Performance characteristics of retarded and normal students on pattern recognition tasks

The purpose was to compare the performance of normal and educable mentally retarded children on pattern recognition tasks. Pattern recognition was assessed by the administration of 96 pattern tasks which measured the ability of children to find: (a) duplicate patterns and same elements as presented in model pattern sequences; (b) opposite patterns and same elements as presented in model pattern sequences; and (c) duplicate patterns but different elements than presented in model pattern sequences. The normal and mentally retarded children were matched on mental age derived from individual and group intelligence tests. Results indicated significant differences in performance measures between groups and various pattern tasks. The data support the suppositions that: (a) mentally retarded children and normal children show the same type of progression through the hierarchical arrangement of pattern tasks; and (b) mentally retarded children show a slower progression through the hierarchy than normal children when matched on mental age. Educational implications from this study are discussed.     

A broad BACEIS for improving thinking

This article describes a theory of factors which affect intellectual performance. Many current programs and approaches to improving thinking skills tend to be overly narrow, often ignoring the affective domain and features of the environmental context. The BACEIS model is a comprehensive theory of internal and external factors affecting the development, retention and transfer of thinking and learning skills. The internal supersystem consists of cognitive and affective subsystems which interact with each other and with the external supersystem and its components. The external supersystem encompasses academic and non-academic subsystems. Three uses of the theory are discussed: for instructional design, to guide research, and to critique existing approaches.     

Practical intelligence and elementary-school teacher effectiveness in the United States and Israel: Measuring the predictive power of tacit knowledge

One important aspect of teacher effectiveness, of course, is formal knowledge of one or more academic disciplines. But another aspect of teacher effectiveness may be informal, or tacit knowledge of how to handle challenging situations, or even crises, that arise in the classroom. Tacit knowledge is what a person needs to know to succeed in an endeavor that is typically not explicitly taught and that often is not even verbalized. It is procedural knowledge, and thus is not just a static form of knowledge, but rather, knowledge in use. We constructed a measure of tacit knowledge for elementary-school teachers, in order to determine the teachers’ likely effectiveness in dealing with problematical classroom situations. In Study 1, our primary goal was to determine whether our measure predicted principals’ ratings of the teachers’ classroom performance as well as teachers’ ratings of their own effectiveness. We found that teachers who scored higher on our tacit-knowledge inventory generally were rated as more effective by their principals, but as less effective by themselves. In Study 2, we investigated whether responses to problematical situations that were viewed as better or worse, respectively, in the United States were also viewed as better or worse, respectively, in Israel. We found a high correlation between responses in the two countries. We concluded that it is possible to measure an important aspect of teacher effectiveness via a measure of tacit knowledge, and that comparable measurements may be possible across at least two cultures.     

Differences between accounts provided by witnesses and alleged victims of child sexual abuse

OBJECTIVES: To determine whether child witnesses of sexual abuse were more or less informative about the alleged incidents than alleged victims when interviewed similarly. METHOD: Twenty-six alleged victims of child sexual abuse (aged 5 to 14 years; M=9.8 years) and 26 children who had witnessed but not experienced similar events were interviewed by experienced youth investigators about the alleged abuse. Children in the two groups were matched with respect to their age, relationships with the alleged perpetrator, and seriousness of the alleged offenses. All children were interviewed using the NICHD investigative interview protocol. RESULTS: Witnesses and victims provided similar amounts of information about the incidents of abuse. Interviewers used more open-ended invitations and elicited more information using open-ended prompts from witnesses than from victims, whereas they used more risky (including suggestive) prompts when interviewing victims. DISCUSSION: These results confirm that young children can be informative witnesses about events that they have either experienced or witnessed.     

A Threefold Model of Intellectual Styles

The field of styles presents three major controversial issues: styles as value-laden versus value-free, styles as traits versus states, and styles as different constructs versus similar constructs with different labels. We address these issues by proposing an integrative model of styles—the Threefold Model of Intellectual Styles—which divides all styles into three basic kinds. The foundation of this model is Sternberg and Zhangs body of empirical investigations into the thinking styles proposed in the theory of mental self-government. The model also draws upon others previous empirical findings in the literature. The model argues that most styles are value-laden rather than value-free; that they have both trait-like and state-like aspects, but for the most part are modifiable and hence more state-like; and that they overlap highly across theories.     

We can be as busy as a bee: a grounded theory study of Filipino elderly prisoners’ engagement

ABSTRACT

The centrality of social relationship for older adults living in prison cannot be underestimated. While previous studies have investigated the loss of social functioning among older prisoners, there is no known information pertaining to how engagement is experienced among this vulnerable group. This grounded study purports to describe the process by which engagement is experienced among a select group of incarcerated Filipino elderly. Strauss and Corbin’s Grounded Theory design was utilized. A total of 25 incarcerated Filipino elderly in the largest penitentiary in the country were purposively chosen to participate in semi-structured interviews. Field texts were subjected to thematic analysis involving open, axial, and selective coding. Finally, themes were validated via member checking procedure. Interestingly, the study afforded the development of de Guzman, Herrera, Hernando, Hipe, and Valdez Zipper of Engagement Theory among incarcerated elderly. Interestingly, three phases relative to engagement emerged, namely: Initiating, Connecting, and Enabling. Primarily, the Initiating phase involves feelings of fear and nervousness as the incarcerated elderly familiarize themselves with the prison environment. The Connecting phase typifies recognition of the benefits of engagement leading to voluntary participation in activities. Finally, in the Enabling phase, inmates empower themselves and others to grow as they fully acquire the sense of engagement. Gerontological education and research implications are discussed.     

STYLES OF THINKING IN THE SCHOOL

Educators know that variables beyond abilities affect students’ performance in school and their interactions with their teachers. Thinking styles are such a variable. Thinking styles are preferred ways of thinking. They are not abilities but rather preferred ways of expressing these abilities. Both students and teachers vary in thinking styles, and in systematic ways. For example, teachers tend to match the stylistic pattern of the school, and students to match the stylistic pattern of their teachers. Teachers tend to overestimate the extent to which their students match their own styles, and also evaluate more favorably students whose styles match their own. Thus, teachers are more likely to identify as “gifted” not only high ability students, but those who match them stylistically.

     

Raising the Achievement of All Students: Teaching for Successful Intelligence

This article describes how we can teach students more effectively by teaching for successful intelligence. Teaching for successful intelligence involves instructing and assessing analytically, creatively, and practically, as well as for memory. Such teaching helps students recognize and capitalize on strengths, and at the same time recognize and correct or compensate for weaknesses. The article describes how to teach for successful intelligence and presents empirical evidence that teaching for successful intelligence really works in the classroom in raising student achievement.     

Opening Windows, Closing Doors: Ethical Dilemmas in Educational Action Research

The chapter records personal accounts of the author's dealings with dilemmas encountered in the research methods literature and in the field of practice, as an action researcher and teacher educator. It draws on Mary Chamberlain's Fenwomen to illustrate some of the dangers of ethnographic research. Using data from two instances, one in a pre-service initial teacher-training programme and the other in teacher induction, the author draws out the tensions between the 'need to know' in order to act professionally, and the 'need to protect' in order to do the same.     

FORESTER,a Simulation Game for Teaching Survey Sampling

At the First International Conference on Teaching Statistics (Grey et al. 1983), several papers dealth with simulation games, either with or without a computer to assist in the teaching of a variety of statistical concepts (Mead 1983, Elliott 1983, Bright et al. 1983a, b, Joiner 1983, Singh 1983). One area not covered was survey sampling which is the subject of this article.