Online teaching tool simplifies faculty use of multimedia and improves student interest and knowledge in science

Digital technologies can improve student interest and knowledge in science. However, researching the vast number of websites devoted to science education and integrating them into undergraduate curricula is time-consuming. We developed an Adobe ColdFusion- and Adobe Flash-based system for simplifying the construction, use, and delivery of electronic educational materials in science. The Online Multimedia Teaching Tool (OMTT) in Neuroscience was constructed from a ColdFusion-based online interface, which reduced the need for programming skills and the time for curriculum development. The OMTT in Neuroscience was used by faculty to enhance their lectures in existing curricula. Students had unlimited online access to encourage user-centered exploration. We found the OMTT was rapidly adapted by multiple professors, and its use by undergraduate students was consistent with the interpretation that the OMTT improved performance on exams and increased interest in the field of neuroscience.     

On the Stability of Students'Rules of Operation for Solving Arithmetic Problems

The purpose o f this study was to examine the consistency with which students applied procedural rules for solving signed-number operations across identical items presented in different orders. A test with 64 open-ended items was administered to 161 eighth graders. The test consisted o f two 32-item subtests containing identical items. The items in each subtest were in random order. Students'responses to each subtest were compared with respect to the identified underlying rules o f operation used to solve each problem set. The results indicated that inconsistent rule application was common among students who had not mastered signed-number arithmetic operations. In contrast, mastery level students, those who use the right rules, show a stable pattern o f rule application in signed-number arithmetic. These results are discussed in light of the hypothesis testing approach to the learning process.     

Fifth graders' science inquiry abilities: A comparative study of students in hands‐on and textbook curricula

A large number of American elementary school students are now studying science using the hands‐on inquiry curricula developed in the 1990s: Insights; Full Option Science System (FOSS); and Science and Technology for Children (STC). A goal of these programs, echoed in the National Science Education Standards, is that children should gain “abilities to do scientific inquiry” and “understanding about scientific inquiry.” We have studied the degree to which students can do inquiries by using four hands‐on performance assessments, which required one or three class periods. To be fair, the assessments avoided content that is studied in depth in the hands‐on programs. For a sample of about 1000 fifth grade students, we compared the performance of students in hands‐on curricula with an equal number of students with textbook curricula. The students were from 41 classrooms in nine school districts. The results show little or no curricular effect. There was a strong dependence on students' cognitive ability, as measured with a standard multiple‐choice instrument. There was no significant difference between boys and girls. Also, there was no difference on a multiple‐choice test, which used items released from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). It is not completely clear whether the lack of difference on the performance assessments was a consequence of the assessments, the curricula, and/or the teaching. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 43: 467–484, 2006     

Eliciting,Interpreting and Developing Teachers' Understandings of the Nature of Science

This paper covers three main areas : eliciting teachers' views of the nature of science; interpreting and understanding these views; and developing them in the context of initial or in-service teacher education. The three areas clearly overlap but we begin with eliciting : this section includes a look at past probes, and then presents the notion of critical incidents, with a range of examples. We argue throughout that critical incidents can be used partly as a means of probing teachers' views of science, but also have value as a tool for professional development. We then discuss interpreting and understanding teachers' responses to critical incidents, based on our research with over 300 teachers and student teachers who have worked with them. In the third section, on developing, we pursue the argument that teachers' understandings of the nature of science are located in their professional experience. We argue that if teachers' understandings are embedded within their professional practice this has important consequences for appropriate teacher education and professional development in the area of the nature of science.     

The university as agent of social transformation: The postmodern argument considered

This is an abridged version of an essay that will appear inThe Imperiled Academy, edited by Howard Dickman, to be published by Transaction this year.     

Signaling a change in cue-outcome relations in human associative learning

In three experiments, we assessed the role of signals for changes in the consequences of cues as a potential account of the renewal effect. Experiment 1 showed recovery of responding following extinction when acquisition, extinction, and test phases occurred in different contexts. In addition, extinction treatment in multiple contexts attenuated context-induced response recovery. In Experiment 2, we used presentations of an extraneous stimulus (ES), instead of context shifts, and found that responding recovered from extinction only when the ES was presented both between acquisition and extinction and between extinction and test. In Experiment 3, we used a reversal learning design in which, during training, two cues were first paired with different outcomes, then paired with the alternative outcomes, and finally paired again with the original outcomes. In this experiment, presentation, just prior to testing, of an ES that had previously been presented between the different phases produced an expectation of reversal in the meaning of the cues.     

General Works on Mass Communications

Russel B. Nye's The Unembarrassed Muse: The Popular Arts in America (Dial Press, $12.50)

Otto Friedrich's Decline and Fall (Harpor & Row, $10.00)

“The Sociology of Mass Media Communicators,” The Sociological Review Monograph No. 13 (University of Keele, Staffordshire, England, January 1969, $4.60 including air mail costs)

Audio Visual Marketplace: A Multimedia Guide (Bowker, $12.25)

Jerry Della Femina's From Those Wonderful Folks Who Gave You Pearl Harbor (Simon and Schuster, $6.50)     

General Communication

COMMUNICATION AS CULTURE: ESSAYS ON MEDIA AND SOCIETY by James W. Carey (Winchester, MA: Unwin Hymen [formerly Allen & Wnwin], 1989—$12.95, paper, ISBN 0-04-445064-8, with a clothbound version available)

CHALLENGING GENDER VALUES edited by Pamela J. Creedon (Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1989—$16.95, paper, ISBN 0-8039-3448-3)

PROGRESS IN COMMUNICATION SCIENCES, VOLUME DC edited by Brenda Dervin and Melvin Voigt (Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1989—$49.50 to institutions; $29.50 personal, ISBN 0-89391-474-6)

THE INFORMATION SOCIETY: ECONOMIC, SOCIAL & STRUCTURAL ISSUES edited by Jerry L. Salvaggio (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1989—$24.95, ISBN 0-8058-0103-0)

MEDIA, SPORTS & SOCIETY by Lawrence A. Wenner (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1989—$14.95, paper, ISBN 0-8039-3244-8, with a clothbound edition available)

THE GLOBAL VILLAGE: TRANSFORMATIONS IN WORLD LIFE AND MEDIA IN THE 21ST CENTURY by Marshall McLuhan and Bruce R. Powers (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989—$29.95, ISBN 0-19-505444-X)     

Why are we here? Managing the meaning of an organizational mission statement

The purpose of this study was to identify and test the influences that lead individuals to actively manage the meaning of a company Mission Statement. Communication about a company Mission Statement was hypothesized to be a function of an individual's information environment, level of work unit commitment, trust in management, and organizational role. The Management of Meaning Scale (MMS) was developed to assess specific meaning management behaviors. The MMS was cast as the chief dependent variable in a path analysis using LISREL. The general model was well supported. Implications for practices associated with Mission Statement implementation are discussed.