Weaving Together Undergraduate Research, Mentoring of Junior Faculty, and Assessment: The Case of an Interdisciplinary Program

Scholars in teaching and learning value student research and program assessment as strategies to promote excellence in undergraduate education. Yet, in practice, each can be complex and difficult to sustain. This case study demonstrates how undergraduate research, mentoring of junior faculty, and assessment can be integrated in ways that enrich the educational experiences of students and the professional development of faculty and improve research on teaching and learning. The authors describe a lively undergraduate research project that became tied to the mentoring of assistant professors and then to program assessment. We conclude with recommendations for implementing such a project in other academic settings. Elizabeth Thomas is Assistant Professor in the Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at the University of Washington Bothell. She received her Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and teaches courses on inquiry in the social sciences, community psychology, and psychology and the arts. Her research examines sociocultural contexts for learning and development with a particular focus on the role of the arts and the potential of participatory action research strategies. Diane Gillespie is Professor and Associate Director of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences (IAS) at The University of Washington, Bothell, received her Ph.D. at the University of Nebraska—Lincoln in Cultural and Psychological Studies in Education. She teaches multicultural social science courses and qualitative research. Her recent publications explore the importance of narrative for reflective teaching and learning, learning in small groups, and the role of human rights in nonformal education.     

University–industry collaboration: Patterns of growth for low- and middle-level performers

Following landmark legislation passed more than 20 years ago, university–industry relationships have now become central to understanding the changing role of research universities in American Society. The paper analyzes the development of university–industry partnerships during the 1990s. Past studies have used a broad array of measures of ties and a variety of research methodologies, but they have shared a focus on top collaborators or on samples of universities skewed toward the top. However, findings based on top collaborators may not be valid for other universities. Universities involved in mid- to low-levels of collaboration are qualitatively different in many ways from the more extensively studied set of top collaborators, suggesting that characteristics affecting university–industry ties may not be the same for these institutions. The paper shifts the focus away from top collaborators to this sizable and less studied majority. In general, we find that the same characteristics predicting high levels of involvement for the sample as a whole also predict high levels of involvement for the sub-sample of mid- and low-level collaborators. However, We find some particular characteristics of these institutions, such as land grant status, are also associated with stronger ties to industry, and that some characteristics of 25 top institutions do not predict the level of involvement of these lower-level collaborators. We will discuss whether the licensing of new technology is likely ever to become an important source of net revenues for current middle and low-level collaborators. Our findings raise doubts about whether many universities below the top 25 will earn substantial net revenues from licensing, though they do not dispute the potential service value of these ties. The study is based on examination of a wide range of potential influences on university–industry collaboration for institutions that are not currently among the most heavily involved in partnerships. These include status, other institutional characteristics (such as size and control), investment in science and engineering, and characteristics of offices or technology transfer.     

Third graders' use of writing to facilitate learning of engineering concepts

Incorporating engineering instruction into the elementary curriculum is not without challenges. Traditionally, researchers investigated using engineering design to promote students learning science concepts. More recently, researchers have conducted qualitative investigations to measure students' learning of engineering concepts after engaging in engineering design. In this study, we extended work on elementary engineering instruction by implementing an integrated engineering and writing unit with 58 third-grade students. Using stratified random assignment based on pre-intervention engineering vocabulary assessment scores, we assigned students to treatment (n = 28) or comparison (n = 30). During a 10-day unit, all students participated in design challenges, emulated the practices of actual engineers, and used writing to support and document their learning, as they designed and authored their own five-page pop-up books. Students in the treatment condition participated in additional writing during 8 of the 10 unit lessons. During this time, they responded to journal prompts related to lesson objectives. At the same time, students in the comparison condition participated in small-group discussions during which they discussed journal prompts orally. We found that all students made statistically significant gains from pre- to posttest on an engineering vocabulary assessment; total words written, number of different engineering concepts used, and depth of understanding of engineering concepts in a written essay response; and number of different engineering concepts used in an oral interview response, regardless of their incoming writing skills and regardless of whether they participated in additional writing or small-group discussion of lesson objectives. This study is the first to quantitatively document the effectiveness of a combined elementary engineering and writing intervention for promoting students' learning of engineering concepts in multiple ways (rote recall, written representation, and oral representation). We argue that literacy, particularly writing, provides an effective and feasible method for incorporating engineering instruction into the elementary curriculum.     

Exploring the variety of parental talk during shared book reading and its contributions to preschool language and literacy: evidence from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort

Although many studies have explored shared book reading between preschoolers and their families, very few have examined this practice within a large, nationally representative sample. Using the ECLS-B dataset, this study investigated shared reading among nearly 700 families of diverse ethnic, linguistic, and socioeconomic backgrounds. Coding of families’ book-related discussion focused on the variety of types of talk that parents used during reading. Results showed that parents focused primarily on the meaning of the story, with little attention to the code of the text. The range of talk techniques that parents used was largely independent of background factors such as child gender, ethnicity, or age, as well as family home language. A wider variety of meaning-related remarks by parents was linked to more advanced language skills among preschoolers. Findings provide a portrait of the nature of shared book reading discussion among American families, a profile of the background factors that are linked to this talk, and a precise account of the unique contributions of this talk to key emergent language and literacy competencies.     

