Math Shelf: A Randomized Trial of a Prekindergarten Tablet Number Sense Curriculum

Research Findings: Effective preschool mathematics instruction is especially important for low-income children. Previous research demonstrates that low-income children enter kindergarten behind their middle-income peers. They receive less mathematics support at home and from public preschools. The aim of this study was to test Math Shelf, a tablet intervention designed to improve at-risk preschoolers’ mathematics performance. A total of 100 children participated in a randomized controlled trial in a large urban Head Start center. Intervention students played Math Shelf on tablet computers for 6 weeks, whereas comparison students played the most downloaded and best reviewed preschool math apps on tablets for an equal amount of time. During game play, graduate student researchers supervised intervention and comparison students in separate rooms. Intervention and comparison groups did not differ on pretest assessments. Math Shelf students performed statistically significantly better (Cohen’s d = 0.57) than comparison students at posttest. Practice or Policy: Math Shelf results suggest that teachers can enhance low-income preschoolers’ mathematics knowledge in a relatively short amount of time by incorporating developmentally appropriate tablet interventions.     

Educational paradigms and engineering educators in South Africa

In this response to Waghid (2000) the authorsquestion the validity of conclusions reachedfrom an examination of the proceedings of anengineering education conference in SouthAfrica. The authors argue that these papersdo not represent the views of engineeringeducators in general. Furthermore they querythe way in which Waghid uses reference toteaching methods in these papers to deduce thetheoretical perspective of the presenters. Itis suggested that the views of the educatorsinvolved in this conference and others like itin South Africa, can be characterised asfalling within a broad interpretivist(constructivist) perspective. Finally, theauthors agree that an engagement with acritical perspective would contributesignificantly to the transformation of theculture of engineering education in SouthAfrica.     

Desperate Journeys

At a time of endemic xenophobia some artists have attempted to resist this trend by depicting its damaging consequences, revealing the inequalities that fuel its disfigurement of human relations and result in mass human displacement. Paul Dash's recent paintings of refugees attempting dangerous and degrading sea crossings are the main subject of this article, and these works are discussed in the context of his negative educational experiences as a child, and his salvation through painting in the sanctuary of his school's art room. This school experience and the trajectory of his artistic career are contextualised by the current marginalisation of the arts in the curriculum and the increasing scarcity of critical and creative approaches to education.     

Teaching Now with the Living: A Dialogue with Teachers Investigating Contemporary Art Practices

The Education Departments of Tate Modern and Goldsmiths College collaborated with a group of teachers to find out what they understood by the term ‘contemporary art’ and to discover the conditions that enable contemporary art practices in the classroom. We explored questions with eleven teachers, from both primary and secondary schools, during the Autumn of 2004. Although the cultural/ethnic context of the schools the teachers worked within was diverse, they shared a commitment to working with contemporary art in the classroom and exploring new pedagogies in this field. Their engagement with contemporary art and their revealing and compelling experiences are documented, contextualized and summarized. Samples of the discussions form the substance of this article. This is preceded by an analysis of the success of socially‐orientated contemporary art in the wider global context and its contrast with the omission of these practices in many schools. Conclusions have been tentatively drawn about how the curriculum may be better served by the use of contemporary art, as well as the means by which new learning methods may be facilitated.     

The Critically Designed Garden

This article is concerned with design applied to gardens, using examples from the Chelsea Flower Show in London. There is a discussion of those show gardens that represented Syrian refugees’ gardens in Iraq and the Windrush generation immigration to the UK. The garden designs combine the aesthetics of organic materials and spatial architecture with an implicit critique of topical contemporary social issues. The article concludes by commenting on the risks posed by the reduced and impoverished UK arts education policies for producing the next generation of applied design practitioners.     

Investing in teaching development: navigating risk in a research intensive institution

It is often assumed that academics working in a research intensive university are unlikely to invest in the professional development of their teaching. Institutional structures and culture tend to undermine investment in academics’ teaching role. This study, conducted at the University of Cape Town, draws on an analysis of the environment within which academics make decisions to invest in their role as teachers. While acknowledging the privileging of research embedded in the institution, a significant group of academics have found ways to assert their academic identities as teachers despite the possible consequences and risks that this position entails.     

The relevance of “recent and relevant” experience

The importance of recent and relevant experience is being asserted for teacher educators though not others responsible for education policy and curriculum. The paper will review the “self evident” value of recent and relevant experience from the perspective of researcher/teacher educator returning to classroom teaching. The potential and implications for research on teaching and learning and the opportunities for more significant school experience in teacher education are outlined. Specializations: teacher education, science education, health education, curriculum evaluation and research.     

Teachers as researchers: The rationale; The reality

Conclusion Collaborative action research, a style of research which connotes involvement, commitment, and growth, has the potential to bring together process and outcome, teaching and research, reflection and action, theory and practice. It is an organising frame to foster productive blending of school knowledge and academic knowledge, through the participation of members of the secondary and tertiary sectors. It has the potential to enhance the professionalism and expertise of members of both sectors, in circumstances which facilitate personal development. It has the potential to enhance the relevance and applicability of educational research to the educational context and hence to generate real and permanent change in schools. We believe that this form of research has potential to be of value that extends beyond the direct participants and school settings in which it occurs. The problem is of translating this potential into practice. Neither the school nor the educational research sectors are geared for such long-term collaborative research. However, PEEL demonstrates that it can be done. Educational research can be made relevant and important to teachers. Through collaborative action research, teachers can participate in improving the quality of education in our schools.