Malaysian Parents' Ideal and Actual Perceptions of Pre-school Education La Perception Ideale et la Perception Reelle de l'Enseignement Prescolaire par les Parents Malaisiens Percepciones Ideales y Reales de los Padres Malasios sobre la Educacion Preescolar

This study explores and describes the perceptions of Malaysian parents concerning pre-school education. The study examines the potential influence of socio-cultural elements on the parents' perceptions and in doing so, challenges the current notion of what constitutes 'appropriateness' in early childhood education. Findings indicate that Malaysian parents hold both idealised and actualised perceptions of pre-school education. The former relate to the parents' image of childhood and the type of education they would like their child to receive in an ideal world, whilst the latter relate to the type of education parents feel their child needs in order to meet the needs of Malaysian society. The authors suggest that this model may be a useful one for exploring perceptions in future studies. Cette etude explore et decrit la perception de l'enseignement prescolaire par les parents malaisiens. Elle examine l'influence potentielle des elements socioculturels sur la perception des parents et elle souleve ainsi la question de ce qui constitue le caractere 'approprie' de 1'enseignement des tres jeunes enfants. Les resultats indiquent que les parents malaisiens ont une perception idealisee et une perception actualisee de 1'enseignement prescolaire. La premiere depend de 1'image que les parents se font de 1'enfance et du type d'education qu'ils voudraient que leur enfant recoive d'un point de vue ideal, tandis que le seconde se rattache au type d'education que les parents pensent necessaire a leur enfant pour repondre aux besoins de la societe malaisienne. Les auteurs suggerent que ce modele pourrait sent a explorer les perceptions dans de futures etudes. Este estudjo explora y describe las percepejones de los padres malasios con relacion a la educacion preescolar. El estudio examina la posible influencia de los elementos socioculturales en las percepciones de los padres y, con ello, se reta la nocion actual de lo que constituye 'lo apropiado' en la educacion de la infancia. Los descubrimientos indican que los padres malasios tienen tanto percepciones idealizadas como reales de la educacion preescolar. La primera hace relacion a la imagen que los padres tienen de la infancia y el tipo de educacion que les gustaria que sus hijos recibieran en un mundo ideal, mientras que la segunda hace relacion al tipo de educacion que los padres creen que necesitan sus hijos a fin de satisfacer las necesidades de la sociedad malasia. Los autores sugieren que este modelo podria ser util para explorar percepciones en futuros estudios.     

Barriers and enablers to clinical fieldwork education in rural public and private allied health practice

There is a need to maximise rural clinical fieldwork placement to build health workforce capacity. This study investigated allied health professionals' (AHPs) experience of supervising students as part of work-integrated learning in public and private rural health settings. An anonymous postal questionnaire with 30 questions was used to collect quantitative and qualitative data about the barriers and enablers that AHPs encounter when supervising students in their clinical setting. A total of 113 public and private AHPs from Southwest Victoria, Australia, returned the questionnaire. The AHPs were trained in the disciplines of occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech pathology, dietetics, podiatry or psychology. The majority of respondents (75%) had previously supervised students. Most respondents had only provided fieldwork education in the public sector. Allied health professionals working in public and private sectors had positive experiences with clinical fieldwork education and often had increased job satisfaction while supervising students. They experienced similar enablers to involvement in clinical fieldwork education programs, however the barriers they encountered were different. The findings highlight the differing issues between rural public and private settings that need to be addressed for successful clinical fieldwork education and work-integrated learning. Strategies to address the identified barriers need to be specific to the work conditions of each setting.     

