Neural Correlates of Performance Monitoring During the Transition to Young Adulthood

Cognitive challenges during transition to adulthood are generally high and require particular skills, such as self‐control, performance evaluation, and behavioral adjustment for success in everyday living. However, age and sex differences in timing and efficiency of brain maturational processes in the early twenties are not well known. We used a go/no‐go paradigm and fMRI to focus on the neural processes underlying response inhibition and performance monitoring during the transition from late adolescence (aged 18–19) to young adulthood (aged 23–25). During performance monitoring, late adolescents showed more activation in right inferior frontal gyrus than young adults, while males showed more activation in left inferior parietal lobe than females. No effects of age and sex were found for response inhibition. Our findings suggest that age and sex‐related differences in neural basis of performance monitoring continue to change between late adolescence and young adulthood.     

Interventions in education to prevent STEM pipeline leakage

The so-called leaking STEM pipeline (dropout in STEM education) has been the subject of many studies. The large interest of scholars in plausible causes of this leakage has resulted in a number of meta-reviews describing factors at system, school and student level related to interest and persistence in STEM education. The STEM pipeline discussion has also resulted in a large number of programmes aimed at enhancing STEM interest and persistence in STEM education. Although these programmes have been widely evaluated, there seems to be no consensus about which interventions are successful in raising interest in STEM or persistence in STEM education. This study reports the results of a systematic review of empirical studies in which the effectiveness of STEM-related interventions are assessed. Initially, 538 studies were found. The quality analyses showed that only a few of these evaluation studies are designed in such a way that it is likely that the found effects are caused by the intervention. Although some potentially effective interventions were found, this review shows that there is still a need for research into the effectiveness of those programmes, especially with regard to programmes preventing talented and initially motivated STEM students to drop out of STEM education.     

Taking Control of Their Lives? A comparison of the experiences of unemployed young adults (18-25) in England and the new Germany

This paper explores the experiences and actions of young adults who have had difficulties in entering and sustaining a place in the labour market. The research was carried out in selected localities undergoing economic transformation in England and the new Germany, as part of the project 'Taking Control' in the ESRC's Youth Citizenship and Social Change Programme. The 18-25 age group has been newly 'targeted' for interventions through programmes such as 'New Deal' and 'JUMP'. Through a combination of questionnaire survey and group interviews the research has explored how, in different ways, choice and uncertainty can be important dimensions in young adults' biographies in the current moment. Their experiences and actions are not exclusively determined by socialising and structural influences, but also involve elements of subjectivity, choice and agency. The article discusses findings on the lives and perspectives of 300 young people affected by unemployment. The sample is drawn from a wider questionnaire survey ( n = 900) and a series of group discussions in the three cities of Derby (England), Hannover (Western Germany) and Leipzig (Eastern Germany). The research builds on and extends the authors' previous comparative research into the education and training experiences of younger age groups in the two countries.     

Student affect and conceptual understanding in learning chemistry

This study explores the relationship between affective and cognitive variables in grade 9 chemistry students (n = 73). In particular, it explores how students' situational interest, their attitudes toward chemistry, and their chemistry‐specific self‐concept influence their understanding of chemistry concepts over the course of a school year. All affective variables were assessed at two time points: at the middle of the first semester of grade 9, and at the end of the second semester of grade 9, and then related to students' postinstructional understanding of chemical concepts. Results reveal that none of the affective variables measured at the earliest time point have a significant direct effect on postinstructional conceptual understanding. Looking at the different affective variables as intermediary constructs, however, reveals a pattern in which self‐concept and situational interest measured at the middle of grade 9 contribute to self‐concept measured at the end of grade 9, which in turn, has a positive, significant effect on students' postinstructional conceptual understanding. These results reveal the importance of a strong and positive self‐concept, the feeling of doing well in the chemistry class, for developing a meaningful understanding of scientific concepts. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 44: 908–937, 2007     

Trying to Include but Supporting Exclusion Instead? Constructing the Roma in Slovak Educational Policies

Based on a social constructivist theoretical framework, this research study examines how the design of proinclusive educational policies and the general public construct the Roma students and parents in Slovakia. For this purpose, data from two selected educational policies and five focus groups conducted in five regions in Slovakia were analyzed. The findings demonstrate that the Roma are constructed negatively as irresponsible dependents and deviants not valuing education and incapable of making wise decisions about their lives. These findings can be considered relevant for policy formulation processes because proinclusive policies may sabotage their own goals if negative social constructions of a certain societal group are embedded in them.     

