo es adecuado.

Tras los resultados obtenidos del trabajo, se puede concluir que los factores externos, en los aspectos que están relacionados a pautas de cuidado y de interacción diádica adulto-niño, son fundamentales para la adecuada adquisición y desarrollo lingüístico y, además, la rehabilitación del mismo no es muy esperanzadora.     

Teaching and learning by videoconferencing at the University of Ulster

The Open University has developed an array of tutorial and advisory services for its students over 16 years. These have been reviewed regularly for their academic appropriateness and effectiveness. More recently, urgent reductions in services have taken place, in response to financial restraints. During 1985, Mary Thorpe and colleagues in the Student Research Centre, the Institute of Educational Technology conducted in‐depth interviews with students and staff to explore their perceptions of studying with the Open University.     

Reflections on Allen and West’s paper: ‘Religious schools in London: school admissions,religious composition and selectivity’

This paper is a reflection upon the research findings of Rebecca Allen and Anne West in relation to religious schools in London. While welcoming this contribution to the systematic study of faith schools (a neglected area of empirical inquiry), the paper argues that the use of ‘religious schools’ as a unitary category is problematic for the analysis. It also suggests that certain historical and cultural contextual knowledge is required when analysing the characteristics of different categories of religious schools. This response is intended to be helpful for future researchers into the different types of faith school.     

THE ROLE OF EDUCATION IN A PROGRAM TO TREAT DEPRESSION IN OLDER WOMEN

This article reports on the crucial role of education in the Social Health Outreach Program (SHOP), a social network intervention designed to treat clinically depressed older women. The role of education in current psychological and medical therapies for depression is discussed, as is the educator's view that education is interventionist by nature and indispensable in transformative programs that aim to strengthen personal, economic, and social resources. The evolution of the role of education in SHOP'S social therapy is outlined, and its modalities—information‐sharing, skills training, and intellectual stimulation—are described. We show how, as a result of participant demand, the educational content of SHOP has gradually expanded during the program's four‐year history. We point out that, in SHOP, education functions as a tool for perspective transformation, during which participants are sensitized to “blame‐the‐victim” biases inherent in psychological and medical approaches to treating depression. Participants learn they are not the problem; rather, they suffer from a role‐determined, social identity deficit. SHOP'S current format is described, and the program is recommended to adult educators for use in a variety of settings. We conclude that, though not therapeutic in and of itself, education acts as an “enabling tool,” playing a crucial role in implementing SHOP'S social‐change therapy.