Does growth in private schooling contribute to Education for All? Evidence from a longitudinal,two cohort study in Andhra Pradesh,India

This paper informs debates about the potential role for low-fee private schooling in achieving Education for All goals in India. It reports Young Lives’ longitudinal data for two cohorts (2906 children) in the state of Andhra Pradesh. Eight year olds uptake of private schooling increased from 24 per cent (children born in 1994–5) to 44 per cent (children born in 2001–2). Children from rural areas, lower socioeconomic backgrounds and girls continue to be under represented. While some access gaps decreased, the gender gap seems to be widening. Evidence on risks to equity strengthen the case for an effectively regulated private sector, along with reforms to government sector schools.     

Parents choosing to combine special and inclusive early years settings: the best of both worlds?

This paper focuses on parents' perspectives of combining special and mainstream services for their children in the early years, offering insights into: how parents came to make this choice for their children's education; what parents expected from the combined provision and how their expectations were being met in practice. The data presented formed part of a small‐scale, UK‐based study that investigated local discourses and practices operating for young children within a global context of commitment to inclusion. Despite moves towards inclusive early years education in the UK, many parents of young children identified as having special educational needs opt for a combination of both inclusive and special early years settings. A survey sent to early years providers, voluntary groups and parents in three local education authorities (LEAs) in southern England, revealed that the practice of combining placements was widespread. Follow‐up interviews with parents of five children revealed rich detail about the processes of choice making and parents' expectations and experiences of combined provision. The research findings have clear implications for the development of inclusive education and its appeal to parents, who may need convincing that it can offer sufficient specialist expertise and resources.     

Lost in transition: supporting Key Stage 2/3 English trainees during secondary placement

Key Stage 2/3 trainees undertake their second school placement in secondary schools having completed a placement in a primary school in the first year of their training. While trainees will have been prepared at their higher education institution, the experience itself can be daunting for reasons other than the fact that this is their first secondary placement. These reasons are discussed in this article, and focuses on how a lesson-planning document was developed at one institution to support English trainees through this placement. The aim of this article is to raise awareness in partnership schools of the specific needs of Key Stage 2/3 English trainees.     

Humor in High-Stress Relationships: Understanding Communication in Police Officers' Romantic Relationships

A career in law enforcement is highly stressful given the nontraditional shiftwork, uncertain interactions, and risk of harm. These combined stressors likely spillover into one's romantic relationship and, thus, the study reported here explored one potential communicative coping mechanism—humor. Research exploring humor suggests that humorous communicators are better able to respond to stress, and this study explored if humor appears to benefit relational communication in police officer relationships. Findings begin to support this argument, revealing that romantic partners of police officers with a high humor orientation (HO) report using humor more to cope as well as experiencing less stress (both perceived and physical) and conflict (lower frequency of conflict and less intense/hostile conflict). Path analyses revealed that the use of humor to cope mediated the relationships between self-reported HO and stress, as well as conflict. Implications for humor and romantic relational communication are discussed.     

Social Understanding in Young Israeli-Jewish,Israeli-Palestinian,Palestinian, and Jordanian Children: Moral Judgments and Stereotypes

Research Findings: An empirical investigation was conducted to test young Palestinian, Jordanian, Israeli-Palestinian, and Israeli-Jewish children's (N = 433; M = 5.7 years of age) cultural stereotypes and their evaluations of peer intergroup exclusion based upon a number of different factors, including being from a different country and speaking a different language. Children in this study lived in a geographical region that has a history of cultural and religious tension, violence, and extreme intergroup conflict. Our findings reveal that the negative consequences of living with intergroup tension are related to the use of stereotypes. At the same time, the results for moral judgments and evaluations about excluding peers provide positive results about the young children's inclusive views regarding peer interactions. Practice: These findings indicate that practitioners working with young children should focus on inclusion in peer contexts. Curricula, media, and social intervention programs must begin in early childhood before children begin to use stereotypes in peer situations, particularly when children from other cultural and ethnic backgrounds play together.     

The aporia of undecidability and the responsibility of teacher

Theories of subjection, the discourses that both subject and constitute identity have been useful in illustrating the becoming of teacher as always already subjected to being teacher in particular ways, constituted by the circulating discursive norms. This paper draws on a qualitative research project to consider the fissures within subjection, considering what might provoke the subject to enact teacher differently than the subjective forces prescribe. Drawing on poststructuralism and psychoanalytic theory, this paper theorizes a significant moment within the research project to consider an aporia in which the teaching subject is faced with both undecidability as well as responsibility, thus contributing to the theorizing of teacher identity at the intersection of curriculum theory.     

Metacognition and the influence of polling systems: how do clickers compare with low technology systems

Recent research suggests that clickers (electronic feedback devices) influence metacognition. This article reports qualitative findings from a quasi-experimental study comparing clickers and low technology polling. We sought to establish how clickers influence metacognition and whether differences exist in how each response system influences metacognition. The qualitative data collected includes an open-ended survey administer to all study participants (n = 198), informal observations, and interviews conducted using purposeful sampling. While low technology polling appears to elicit more metacognition than clickers, negative feelings and conformity affect also increase. Clickers result in positive feelings and reduction of the conformity effect. In addition to significantly higher performance outcomes, findings indicate polling systems result in different qualities of metacognition, meaning either more or less productive, and either self-reflective or group reflective. These differences contribute to the degree to which the environment is learner centered.     

Preparing preservice English teachers and school counselor interns for future collaboration

The authors believe that by working together, teachers and school counselors can better support students and more effectively work for their success. In this article, we present our efforts in creating a collaborative class for preservice English teachers and school counselor interns. While offering an overview of English teachers and school counselors in their daily interactions with adolescents, we focus on the university preparation of both groups, specifically the preparation at our university, a large research institution in the Midwestern United States. We provide a look at the collaborative class created for the preservice English teachers and school counselor interns, offering examples of their interaction and feedback from the students. Lastly, we close with a consideration of the meaning of such collaboration at the university level for both English teachers and school counselors.     

Erfassung und Struktur berufswahlrelevanter Faktoren für die Lehrerausbildung und den Lehrerberuf in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz

The career choice motivations of potential teachers, their interests and other factors relevant to their choice of career are studied in order to achieve the best possible recruitment of new entrants to the teaching profession. However, the research and findings which are already available in this field are inadequate. The article is the first study which aims to analyse the structure and applicability of the internationally accessible FIT-Choice instrument to detect the relevant factors for teaching as a career choice in Germany, Austria and Switzerland on the basis of representative samples (n = 6,601) in order to create a data basis which will enable the previously unconnected research initiatives in German-speaking countries to be combined. In addition, teaching experience is taken into account and used to check how valid the career choice motives stated by the students are. The overall objective is to explore the extent to which measurements of career choice motives and teaching experience and analysis of two areas can be generalised across different institutions and countries and can go beyond the limited significance of the previously available findings, and eventually to formulate generalisable assumptions about the ideas which influence teaching as a career choice, and especially the motivation which leads to this career choice.     

The relationship between parental traits and open family communication: Affective orientation and verbal aggression

This study examined haw the parental traits of affective orientation and verbal aggressiveness were associated with openness in family communication patterns. Responses were obtained from 133 college‐aged children and their parents.

Parental affective orientation was positively related to their children's perceptions of more open family communication patterns, while verbal aggressiveness was negatively related. Parents’ and children's levels of trait affective orientation were moderately correlated (r=.45) with children's AO levels being higher than their parents’.