Individual and group performance of computerized educational tasks

This study examines the conditions under which task performance is accomplished more efficiently by a single individual or a group. 116 participants, ranging in age from high school level through holders of Master’s degrees, 58 women and the same number of men, were presented with a computer game based on educational software, arranged in five levels of difficulty. A comparison was made of the speed in which objectives were attained when performed individually and when divided among groups of two to four partners, controlling for the type of coordination required. Cases of expedient and inexpedient division of labor were identified, as were factors affecting feasibility, among them the number of simultaneous tasks to be performed, complexity level, number of participants and the intensity of coordination required among them. Basic principles, pertaining to the functional division of roles in learning activities and in educational administration, are discussed.     

Fred outdoors: An initial report into the experiences of outdoor activities for an adult who is congenitally deafblind

Abstract

Outdoor Education has long been used with groups that could be described as having “special needs”. Research in this particular area has in the past concentrated on adaptations to equipment and activities, allowing access for people with physical disabilities, and expanding the learning and development opportunities available to those with learning difficulties. This article documents the initial observations made of the experiences of a man, who is congenitally deafblind, when given the opportunity to experience outdoor activities. The article highlights a number of areas, which appear particularly relevant to this specific target group, and may be worthy of further investigation. The use of video technology is also demonstrated to be a valuable research tool when working with people who have multisensory impairments.     

Synergy Between Teacher Practices and Curricular Scaffolds to Support Students in Using Domain-Specific and Domain-General Knowledge in Writing Arguments to Explain Phenomena

We investigated how 2 different curricular scaffolds (context-specific vs. generic), teacher instructional practices, and the interaction between these 2 types of support influenced students' learning of science content and their ability to write scientific arguments to explain phenomena. The context-specific scaffolds provided students with hints about the task and what content knowledge to use in or incorporate into their writing. The generic scaffolds supported students in understanding a general framework (i.e., claim, evidence, and reasoning) regardless of the content area or task. This study focused on an 8-week middle school chemistry curriculum that was enacted by 6 teachers with 578 students during the 2004–2005 school year. Analyses of identical pre- and posttests as well as videotapes of teacher enactments revealed that the curricular scaffolds and teacher instructional practices were synergistic in that the effect of the written curricular scaffolds depended on the teacher's enactment of the curriculum. The context-specific curricular scaffolds were more successful in supporting students in writing scientific arguments to explain phenomena, but only when teachers' enactments provided explicit domain-general support for the claim, evidence, and reasoning framework, suggesting the importance of both types of support in successful learning environments.     

Reviews

The Development of Scientific Thinking Skills. Deanna Kuhn, Eric Amsel, and Michael O'Loughlin, Academic Press, 1988. 249 pp.

Understanding the Representational Mind, Josef Perner, MIT Press, 1991. 348 pp.

Literacy as Involvement: The Acts of Writers and Readers, and Texts. Deborah Brandt. Carbondaie: Southern Illinois, 1990. 159 pp.

Dialogue, Dialectic, and Conversation: A Social Perspective on the Function of Writing. Gregory Clark. Carbondale: Southern Illinois, 1990. 93 pp.

Hypermedia and Literary Studies. Ed. Paul Delany and George P. Landow. Cambridge: MIT P, 1991. 352 pp.

Writing Space: The Computer, Hypertext, and the History of Writing. Jay David Bolter. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1991. 258 pp. Also from Erlbaum, Writing Space: A Hypertext for Macintosh.

Writing and Speaking in Business. Gretchen N. Vik, Clyde W. Wilkinson, and Dorothy C. Wilkinson. 10th ed. Homewood: Irwin, 1990. 636 pp.

Communication for Management and Business. Norman B. Sigband and Arthur H. Bell. 5th ed. Glenview: Scott, 1989. 783 pp.

Business Communication Today. Courtland L. Bovee and John V. Thill. 2nd ed. New York: Random, 1989. 680 pp.

Guidelines for Preparing Proposals: A Manual on How to Organize Winning Proposals. Roy Meador. Chelsea: Lewis, 1985. 116 pp.     