Preschoolers’ Visual Attention during Electronic Storybook Reading as Related to Different Types of Textual Supports

Preschoolers’ (n?=?32) attention to print and pictures was documented during an electronic storybook reading session. Children (M?=?51.06 months; SD?=?7.34 months) looked at a 12-page book that contained three types of pages, each of which was presented four times over the course of the book: (1) silent presentation of print, (2) print that was read aloud, and (3) print that was both read aloud and highlighted. Our research objectives were to analyze whether the way in which print was presented related to the ways in which children attended to print and pictures during the reading session. Gaze fixation duration to print and pictures was assessed using a Tobii X2-60 portable eye tracking unit, which captured corneal reflection data for each child. Children’s total fixation duration to print was greatest when print was read aloud and highlighted as compared to when it was presented silently or read aloud. In addition, children looked at print more when it was displayed silently than when the computer read the story to children, although this difference was much smaller in magnitude. Children attended to pictures more than print across pages, but this difference was most notable when the story was read aloud. Results demonstrate the potential utility of nonverbal print referencing strategies during book reading.     

Sharing Books and Learning Language: What do Latina Mothers and Their Young Children Do?

This study examined low-income, Spanish-speaking, immigrant Latina mothers' book sharing behaviors in relation to their children's vocabulary. Participants were 47 3-year-old children and their mothers. We addressed two research questions: (a) What interactive behaviors are evident when low-income immigrant Latina mothers and their 3-year-old children look at books together? (b) For these children and their mothers, which book-sharing behaviors are related to children's expressive language? Overall, our results indicated that mothers were involved in several kinds of interactions with the books. They enhanced their children's attention to the printed text, promoted interaction or conversation with their children about what was in the books, and somewhat less often, used more complex literacy strategies. Mothers who did these things most had children with the largest vocabularies even when mothers' vocabulary was taken into account. Implications for designing interventions for similar families are discussed.     

Using time dynamically in static intervals: Does it close the achievement gap?

A mixed-methods study was undertaken with 118 biology students in two urban high schools. A Student-Centered Adaptable Learning Environment (SCALE) was created to improve engagement from affective and cognitive perspectives using choice, creativity and technological allowances. Results demonstrated that fast and slow learners are generally separated by about 30 min in terms of inputting speeds, but can be as much as 65 min apart from one another. Given that traditional classrooms afford students only 45 min in which to learn, static time could have become a source of inequity in public schools. SCALE optimally allowed for the dynamic use of time in constrained periods, therefore reducing and even eliminating any negative relationships between speed of learning and resultant achievement gains in the block setting. Especially benefitting from their ability to maneuver were the slowest learners, who showed the largest achievement improvements in either time interval amongst ability groupings. As learning speed can be the most critical contributing component of resultant educational outcomes, providing students the ability to use time dynamically should be considered as a feasible solution to helping teachers reestablish equity in mixed-ability classrooms in public schools.     

Breaking through: Using educational technology for children with special needs

Barbara Albers Hill markets the book, Breaking Through: Using Educational Technology for Children with Special Needs, as a tool providing assistance with use of educational technology as it relates to children with special needs. The mention of specific special needs, such as children with Autism and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), leads readers to believe the book will provide detailed information on how educational technology will assist a child according to each specific need. Hill organizes the book in two parts. The first part provides an overview of tablet technology and how to use it to enhance learning for children with special needs. Part two of the book provides the reader with information that will assist a consumer with purchasing the right tablet for the special need. Upon review of the content, the book is less about detail and more about a shopping guide for the consumer as to the best tablet to select for children with special needs.     

Randomized trial of a statewide home visiting program: impact in preventing child abuse and neglect

OBJECTIVES: To assess the impact of home visiting in preventing child abuse and neglect in the first 3 years of life in families identified as at-risk of child abuse through population-based screening at the child's birth. METHODS: This experimental study focused on Hawaii Healthy Start Program (HSP) sites operated by three community-based agencies. From 11/94 to 12/95, 643 families were enrolled and randomly assigned to intervention and control groups. Child abuse and neglect were measured by observed and self-reported parenting behaviors, all hospitalizations for trauma and for conditions where hospitalization might have been avoided with adequate preventive care, maternal relinquishment of her role as primary caregiver, and substantiated CPS reports. Data were collected through annual maternal interviews (88% follow-up each year of all families with baseline interviews); observation of the home environment; and review of CPS, HSP, and pediatric medical records. RESULTS: HSP records rarely noted home visitor concern about possible abuse. The HSP and control groups were similar on most measures of maltreatment. HSP group mothers were less likely to use common corporal/verbal punishment (AOR=.59, p=.01) but this was attributable to one agency's reduction in threatening to spank the child. HSP group mothers reported less neglectful behavior (AOR=.72, .02), related to a trend toward decreased maternal preoccupation with problems and to improved access to medical care for intervention families at one agency. CONCLUSIONS: The program did not prevent child abuse or promote use of nonviolent discipline; it had a modest impact in preventing neglect. Possible targets for improved effectiveness include the program's implementation system and model.