From Green Revolution to Green Evolution: A Critique of the Political Myth of Averted Famine

This paper critiques the so-called “Green Revolution” as a political myth of averted famine. A “political myth,” among other functions, reflects a narrative structure that characterizes understandings of causality between policy action and outcome. As such, the details of a particular political myth elevate certain policy options (and families of policy options) over others. One important narrative strand of the political myths of the Green Revolution is a story of averted famine: in the 1950s and 1960s, scientists predicted a global crisis to emerge in the 1970s and beyond, created by a rapidly growing global population that would cause global famine as food supplies would not keep up with demand. The narrative posits that an intense period of technological innovation in agricultural productivity led to increasing crop yields which led to more food being produced, and the predicted crisis thus being averted. The fact that the world did not experience a global famine in the 1970s is cited as evidence in support of the narrative. Political myths need not necessarily be supported by evidence, but to the extent that they shape understandings of cause and effect in policymaking, political myths which are not grounded in evidence risk misleading policymakers and the public. We argue a political myth of the Green Revolution focused on averted famine is not well grounded in evidence and thus has potential to mislead to the extent it guides thinking and action related to technological innovation. We recommend an alternative narrative: The Green Evolution, in which sustainable improvements in agricultural productivity did not necessarily avert a global famine, but nonetheless profoundly shaped the modern world. More broadly, we argue that one of the key functions of the practice of technology assessment is to critique and to help create the political myths that preserve an evidence-grounded basis for connecting the cause and effect of policy action and practical outcomes.

     

Knowledge construction and diverging thinking in elementary & advanced mathematics

This paper begins by considering the cognitive mechanisms available to individuals which enable them to operate successfully in different parts of the mathematics curriculum. We base our theoretical development on fundamental cognitive activities, namely, perception of the world, action upon it and reflection on both perception and action. We see an emphasis on one or more of these activities leading not only to different kinds of mathematics, but also to a spectrum of success and failure depending on the nature of the focus in the individual activity. For instance, geometry builds from the fundamental perception of figures and their shape, supported by action and reflection to move from practical measurement to theoretical deduction and euclidean proof. Arithmetic, on the other hand, initially focuses on the action of counting and later changes focus to the use of symbols for both the process of counting and the concept of number. The evidence that we draw together from a number of studies on children's arithmetic shows a divergence in performance. The less successful seem to focus more on perceptions of their physical activities than on the flexible use of symbol as process and concept appropriate for a conceptual development in arithmetic and algebra. Advanced mathematical thinking introduces a new feature in which concept definitions are formulated and formal concepts are constructed by deduction. We show how students cope with the transition to advanced mathematical thinking in different ways leading once more to a diverging spectrum of success.This revised version was published online in September 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Dynamic object recognition in pigeons and humans

We investigated the role of dynamic information in human and pigeon object recognition. Both species were trained to discriminate between two objects that each had a characteristic motion, so that either cue could be used to perform the task successfully. The objects were either easy or difficult to decompose into parts. At test, the learned objects could appear in their learned motions, the reverse of the learned motions, or an entirely new motion, or a new object could appear in one of the learned motions. For humans, any change in the learned motion produced a decrement in performance for both the decomposable and the nondecomposable objects, but participants did not respond differentially to new objects that appeared in the learned motions. Pigeons showed the same pattern of responding as did humans for the decomposable objects, except that pigeons responded differentially to new objects in the learned motions. For the nondecomposable objects, pigeons used motion cues exclusively. We suggest that for some types of objects, dynamic information may be weighted differently by pigeons and humans.     

Beyond phonics: Integrated decoding and spelling instruction based on word origin and structure

In this paper, the relevance of word structure knowledge to decoding and spelling instruction is discussed. An explicit, discussion oriented, direct approach to teaching decoding and spelling based on word origin and structure results in improved reading and spelling. This instruction leads students to a comparison and contrast of letter-sound correspondences, syllable patterns, and morpheme patterns in English words of Anglo-Saxon, Romance, and Greek origin.     

Learning and gender: Complexity and possibility

Severiens and Ten Dam's efforts to link theories of learning and gender are applauded as a valuable step forward in understanding learning. Complexities of the relationships among epistemic structures, patterns within structures, and learning activities are highlighted as are dilemmas in assessing these multiple layers of learning.     

The places of pedagogy: or,what we can do with culture through intersubjective experiences

Beginning by highlighting considerations of the intersections among social and ecological issues and the recent diversification of critical pedagogy, this paper suggests means by which approaches such as Gruenewald’s (2003 Gruenewald, D.A. 2003. The best of both worlds: A critical pedagogy of place. Educational Researcher, 32(4): 3–12. [Crossref] [Google Scholar]) “critical pedagogy of place” can be expanded to accommodate a broader range of possible places of pedagogy. The paper is centrally concerned with what happens when we consider socio‐ecological learning, not as occuring via cognitive critique or embodied place‐based experience, but rather as taking place in between the thought and the sensed via a range of intersubjective experiences. It suggests that these intersubjective locations that comprise the “where” of the learning of the student can be particular physical places, but can also be in and of experiences of friendship, art, literature, irony, cultural difference, community. By expanding our possible repertoire of “pedagogical arts,” or the range of intersubjective places and spaces of pedagogy engaged, we are able to conceptualise and practise education in ways that enable a deeper connection to place but also opportunities for other modes and outcomes of student learning. In particular, the paper outlines the possibilities for learning and cultural formation enabled by spaces of collective youth engagement.     

Teaching science through online,peer discussions: SpeakEasy in the Knowledge Integration Environment

In 1995, cooperative learning tutorials were introduced into large first year physics classes at the University of Sydney. This paper describes the effect of these cooperative learning tutorials, called Workshop Tutorials, on student learning from both a quantitative and qualitative point of view. It was found that students attending more than half the total number of tutorials scored significantly better over the year than those attending less than half. Student reaction was almost wholly positive, with particular mention made of the voluntary nature of the tutorials as well as the use of practical, 'hands on' demonstrations within the tutorials.     

Delivering reading intervention to the poorest children: The case of Liberia and EGRA-Plus,a primary grade reading assessment and intervention

As governments, donors and implementation organisations re-focus Education for All Goals in terms of quality of education, increasing concerns have been raised over low literacy levels in developing countries. This paper provides key learning from the application of an early reading intervention applied in post-conflict Liberia, which included a robust assessment tool (Early Grade Reading Assessment) to measure the impact of the programme on students’ reading levels. A rationale for the design and methodology applied by the two implementing organisations (Research Triangle Institute (RTI) and Concern Worldwide) is provided, situated within the Liberian education context. The paper demonstrates the positive impact on programme quality, contextual relevancy and scale-up that a diagnostic baseline assessment has when linked to a tailored literacy intervention. Lessons learnt are presented to guide the identification of best practice in early literacy interventions at national-level and internationally.