BLACK POWER AND BLACK STUDENTS IN KANSAS CITY

In this research I examined the enactment of liberatory pedagogy, a teaching practice that promotes equity for all learners, from the uniquely informative perspective of young women majoring in mathematics and elementary education. It is grounded theory that seeks to understand the role of personal identity and social location in learning and teaching. I collected data over a two-year period, following two young women from the final semester of their teacher education program to their first teaching positions. Three distinct influences inform the conceptual framework of this study: (a) the underrepresentation of women in mathematics; (b) the devaluing of elementary teachers' content and pedagogical knowledge; and (c) the marginalization of the education major and pedagogical knowledge. I ask research questions regarding the type of preservice education these women experience and how it informs their enactment of liberatory pedagogy. Themes among the findings include coping with being a stranger in both lands, the desire to know oneself as a learner, and enacting liberatory pedagogy as beginning inservice teachers.     

ALUMNI SURVEY OF ENTRY GOALS,SATISFACTION, AND JOB BENEFITS ASSOCIATED WITH THE ASSOCIATE DEGREE

Organizations can be classified as being either responsive or unresponsive to their constituents’ needs and attitudes. The present study was undertaken at the Community and Technical College at the University of Akron, Akron, Ohio in an attempt to implement a responsive orientation toward its constituents (students). Data were obtained from 401 alumni, from six majors who graduated between the years of 1969 through 1982. Each alumnus completed an Alumni Questionnaire which gathered information concerning enrollment goals, achievement of goals, job‐related benefits derived through the associate degree, and satisfaction with faculty and the curriculum. Results indicated that most alumni had career‐oriented goals at the time of enrollment and nearly 82% reported that these goals had been achieved through the educational experience. Most alumni reported important job‐related benefits which may have been the result of the attainment of an associate degree. Alumni reported high levels of satisfaction with faculty instruction and the curriculum; however, they were only marginally satisfied with faculty guidance. Those alumni who pursued course‐work beyond the associate degree indicated that their prior education was helpful in preparing them for the additional coursework     

A High Impact Practice that Works: Connecting Mentors From the Professional Community to Teacher Education Students

A high impact mentoring program at a community college connected professionals from the special education and early intervention fields with small groups of teacher education students. Two federal grants from U.S. Department of Education funded tuition scholarships and mentoring for 76 Special Education students and 78 Early Childhood Education/Early Intervention students in associate degree programs. The mentor programs consisted of individual monitoring by project staff, consistent contact with a mentor from the professional community and with other students in mentor groups, and structured monthly dinner meetings. Students who participated in the mentoring programs showed increased persistence and higher grade point average when compared with the general population of similar majors. Within each grant-funded population, students who showed low participation in the mentor programming presented lower retention rates and lower GPA than grant-funded students who took full advantage of the mentoring program.     

Framing Quality: Annotated Video-Based Portfolios of Classroom Practice by Pre-service Teachers

In this paper we describe the use of peer learning teams creating annotated video-based portfolios to improve the quality of teacher–child interactions of undergraduate majors in early childhood and family studies. We used the intentional teaching framework (Hamre et al. in Handbook of early education. Guilford Publications, New York, 2012a) to create a course that moved students through the process of “knowing,” “seeing,” “doing,” and “reflecting & improving.” Forty-four undergraduate early childhood students formed eleven peer learning teams of four. We started the course by teaching the teacher–child interaction skills that are considered to be high-quality and linked to positive child outcomes (knowing). After learning to reliably identify (seeing) high quality instruction using the Classroom Assessment Scoring System, the students created video portfolios featuring their own adult-child interactions (doing). These portfolios, featuring short salient examples of six different dimensions of quality instruction, were posted to a website and shared with their peer learning team. Each team member then commented on the extent to which she or he believed the students’ example was high quality. The portfolios and the peer coaching learning team (PCLT) process have improved our ability to document change in interactions as well as the students’ abilities to see their own growth (reflecting & improving). Further, it allows us to tighten the connection between course content and practical application as well as providing us with an alternative to on-site supervision of practicum students, which can be challenging due to budget constraints. Finally, we hope that sharing this activity will encourage others to integrate video-based technology into their coursework as a means to demonstrate positive change in students’ learning.     

Homeless Children and Youth at Risk: The Educational Impact of Displacement

We know that homelessness creates conditions of risk for homeless children and youth (e.g., malnutrition, missing parental support, affiliation with deviant peers, disconnect from schooling, and so forth). Researchers also document that these states of risk have devastating physical, emotional, social, and educational impacts on young people. In this article, we explore the final issue—how displacement affects the educational well-being of homeless children and youth. We begin our review with a variable—mobility—that has a good deal of explanatory power for the educational impacts examined. We conclude with the consequences of homelessness that follow displaced children and youth into adulthood. In between we discuss an assortment of outcome factors: placement in special education, attendance, academic success, and graduation.