Teachers’ Perspectives on Promoting Reading and Writing for Pupils with Various Linguistic Backgrounds in Grade 1 of Primary School

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study is to gain a deeper understanding of teachers’ perspectives on promoting reading and writing for pupils with various linguistic backgrounds in grade 1. Focus group interviews were conducted with 17 teachers who work in preschool classes and in grade 1. The teachers’ perspectives on reading and writing can be characterised as balanced, in the sense that the teachers describe how they work with both the technical and the learning-oriented dimension. The number of different languages spoken in their classes is regarded in a positive manner, but it also leads to major challenges, such as not having enough time for all of the pupils and not having sufficient knowledge of multilingualism.     

‘It has a purpose beyond justifying a mark’: examining the alignment between the purpose and practice of feedback

Abstract

Research has shown that written feedback is important for student learning and development. However, the messages embedded in feedback may lead to students being misled about what they need to learn or how they need to develop. This article reports on a small-scale investigation into the messages embedded in feedback. Legitimation Code Theory was used to first conceptualise the often-hidden purpose of a discipline (English Studies), and concomitantly of feedback within the discipline, and second to analyse actual comments given to first-year students on their assignments. It was found that there is a clear misalignment between the purpose and practice of feedback, thereby suggesting that students are receiving misleading messages about what they need for success within the discipline. This may have implications beyond merely passing the module. A suggestion is made to actively consider, and develop, feedback as a discipline-specific literacy.     

Inquiry-based science education: towards a pedagogical framework for primary school teachers

Inquiry-based science education (IBSE) has been promoted as an inspiring way of learning science by engaging pupils in designing and conducting their own scientific investigations. For primary school teachers, the open nature of IBSE poses challenges as they often lack experience in supporting their pupils during the different phases of an open IBSE project, such as formulating a research question and designing and conducting an investigation. The current study aims to meet these challenges by presenting a pedagogical framework in which four domains of scientific knowledge are addressed in seven phases of inquiry. The framework is based on video analyses of pedagogical interventions by primary school teachers participating in open IBSE projects. Our results show that teachers can guide their pupils successfully through the process of open inquiry by explicitly addressing the conceptual, epistemic, social and/or procedural domain of scientific knowledge in the subsequent phases of inquiry. The paper concludes by suggesting further research to validate our framework and to develop a pedagogy for primary school teachers to guide their pupils through the different phases of open inquiry.     

Temporal Contingency as an Independent Component of Parenting Behavior

Several theoretical conceptions emphasize the importance of prompt responses to infant's signals in providing them with early causal experiences. The present paper examines if a maternal tendency toward prompt responses can be identified by distributional analyses of maternal response latencies and if this response tendency can be shown for different communicative channels (in verbal/vocal, nonverbal, intermodal communication). In addition, the paper focuses on the relation between the temporal contingency of maternal behavior and measures of maternal interactional quality. Interactional sequences of 54 mother and 3-month-old infant dyads were analyzed using microanalytical assessment techniques and ratings of interactional quality. Distributional analyses of maternal expressions during face-to-face encounters revealed that promptness of responses toward infant signals with a short latency is a typical response tendency in maternal behavior. There are, however, individual differences between mothers, indicating that this response tendency is expressed in different communicative channels by individual mothers. This is shown by low correlations between the contingency indices of different communicative channels. The relation between contingency and rated indicators of interactional quality turned out to be rather small, indicating that maternal contingency may be conceptualized to contribute an independent factor to the quality of maternal interactional behavior.