Enabling integrated knowledge acquisition and management in health care teams

Basing treatment, policy and planning decisions on the best available research knowledge remains a central principle in modern health care around the world, yet many health professionals find acquiring and managing published research knowledge challenging. In this paper, we report on a Soft Systems Methodology-based collaborative action research initiative with a specialist mental health service from the United Kingdom's National Health Service. Our objective was to design and implement improvements to their knowledge acquisition and management activities in order to facilitate sustained and effective evidence-based practices. We report on both the factors found to impede effective research knowledge acquisition and management and the development of more integrated knowledge management processes designed to improve the situation.     

The how's and why's of biological change: How learners neglect physical mechanisms in their search for meaning

This study describes the trends in students' explanations of biological change in organisms. A total of 96 student volunteers (8 students from each of 2nd, 5th, 8th, and 12th grades from 3 localities) were interviewed individually and each student was presented a series of graphics depicting natural phenomena. Students' explanations to questions of how something occurred were assigned to one of three categories (responses addressing how something occurred, why something occurred, and 'I don't know'). While the number of responses in each category was roughly equivalent in prominence across grade levels, the majority of students were unable to offer a causal explanation of how a phenomena occurred. An unexpected phenomenon was the students' predilection to redirect the interview question so they could answer them. If asked a how question, as they were in every interview instance, 32% the students answered with a 'why' response. The way biology is taught, the structure of biology or/and how we learn it could shed some light into this phenomenon and has implications for science educators.     

Concept maps as assessment in science inquiry learning - a report of methodology

Increasing availability of technologies, such as CD ROMs and the World Wide Web, in schools means that more teachers will have the potential to implement student-centred, inquiry-based approaches to learning. Assessing what each student knows in a broad subject area, such as science, is difficult. Assessing students' understanding in circumstances where each student may pursue different topics of study, where there is no way to predict in advance what those topics of study will be and where the possible topics of study include natural phenomena which are only beginning to be studied by professional scientists, is even more difficult. The authors recently faced such a challenge. To meet the challenge, the authors chose to assess student learning using an open-ended concept map activity combined with a rubric which extracts quantitative information about the quality of understanding from each map. This article describes the method the authors developed, including tests of reliability and validity.     

Population differences in constructive memory

An experiment was conducted to evaluate constructive memory in fourth-grade low-SES black and middle-SES white children. The children were read nine short passages; each passage was composed of two premise statements and a filler sentence. The children were tested by a recognition procedure. Thirty-six test sentences were presented randomly. Four sentences were associated with each passage (true premise, false premise, true inference, and false inference). Subjects were asked to make yes/no recognition decisions based on whether the test sentence was identical to a sentence presented at study. Middle-SES white children made few errors, except to true inference test sentences. This pattern of performance is consistent with the constructive view of memory. Low-SES black children also had a high error rate to true inference items. However, this outcome may not reflect constructive memory because they also had a high error rate to some of the other types of test sentences.     

Stakeholders in Comprehensive Validation of Standards-Based Assessments: A Commentary

Linda Cracker is a Professor of Educational Psychology, University ofFlorida, P.O. Box 11 7047 Gainesville, FL 32611-7043. Her areas of specialization are assessment development, validation, and test-taking behavior.     

From national policy-making to global edu-business: Swedish edu-preneurs on the move

This study explores the movements of some Swedish former education policy-makers that are currently active as commercial edu-business actors with the ambition to expand in the Global Education Industry (GEI). The aim is to map and analyze how a selection of Swedish edu-preneurs affiliated with a particular Swedish school chain enter the GEI and thereby market both their commercialized services and the policy ideas about so-called free schools, in its Swedish version. The study shows how these edu-preneurs move from the domestic to global arenas and how their business and policy advocacy activities are framed and represented. Mobilization and public exposure of previous and present policy advocacy networks are important assets for these edu-preneurs as they navigate the GEI. The study illustrates how these actors make use of particular forms of knowledge, from department ministerial work and party politics, which blends with work in public relations and various edu-businesses, pointing to the interrelatedness of politics, policy, business, power, and ideology. The paper concludes by raising issues in need of further exploration and debate, pertaining to our understanding of education policy-making and, ultimately, democracy.     

‘But that wasn't enough’: exploring affective assemblages within a professional relationship

This paper engages with the early childhood–school relationship. The relationship has a long-standing history of being defined by a series of divisions and separations. Research has identified the divisions and separations to be largely determined by differences around concepts of learning and pedagogy. Discursive analyses of these differences often result in a series of impasses. The aim of this paper is to move beyond these discursively determined impasses. I draw on data from a small pilot study where a group of early childhood teachers come together to talk about their use of Transition Statements. I bring to the analysis of the data the concept of affective assemblages. This allows me to look beyond that which has been discursively produced in order to ask new questions, and to offer new ways of being in relationship.