HOPE VI Neighborhoods and Neighborhood Schools: Understanding How Revitalized Neighborhoods Influence School Environments

As detailed in the articles throughout this issue, the U.S. education system experienced a number of structural developments throughout the 20th century. These changes served to shift the landscape of decision-making authority in multiple areas of primary and secondary schooling. This article provides an international perspective on the changes undergone by the American system, painting a broad picture of where the trends in the United States’ educational system fit within changes worldwide. To best understand the possible implications of changes in the United States, I describe trends in educational centralization and decentralization in other nations, placing the American changes in a broader context shedding light on where education in the United States could be headed.     

Investigating the impact of automated feedback on students’ scientific argumentation

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the role of automated scoring and feedback in supporting students’ construction of written scientific arguments while learning about factors that affect climate change in the classroom. The automated scoring and feedback technology was integrated into an online module. Students’ written scientific argumentation occurred when they responded to structured argumentation prompts. After submitting the open-ended responses, students received scores generated by a scoring engine and written feedback associated with the scores in real-time. Using the log data that recorded argumentation scores as well as argument submission and revisions activities, we answer three research questions. First, how students behaved after receiving the feedback; second, whether and how students’ revisions improved their argumentation scores; and third, did item difficulties shift with the availability of the automated feedback. Results showed that the majority of students (77%) made revisions after receiving the feedback, and students with higher initial scores were more likely to revise their responses. Students who revised had significantly higher final scores than those who did not, and each revision was associated with an average increase of 0.55 on the final scores. Analysis on item difficulty shifts showed that written scientific argumentation became easier after students used the automated feedback.     

Measuring Knowledge Integration Learning of Energy Topics: A two-year longitudinal study

Although researchers call for inquiry learning in science, science assessments rarely capture the impact of inquiry instruction. This paper reports on the development and validation of assessments designed to measure middle-school students’ progress in gaining integrated understanding of energy while studying an inquiry-oriented curriculum. The assessment development was guided by the knowledge integration framework. Over 2 years of implementation, more than 4,000 students from 4 schools participated in the study, including a cross-sectional and a longitudinal cohort. Results from item response modeling analyses revealed that: (a) the assessments demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties in terms of reliability and validity; (b) both the cross-sectional and longitudinal cohorts made progress on integrating their understanding energy concepts; and (c) among many factors (e.g. gender, grade, school, and home language) associated with students’ science performance, unit implementation was the strongest predictor.     

生机盎然

1我以前怎么会从未留意它们?我与哥哥乔希每天在往返于学校的路上,要经过位于牧场边缘的一块空地。后来,在一个春天的下午,我看见了它们:小小的光点,在一丛丛凌乱的青草的上方窥视着我——黄     

Electronic Portfolios in Teacher Education: A Case Study of Early Childhood Teacher Candidates

The use of electronic portfolios is increasingly becoming popular in teacher education programs. The electronic portfolio allows learners to express their work and take ownership over their own ability to plan and assess and reflect upon their learning during a specific period of time. While many teacher education programs have adopted electronic portfolios in order to meet accreditation requirements, others use electronic portfolios to develop and improve on students’ technology skills—train students on how to better use technology in instruction and student assessment. Irrespective of the reasons for adoption, there is the need to assess students’ perceptions of electronic portfolios, and especially to explore the benefits and challenges students face in using electronic portfolios in their course work. Using a qualitative research design, the current study explored teacher candidates’ attitudes toward electronic portfolios and the differences that electronic portfolios bring to their profession. Such a study is necessary to help administrators identify students’ needs to ensure that they are gaining the maximum benefits from the use of electronic portfolios in their programs of study.     

Just picking it up? Young children learning with technology at home

We describe a two year empirical investigation of three‐ and four‐year‐old children's uses of technology at home, based on a survey of 346 families and 24 case studies. Using a socio‐cultural approach, we discuss the range of technologies children encounter in the home, the different forms their learning takes, the roles of adults and other children and how family practices support this learning. Many parents believed that they did not teach children how to use technology. We discuss parents' beliefs that their children ‘pick up’ their competencies with technology and identify trial and error, copying and demonstration as typical modes of learning. Parents tend to consider that their children are mainly self‐taught and underestimate their own role in supporting learning and the extent to which learning with technology is culturally transmitted within the family.     

