Does Physics Teaching Affect Gender-Based Science Anxiety?

We present the results of a study designed to measure the level of science anxiety in students enrolled in physics courses at Loyola University Chicago. We undertook this study with two objectives: (1) to determine the factors contributing to science anxiety; in particular, to ascertain whether the leading factors identified in an earlier study have remained constant over time, and (2) to investigate whether science anxiety was affected by a semester of introductory physics. This is the first study of its kind, analyzing science anxiety in pre- and posttests of a cohort composed entirely of students taking physics courses. We find that the leading factors contributing to science anxiety are nonscience anxiety, gender, and to a much lesser degree, course of study (major), in agreement with earlier results. In general, males start and end the course with somewhat less science anxiety (and nonscience anxiety) than females. Post-course responses indicated some improvement in nonscience anxiety and in science anxiety for both genders. Acute levels of science anxiety were somewhat decreased by exposure to a physics course. Different pedagogies and gender role models may correlate with anxiety reduction.     

Scholarly Productivity Redefined in Counselor Education

In this study, counselor educators responded to a survey about their scholarly productivity over a 3‐year period. Their involvement in 7 scholarly activities is reported by category and by type of institution, tenure status, academic rank, and gender. Using a more comprehensive definition of scholarly productivity, this study documents that counselor educators are involved in a much broader, more diversified spectrum of scholarly activities than prior studies of scholarly productivity have indicated. Implications for tenure and promotion decisions, along with recommendations for training and mentoring of future counselor educators as well as future directions for research, are discussed.     

“Improving and Embellishing the Wilderness”: Spreading the Gospel of Proper Land Use,New Harmony,Indiana, 1814–1824

This article examines the westward imposition of specific kinds of land use by focusing on the Harmony Society's transformation of Posey County, Indiana. The German pietistic society carried their vision of proper land use from Europe to Pennsylvania and, in 1814, to what was then considered the West: Indiana Territory. During their decade in Indiana, the Harmonists attempted to exploit, control, and beautify the natural environment. The goal of “improving and embellishing the Wilderness”—as well as survival and profit—provided the justification for clearing forests, draining wetlands, mining subsoil, planting crops, creating pastures, altering waterways, and hunting local fauna; all of these activities greatly transformed the ecosystems of southwestern Indiana. Ultimately, the Harmonists’ notions of land use were transmitted, learned, and, eventually, codified.     

Use of learner‐centered instruction in college science and mathematics classrooms

Learner‐centered approaches to science and mathematics instruction assume that only when students are active participants will learning be deep, enduring, and enjoyable, and transfer to contexts beyond the classroom. Although their beneficial effects are well known, the extent to which learner‐centered practices are used in college classrooms may be low. Surveys of undergraduate science and math majors reveal general dissatisfaction with how courses in their majors are taught, and their number is half what it was 2 decades ago. In response, federally funded systemic reform initiatives have targeted increasing the use learner‐centered instruction in science and mathematics courses to improve undergraduate education generally and the training of preservice teachers specifically. Few data exist regarding how effective these initiatives have been or how frequently learned‐centered instruction occurs as assessed from faculty's perspective, which may not corroborate undergraduate perceptions. Accordingly, a survey was developed to assess the use of learner‐centered techniques and was administered to science and math professors of Louisiana over the Internet. The return rate was 28%. Analyses reveal that they are used infrequently, but when used, are applied to all aspects of teaching. Data also suggest that federal funding has been slightly effective in promoting its use. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 40: 566–584, 2003     

A program to improve elementary teacher preparation in science at Rollins College

Conclusion The goals of this project were to design and implement a series of courses that would better prepare elementary school teachers to teach science and would promote positive attitudes toward science and science teaching. The initial offering of the first series of courses met with moderate success. Although the courses fostered an increase in cognitive knowledge, the magnitude of the improvement was not what we had anticipated. There was no significant improvement in the attitudes of the students toward science or science teaching. The science course has been revised and is currently being offered for both preservice and inservice teachers. The revisions include lengthening the class time, so that the material can be covered at a more relaxed pace, and increasing the amount of active team teaching by the instructors to further emphasize the interrelations between chemistry and biology and to eliminate the fragmentation of the course. It is hoped that these changes will also have a positive impact on the students’ attitudes toward the course and thus toward science in general.     

