Principles of Classroom Discipline: Toward a Pragmatic Synthesis

Individuals who change careers to assume teaching roles in secondary schools are more likely to struggle in the classroom than those without such backgrounds. In this investigation, we identified three such career-changing teachers who were beginning their education careers in rural schools, and observed and interviewed them throughout their first year of teaching to understand their unique challenges and to identify the types of supports that they found to be most helpful. Three primary themes emerged: (1) adjustment to the unique culture of a school, (2) the importance of mentoring, and (3) adaptation of previous work experiences to teaching. Recommendations included more emphasis in teacher preparation programs of awareness of the uniqueness of every school's particular culture and the critical nature of effective mentoring in the success and happiness of these career-changing teachers.     

Collaborative Teaching in the Face of Productivity Concerns: The Dispersed Team Model

The development of collaborative teaching efforts is briefly reviewed within the context of higher education today, which is a time of declining resources available for such efforts. Therefore costs must be considered in the promotion of collaboration, which most would likely agree is a positive element in the delivery of courses. Models of team coordinated teaching and team teaching are explained, and the authors identify four dimensions of collaboration—integration, interaction, active learning, and faculty autonomy. A successful model, which addresses both quality and cost concerns, is then offered.     

The Responses of Kuwaiti Special Educators to American Approaches to the Care and Treatment Provided Individuals with Mental Retardation in the United States Today

Twenty‐five special educators from Kuwait who had participated in a six‐week special education enrichment program in the United States were surveyed regarding their impressions and reactions. A presentation of the program in which they participated is combined with an elaboration of their socio‐cultural background to form the framework upon which their impressions and reactions are discussed. Lessons learned regarding international training efforts are also included.     

Figures for new frontiers,from Davy Crockett to cyberspace gurus

Figures of public discourse and imagination such as Davy Crockett model novel subjectivities and participate in the constitution of new frontiers‐ In the nineteenth century, figures like Crockett embodied the virtues and vices of combining with nature in speech and deed, while in the twentieth century figures such as cyberspace gurus, images of subjectivity from economic and social theory, and popular culture display the virtues and vices of combining with the “second nature” of commodities and computers. Engaging new frontier discourses and their characteristic rhetorical ornaments across time, this essay situates figures of speech and culture between the sublime and the ridiculous, pious awe and impious ridicule, and critiques the representative attitudes they cultivate for publics. The fundamental characteristic of a democratic aesthetic as it has been historically realized and imagined, and of which Crockett is an intriguing representative, may be its figural hybridizing of these two rhetorics, sublime/awe and ridicule/impiety.     

Repeatability of three-dimensional thorax and pelvis kinematics in the golf swing measured using a field-based motion capture system

Field-based methods of evaluating three-dimensional (3D) swing kinematics offer coaches and researchers the opportunity to assess golfers in context-specific environments. The purpose of this study was to establish the inter-trial, between-tester, between-location, and between-day repeatability of thorax and pelvis kinematics during the downswing using an electromagnetic motion capture system. Two experienced testers measured swing kinematics in 20 golfers (handicap < or =14 strokes) on consecutive days in an indoor and outdoor location. Participants performed five swings with each of two clubs (five-iron and driver) at each test condition. Repeatability of 3D kinematic data was evaluated by computing the coefficient of multiple determination (CMD) and the systematic error (SE). With the exception of pelvis forward bend for between-day and between-tester conditions, CMDs exceeded 0.854 for all variables, indicating high levels of overall waveform repeatability across conditions. When repeatability was compared across conditions using MANOVA, the lowest CMDs and highest SEs were found for the between-tester and between-day conditions. The highest CMDs were for the inter-trial and between-location conditions. The absence of significant differences in CMDs between these two conditions supports this method of analysing pelvis and thorax kinematics in different environmental settings without unduly affecting repeatability.     

Pediatric health assessments of young children in child welfare by placement type

Objectives

To describe health-related problems across placement types (unrelated foster, kin foster, in-home with birth parent); to examine the association of placement and demographic/child welfare variables (child gender, age, race/ethnicity; caregiver language; type of maltreatment, and length of time receiving services from child welfare) with health-related problems.

Methods

This study utilized a retrospective medical chart review of children less than 6 years old (n = 449) seen at an outpatient child welfare pediatric clinic. Logistic regression modeling was used to estimate odds of having a weight, medical, or provisional developmental delay problem by placement and demographic/child welfare characteristics.

Results

Almost 13% of children in the sample were obese (≥95% age-gender specific percentile) and more than a quarter were overweight/obese (≥85%) while only 7% were underweight (≤5%). Most children (78%) had a physical health diagnosis and 25% were provisionally identified with a developmental delay. No differences between weight diagnoses, type of medical diagnoses, and provisional developmental delay by placement type were found, although children with 3 or more medical diagnoses were more likely to be with kin (p < .05). Children 2 years old or older were more likely to be overweight/obese than children under 2 years old (p < .05) and Hispanic children were more likely to be overweight/obese than non-Hispanic children (p < .01). Length of stay in child welfare was positively related with a medical diagnosis or provisional developmental delay (p < .01).

Conclusions

Results argue for careful assessment of weight, medical, and developmental problems in children active to child welfare, whether residing in their home of origin, with kin, or with unrelated foster parents. The increasing problem of obesity among young children in child welfare warrants further investigation and intervention.

Practice implications

The comprehensive health examination and enhanced health maintenance schedule for children in foster care should be extended to children who remain at home with child welfare services as child welfare involvement rather than placement is related to health-related problems.     

Increased learning observed in redesigned introductory biology course that employed web-enhanced, interactive pedagogy

Our Introduction to Biology course (BIOL 1010) changed in 2004 from a standard instructor-centered, lecture-homework-exam format to a student-centered format that used Web-enhanced, interactive pedagogy. To measure and compare conceptual learning gains in the traditional course in fall 2003 with a section of the interactive course in fall 2004, we created concept inventories for both evolution and ecology. Both classes were taught by the same instructor who had taught BIOL 1010 since 1976, and each had a similar student composition with comparable biological knowledge. A significant increase in learning gain was observed with the Web-enhanced, interactive pedagogy in evolution (traditional, 0.10; interactive, 0.19; p = 0.024) and ecology (traditional, -0.05; interactive, 0.14; p = 0.000009) when assessment was made unannounced and for no credit in the last week of classes. These results strengthen the case for augmenting or replacing instructor-centered teaching with Web-enhanced, interactive, student-centered teaching. When assessment was made using the final exam in the interactive course, for credit and after studying, significantly greater learning gains were made in evolution (95%, 0.37, p = 0.0001) and ecology (143%, 0.34, p = 0.000003) when compared with learning gains measured without credit or study in the last week of classes.