Comparing Models of Nature of Science Dimensionality Based on the Next Generation Science Standards

Instruments measuring understanding of the nature of science (NOS) are required if educational institutions intend to use benchmarks or examine the effects of interventions targeting students’ NOS development. Compared to other constructs, NOS understanding is complex, having been the subject of debate among scholars in both its substance and its dimensionality. This complexity invites challenges in defining what is to be measured. Drawing from the perspective that policy reform documents provide pragmatic consensus-based definitions of NOS, this study investigated how well the dimensionality described in the NOS component of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) framework matched the empirical structure of data collected from a set of secondary-school students’ responses to an NOS instrument comprising multiple-choice and Likert-scale items. Using multidimensional item response modeling to compare structures of NOS dimensionality, we found that treating NOS as comprising multiple dimensions—as defined by the themes in the NGSS NOS framework—resulted in a better fitting model than when treating NOS as a single dimension. The multidimensional model also had fewer poorly functioning items and revealed NOS profiles that otherwise would have been masked in a model treating NOS as a single dimension. These results provide support for the NOS NGSS framework and contribute to the ongoing discussion about the dimensionality of NOS.     

Supporting teacher responsiveness in assessment for learning through disciplined noticing

Abstract

Assessment for learning (AfL) practices are commonly recommended as effective classroom strategies for providing teachers with information about student understanding. For teachers, the substantive potential of these AfL practices to inform student learning actions depends on what teachers notice and select as a focus and how they interpret and act on the information they have. This paper suggests research on teacher professional noticing has something to offer in understanding how teacher AfL attention and actions are framed in the moment. It explains noticing as a responsive act that invites action that is an inclusive, dynamic and purposeful response to evidence of student ideas. Noticing is what enables a teacher to act on the fly because it informs and underpins possible actions. Three frames of noticing are introduced to guide noticing and action – curriculum connoisseurship, cultural and community connectedness, and collaborative ways of working. Through consideration of classroom events using these frames, teachers become better prepared to choose to respond in the moment creatively. The three frames provide teachers and researchers with a conceptual language to articulate and sharpen their AfL practices as part of a flexible and rigorous responsiveness to their students’ learning.     

Using action research to address the mental health needs of older people: a reflection and discussion of real‐world problems

Action research provides an opportunity to implement and understand the process of change in practice settings, as well as develop theoretical insights into complex social situations. The provision of mental healthcare for older people within the general hospital is one such situation, and this paper presents a discussion and reflection on the use of action research in this setting. The background to the project is described, followed by a discussion of three major issues that emerged for us: the extent to which we were able to promote democracy and maintain and demonstrate democratic behaviour, the problems and pitfalls of operationalising grounded theory methodology within an action research approach, and the challenges of developing an authentic and credible account of the care of older people with mental health needs. This paper aims to add to a discourse regarding action research and will be of value to researchers using this approach across a range of health, social care and educational settings.     

Constructing the Good Teacher in Higher Education: The discursive work of standards

Professional development for academics in higher education is increasingly important in the United Kingdom and elsewhere. Promoting better teaching practices through professional development is part of the drive for quality and excellence. However, the focus has been on teaching as a "technical" activity, defined as competence in a particular domain of practice. This has obscured the social and discursive practices through which a very particular sort of teacher identity is produced. It is possible, therefore, to examine the ways in which the standards of competence operate to normalise and fashion what it means to be a "good teacher". In this article, we examine extracts from course documentation produced by a UK university through which the professional standards of those working in higher education are being constituted. Our focus is not the quality of these particular materials but the work the documentation performs in building up a particular notion of what characterises a professional teacher in higher education.     

A typology of school science models

Modelling is the essence of thinking and working scientifically. But how do secondary students view science models? Usually as toys or miniatures of real-life objects with few students actually understanding why scientists use multiple models to explain concepts. A conceptual typology of models is presented and explained to help teachers select models that are appropriate to the conceptual ability of their students. The article concludes by recommending that teachers model scientific modelling to their students, encourage the use of multiple models in science lessons, progressively introduce sophisticated models, systematically present in-class models using the Focus, Action and Reflection (FAR) guide and socially negotiate all model meanings.     

Instruction in radio and television in twenty‐five selected universities

The mushroom growth of radio and television instruction taking place since the end of World War II has left in its wake a patch‐work guilt of academic programs in colleges and universities from coast to coast. The importance of trying to answer the question ‘Where are we going?”; indicates a need for realistic stock‐taking and thorough curriculum evaluation.

In keeping with its policy of seeking to advance the field of knowledge as to education for broadcasting, the Journal presents a special report on the current state of the curriculum which, it is hoped, will prove of value to all those interested in education for broadcasting.     

A Critique of Internet Polls as Symbolic Representation and Pseudo-Events

The Internet continues to grow as an information and entertainment medium. Internet growth has implications for the news industry. Twenty-four hour news networks such as CNN and MSNBC regularly encourage viewers of their television programs to visit their Web sites. While visiting news Web sites, visitors are invited to participate in opinion polls. Unfortunately, these online opinion polls are not scientific and have little real news value. In spite of these limitations, news Web sites' Internet polls are often treated as serious topics in broadcast news discussions. This article examines media organizations' Internet online polls and critiques them as instances of symbolic representation and pseudo-events that have arisen largely out of the integration of print, broadcast, and Internet media.     

Collaborative action research as a tool for generating formative feedback on teachers’ classroom assessment practice: the KREST project

This paper sets out to explore science teachers’ classroom assessment practices and outlines some of the tensions and synergies in changing assessment practices. It describes episodes from a collaborative action research project with science teachers designed to support the strengthening of classroom assessment practices – the King’s Researching Expertise in Science Teaching project. This paper focuses on how the collaborative action research project functioned as a tool for generating formative feedback for the teachers and how this feedback supported the teachers in making sense of and further developing their classroom assessment practices.     

Violence,Silence and Storytelling: The Dilemma of Matricide in Women’s Memoirs

In this paper I explore how women’s thinking subjectivity is structured by a need to negotiate between identifying with and repudiating our mothers. Oriented by Melanie Klein’s theory of matricide which posits that an infant’s capacity to think for herself originates in her need to separate from her mother, I consider the implications of this structure for women’s gendered experiences of intellectualism. To examine how this dilemma of matricide animates women’s thinking lives I read Helen M. Buss’s criticism of Carolyn Kay Steedman’s memoir Landscape for a Good Woman. I argue that Buss’s criticism of Steedman is symptomatic of her ambivalent relation to the problem of identification and repudiation that drives her own intellectual labour. I then turn to a scene in Buss’s memoir, Memoirs from Away, to examine how the matricidal dilemma resonates through her work of reading other women’s memoirs and of writing her own.