The Interactive Science and Technology Project: the Nuffield Foundation's Launchpad for a European Collaborative

The development of interactive science and technology centres in the UK, catalysed by the example of successful North American science centres, is also a reflection of increasing British concern for public understanding of science.

In 1986, the Committee on the Public Understanding of Science was established jointly by the Royal Society, the Royal Institution and the British Association, as a focus for initiatives to improve public awareness of science and technology. The COPUS ‘Interactive Science and Technology Centres’ working group linked COPUS's own programmes with the co‐ordination and promotion activities developed by the Nuffield Foundation's interactive science and technology project.

Launched in 1987, the Nuffield project served as a resource for the science centres and, building a strong network of contacts stretching from the BBC and British Association to science centres worldwide, itself served as a launchpad for ECSITE‐the European Collaborative for Science, Industry and Technology Exhibitions.     

Homelessness as the Unforgiving Minute of the Present: The Rhetorical Tenses of Democratic Citizenship

Popular discourse and advocacy efforts characterize homelessness as a social problem bound by the present-centered concerns of physical affliction and material deprivation. Wayne Powers's documentary film Reversal of Fortune exemplifies this tendency by performing a “social experiment” to investigate how giving a homeless man $100,000 would change his life: the film chronicles the intervention in terms of an ever-fleeting opportunity that the man ultimately fails to utilize. Such discourses deny the future-oriented grounds for identification between homeless and housed as citizens sharing a common political destiny. Discourses of homelessness thus provide an important opportunity for questioning how the rhetorical tenses of democratic citizenship can be cultivated or suppressed, and how such rhetorical work can contribute to a more dynamic democratic culture.     

Not the nine o'clock service: Using children's culture

This paper discusses current thinking and practice about the use of popular culture in the primary school to teach literacy. It attempts to question the methods that attempt to galvanise children's interest in popular texts to teach the current literacy curriculum. It argues that there is an incompatibility between the pleasures and practices of the world of popular culture and the traditional environment and curricula of school. The paper argues that instead of ‘using’ children's culture to teach the literacy curriculum in school, children's vibrant, sophisticated and valuable culture needs to be embedded within it.     

Developing the Theory and Practice of Action Research: a South African case

The three tales told here concern my experiences of teaching educational action research. I first became involved in action research in 1973 while a doctoral student working on peace and cultural studies education curriculum in Northern Ireland where project teachers inquired into their own classrooms so as to facilitate the teaching of contentious social and political issues for mutual understanding across the religious–political divide. My three tales of teaching action research are rooted in three very different settings: one working with gypsy education projects in inner-city Dublin; the second as part of a small university–school collaborative in rural North Carolina, and the last a tale of a doctoral seminar at East Carolina University.     

Playing among the stars: Science in Sport,or the Pleasures of Astronomy (1804)

In 1804, John Wallis published a game that converted learning about astronomy into a race to the Royal Observatory, Greenwich. This essay uses Science in Sport to explore the cultures of Georgian recreative science, analysing how the rules and conventions of playing a game affected the gaining of natural knowledge. New familial audiences and markets, a ‘public culture’ of science, and a vogue for rational amusement led to a boom in the publishing of instructive pastimes around 1800, of which Wallis’s firm was a leading innovator. Revised and approved by author and educator Margaret Bryan, Science in Sport sought to inculcate accurate ideas about the heavens in a domestic setting, and through the penalties and rewards of an entertainment. By investigating the story of The Pleasures of Astronomy the author demonstrates the ideas, actions, morals and experiences that were brought into play when astronomical education became a game.     

The role of cognitive “performance orientation” in communication anxiety

This study examined cognitive patterns involved in communication anxiety, particularly in public speaking situations. The cognitive patterns were represented by Motley's (1990) theoretical‐clinical conceptualization of either a “performance” or a “communication” orientation to public presentations. The mediating role of public self‐consciousness in these anxious cognitive patterns was also examined.

Results indicated that Motley's measurement of performance orientation (i.e. the presentation has to be perfect and will be closely scrutinized for delivery by the audience) was not associated with communication apprehension, public speaking anxiety, nor with public self‐consciousness. Although other scales performed as expected, the Performance/Communication Orientation scale proved to be multi‐factored and internally unreliable.     

Funny Students Cope Better: Patterns of Humor Enactment and Coping Effectiveness

Increasingly, college students are employed in jobs outside of class—and contend with additional stressors as a result—when they attempt to balance work and academic demands. Enacting humorous communication is one productive way to handle such stress. In a college student, the replication of the process of using humor to cope with job stress (i.e., higher humor orientation, HO) was associated with higher ratings of effectiveness, greater self-perceived coping effectiveness, and subsequently with higher job satisfaction. Path analysis demonstrated that, as the transactional theory would predict, students' trait HO influences their job satisfaction through its effect on heightened coping efficacy. Results indicated that, across two very different sample populations, college students and fully employed adults are extremely similar in the process and benefits of using humor to cope.     

Responses to Jealousy Situations That Evoke Uncertainty in Married and Dating Relationships

This study examined jealousy situations among married versus dating relationships, the uncertainty jealousy induced, and communicative responses. Participants (N = 155) described situations, and analytic inductive procedures identified 9 jealousy situations. Comparisons indicate the Presence of Attractive Romantic Alternative and Choice of a Non-Romantic Other situations are most common among dating partners, whereas Choice of a Non-Romantic Other and Never Experienced Jealousy are most common among married couples. Dating partners experienced greater partner uncertainty following jealous situations. Situations differed in production of partner and relational uncertainty, satisfaction, and impact on other aspects of life.     

范德堡留学趣闻

Toru其人 Toru来自日本,全名叫Toru Takahata。在每周一次的英文会话班上,我们一起练习口语。英文会话班学生流动性很大,每周都有新而孔．因此每节课开始前,     

Prioritization of online instructor roles: implications for competency‐based teacher education programs

Online instructors need to take on a multi‐dimensional role and to be an effective online educator they are required to possess a varied and wider range of competencies. Preparing teachers for online education involves preparing them for a wide variety of roles and developing related competencies. However, the extent of emphasis required to be placed on each of these roles or competencies during a teacher training program may vary according to its culture and the context. The investigation reported in this article obtained expert opinions with regard to the priority and criticality of eight online instructor roles identified in earlier research on online education. Pedagogical roles received the highest priority by the respondents, followed by professional, evaluator, social facilitator, technologist, advisor, administrator, and researcher roles. These results have implications for teacher education and further research pertaining to the context in India.