Developing a Reform-Minded Science Teaching Identity: The Role of Informal Science Environments

Recommendations for reform in science education around the world set high goals for beginning elementary teachers. Concurrently, existing literature indicates a number of challenges that beginning elementary teachers face. In this paper an argument is put forward about the integration of informal science environments in elementary teacher preparation, as a means for supporting beginning elementary teachers develop reform-minded science teaching identities. Essentially, the purpose of this paper is to explore the links between teacher identity, reform recommendations, and informal science environments. In doing so, a discussion of the theoretical construct of teacher identity in conjunction with reform recommendations is offered, followed by a summary of existing literature about the challenges that beginning elementary teachers face. Subsequently, the advantages and unique opportunities that informal science environments offer for teacher learning and development are discussed through a review of related literature. Following this review, a set of theoretical and methodological limitations of existing literature are identified. Based on these limitations, a research agenda is framed to address the theoretical, methodological and research implications that the idea of integrating informal science environments and approaches to elementary teacher preparation holds.     

Art School Building: the Old/New Chelsea

In the wake of the recent demolition of the 1965 Chelsea School of Art building on Manresa Road in London, this article seeks to explore the relationship between art school architecture and art school pedagogy. Research on art school buildings, both national and international, and British art school education of the 1960s, is brought to bear, on the former ‘New School of Art in Chelsea’ building. In addition to an account of how this building came about, drawn from archival records and interviews with architects and former Chelsea students and staff, the correlation of utopianist values in post‐war British society, modernist architecture and higher education in art is examined. The reports of the National Advisory Council on Art Education (NACAE), which, in the 1960s, ushered in fundamental changes to British art education, are touched upon, and an account of the building design developed between art educationalists (including Chelsea Principal Lawrence Gowing and Chairman of the NACAE William Coldstream) and architects of the London County Council, is given. Photographs of the building, in the 1960s and during its demolition in 2010, are included. In addition to a historical account and case‐study, and despite the difficulties inherent, art school building is approached as an imaginative and socio‐political gesture, as a utopian act; ‘art school building’ in both senses (‘building’ as a verb and as a noun).     

Traceable clonal culture and chemodrug assay of heterogeneous prostate carcinoma PC3 cells in microfluidic single cell array chips

Cancer heterogeneity has received considerable attention for its role in tumor initiation and progression, and its implication for diagnostics and therapeutics in the clinic. To facilitate a cellular heterogeneity study in a low cost and highly efficient manner, we present a microfluidic platform that allows traceable clonal culture and characterization. The platform captures single cells into a microwell array and cultures them for clonal expansion, subsequently allowing on-chip characterization of clonal phenotype and response against drug treatments. Using a heterogeneous prostate cancer model, the PC3 cell line, we verified our prototype, identifying three different sub-phenotypes and correlating their clonal drug responsiveness to cell phenotype.     

Practice-Based Design of Information Systems: Notes from the Hyperdeveloped World

This paper offers reflections on information systems design based in everyday practices. Drawing on experience in what I name the hyperdeveloped world of industrial research and development in the United States, I outline a series of concerns, organized under the themes of information flows, local improvisations and work practices. I then offer a set of alternative understandings of change and innovation that underwrite a practice-based design approach. These include a view of innovation as indigenous to technologiesin-use, an emphasis on the investments needed to create sustainable change, and an orientation to artful integration as an objective for information systems design.     

Designing your web site for instructional effectiveness and completeness: First steps

TechTrends - Developing and publishing Web sites is becoming almost trivially easy today, and there are many sites on the Web nowadays that purport to be instructional in one way or another. In...     

The effect of Braille orthography on blind children’s phonological awareness

Little is known about the phonological awareness and literacy skills of children who are blind. Fifteen 7–12 year old blind children were assessed on standardised measures of intelligence, spelling and reading. They performed poorer when reading than their chronological age would predict. Their phonological awareness skills were compared with a sighted group matched for chronological age (CA). The blind children performed poorer than the CA matched group. In a second experiment, the effect of Braille orthography on phonological awareness was investigated by comparing blind and CA matched children’s ability to segment heard words, which are written in Braille with and without contractions. Words with Braille contractions were less well segmented by the blind children. The results suggest that the nature of the orthography learned affects phonological awareness.     

Merging Academics and Police Training: Washington State University’s Department of Police Science and Administration and the Law Enforcement Assistance Act of 1965

The Law Enforcement Assistance Act of 1965 prompted a nationwide movement to create and expand police education programs at colleges and universities across America. This paper details the actions of the well-established Washington State University Department of Police Science and Administration program in response to the passage of the 1965 Act. Among the actions taken, the program’s leaders responded to calls for their expert advice in setting up new programs, increased the number of undergraduates in their program to answer greater demands for college training opportunities for current and future police officers, and admitted more students to their graduate program so as to provide qualified teachers for new academic programs being created through the Act’s funding.     

Millennial Students' Mental Models of Search: Implications for Academic Librarians and Database Developers

Today's students exhibit generational differences in the way they search for information. Observations of first-year students revealed a proclivity for simple keyword or phrases searches with frequent misspellings and incorrect logic. Although no students had strong mental models of search mechanisms, those with stronger models did construct more complex searches.     

Supporting student teachers in developing and applying professional knowledge with videoed events

Student teachers often struggle with handling events in the complex environment that is a classroom. This article reports on a study that investigates the potential of using video-based materials to support mathematics student teachers in developing and applying professional knowledge. Student teachers viewed videos of classroom events with possible teacher reactions to each event. This article reports on the discourse that occurred before and after the viewing of the four possible responses in terms of the content and the nature of the discussions. Results show that when the event focused on mathematics, the focus of the responses shifted from themselves as teachers to the learners. However, the converse was true when the event focused on generic classroom management issues. Additionally, the nature of both sets of responses became more evaluative and interpretive following the video clips of possible responses.     

Evidencing the impact of teaching-related CPD: beyond the ‘Happy Sheets’

Abstract

In this paper we report the outcomes of a national survey of academic development staff in a range of UK HE Institutions to consider the approaches adopted to evaluate teaching-related continual professional development (CPD). Despite the increasing drive towards accountability, the majority of respondents undertook no benchmarking to establish existing knowledge, there was minimal use of existing data sets, and few evaluated provision longitudinally. We argue that in order to arrive at an evidence-informed approach, evaluation and teaching-related CPD must be clearly conceptualised, and aligned with institutional priorities. The involvement of students with staff CPD could also be usefully explored.