Design Decisions in Developing Learning Trajectories–Based Assessments in Mathematics: A Case Study

This article analyzes the design decisions of a team developing diagnostic assessments for a learning trajectory focused on rational number reasoning. The analysis focuses on the design rationale for key decisions about how to develop the cognitive assessments and related validity arguments within a fluid state and national policy context. The study draws on ethnographic methods adapted from science, technology, and society studies to document key rationales for decisions. For this team, concerns about the validity of both the assessments and the hypothetical trajectory, anticipated uses of the assessments, and the available distribution of resources and expertise to different project activities were all considerations for significant design decisions throughout the project. The study findings suggest that success in the design of trajectories-based assessments depends on teams’ attention to balancing core design activities with engagement in the external policy environment, balancing precision with utility for diagnosis in defining the levels of a trajectory, and balancing the goals of supporting and assessing student learning.     

Media Production

Peter Utz' Video User's Handbook (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1980--- $12.95 in paper with a hardback available as well).

Martin Maloney and Paul Max Rubenstein's Writing for the Media (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1980---$14.95).

Betsy P. Graham's Magazine Article Writing: Substance and Style (New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1980---$10.95, paper)

Michael L. Kleper's How to Build a Basic Typesetting System (1979---$10.00, paper)

Martin L. Gibson's Editing in the Electronic Era (Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1980---$15.50).     

Effect of written text on usage of newton's third law

This article reports on a study that investigated novice students' rules for determining which of two objects exerted the greater force on the other. Subjects worked five paper-and-pencil task sets depicting different objects interacting with each other. For each situation they were asked to identify which of the two objects was exerting the stronger force on the other. Each subject worked the task sets under one of three conditions: with no aid, with a written statement describing forces as interactions that always occur in pairs, or with a written statement of Newton's third law. The vast majority of the subjects in the study used procedures (rules) which could be identified. There were significant differences in the patterns of usage of the various rules between those who received no written statement and those who received the statement of Newton's third law. The primary difference between the two groups was in the usage of a rule (All Equal) which produced the same response sequence as Newton's third law. However, only 29% of those who received the Newton's third law handout used the All Equal rule on all five task sets. There were no significant differences in usage of the All Equal rule between those who had had high school physics and those who had not. Strong evidence was found to contradict the idea that the subjects who failed to used the All Equal rule simply did not read the written statement properly. The results of this study have implications for learning from text.     

Decomposing ethnic differences in university academic achievement in New Zealand

We use individual-level administrative data to examine the extent and potential explanations for the relatively poorer academic performance of three ethnic minority groups in their first year of study at a New Zealand university. Substantial differences in course completion rates and letter grades are found for Māori, Pasifika, and Asian students relative to their European counterparts. These large and significant gaps persist in the face of alternative definitions of ethnicity and sample restrictions. We use regression analysis and formal decomposition techniques to test whether differences in other personal characteristics, high school backgrounds, and university enrollment patterns might account for these ethnic disparities in early academic achievement. We estimate that no more than one quarter of the relatively poorer performance of Māori and Pasifika students would be eliminated if they had the same relevant observable factors of European students. Substantial unexplained ethnic differences in early academic performance at university raise concerns about appropriate policies to close ethnic gaps in academic achievement at university.     

Rule-governed approaches to physics: Conservation of mechanical energy

This article reports on a study conducted to investigate the methods individuals use to make predictions about five situations involving the conservation of mechanical energy. The subjects in the study came from two different populations—science majors and nonscience majors. The technique used to determine the strategies subjects employed was a paper-and-pencil version of Siegler's Rule-Assessment technique. Each subject worked five task sets, although the order in which they did the sets varied. The task sets had simple situations involving carts moving on inclines or horizontal paths. The situations had energy transformations from: (1) kinetic energy to thermal energy via work against friction, (2) potential energy to thermal energy via work against friction, (3) potential energy to potential energy, (4) potential energy to kinetic energy, and (5) kinetic energy to potential energy. The major findings of the study were: (a) the subjects did employ identifiable strategies in over 97% of the cases, (b) the sequencing of the task sets did affect the way subjects worked the problems, (c) there was a difference in the way science majors and nonscience majors worked the problems, and (d) the effect of the variation in sequence differed for the two populations.