Supporting novice elementary mathematics teachers’ induction in professional communities and providing innovative forms of pedagogical content knowledge development through information and communication technology

This paper reports on the needs identified as important to 27 novice elementary mathematics teachers and examines how Connect-ME, an online mathematics community, provides these supports. Qualitative data were collected using two focus groups and 16 telephone interviews. Findings validate the need for alternative teacher professional development (TPD) models and the value of professional communities and knowledge acquired through technology-facilitated learning. The results indicate that teachers actively seek formal and informal TPD experiences, opportunities for sharing and communicating, and access to quality resources. This study provides educational researchers and administrators with essential elements for effectively supporting novice elementary mathematics teachers.     

Friendship Behaviors During Early Childhood and Beyond

This project examines friendship development by identifying behaviors that young children associate with friendship and comparing whether those behaviors match what adults in an enduring friendship recall about the beginnings of their friendships. To examine these questions, young children at a child care facility were interviewed about friendship and 95 adults in enduring friendships identified critical incidents from the beginnings of their friendships. The results not only support past research about what friends mean to young children; but also identifies the ability children have to make distinctions among the many individuals who play with them to be able to label a special person as a best friend. The project proposes that whether childhood friendships become enduring friendships is based on the opportunities the children have to remain friends. It is suggested the opportunity to remain friends is one that can be enhanced by parents and early childhood programs.     

Child-methods in secondary mathematics

An earlier research project, the Concepts in Secondary Mathematics and Science (Mathematics) project, identified both a hierarchy of levels of understanding in different areas of secondary mathematics, and a number of particular errors which were made by significant proportions of the children tested. Preliminary consideration of these errors and the strategies which appear to have given rise to them suggests that the use of informal naive methods which are limited in their applicability is widespread even at fourth-year level. The suggestion is made that there may be two systems of mathematics coexisting in the secondary school classroom: the formal taught system, and a system of child-methods which are based upon a counting, adding-on or building-up approach, and by which children attempt to solve mathematical problems within a human-sense framework. The difficulties which some children appear to experience in mathematics is suggested to be due in part to these children's non-initiation into the formal taught system. The implication of such a view for teaching and research are indicated.     

Developmental differences in visual and auditory processing of complex sentences

Children aged 8 through 11 (N = 250) were given a word-by-word sentence task in both the visual and auditory modes. The sentences included an object relative clause, a subject relative clause, or a conjoined verb phrase. Each sentence was followed by a true-false question, testing the subject of either the first or second verb. Participants were also given two memory span measures: digit span and reading span. High digit span children slowed down more at the transition from the main to the relative clause than did the low digit span children. The findings suggest the presence of a U-shaped learning pattern for on-line processing of restrictive relative clauses. Off-line accuracy scores showed different patterns for good comprehenders and poor comprehenders. Poor comprehenders answered the second verb questions at levels that were consistently below chance. Their answers were based on an incorrect local attachment strategy that treated the second noun as the subject of the second verb. For example, they often answered yes to the question "The girl chases the policeman" after the object relative sentence "The boy that the girl sees chases the policeman." Interestingly, low memory span poor comprehenders used the local attachment strategy less consistently than high memory span poor comprehenders, and all poor comprehenders used this strategy less consistently for harder than for easier sentences.     

Opening dimensions of variation: An empirical study of learning in a Web-based discussion

The discussions held in specifying an automaticvehicle as a project in a distance work-relatedcourse are in focus for an analysis of learningin networked discussions. Learning ischaracterised as coming to experience things indistinctly new ways, in keeping with theunderlying phenomenographic research approachfor the study. Group discussions are seen asone feature in the experience of, and theformation of, the context for learning, in anexperiential interpretation of activitysystems. The analysis has led to theidentification of pivotal contributions todiscussions that can be said to afford learningwithin the group, in the sense of openingdimensions of variation around criticalfeatures of the task. This is developed toproduce a taxonomy of contributions, withparticipatory, factual, reflective and learningcontributions, suggested to be necessary,though not sufficient, conditions for learning.The taxonomy is illustrated and discussed, asare its implications for tutoring in networkedcourses of this type.     

Navigating cross-boundary connections in educational research

Drawing on insights from reflective research accounts in the social sciences, this paper attends to the complexities of conducting cross-boundary educational research. Cross-boundary research is defined as any type of inquiry that is conducted across cultural and/or structural boundaries, including but not limited to race, class, gender, language, religion, age, sexual identity, and national origin. The authors present dilemmas they have faced in conducting educational research and offer three intersecting recommendations for those who wish to conduct research across boundaries.     

The Pictorial Representation of Gender and Physical Activity Level in Caldecott Medal Winning Children's Literature (1940-1999): A Relational Analysis of Physical Culture

The pictorial representation of physical activity and gender over three time periods is investigated in Caldecott Medal winning children's literature. Relational analysis and recent national position documents on physical activity are used to frame an interdependent relationship between current levels of physical activity among children and the various institutionalized forms of physical culture with which they interact. Fifty-seven Caldecott Medal winning books were analyzed. Frequency counts were recoded for each book in four categories: (1) females engaged in sedentary roles, (2) females engaged in active roles, (3) males engaged in sedentary roles and (4) males engaged in active roles. A 2 (gender) 2 2(activity level) 2 3 (time period) factorial ANOVA adjusted for nonormally distributed data was used to test frequency of pictorial representation. Results indicate the illustrations in Caldecott Medal literature are a poor media for communicating a physically active lifestyle to children while at the same time have consistently underrepresented females. Males were significantly more likely to be portrayed than females (p < 0.05) and, regardless of gender, sedentary roles were significantly more likely to be portrayed than active roles (p < 0.05). This condition did not change significantly over the three time periods tested (1940-1959, 1960-1979 and 1980-1999). With recent national position documents identifying young people as largely inactive and unfit researchers and practitioners are (1) encouraged to rethink the seemingly innocent relationship between picture books and the trend of inactivity currently seen in the United States and (2) develop skills related to critical media literacy as part of a pedagogy for new times.     

A Perspective on Inclusion from England

I argue that it is not possible to provide a single English perspective on ‘inclusion’ or ‘integration’. Instead, I set out my perspective and compare it with the way ‘inclusion’ and ‘inclusive education’ have been defined by others. My view starts from an assumption of diversity within common groups and is linked to the development of comprehensive community education. It is concerned with fostering participation for all and reducing all exclusionary pressures. I indicate the conflicts between this approach, the discourse of ‘special needs’ and the selective pressures from recent legislation and official policy. I relate two studies to my perspective; the first concerned with the inclusion of students with Down's Syndrome in mainstream secondary schools and the second with exploring the participation of all students in a community high school.