The Neolithic or Wood Age

Although perishable under many conditions, wooden artifacts from the Neolithic period have been remarkably well preserved in peat bogs and lakes. Indeed, in view of the large number and quality of the finds, the Neolithic Age might equally well be termed the Wood Age. The objects produced were technically highly sophisticated: the properties of different kinds of wood were well known and used to full advantage, and the skill with which they were made suggests that there may have been craftsmen specializing in woodwork.     

A neurodevelopmental profile of the rural hearing‐impaired child in the QwaQwa region,South Africa

Being hearing impaired does not only affect a child's academic performance, but can also influence a child's overall development and ability to succeed academically. Children with hearing impairment often experience delays in other areas of their development and an understanding of the inter‐relatedness of these delays are important in order to address all these aspects, and thus minimise the impact on a child's overall development. The paper provides a neurodevelopmental profile of 4‐year‐old to 8‐year‐old rural hearing‐impaired children based on the result of a psychometric assessment. Eighteen children were selected from a special needs school in the rural QwaQwa Free State area of South Africa and underwent a psychometric assessment using two test batteries (Griffiths mental developmental scales – extended revised and a neurodevelopmental evaluation scale). The neurodevelopmental profile will contribute to knowledge of the nature of the challenges faced by the hearing‐impaired child in rural education and the neurodevelopmental origin of these challenges.     

English language teaching in public primary schools in Mexico: the practices and challenges of implementing a national language education program

Over the past 15?years, many state governments in Mexico have initiated local programs to introduce English at the primary school level. In 2009, the Mexican Ministry of Education formalized the Programa Nacional de Inglés en Educación Básica (PNIEB) as part of the national curriculum, based on the argument that increasing the number of English speakers in Mexico is necessary for the country to be globally competitive and to follow the trend in other developing economies of augmenting English instruction in public education. This paper focuses on the implementation of PNIEB and the state programs that preceded it. The authors document the practices and challenges associated with the program based on data collected from interviews with the main stakeholders involved (students and parents, teachers, school principals, and program coordinators) and from classroom observations. The total data-set consisted of over 200 interviews and classroom observations spread over several years from 2008 to 2012. Several challenges are described, including the development of materials, the role of English in relation to other subject areas, and the training of teachers who often speak English but have uneven formal preparation. The status of the teachers, both as second-class citizens within the schools and the instability and irregularities with their contracts, was identified as the most significant challenge to the successful implementation of the programs.     

An assessment of the effectiveness of a classroom activity designed to teach the value of lifelong learning

Many agree that educational systems should instill in students the value of lifelong learning (LLL), but few have suggested how to accomplish that or how to measure the effectiveness of those curricular initiatives. We developed a technique intended to strengthen students' beliefs about the value of LLL and piloted use of a recently developed scale to assess changes in commitment to LLL. Using a quasi-experimental procedure, we presented students with faculty members’ career biographies describing their personal career paths, including how they learned from their experiences and how they had to adapt and adjust to changing circumstances. To assess beliefs about LLL, students completed Bath and Smith's Propensity for Lifelong Learning (PLLL) scale. We found that students who listened to career biographies had significantly stronger beliefs regarding the value of LLL than the students who were not exposed to the career biographies. We concluded that listening to career biographies strengthened commitment to LLL and that the PLLL scale is a useful outcome measure of this commitment. We discussed limitations and future directions of our method and measurement instrument.     

Political Ideology and Perceptions of Social Justice Advocacy Among Members of the American Counseling Association

This study explored perceptions of social justice advocacy among liberal, moderate, and conservative members (N?=?214) of the American Counseling Association (ACA). Results showed that conservative participants had somewhat less favorable perceptions of social justice advocacy, but generally did not differ statistically from liberal and moderate participants. Statistically significant differences, however, were found among extremely liberal participants. All participants generally supported the use of ACA resources for social activism. Implications and limitations are discussed.     

How many hours of instruction are needed for students to become competent in engineering subjects?

The aim of this work was to compare the curricula of three different agricultural engineering courses and to determine the competence of graduating students in three subject areas in order to identify possible shortfalls in the number of hours of instruction (HI) required for full competence to be attained.

A total of 132 students sat a voluntary examination in the final year of their studies to determine their competence in three subject areas: electrical facilities, machinery and construction. The degree courses completed by these students are meant to provide them with the legal standing required to undertake infrastructure projects in agricultural installations.

This work detected significant differences in the competence of graduates in the mentioned subjects, depending on the number of HI they had received. Students who had received under 120 HI in these subjects were found to be significantly less competent than those who had received more.     

Be(com)ing an excellent student: a qualitative study with engineering undergraduates

This study explores the factors affecting the development of academic excellence on a group of 33 high-achieving engineering students. Participants were interviewed individually to explore several personal and contextual aspects of their past and current academic pathways. The results obtained reflect three main contributions to the conceptualization and understanding of excellence in academic contexts: the need to adopt a multidimensional and dynamic view about the concept of excellence; the existence of a variety of possible pathways and environmental conditions to achieve excellence; and the understanding of excellence as a process undergoing continuous development, which thrives within the family context and school environment, and that seems to be continuously nurtured by individuals in interaction with their contexts.     

Relations between parent-child acculturation differences and adjustment within immigrant Chinese families

The relations between parent and child acculturation and family and child adjustment were examined among 91 immigrant Chinese families in Canada with early adolescents (average age of 12). Acculturation was assessed in public (e.g., language use) and private (e.g., values) domains separately in Chinese and Canadian cultures. With one exception, interactions between parent and child acculturation in Canadian domains were unrelated to adjustment (conflict intensity, depressive feelings, and achievement motivation). Interactions in Chinese domains were more clearly associated with adjustment. Specifically, mother-child interactions in Chinese public domains and father-child interactions in the Chinese private domain predicted adjustment. In all interactions, when parents were strongly orientated toward Chinese culture, lower levels of Chinese orientation among children were associated with lower adjustment.     

Prevalence of vulnerability and protective factors of sexual victimization

English language abstract not available at time of publication.