An Investigation of Media Influences on Elementary Students Representations of Scientists

Even long before children are able to verbalize which careers may be interesting to them, they collect and store ideas about scientists. For these reasons, asking children to Draw-A-Scientist has become an accepted method to provide a glimpse into how children represent and identify with those in the science fields. Years later these representations may translate into student’s career choice. Since 1995, children’s illustrations of scientists have been assessed by the Draw-A-Scientist Checklist (DAST-C). The checklist was created from the common aspects or features found in illustrations from previous studies and were based initially on the scientists, broken down into “stereotypical” and “alternative” images shown in the drawings. The purpose of this paper is to describe the development, field test and reliability of the modified Draw-A-Scientist Test (DAST) and The Draw-A-Scientist Rubric designed as an improvement of the DAST-C to provide a more appropriate method of assessing students’ drawings of scientists. The combination of the modified DAST and the DAST Rubric brings more refinement as it enables clarities to emerge and subsequently increased detail to what one could ascertain from students about their mental images of scientists.     

Identifying Key Features of Effective Active Learning: The Effects of Writing and Peer Discussion

We investigated some of the key features of effective active learning by comparing the outcomes of three different methods of implementing active-learning exercises in a majors introductory biology course. Students completed activities in one of three treatments: discussion, writing, and discussion + writing. Treatments were rotated weekly between three sections taught by three different instructors in a full factorial design. The data set was analyzed by generalized linear mixed-effect models with three independent variables: student aptitude, treatment, and instructor, and three dependent (assessment) variables: change in score on pre- and postactivity clicker questions, and coding scores on in-class writing and exam essays. All independent variables had significant effects on student performance for at least one of the dependent variables. Students with higher aptitude scored higher on all assessments. Student scores were higher on exam essay questions when the activity was implemented with a writing component compared with peer discussion only. There was a significant effect of instructor, with instructors showing different degrees of effectiveness with active-learning techniques. We suggest that individual writing should be implemented as part of active learning whenever possible and that instructors may need training and practice to become effective with active learning.     

Altitude and wind effects on long jump performance with particular reference to the world record established by Bob Beamon

An analysis of long jump performance, including both the approach and aerial phases, is applied to Bob Beamon's legendary leap at the Mexico City Olympic Games of 1968. It is shown that the combined effects of altitude and wind assistance yielded an increment in the length of the jump of about 31 cm, compared to a corresponding jump at sea level under still air conditions. The main factor is shown to be the increased sprinting speed attained under favourable conditions of wind and altitude.     

The practical paradox of technology: The influence of communication technology use on employee burnout and engagement

Technological advancements in the workplace frequently have produced contradictory effects by facilitating accessibility and efficiency while increasing interruptions and unpredictability. We combine insights from organizational paradoxes and the job demands–resources model to construct a framework identifying positive and negative mechanisms in the relationship between communication technology use (CTU) and employee well-being, operationalized as work engagement and burnout. In this study of Dutch workers, we demonstrate that CTU increases well-being through positive pathways (accessibility and efficiency) and decreases well-being through negative pathways (interruptions and unpredictability). We highlight the importance of (1) investigating CTU resources and demands simultaneously to grasp the relationship between CTU and employee well-being, and (2) considering CTU's downsides to successfully implement new communication technologies and flexible work designs.     

The Thatcher governments and the British Sports Council, 1979–1990

The month of February 2015 marked the fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of the Sports Council. Despite its central role in sports governance in Britain, the advisory Council of 1965 and its successor bodies have received little attention from historians. This article assesses the early history of the Sports Council, using primary material such as National Archive papers and memoirs by practitioners to focus attention particularly on the period of Margaret Thatcher’s premiership in the 1980s. The pre-1979 Council commanded widespread respect, and the article explores how and why it became beleaguered thereafter, attributing this to a combination of ideological distrust as ‘Thatcherism’ gained in strength, shortcomings on the part of the Council itself and parochial in-fighting among leading sports bodies. By the mid-1980s the Council was under scrutiny as never before, some in the political and sporting world questioning whether it had a viable future. Although it survived to fight another day, the confidence and momentum of earlier years became a thing of the past and the way was opened up for a major overhaul of sports administration to be carried out in the 1990s.     

Presidential reflections

Family stories participate in the formation of culture as they imagine and reproduce ethnic identity. This essay examines grandmother (mémère,) stories in Franco American families as the cultural location of a global moment where family, white ethnic identity, and gender intersect. Within a transnational feminism and performative theory of family storytelling which historidze and situate cultural texts, grandmothers become linked with the motherland and mother tongue in the imagination of Franco American identity. The analysis of a corpus of mémère stories identifies both the performative agency and constraints on traditional ethnic women within structures of gender, culture, ana power. The performance of mémère stories enchants the grandmother as a cultural icon and reproduces the Franco American family. However, the formation of cultural identity through family storytelling in mémère stories is a problematic achievement because it is built upon myths of cultural purity and “goodness,“ although narrative strategies complicate these images.