EMPIRICAL SYNTHESIS OF THE EFFECT OF STANDARD ERROR OF MEASUREMENT ON DECISIONS MADE WITHIN BRIEF EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSES OF READING FLUENCY

Intervention researchers often use curriculum‐based measurement of reading fluency (CBM‐R) with a brief experimental analysis (BEA) to identify an effective intervention for individual students. The current study synthesized data from 22 studies that used CBM‐R data within a BEA by computing the standard error of measure (SEM) for the median data point from the baseline and intervention data. The median CBM‐R score from the intervention that the authors of each study identified as most effective fell within the SEM (68% confidence interval) of the baseline data approximately 30% of the time, but the ranges for the two author‐identified most effective interventions overlapped over 75% of the time. Extended analyses were consistent with the BEA results for approximately three‐fourths of the instances after considering the SEM of the baseline and intervention phases. Using matched passages did not improve the overlap of the ranges, but there was less overlap when the study used three data points per condition. Results emphasize the importance of considering SEM of CBM‐R data when comparing interventions within a BEA. Further implications for practice and future research are included.     

Exploring undergraduates' understanding of photosynthesis using diagnostic question clusters

We present a diagnostic question cluster (DQC) that assesses undergraduates' thinking about photosynthesis. This assessment tool is not designed to identify individual misconceptions. Rather, it is focused on students' abilities to apply basic concepts about photosynthesis by reasoning with a coordinated set of practices based on a few scientific principles: conservation of matter, conservation of energy, and the hierarchical nature of biological systems. Data on students' responses to the cluster items and uses of some of the questions in multiple-choice, multiple-true/false, and essay formats are compared. A cross-over study indicates that the multiple-true/false format shows promise as a machine-gradable format that identifies students who have a mixture of accurate and inaccurate ideas. In addition, interviews with students about their choices on three multiple-choice questions reveal the fragility of students' understanding. Collectively, the data show that many undergraduates lack both a basic understanding of the role of photosynthesis in plant metabolism and the ability to reason with scientific principles when learning new content. Implications for instruction are discussed.     

Digital culture clash: “massive” education in the E-learning and Digital Cultures MOOC

While education has been both open and online, the sizeable enrolment numbers associated with massive open online courses (MOOCs) are somewhat unprecedented. In order to gauge the significance of education at scale, this article analyses specific examples of massive participation derived from E-learning and Digital Cultures, a MOOC from the University of Edinburgh in partnership with Coursera. Student-created content, user statistics, and survey data are illustrated to examine the experiences and repercussions of engaging with educational activity where participants number in the tens of thousands. This activity is shown to mirror established instructionist or constructivist approaches to pedagogy. However, rather than working with “massiveness,” these positions are suggested to oppose large participant numbers. Concluding remarks propose an irreducible diversity of participation, rather than a generalised categorisation of “student,” and call for future considerations of the MOOC to move beyond individualism and self-interest.     

Nonverbal immediacy in the physician/patient relationship

This study examined the relationships between the nonverbal immediacy of physicians and their patients’ satisfaction with them as doctors and overall medical care. Consistent with the results of previous studies in the instructional and organizational communication areas, substantial associations were found in this medical context. Patients who see their physicians as more immediate report more satisfaction with the physician and are generally more satisfied with the medical care they receive. The patients also indicated experiencing less fear of their physician when the physician was more immediate.     

Newer is not necessarily better a reexamination of affective learning measurement

The instrument commonly employed in instructional communication to measure affective learning was subjected to tests of its construct validity as a measure of higher‐order affective learning. The results indicate the instrument is a satisfactory instrument for this purpose. Newer measures of higher‐order affective learning were found to be highly associated with the older measure. Teacher evaluation measures were found to be distinct from both the newer and the older affective learning measures. The construct validity of the commonly used affective learning instrument is good.     

Curriculum change: a study of the implementation of General National Vocational Qualifications

This article focuses on curriculum change, in particular on course team responses to the introduction of a new curriculum and on the implications of empirical findings for our understanding of curriculum implementation and change. The case discussed is that of the second version of GNVQ. The discussion is based on an analysis of data collected across twenty-two course teams in ten schools and colleges over a two-year period as part of an ESRC-funded project. The model of comprehensive assessment of the second version of the GNVQ is one in which the curriculum reinforcement role of assessment related to the coverage and standards of the qualification but not to the design of courses. Theoretically, significant scope was accorded to course teams to develop and provide courses that responded to local contexts. The article explores how patterns of difference and similarity in course team responses to the introduction of this curriculum might be explained and indicates three broad approaches: implementation, adaptation and assimilation, relating these responses to the existing experience and expertise of members of the various course teams. The article draws on concepts from the field of linguistics to put forward the notions of ‘curricular fields’ and ‘sub-curricular fields’ and suggests that curriculum implementation needs to take greater account of the sub-curricular fields of course teams.     

Uncivil Speech: Invective and the Rhetorics of Democracy in the Early Republic

Robert Owen's “Declaration of Mental Independence,” declaimed on the Fourth of July, 1826, was one of the most ill-received speeches in the early Republic. The attendant controversy provides an opportunity to theorize invective's role in democratic culture. Invective was useful in the early Republic, and continues to be useful today, because it is both constitutive of national identity and a curative rhetoric for managing cultural anxiety. However, there are limits to what invective can achieve, and invective's place in democracy is consequently ambivalent. Rather than curing democratic anxiety, invective tends to perpetuate it, disrupting democracy's emphasis on controlled conflict and pushing it ever closer to violence.