Online engineering education for manufacturing technology: Is a remote experiment a suitable tool to teach competences for “Working 4.0”?

The demands of modern industry contexts (so‐called Industry 4.0) are going to reshape the working world of future engineers. It seems obvious that these technological developments will affect higher education institutions with increasing intensity. For years, there has been a vivid discussion on the IT competences, which need to be developed by students in order to face emerging technology changes. To tackle the question regarding industry expectations towards future engineers, in this article a remote laboratory at a German university is analysed to identify potentials for future‐oriented teaching and learning in the light of the required competences for “Working 4.0”. Current scientific studies and industry agendas about Working 4.0 competences are identified, connected learning objectives are derived and the focused remote laboratory is linked to these objectives. As a result, it can be shown that this educational setting has the potential to reflect the complexity of Working 4.0. However, the results also show that the examined laboratory addresses only some of the competences in the context of Industry 4.0. Furthermore, it is argued in how far industry demands serve as the only basis for educational development efforts. The scientific studies and the industry agenda offer a limited and more political perspective on educational development. Nevertheless, based on the research in this article, it can be argued that remote labs (and online labs in general) have the potential to lift traditional laboratory‐based engineering education to a modern engineering education 4.0.     

Rescuing the Childcare Center: One Community’s Efforts to Manage Change Through Generating and Coordinating Resources

Childcare centers are business organizations and are subject to some of the same issues and problems as any small business. Many childcare administrators have little or no business training, and are unable to embrace change in order to help their programs survive economic problems. This article describes how one community saved their childcare center through collaboration.     

The press, public knowledge and the grant maintained schools policy

This article examines as a critical case how newspapers reported the grant maintained schools policy. It argues that claims that press reporting of educational issues is frequently unfair are only partially substantiated. The quality press is more likely to be internally inconsistent and contradictory in its reportage of education policy and, on occasion, to inhibit debate through discourses of omision.     

Aiding culturally responsive assessment in schools in a globalising world

Educational Assessment, Evaluation and Accountability - Across the world, teachers’ classroom assessment tasks and responsibilities are becoming more diverse due to increased migration. In...     

Communities of Practice in Workplaces

Since the 1990s we have seen an increase in consideration of social and cultural aspects of learning as a way to foster organizational learning and human performance. Despite strong interest among practitioners and scholars, the study of organizational learning is lacking in empirical research. The study described here calls attention to the importance of informal learning in designing effective learning environments for the training of professionals. The study examines how people share and construct their knowledge in a Public Defender's Office and conclude that there are six attributes of communities of practice (CoPs) that serve as scaffolding for organizational learning. The attributes are (1) a group of professionals, (2) development of a shared meaning, (3) informal network, (4) supportive culture‐trust, (5) engagement in knowledge building, and (6) individuals' negotiation and development of professional identities. Implications for education and training in relation to the concept of CoPs are discussed.     

Peer Assessment of an Individual ‘s Contribution to a Group Project

In an optometry subject which utilised group projects, students complained that awarding the same mark to all group members was often not a fair reflection of individual effort. Accordingly, an examination was made of procedures for assessing the contribution of an individual to a group project. A classification system for such schemes is given. One subject in the optometry course used a system which modified the group mark by a two‐part weighting factor. A detailed evaluation and critique of this scheme is given. A simpler scheme with a one‐part multiplicative weighting factor was derived from the best elements of the initial scheme. The simplified scheme is described and examples of the calculations given. Its use in another subject in the same course is described and evaluation data presented.     

Honesty tests in academia and business: A comparative study

This study was designed to extend our understanding of trustworthiness and attitude measures as they relate to academia and business. The basic research question was whether students modify their responses to such inventories based on the purpose of the test. Students were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: respond as honestly and openly as possible or respond as if applying to graduate school or as if applying for a job. Results indicate that students modified their responses to an honor system survey if the results would be used as part of the admission criteria to graduate school; students did not modify their responses to an employment trustworthiness survey when the results would be used as part of the hiring decision. Implications for schools and businesses are discussed.     

Teachers’ learning in a research and development work project

This article focuses on teachers’ learning in a research and development (R&D) work project. The teachers are working in a lower secondary school, and the cooperation between them and the researcher lasted for two years. The aim of this article is to show what teachers can learn and how they can learn during such a project. In the qualitative study conducted within this R&D project, observations, reflection dialogues and log‐book entries were key data collection strategies. This material shows that teachers want to reflect together to learn, but both the form and content of these collective reflections have a major impact on their learning. Before the teachers are ready to challenge each other, they have to have confidence in each other. Once they have this confidence, the form of the reflection dialogues can change. During the R&D work the teachers learn how reflections become part of the planning process for their next teaching sessions, and after a while theories become a tool that can help them with their reflections.     

Children's use of analogy during collaborative reasoning

This microgenetic study examined social influences on children's development of analogical reasoning during peer-led small-group discussions of stories about controversial issues. A total of 277 analogies were identified among 7,215 child turns for speaking during 54 discussions from 18 discussion groups in 6 fourth-grade classrooms (N = 120; age M=10.0, SD=0.6). Use of analogy was found to spread among the children in discussion groups and occur at an accelerating rate, primarily because of the increasing use of novel analogies. Relational analogies with shared surface features triggered purely relational analogies during the next 2 speaking turns, showing a trend of relational shift. These results provide distinctive new evidence for the importance of social interaction in an aspect of cognitive development.     

The researcher reflecting on her own role during action research

This article focuses on the challenges and opportunities a researcher may encounter in practice, and presents four narratives that take the reader into situations which may arise when the researcher steps into the practice field. Episodes that challenge the researcher both cognitively and emotionally are depicted in the narratives. The authors describe their experiences, the prior understanding they have when they enter the situations and the reactions these lead to. Experiences that are close to practice are placed in a theoretical context so they can be analysed and understood through the lens of theory. This text may function as a thinking tool for researchers about to enter the same researcher role, and it is thus relevant for other researchers who wish to be part of close research partnerships. Hopefully, the article will contribute to discussions that may prepare researchers for unpredictable events.