What's Gender Got To Do With It? Teachers' Perceptions Of Situation Severity And Requests For Assistance

There is currently a gap in the consultation literature related to how teacher and student gender may affect teacher perceptions of and responses to student behavior. In this study, 147 preservice and practicing teachers were presented with four “gender-neutral” student-centered problems in the form of short vignettes in which the gender of the student was rotated. Respondents rated these vignettes on problem severity, likelihood of seeking assistance, and from whom they would seek assistance. Data were analyzed by teacher status (preservice or practicing), teacher gender, and student gender. Results suggest teachers typically did not make different decisions based on student gender. However, female teachers often rated student situations as more severe than their male colleagues, with some differences between practicing and preservice teachers. The potential implication of this and related findings for the process of consultation are highlighted.     

Broadening Conceptions of Curriculum for Young People: Reports from three student-teachers on exchange

Research reports prepared by three Australian preservice teachers--Paula Shaw, Chris Sharp and Scott McDonald--undertaking their teacher education practicum in Canada, form the basis of this paper. The reports provide critical insights into three aspects of education for young people in both Canada and Australia. They also provide critical insight into the ways in which a practicum research project, along with the opportunities afforded through an international experience, enabled the preservice teachers to broaden their understanding of the curriculum for young people, of issues relevant to the diverse needs of young people, and of themselves and their priorities as teachers. The preservice teachers investigated three topics: attempts to reduce homophobia in schools; the presence or absence of Aboriginal content in the school curricula in British Columbia and Queensland; and "schools-within-schools" as a means to meet the needs of diverse student populations. Linda Farr Darling from the University of British Columbia provides a response to the three reports.     

Beyond the Screen: Narrative Mapping as a Tool for Evaluating a Mixed-Reality Science Museum Exhibit

This article describes the authors' work as formative evaluators of a mixed-reality science museum installation, Journey with Sea Creatures. Looking beyond the focal point of the screen to the spatial and temporal surroundings of the exhibit, the authors employed a technique they call retrospective narrative mapping in conjunction with sustained on-site observations, follow-up interviews with museum visitors, and the development of personas to better understand the user experience in multimodal informal learning environments.     

SIRIUS Academics: A Multidimensional Initiative to Improve Student Retention and Success

SIRIUS Academics is a partnership of educators, technical experts, and corporate sponsors assembled to produce a highly interactive textbook replacement model for use in all course delivery modes. The model promotes student retention and success by integrating learning and motivation research, embedded assessments, and enriched multimedia content for student engagement.     

Differences in educational outcomes of African American students from different socioeconomic backgrounds

This research tested a structural equation model of educational outcomes for three socioeconomic status (SES) groups of African American students enrolled in a community college. The structural model, which was based on a variant of Tinto's (1987) model, contained two exogenous constructs, educational intentions/commitment and external commitments, and three endogenous constructs, academic integration, social integration, and educational outcomes. The study demonstrated that higher levels of academic and social engagement had positive direct effects on educational outcomes for all students regardless of SES background. Other paths that were supported included the positive direct effects of educational intentions/commitment on academic and social integration and the negative impact of external commitments on social integration. Significant structural differences were not present in the measurement of model constructs or the process of educational outcomes among lowest, lower to middle, and middle to upper SES groups.     

Effect of the number of scale points on chi‐square fit indices in confirmatory factor analysis

This article investigates the effect of the number of item response categories on chi‐square statistics for confirmatory factor analysis to assess whether a greater number of categories increases the likelihood of identifying spurious factors, as previous research had concluded. Four types of continuous single‐factor data were simulated for a 20‐item test: (a) uniform for all items, (b) symmetric unimodal for all items, (c) negatively skewed for all items, or (d) negatively skewed for 10 items and positively skewed for 10 items. For each of the 4 types of distributions, item responses were divided to yield item scores with 2,4, or 6 categories. The results indicated that the chi‐square statistic for evaluating a single‐factor model was most inflated (suggesting spurious factors) for 2‐category responses and became less inflated as the number of categories increased. However, the Satorra‐Bentler scaled chi‐square tended not to be inflated even for 2‐category responses, except if the continuous item data had both negatively and positively skewed distributions.     

Great Business Training is Just Enough,Just in Time,and Just for Me

Retrenchment practices in the 1980s represented a new challenge to institutions of higher education. The literature encompassing higher education within the past 10 years has revealed limited information concerning retrenchment policies in public community colleges in Texas. This study investigated the presence or absence of retrenchment policies and their relation to fluctuations in enrollment and state funding. All 49 public community‐junior college districts in the state of Texas were included in the study. Twenty (41%) of these community colleges had a retrenchment policy. This study indicated that administrative decisions regarding the development and adoption of retrenchment policies are based on state revenue declines as opposed to enrollment fluctuations.     

Changes in Understandings of Three Teachers' Beliefs and Practice Across Time: Moving From Teacher Preparation to In-Service Teaching

Beliefs often guide a teacher's decision-making, thinking, and practice in the classroom (Vartuli, 2005 Vartuli, S. 2005. Beliefs: The heart of teaching. Young Children, 60: 76–86.  [Google Scholar]). There is limited longitudinal research on how early childhood preservice teachers develop new knowledge about their beliefs as they transition into in-service teaching positions (Joram & Gabriele, 1998 Joram, E. and Gabriele, A. J. 1998. Preservice teachers' prior beliefs: Transforming obstacles into opportunities. Teaching and Teacher Education, 14: 175–191. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). Across 4 years that encompassed a series of three studies, this article chronicles three teachers' understandings of how their beliefs and practices were interrelated and informed by one another. Preservice teachers were interviewed and completed written reflections as they moved from under the umbrella of an undergraduate early childhood teacher preparation program into classrooms as in-service teachers. Findings reveal (a) how the preservice teachers' beliefs were initially unstable and nascent during Study One, (b) how a transactional nature between beliefs and practice began to emerge during Study Two, and (c) how, during Study Three, this relational exchange contributed to an increase in deliberate action as in-service teachers. Implications for early childhood teacher preparation programs include ensuring opportunities for preservice teachers to use self-reflection and inquiry across a range of course and field experiences as they identify and make connections between beliefs and practice.