Changing Social Dynamics in Early Childhood Classrooms

The purpose of this study was to analyze how social dynamics in early childhood classrooms change from fall to spring and from early to late preschool. The subjects were 92 preschoolers in age-stratified (3-year-old, 4-year-old, and 5-year-old) classrooms. Their sociometric ratings and peer contact patterns were recorded during the fall and spring. From early to late preschool, children's sociometric ratings became increasingly negative, especially toward cross-sex peers. Their contact patterns showed an analogous decrease in cross-sex contacts, although the changes were not as linear as those in the sociometric ratings. The analysis of group sizes showed that the 4-year-olds spent more time in larger groups than both their younger and older peers did. Group sociometric ratings and contact patterns changed from fall to spring, but individual children showed considerable stability in the sociometric ratings that they gave their peers and in the size and gender composition of their play groups.     

School climate: perceptual differences between students,parents, and school staff

Research suggests that school climate can have a great impact on student, teacher, and school outcomes. However, it is often assessed as a summary measure, without taking into account multiple perspectives (student, teacher, parent) or examining subdimensions within the broader construct. In this study, we assessed school climate from the perspective of students, staff, and parents within a large, urban school district using multilevel modeling techniques to examine within- and between-school variance. After adjusting for school-level demographic characteristics, students reported worse perceptions of safety and connectedness compared to both parent and staff ratings (all p < 0.05). Parents gave the lowest ratings of parental involvement, and staff gave the lowest ratings of academic emphasis (ps < 0.05). Findings demonstrate the importance of considering the type of informant when evaluating climate ratings within a school. Understanding how perceptions differ between informants can inform interventions to improve perceptions and prevent adverse outcomes.     

Science Anxiety and Gender in Students Taking General Education Science Courses

Earlier studies [Mallow, J. V. (1994). Gender-related science anxiety: A first binational study. Journal of Science Education and Technology 3: 227–238; Udo, M. K., Ramsey, G. P., Reynolds-Alpert, S., and Mallow, J. V. (2001). Does physics teaching affect gender-based science anxiety? Journal of Science Education and Technology 10: 237–247] of science anxiety in various student cohorts suggested that nonscience majors were highly science anxious (SA), regardless of what science courses they were taking. In this study, we investigated science anxiety in a cohort consisting mostly of nonscience majors taking general education science courses. Regression analysis shows that the leading predictors of science anxiety are (i) nonscience anxiety and (ii) gender, as they were for different cohorts in the earlier studies. We confirm earlier findings that females are more SA than males. Chi-square analysis of acute science anxiety shows an amplification of these differences. We found statistically significant levels of science anxiety in humanities and social science students of both genders, and gender differences in science anxiety, despite the fact that the students were all enrolled in general education science courses specifically designed for nonscience majors. We found acute levels of anxiety in several groups, especially education, nursing, and business majors. We describe specific interventions to alleviate science anxiety.     

Teachers’ job satisfaction: Analyses of the Teacher Follow-up Survey in the United States for 2000–2001

This study examined teachers’ satisfaction with various aspects of their job through multilevel analyses of national surveys conducted in the United States. The data came from the National Center for Education Statistics Schools and Staffing Survey for 1999–2000 and Teacher Follow-up Survey for 2000–2001. We found that teachers were least satisfied with work conditions and compensation, and that minority teachers were generally less satisfied with their job than were non-minority teachers. We also found that teachers’ job satisfaction varied with gender, years of teaching, and career status. These findings provide significant implications for educational policy aimed at retaining teachers in education.