The visual motor integration test: High interjudge reliability,high potential for diagnostic error

Extending Pryzwansky's (1977) work on the Developmental Test of Visual Motor Integration (VMI), this paper investigated scoring agreement among three levels of increasingly better trained VMI diagnosticians. Correlational data demonstrated high interexaminer reliabilities (.92, .93, and .98) between groups of Consumers (Special Education undergraduates), Experts (doctoral Psychology students), and Consensus-Judges (experienced school psychologists) in their scoring of 39 subject protocols. However, gross errors in precision were discovered after the raw scores had been converted into the VMI age equivalent scores: fully 56% of the assigned age equivalent scores resulted in discrepancies of at least one year of age. These findings indicate that, despite high interexaminer reliabilities, great caution must be exercised when children are evaluated or placed by virtue of their age equivalent scores.     

Interactions of black inner-city mothers with their newborn infants.

Interactions of 45 black inner-city mothers with their healthy full-term newborn infants were observed during a bottle-feeding on the third day after birth. An exhaustive catalog of some 100 mother and infant behaviors was used to describe objectively the interactions of mothers and infants. In addition to being observed with their mothers, infants were examined with the Rosenblith scale. The infants' birth weights, birth order, and sex and maternal medication were found to affect the infants' behaviors and/or the patterns of mother-infant interactions.     

Implementation of the Peer-Led Team-Learning Instructional Model as a Stopgap Measure Improves Student Achievement for Students Opting Out of Laboratory

In entry-level university courses in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics fields, students participating in associated laboratory sessions generally do better than those who have no related lab classes. This is a problem when, for various reasons, not enough lab sections can be offered for students and/or when students opt out of optional available lab courses. Faced with such a situation, this study evaluated the efficacy of the peer-led team-learning (PLTL) instructional model as a potential method for narrowing the achievement gap among undergraduate students electing not to enroll in an optional laboratory component of an introductory biology course. In peer-led workshops, small groups of students participated in solving problems and other activities that encouraged active learning. Students led by peer leaders attained significantly higher exam and final course grades in introductory biology than comparable students not participating in PLTL. Among the introductory biology students who opted not to enroll in the optional lab course, those who participated in PLTL averaged more than a letter grade higher than those who did not. This difference was statistically significant, and the PLTL workshops almost entirely closed the achievement gap in lecture exam and final grades for students who did not take the lab.     

数独世界冠军专栏

正三届数独世界冠军托马斯·辛德(Thomas Snyder)为《大学生》读者们专门设计数独题。辛德曾三次获得数独世界冠军,五次夺得美国数独冠军,他的专业是化学,本科毕业于加州理工学院,在哈佛大学取得博士学位,现是斯坦福大学生物工程学助理研究员。辛德爱好数独,用艺术手法设计数独题。请看题:     

数独世界冠军专栏

正三届数独世界冠军托马斯·辛德(Thomas Snyder)为《大学生》读者们专门设计数独题。辛德曾三次获得数独世界冠军,五次夺得美国数独冠军,他的专业是化学,本科毕业于加州理工学院,在哈佛大学取得博士学位,现是斯坦福大学生物工程学助理研究员。     

STEM Career Changers’ Transformation into Science Teachers

This study examines the transformation (professional growth) of career-changing women scientists who decided to become teachers. Drawing upon Mezirow’s Transformative Learning Theory, we tracked their transformation for 3 years. Our findings revealed multiple identities, disorientation, a perceived sense of meaninglessness, loss and eventual regain in confidence, gain in pedagogical knowledge and skill, and changed perceptions of the social roles of science teachers and scientists. Driven by personal choice or need (financial, intellectual), such transformations were achieved through active pursuit of meaning in one’s work, critical assessment of assumptions, planning, and trying on the unfamiliar role of a science teacher. It is argued that such transition entails complex changes in thinking about science teaching and identifying oneself as a science teacher.     

Foreign and International Media

Ion Trewin's The Professions: Journalism (North Pomfret, Vt.: David & Charles, 1976—$9.95)

Charles Husband (ed.) White Media and Black Britain: A Critical Look at the Role of the Media in Race Relations Today (London: Arrow Books, Ltd., 1975—about $3.50, paper)

Peter Douglas' Television Today (London: Osprey Publishing, 1975—about $9.00)

Louis L. Snyder's Encyclopedia of the Third Reich (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1976—$24.95)

Leo Bogart's Premises for Propaganda: The United States Information Agency's Operating Assumptions in the ColdWar (New York: Free Press, 1976—$12.95)

Marcellus S. Snow's International Commercial Satellite Communications: Economic and Political Issues of the First Decade of Intelsat (New York: Praeger Special Studies, 1976—$16.50)

Charles Sherman and Donald Browne (eds) Broadcast Monographs No. 2: Issues in International Broadcasting (BEA, 1771 N. St. NW, Washington D.C. 20036—$5.00, with a $4.00 price to BEA members, paper)

Access: Technology and Access to Communications Media by B.R. Webster (54 pp., $2.65, paper)

Towards Realistic Communication Policies: Recent Trends and Ideas Compiled and Analysed by John A.R. Lee (59 pp., $2.65, paper)

Mehra Masani, Broadcasting and the People (179 pp., Rs 10.25, paper)

Narayana Menon, The Communications Revolution (89 pp., Rs 5.75, paper)     

Are they paying attention? Students’ lack of motivation and attention potentially threaten the utility of course evaluations

Student evaluations are a common source of information used by instructors and administrators, but their utility depends on students’ motivation and attention. This paper presents evidence from two studies indicating that insufficient effort responding and lack of motivation may be problems in course evaluations. In the first study, approximately one in four students responded in an improbable way to ‘catch items’ embedded in actual course evaluation instruments, suggesting a lack of attention. In the second study, students’ responses to an online survey indicated that they doubted that their responses to course evaluations would be used by instructors or administrators. The majority of students admitted to only occasionally putting sufficient effort into their responses. Potential means for identifying insufficient effort responding and mechanisms for increasing student attention and motivation during the course evaluation process are discussed.