Extinction with multiple excitors

Four conditioned suppression experiments with rats, using an ABC renewal design, investigated the effects of compounding the target conditioned excitor with additional, nontarget conditioned excitors during extinction. Experiment 1 showed stronger extinction, as evidenced by less renewal, when the target excitor was extinguished in compound with a second excitor, relative to when it was extinguished with associatively neutral stimuli. Critically, this deepened extinction effect was attenuated (i.e., more renewal occurred) when a third excitor was added during extinction training. This novel demonstration contradicts the predictions of associative learning models based on total error reduction, but it is explicable in terms of a counteraction effect within the framework of the extended comparator hypothesis. The attenuated deepened extinction effect was replicated in Experiments 2a and 3, which also showed that pretraining consisting of weakening the association between the two additional excitors (Experiments 2a and 2b) or weakening the association between one of the additional excitors and the unconditioned stimulus (Experiment 3) attenuated the counteraction effect, thereby resulting in a decrease in responding to the target excitor. These results suggest that more than simple total error reduction determines responding after extinction.     

Welcome to the Neighborhood! Reinventing Academic Life for Undergraduate Students

June Pierce Youatt, Wyl McCully, and Sue A. Blanshan describe an innovative, collaborative approach to making on‐campus life more accessible to students at Michigan State University.     

Perceptions of School and Aspirations of Rural Students with Learning Disabilities and Their Nondisabled Peers

This study examined the school perceptions and educational aspirations of 6,599 rural high school students, a sample that included 428 students with learning disabilities (LD). Regardless of disability status, rural high school students who had negative perceptions of school had less well‐defined postsecondary educational plans and less often aspired to complete college or pursue an advanced degree. Compared to nondisabled youth, rural students with LD were more likely to have negative perceptions of school and lower postsecondary aspirations. However, students with LD who had positive perceptions of school more often planned to pursue postsecondary education and aspired to complete college or an advanced degree. Implications for research and interventions pertaining to the educational attainment of students with LD are discussed.     

W. N. ‘Bill’ Carson: Double All Black,Military Cross Recipient

Measuring the impact of sports experience as preparation for war, and especially leadership in war, is open to debate. Accordingly, this paper is intended to highlight the role that sport played in New Zealand's effort in the Second World War and the way in which sport prepared some of those who would have positions of command in the structure of the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Force. The paper explores the realisation of the Commander of the New Zealand Division in the war, General Bernard Freyberg, that he needed to reshape his command by utilising younger, more durable, officers to cope with the more mobile methodology of the German war machine, especially after the military disasters that occurred in Greece and Crete. By concentrating on a particular soldier, W. N. ‘Bill’ Carson, a double New Zealand cricket-rugby representative, it is intended to show that sport was capable of providing the sort of life experiences that could prepare him for command and the need to adapt under extreme pressure by utilising the exposure to both success and failure in sport to cope with what were for him unique demands of battle.     

INTERGENERATIONAL EDUCATION AND SERVICE PROGRAMMING: A MODEL FOR SELECTION AND EVALUATION OF ACTIVITIES

The intergenerational approach is a proven method for education and service programming with older adults, children, and youth. However, the broad scope of intergenerational programming inherently makes it difficult to create general decision‐making processes or models for the selection of appropriate activities for diverse participants. We present a model for decision making in intergenerational programs that is adaptable to a wide variety of participant groups, sponsoring agencies, and program goals. The model emerged as we developed and conducted an intergenerational training program for caregivers of children and the frail elderly. It stresses the importance of involving all constituent groups in planning, delineates five program categories, and establishes four criterion levels for decision‐making regarding appropriate activities. The model will be useful to those planning and implementing intergenerational programs in a vareity of settings.     

Inservice Science Supervisors' Assessments of a Novice Science Teacher's Videotaped Lesson

Journal of Science Teacher Education -     

Strategies,systems and services: a Northern Ireland early years policy perspective

Following a lengthy consultation process across Northern Ireland (NI), 2013 saw the publication of Learning to Learn: A Framework for Early Years Education and Learning [DE (Department of Education). 2013. “Learning to Learn: A Framework for Early Years Education and Learning.” Accessed July 15, 2014. http://www.deni.gov.uk/english_a_framework_for_ey_education_and_learning_oct_13_tagged.pdf]. This document has major implications for change in regard to children's services in the province. For this paper we have employed a critical discourse analysis (CDA) methodology (Ozga, J. [2000]. Policy Research in Educational Settings. Buckingham: Open University Press) in order to explore the relationships between language and power in the shaping of the policy discourse illustrated by Learning to Learn. Comparisons and contrasts are drawn between the language and assumptions made in the document, particularly in relation to the issues of quality and workforce qualifications. Attention is drawn to the message of the framework document that early years professionals must provide consistently high quality services to children and families through a process involving effective collaboration. However, the persistent ‘split system’ of statutory and voluntary sectors within the field of early childhood provision in NI plays a key role in the creation and legitimation of dominant discourses and accepted norms. Through this CDA process we demonstrate the ‘emancipatory potential’ of CDA for analysis of early years policy by both academics and practitioners.