Absence of girl images: the gender construct in personal and social education in Hong Kong

Education Ordinance 1971 in Hong Kong not only provided girls with a much greater chance of receiving education than had hitherto been the case, it also had the effect of incorporating them into the regulatory framework of the school system. This paper examines how the discourses of civic education and sex education before and after reunification with mainland China have interchanged the concept of gender with the biological sex in the construction of the girl. In particular, it argues that, in the name of maintaining the stability of society, the developmental path for girls has been limited in the discourses of sex, personal and social education. As a result, girls are only presumed to become women and take up their appropriate gender roles according to the social norms of contemporary Hong Kong.     

Young Children's Ability to Read and Spell Their Own and Classmates' Names: The Role of Letter Knowledge

Children's ability to read and spell their own and classmates' personal names in and out of context in Hebrew was studied. Preliterate children aged 4 to 6 years (N = 60) showed high knowledge of their own names but varied greatly in knowledge of others' names and emergent literacy skills. Reading and spelling of names was primarily related to letter knowledge rather than to phonemic awareness. Superior performance with initial over medial/final letters occurred despite no capitalization in Hebrew names. Names of two letters were read better than longer names, which were read equally well, indicating use of partial cues. These results bear on Ehri's (2005) phase theory. We speculate that informal learning of names is founded on letter knowledge plus exposure to names and is fueled by children's interest in names.     

Children's Frequency of Participation in Moderate to Vigorous Physical Activities

Abstract

Third and fourth grade boys (n = 422) and girls (n = 390) in four Texas elementary schools reported their participation in moderate to vigorous physical activities (MVPAs) over a 3-day period. Students were surveyed during class on successive days. On a subsample (n = 44), the agreement between reported and observed physical activities during physical education or recess was 86.3%. Running, walking fast, games and sports, and bicycling accounted for 70% of Total MVPAs. Of Total MVPAs reported, 47.0% for boys and 44.6% for girls were 10 min or longer in duration (LMVPA). The average number of LMVPAs per day was 1.7 for both boys and girls. Students reported significantly more occurrences of LMVPAs out of school than during school. Significant interaction between grade and gender indicated that third grade boys reported more Total MVPAs and LMVPAs than third grade girls, but fourth grade boys reported fewer Total MVPAs and LMVPAs than fourth grade girls. During the 3-day reporting period, 12.3% of boys and 13.3% of girls reported no LMVPAs, and 35.6% of boys and girls reported fewer than one LMVPAs per day. While the majority of children reported obtaining at least some activity daily, a substantial proportion of children in this sample reported fewer than one LMVPA daily, indicating that many children may not be obtaining adequate amounts of physical activity.     

Multifaceted Evaluation Criteria of Digital Libraries in Academic Settings: Similarities and Differences From Different Stakeholders

Digital library (DL) evaluation is essential to the success and enhancement of DLs. However, there is a lack of research on the assessment of comprehensive evaluation criteria across multiple dimensions of DLs. In particular, limited research is available on criteria prioritization to determine which criteria are perceived important by different stakeholders. This study was conducted to compare similarities and differences in perceptions of the importance of different DL evaluation criteria by heterogeneous stakeholders in academic settings. Ninety subjects were recruited with 30 from each of the group representing DL scholars, DL librarians, and DL users. Subjects were instructed to fill in an in-depth survey consisting of 10 evaluation dimensions with 94 criteria. ANOVA and t-test were applied to examine the similarities and differences among the three groups. This study reveals consensus and divergence in perceptions of criteria importance among the three groups, and indicates an inherent tension among the stakeholders. Moreover, the differences identify gaps not only between user expectations and the DL practice but also between what's desirable and what's possible in the academic environment. The findings provide a comprehensive list of criteria to guide practical evaluation of DLs, and contribute to the narrowing of the identified gaps.     

Extending Learning Communities: New Technologies,Multiple Literacies,and Culture Blind Pedagogies

Technologies such as videoconferencing used for distance education are creating ways for high schools to extend their learning communities to connect youth with professional communities of practice in ways that approximate the face-to-face interactions in traditional classrooms. These technologies are often touted as a way to augment course offerings and curricula, particularly those needed for college-going. The use of videoconferencing technologies alone, however, does not ensure that the desired forms of interaction will occur particularly given their reliance on traditional banking-model pedagogies and literacies. In this article, we focus on college bound Black and Latino/a youth from under resourced urban communities and their negotiations of new technologies, multiple literacies, and traditional pedagogies within a music education learning community extended through videoconferencing technologies. Employing a multicultural feminist critical theoretical framework, we unearth the ways Black and Latino/a youths identities as active learners and college-bound musicians shape, and are shaped, in the interplay of new technologies, multiple literacies, and traditional pedagogies within a music education classroom.     

Children’s and Adolescents’ Specific Interest in Science and Technology,Participation in Out-of-School Activities and Inclination to Become Scientists

Journal of Science Education and Technology - Recently, the literature has repeatedly reported an interesting decrease in science and technology (S&T) among youngsters, and a drop of...     

Allowing course compensation in higher education: a latent class regression analysis to evaluate performance on a follow-up course

Abstract

In this study, the consequences of allowing course compensation in a higher education academic dismissal policy are evaluated by examining performance on a second-year follow-up (i.e. sequel) course that builds on material from a first-year precursor course. Up to now, differences in the consequences of compensation on student performance across groups of students who portray different unobserved study processes were not considered. In this study we used a latent class regression model to distinguish latent groups of students. Data from two undergraduate curricula were used and latent classes were formed based on similar patterns in averages, variability in grades, the number of compensated courses, and the number of retakes in the first year. Results show that students can be distinguished by three latent classes. Although the first-year precursor course is compensated in each of these latent classes, low performance on the precursor course results in low performance on the second-year sequel course for psychology students who belong to a class in which the average across first-year courses is low and the average number of compensated courses and retakes are high. For these students, compensation on a precursor course seems more likely to relate to insufficient performance on a sequel course.     

Can professional development make the vision of the standards a reality? The impact of the national science foundation's local systemic change through teacher enhancement initiative

Professional development is seen as one of the major levers for aligning science instruction in the USA with the vision put forth by national standards documents. Although there is a growing consensus regarding what constitutes effective professional development, there is little empirical evidence to support this consensus. This study examines the impact of professional development that is content‐based, situated in classroom practice, and sustained over time on teacher attitudes, perceptions of preparedness, and classroom practices. It utilizes longitudinal data from the National Science Foundation's Local Systemic Change through Teacher Enhancement Initiative (LSC), collected from 42 projects over a span of 7 years. The professional development model used in the LSCs differed from previous initiatives in that it targeted all teachers in a jurisdiction and emphasized preparing teachers to implement project‐designated instructional materials. Analyses of the data provide evidence that this model for professional development has an impact on teachers and their classroom practices. In addition, the analyses found that teachers' perception of principal support for Standards‐based science instruction is an important predictor of these outcomes. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 44: 375–395, 2007