Opening the black box of field experiences: How cooperating teachers' beliefs and practices shape student teachers' beliefs and practices

This study employed ethnographic methods to describe and explain changes to beginning science teachers' (n = 6) practices and beliefs during a year long internship. Teaching practices were strongly influenced by the cooperating teachers. Initially, all six interns attempted to re-enact lessons they witnessed their cooperating teachers teach, including following lesson structures and borrowing representations, anecdotes, and jokes. Later, they independently implemented instruction that emphasized similar strategies as their mentors, regardless of whether or not they were experiencing success. Interns who were successful also shifted their beliefs to match their mentors.     

Preservice teachers' coping styles and their responses to bullying

The literature suggests that teacher responses to bullying are a function of the type of aggression (overt vs. relational), the gender of the children involved, and characteristics of the teacher. We extended the literature by examining teachers' dispositional coping styles as a predictor of their responses to bullying. Preservice teachers (N = 97) completed a measure of coping styles and then responded to eight vignettes showing overt or relational aggression occurring among boys or girls. Overt aggression was viewed as a bigger problem than relational aggression, and teacher interventions were deemed more necessary for overt than relational aggression. Preservice teachers who typically use more active coping, less denial coping, and less self‐blame responded more actively to bullying, especially in response to relational aggression among boys. These findings point to the need to consider teacher coping styles when working with them to intervene effectively in responding to bullying. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Voice over instant messaging as a tool for enhancing the oral proficiency and motivation of English‐as‐a‐foreign‐language learners

The challenge of providing authentic experiences and interactions for fostering oral proficiency and motivation in foreign languages is an opportunity for innovation in educational technology and instructional design. Although several recent innovations have received the attention of scholars, empirical investigation and validation is often lacking, as is the case with voice over instant messaging (VoIM). The goal of this study was to empirically test the effectiveness of VoIM for enhancing students' oral English proficiency and learning motivation. Different types of online discussions were examined—unstructured, structured without the facilitation of English teaching assistants (ETAs) and structured with the facilitation of ETAs. A pre‐test and post‐test quasi‐experimental design was employed to achieve this goal. The participants, 90 students enrolled in three sections of a freshman English course at a large university in Asia, participated in eight VoIM discussions in addition to their regular coursework. The results provide empirical support for the importance of structured discussions and the facilitation of ETAs in improving both oral English proficiency and learning motivation. These findings highlight the role of facilitation in VoIM discussions, and recommend prompt feedback, modelling and encouragement for fostering oral proficiency and learning motivation in foreign language classes. Based on the results of this study, recommendations for future research are provided.     

Childhood maltreatment and conduct disorder: Independent predictors of criminal outcomes in ADHD youth

ObjectiveChildren with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are at heightened risk for maltreatment in childhood and criminality as they enter into adolescence and early adulthood. Here, we investigated the effect of moderate to severe childhood maltreatment on later criminality among adolescents/young adults diagnosed with ADHD in childhood while accounting for the contributions of other known risk factors such as early conduct disorder (CD).MethodsEighty-eight participants from a longitudinal study of children diagnosed with ADHD and screened for comorbid disorders at age 7–11 years were assessed for maltreatment histories at the time of the 10-year adolescent follow-up. Detailed juvenile and adult criminal records were obtained from the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services approximately 3-years after commencement of the follow-up study. We used regression analyses to determine predictors of adolescent/young adult criminal behavior.ResultsModerate to severe childhood maltreatment increased the risk of adolescent/young adult arrest over and above the risk associated with childhood CD, while both childhood maltreatment and childhood CD significantly increased the risk of recidivism. ADHD youth classified as maltreated were three and a half times more likely to be arrested when compared to ADHD youth without a maltreatment classification.ConclusionWe established maltreatment as a risk factor for criminality in ADHD youth and demonstrated that this relationship was independent of the contributions of CD, and established risk factor for antisocial behavior in this population. The findings highlight the need for maltreatment screening in children with ADHD in order to identify those at heightened risk for criminal activity, and target treatment to improve outcome in this high-risk group of children.     

Modelling information flow for organisations: A review of approaches and future challenges

Modelling is a classic approach to understanding complex problems that can be achieved diagrammatically to visualise concepts, and mathematically to analyse attributes of concepts. An organisation as a communicating entity is a made up of constructs in which people can have access to information and speak to each other. Modelling information flow for organisations is a challenging task that enables analysts and managers to better understand how to: organise and coordinate processes, eliminate redundant information flows and processes, minimise the duplication of information and manage the sharing of intra- and inter-organisational information.     

Long‐Term Episodic Memory in Children with Attention‐Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder

Twenty‐nine grade‐matched 4th–8th‐grade males, 12 with attention‐deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) (age M= 12.2 years, SD= 1.48), and 17 without (age M= 11.5, SD= 1.59), completed two working memory tasks (digit span and the Simon game) and three long‐term episodic memory tasks (a personal event memory task, story memory task, and picture recognition task). In line with clinical observations, children with ADHD performed worse than peers on all working memory tasks, but performed as well as or better than peers on long‐term episodic tasks, demonstrating particularly detailed memory for personally experienced past events. Participants' parents also completed questionnaires about their children's memories in daily life. Parents rated children with ADHD lower than children without ADHD on working and semantic memory (e.g., remembering names, spelling, and math), but rated them as high or higher on memory for events. Implications for theory and educational practice are discussed.