The internal restlessness scale: performance of college students with and without ADHD

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) was previously believed to be a disorder of childhood, with symptoms attenuating at the onset of puberty. Follow-up studies, however, suggest that the majority of children with ADHD continue to manifest symptoms into adulthood. Although the inattention components associated with ADHD persist into adulthood, the nature of the hyperactivity component is less well understood. For example, according to criteria established by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition, hyperactivity in adolescents and adults may be limited to subjective feelings of restlessness. Recent studies with adults with ADHD have also reported that mental restlessness is commonly reported by individuals with the disorder. To better understand this characteristic of ADHD, the Internal Restlessness Scale (IRS) was developed. The results of the IRS suggest that (a) college students with ADHD report significantly higher ratings of internal restlessness than college students without ADHD, and (b) the IRS appears to have adequate test-retest reliability and a four-factor structure. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

Immigrant and nonimmigrant children's social interactions and peer responses in mainstream preschool classrooms

The authors examined the social practices and outcomes of 23 immigrant and 16 nonimmigrant preschoolers in English only preschool classrooms. In both classrooms, the majority of the children (nearly two thirds) were immigrant, English language learners. The children's social attempts, social strategies, speech functions, and degree of social success were observed and comparisons were made between nonimmigrant and immigrant peers. There were similarities between groups in their social engagement and social construction strategies; there were differences in social roles, social language functions, and types of social construction strategies. There also were significant differences in the social success of the two groups. Immigrant children experienced rejection of their social bids more than their preschool peers did. Immigrant children also were less likely to be leaders and seemed positioned in a lower social status among their peers did. These results are discussed along with implications for educational practices.     

Modeling and Measuring High School Students’ Computational Thinking Practices in Science

Journal of Science Education and Technology - Despite STEM education communities recognizing the importance of integrating computational thinking (CT) into high school curricula, computation still...     

Walking the walk and the impact of space and place on new media art

This paper looks at the implications of the loss of site illustrated by three diverse, site-specific new media art case studies: Taking Pictures by Janet Cardiff, Rio Videowall by Dara Birnbaum, and net.flag by Mark Napier. Focus will be placed on the challenges to permanence of new media art by exploring the impact of the expansion of the Saint Louis Art Museum and changes to geography of the surrounding park on Taking Pictures. The preservation of Taking Pictures is considered in the context of the other two case studies in terms of physical site-specificity vs. mediated site-specificity. The impact of new media technology, artist intent, and participant's interactions are considered in terms of the functionality, viability, and preservation of site-specific new media art.     

Active Families in the Great Outdoors: a program to promote family outdoor physical activity

This study evaluated a 4-week program to increase the time families spent engaging in outdoor activity. Parents were provided strategies to increase family outdoor activity and locations to be active. Sixteen families completed the program. Duration and number of family outdoor activity bouts per week, type of activities, locations, and family member attendance were measured using logs. Pre/post surveys were conducted to determine the usefulness of providing educational resources and maps. Compared to baseline (216.1±127.3 min/week), family outdoor activity for weeks 1 (316.1±180.2 min/week), 2 (351.1±209.1 min/week), and 4 (317.5±186.8 min/week) were significantly greater at follow-up. At follow-up, parents reported increased regular exercise and encouragement for their child to be active. Children reported adults engaged in physical activity with them and increased transportation to places to be active. This novel program increased family outdoor activity levels and contributes to limited research on strategies to increase outdoor activity in youth.     

Using evaluation in the development of open learning for YTS

In this article Lorna Unwin (School of Education, Open University), Hillary Read (Project Manager, Oxfordshire Programme for Training, Instruction and Supervision), and Ian Haffenden (Surrey University) describe the development of a national project seeking to create flexible open learning strategies in the two‐year Youth Training Schemes, incorporating evaluation at each stage. An account of the way in which participative workshops have been run with practitioners demonstrates how the user can act as evaluator and directly influence the outcomes of the project. In this way, a structured evaluation strategy is shown to play a crucial part in the development of open learning approaches linked to the needs expressed by the learners.     

Research in Sport Management: A Vital Rung of This New Corporate Ladder

As sport assumes greater importance in American society, research specific to the problems of this industry becomes increasingly vital. This paper reviews the current state of research in sport management. Further, four areas for future study are suggested (depending on the variables used): subordinate-related, superior-related, organization-related, and environment-related. Research topics and issues specific to each of these four areas are offered.     

Developing and evaluating instructionally sensitive assessments in science

The purpose of this article is to address a major gap in the instructional sensitivity literature on how to develop instructionally sensitive assessments. We propose an approach to developing and evaluating instructionally sensitive assessments in science and test this approach with one elementary life‐science module. The assessment we developed was administered to 125 students in seven classrooms. The development approach considered three dimensions of instructional sensitivity; that is, assessment items should: represent the curriculum content, reflect the quality of instruction, and have formative value for teaching. Focusing solely on the first dimension, representation of the curriculum content, this study was guided by the following research questions: (1) What science module characteristics can be systematically manipulated to develop items that prove to be instructionally sensitive? and (2) Are the instructionally sensitive assessments developed sufficiently valid to make inferences about the impact of instruction on students' performance? In this article, we describe our item development approach and provide empirical evidence to support validity arguments about the developed instructionally sensitive items. Results indicated that: (1) manipulations of the items at different proximities to vary their sensitivity were aligned with the rules for item development and also corresponded with pre‐to‐post gains; and (2) the items developed at different distances from the science module showed a pattern of pre‐to‐post gain consistent with their instructional sensitivity, that is, the closer the items were to the science module, the larger the observed gains and effect sizes. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 49: 691–712, 2012