Development and Implementation of a Food Safety Knowledge Instrument

ABSTRACT:  Little is known about the food safety knowledge of young adults. In addition, few knowledge questionnaires and no comprehensive, criterion-referenced measure that assesses the full range of food safety knowledge could be identified. Without appropriate, valid, and reliable measures and baseline data, it is difficult to develop and implement effective education efforts. Thus, the purpose of this study was to develop a comprehensive, valid, reliable food safety knowledge questionnaire. Questionnaire development followed this process: 1) use of published reports and input from experts in food safety and sanitation (n = 7) to identify key food safety concepts; 2) development of a question bank (n = 101) assessing knowledge of key concepts (i.e., cross contamination prevention'disinfection procedures; safe times/temperatures for cooking/storing foods; groups at greatest risk for foodborne disease; foods that increase risk of foodborne disease; and foodborne disease pathogens); 3) refinement of initial questions by experts; 4) questionnaire pretest with young adults (n = 180) and refinement; 5) questionnaire pilot test (n = 126) and refinement; 6) final expert review and refinement; and 7) conversion into an online survey. Young adults (n = 4343, mean age 19.9 ± 1.7SD years) from 21 universities and colleges across the country completed the questionnaire. Item analysis was used to determine the overall quality of the test and identify improvements needed. Livingston's coefficient of reliability for criterion-referenced tests was 0.92. The questionnaire met or exceeded generally recognized standards of reliability and validity. This questionnaire could be useful in baseline assessment of food safety knowledge and measurement of knowledge gained after an educational intervention in adults.     

Socioeconomic Status and Preschoolers' Mathematical Knowledge: The Contribution of Home Activities and Parent Beliefs

Research Findings: Children from families of lower socioeconomic status (SES) enter kindergarten with less developed mathematical knowledge compared to children from middle SES families. This discrepancy is present at age 3 years and likely stems from differences in the home learning environment. This study reports SES-related differences both in the quantity and quality of mathematical support children receive in the home and in parent beliefs about early mathematical development and then compares both with children's performance on a comprehensive mathematics assessment. Participants included 90 children in their 1st year of preschool (2 years before kindergarten entry) and 88 children in their prekindergarten year (the year just prior to kindergarten entry). Both cohorts were balanced for SES and gender. The results suggested minimal SES-related variation in mathematical support received in either cohort but clear SES differences in parents’ beliefs about early mathematical development. Middle SES parents of children in both cohorts held higher expectations in terms of skills they expected children to possess by age 5, as well as a more accurate understanding of which skills are within the developmental range of most children by age 5. These differences accounted for unique variance in children's scores on the mathematics assessment. Practice or Policy: Implications are discussed.     

Effects of different types of true–false questions on memory awareness and long-term retention

This study investigated the effects of two different true–false questions on memory awareness and long-term retention of knowledge. Participants took four subsequent knowledge tests on curriculum learning material that they studied at different retention intervals prior to the start of this study (i.e. prior to the first test). At the first and fourth (pre- and post-) tests, participants indicated which form of memory awareness (i.e. remember, know, familiar and/or guess) accompanied their answer. On the two intermediate tests, testing format was manipulated: true/false or true/false justification, that is a true/false statement with the additional instruction to explain why the statement is true or false. The results resembled earlier findings in that different forms of memory awareness could be distinguished. The study did not indicate (additional) knowledge schematisation as a result of testing or testing format. However, independent of test format, the proportion of correct answers on the post-test was higher than on the pre-test. This could indicate that the beneficial effects of testing can occur even when the learning episode was at a long retention interval prior to the first test.     

Using Theater and Drama to Expose and Expand the Epistemic Insights of Youth Regarding the Nature of Science

Students learn about science in a range of life contexts. Unfortunately, science classrooms are often disconnected from the ways of knowing about science that are embedded in, and embodied by, the life experiences of students. Drama has been identified as a potential means by which deeper understandings of the nature of science can be derived and nurtured but research on how this might be achieved is sparse. This study uses drama methodology to explore epistemologies of science with two groups of secondary school students from very different social contexts: one from a private university preparatory school and another from an after-school community group in a low-income neighborhood. We use a combination of traditional instruments and contemporary methodologies to elucidate students’ perspectives on the nature of science. Despite the similarity in perspectives revealed by the two groups when using the more traditional nature of science testing format, we have shown how drama activities can uncover very different ways in which the two cohorts mobilize their understandings about science. We propose ways in which these methodologies may be employed by teachers to explore and expand the epistemic insights that students bring to the science classroom.