Choice? Factors That Influence Women’s Decision Making for Childbirth

This article reports the findings from a mixed-methods study on factors that influence women’s decisions about birth, with the view that women’s decision making about birth can affect the use of cesarean surgery. Data was collected from focus groups and structured postpartum interviews and was analyzed using the Consensual Qualitative Research method. The findings relate specifically to the factors reported as influential in making decisions about birth including how the women categorized, prioritized, and/or favored certain types of knowledge about modes of birth. Four major information categories were identified but only stories about birth and/or attending a birth appeared to have a lasting effect on birth choices. These findings have implications for prenatal and perinatal education and nursing practice.     

Education reform for the expansion of mother-tongue education in Ghana

In 1957 Ghana was the first sub-Saharan colonial nation-state to achieve independence from British rule. The language of literacy instruction, however, remained English throughout most of Ghana’s independence, effectively thwarting reading and writing in 11 major and 67 minor indigenous languages in use today. After years of policy shifts, including the intermittent of mother tongue in early childhood schooling to facilitate English language and literacy instruction, prospects for a bold move towards multilingual education have emerged from a coalescence of forces inside and outside of Ghanaian education policy circles. This article discusses how the inertia of a dated language policy and a historic disregard for Ghana’s multilingual landscape by the country’s own policy makers are being overcome, at least partially, by progressive powers of change, albeit not without challenge. It undertakes an analysis of how a policy environment that supports bilingual education was created in order to implement a comprehensive and innovative multilingual programme, the National Literacy Acceleration Program (NALAP), which was rolled out across the nation’s schools in early 2010. Having been involved in the process of designing NALAP, the authors describe the development of standards of learning and materials, as well as innovative aspects of a constructivist teacher education approach. The paper concludes with recommendations for further research, including combining a change process for key stakeholders and randomised language and literacy assessment with social marketing research in a unified approach.     

Young Children's Reasoning About the Effects of Emotional and Physiological States on Academic Performance

This study assessed young children's understanding of the effects of emotional and physiological states on cognitive performance. Five, 6-, 7-year-olds, and adults ( N = 96) predicted and explained how children experiencing a variety of physiological and emotional states would perform on academic tasks. Scenarios included: (a) negative and positive emotions, (b) negative and positive physiological states, and (c) control conditions. All age groups understood the impairing effects of negative emotions and physiological states. Only 7-year-olds, however, showed adult-like reasoning about the potential enhancing effects of positive internal states and routinely cited cognitive mechanisms to explain how internal states affect performance. These results shed light on theory-of-mind development and also have significance for children's everyday school success.     

Teachers' attitudes toward and frequency of engagement in reading aloud in the primary classroom

Reading aloud to children is considered one of the most highly effective strategies for fostering a range of literacy skills, both at home and within contemporary classrooms. However, little is known about teachers' attitudes toward reading aloud, their self‐reported frequency of engagement in the practice and what may pose as contemporary barriers to the practice. The 2016 Western Australian Study in Reading Aloud (WASRA) collected data from over 100 teachers at 14 Australian schools. The WASRA reveals tensions in translating reading aloud practices into daily practice due to reported lack of time and high curriculum demands. The findings suggest that primary school teachers typically enjoy reading aloud to children, though fewer enjoyed reading themselves. Recommendations are provided to address time and curriculum demands purported as being inhibitors of daily reading practices. These recommendations go some way to help mitigate against literacy inequities within our primary classrooms and in so doing encourage provision of daily reading opportunities for teachers and reading aloud practices.     

An analysis of associations between residential and school mobility and educational outcomes in South African urban children: The Birth to Twenty cohort

Using data from Birth to Twenty, a cohort of South African urban children, the current paper investigates the relationships between residential and school mobility and a set of educational outcomes. The findings provide some evidence of a positive association between changes in residence and numeracy and literacy scores, and school mobility was found to be associated with grade repetition, however, no relationship was observed between changes in school and competency in numeracy and literacy. The South African study provides a counter example to trends observed in higher-income countries, while highlighting that associations are likely to be context specific.     

Race salience and essentialist thinking in racial stereotype development

The authors explored the emergence and antecedents of racial stereotyping in 89 children ages 3-10 years. Children completed a number of matching and sorting tasks, including a measure designed to assess their knowledge and application of both positive and negative in-group and out-group stereotypes. Results indicate that children start to apply stereotypes to the out-group starting around 6 years of age. Controlling for a number of factors, 2 predictors contributed significantly toward uniquely explaining the use of these stereotypes: race salience (i.e., seeing and organizing by race) and essentialist thinking (i.e., believing that race cannot change). These results provide insight into how and when real-world interventions aimed at altering the acquisition of racial stereotypes may be implemented.     

Child and Parent Relationships with Teachers in Schools Responsible for the Education of Children with Serious Medical Conditions

Claire Norris, former research associate at Moray House Institute of Education, and Alison Closs, a lecturer in special education at the Institute, describe a small research project which examined the interpersonal relationships between children with chronic and/or deteriorating conditions and their parents and teachers. The research was one aspect of a wider study (Closs & Norris, 1997) which sought ways of enabling the mainstream education of such children in Scotland.     

Needs Assessments: An Integrated Assignment in Civic Service

An undergraduate social work program developed a service‐learning experience in partnership with a local United Way organization to complete a community needs assessment project. The experience integrated the curricula of a social work research methods course and a generalist‐macro practice course with the principles and actions of experiential and service‐ learning, evidence based practice, and civic responsibility. This integrated curricula project yielded practical, “real world” outcomes for the local community and learning outcomes for the students. Needs assessments conducted by social students resulted in particular groups of community citizens receiving targeted services from agencies receiving funding from United Way. Evidence obtained from the students who participated in this experience indicates that two important learning outcomes were achieved; a heightened awareness of the local community's resource system and a sense of connection to the local community, along with the enhancement of students ‘self‐esteem and increased self‐confidence in their abilities.     

“If They're Trying to Say Something About My Culture … I'm Confused”: Recognizing and Resisting Authenticity in Latino-Themed Television

The television landscape has expanded to include an ever-increasing crop of culturally themed programs aimed at the Latina/o audience. Assumptions about the audience have shaped this trend, resulting in questions about the effectiveness of niche programming to satisfy viewer taste. This project investigates LatiNation with specific focus on the differences in the reception process based on participants' connection to their ethnic identity. In-depth interviews were conducted with self-identified Latina/o students who were also given a survey with scaled items to measure their connection to their ethnic identity. In general, the findings indicate that audience members produce varied readings of the text showing the participants actively negotiate identity by using LatiNation as an opportunity to both embrace and critique Latinidad.