Boundary as Bridge: An Analysis of the Educational Neuroscience Literature from a Boundary Perspective

Within the emerging field of educational neuroscience, concerns exist that the impact of neuroscience research on education has been less effective than hoped. In seeking a way forward, it may be useful to consider the problems of integrating two complex fields in the context of disciplinary boundaries. Here, a boundary perspective is used as a lens for analyzing the results of a systematic review of the educational neuroscience literature. Recurring vocabulary used within the literature suggests indirect use of boundary principles, including the idea of connections and bridges between disciplines, inter-, multi-, and transdisciplinarity, and reference to tools (boundary objects) and people that may be useful in the evolving field of educational neuroscience. Analyzing the educational neuroscience literature through the lens of boundary principles indicates that the boundary between the two disciplines may itself be a bridging mechanism useful for the creation of a new discipline and new knowledge.     

Teaching Communication Skills to Medical Students: Unexpected attitudes and outcomes

Experiences in teaching communication skills to medical and veterinary medical students are described. The first involved unexpected attitudes of resentment arising when students took on the role of a patient undergoing a clinical examination. The emergence of empathy as a learning issue due to greater self-awareness was a useful outcome. The second involved resistance to dealing with ethical problems arising during problem-based learning cases. These two emotionally laden attitudes would not have been revealed if more passive traditional ways of teaching had been used. While ability to empathise with another and the ability to deal with difficult interpersonal situations are desirable in the medical professional, there is a paucity of teaching approaches dealing with this aspect of self-development in the undergraduate curriculum. This poses a real challenge to us as facilitators of learning.     

The Rise of the Citizen Author: Writing Within Social Media

The concept of the citizen author is defined and explored within the publishing industry. In order to understand what positions the citizen author currently, and potentially could, hold it begins with a historical view of their rise, including concepts of their eighteenth century antecedents. But the focus of this research is on their growth alongside that of social media platforms. This allows for drawing out relationships between genre fiction, publishers, and the citizen author, which provides a more full understanding of the power dynamics involved when publishers, social media, and the citizen authors mix in the current industry climate.     

The Big-fish–little-pond-effect Stands Up to Critical Scrutiny: Implications for Theory, Methodology, and Future Research

The big-fish–little-pond effect (BFLPE) predicts that equally able students have lower academic self-concepts (ASCs) when attending schools where the average ability levels of classmates is high, and higher ASCs when attending schools where the school-average ability is low. BFLPE findings are remarkably robust, generalizing over a wide variety of different individual student and contextual level characteristics, settings, countries, long-term follow-ups, and research designs. Because of the importance of ASC in predicting future achievement, coursework selection, and educational attainment, the results have important implications for the way in which schools are organized (e.g., tracking, ability grouping, academically selective schools, and gifted education programs). In response to Dai and Rinn (Educ. Psychol. Rev., 2008), we summarize the theoretical model underlying the BFLPE, minimal conditions for testing the BFLPE, support for its robust generalizability, its relation to social comparison theory, and recent research extending previous implications, demonstrating that the BFLPE stands up to scrutiny. Quotations (associated page numbers) to the Dai and Rinn (2008) article are based on a prepublication version of the article available to the authors of this article that may have changed during the final preparation for publication. The authors would also like to express thanks to David Dai and Anne Rinn for their encouragement and assistance to us in preparation of our article, whilst still acknowledging that they might not agree will all the views expressed here.     

A state examination system and perpetuation of middle-class advantage: an Irish school context

This article explores how a formal state examination system operates as a tool which enables the cultural reproduction of the middle classes in an increasingly market-driven education system in Ireland. It is based on a study of a group of final-year girls approaching the high-stakes terminal Leaving Certificate examination. The success of this reproduction is based on a mutually beneficial partnership between the school and the parents, which ultimately benefits the students. The article examines how the school is successful in this competitive education market place and in upholding the middle-class nature of schooling. The structures of the school also empower parents and students to enhance privilege and academic success. The article concludes by considering the continuing relevance of Bourdieu to social reproduction in education.     

Identifying and Nurturing Gifted Children in Israel

The article describes Israel’s approach to the education of gifted and talented children. It describes the programs for gifted and talented children in Israel and the process for selecting students for these programs. The method of selecting students for programs is consistent with the Ministry of Education’s definition of giftedness, the goals of the giftedness programs, and the characteristics of these programs. The selection method is affected by the standards required of the instruments as well as other constraints, such as the constraints on funding for this purpose.The author of this article is the director of the Szold Institute program for identifying gifted children. The project is funded by the Israeli Ministry of Education     

Children's concepts of gears and their promotion through play

The mechanical transmission of motion, which is observable in gears’ turning direction (TD) and turning speed (TS) can be understood as part of the core concept “force and motion”. Previous studies have suggested that most children before the age of nine have naïve concepts of gears’ TD and TS. However, these studies relied on children's explanation data and might have therefore underestimated young children's potential. Moreover, these studies did not examine whether preschoolers can overcome their naïve concepts through teaching. Recently, educators have proposed guided play as an educational approach that combines children's play with teacher guidance in a purposefully designed environment. We conducted two subsequent studies. In Study 1, we investigated the children's (naïve) concepts of gears’ TD and TS with a cross‐sectional approach using a nonverbal test procedure. This study comprised 248 children aged 5–10 years and 73 adults. The results showed that the proportion of children with adequate concepts increased with age. More specifically, 7‐ to 8‐year‐olds differed significantly from 5‐ to 6‐year‐olds, indicating a developmental shift around this age. However, naïve concepts of TS were more persistent with age than naïve concepts of TD. Altogether, the results indicated the potential to foster 5‐ to 6‐year‐olds’ concepts of both TD and TS in an intervention. Thus, in Study 2, we developed and tested a guided play intervention to foster 5‐ to 6‐year‐old children's concepts of TD and TS. We conducted a prepost‐intervention design with a guided play group (n = 19) and a free play group (n = 21). The results suggested stronger learning gains in the guided play group (d_TD = 0.337, d_TS = 0.758) than in the free play group (d_TD = 0.224, d_TS = 0.158).     

The Use of Different Translation Devices to Analyze Knowledge-Building in a University Chemistry Classroom

Research in Science Education - This research draws on Legitimation Code Theory (LCT) to understand the epistemic dimension of the higher education classroom discourse of a professor who is well...     

Communicating the Value of an Institutional Repository: Experiences at Ghana's University for Development Studies

ABSTRACT

The quality of research depends greatly on access to existing information. Institutional repositories (IRs) have the potential to enhance and promote the dissemination of knowledge and research. This may lead to discoveries and innovation alongside maximizing return on investment in research and development. Following some background information, this article briefly discusses the processes involved in the establishment of Ghana's University for Development Studies (UDS) IR (UDSspace). Marketing and advocacy strategies employed to engage Faculty to enable them to contribute meaningfully and effectively in the populating of the IR are outlined and benefits described. The study uses a quantitative method. A questionnaire was used to elicit data from faculty. This article describes the various communication methods used to promote the IR and evaluates their effectiveness in getting users to participate in populating the IR. The survey found that although as high as 80.3% of respondents were aware of the benefits of an IR and 66.2% were aware of the existence of the UDS IR, 86.8% of respondents had not submitted to the IR.     

The Professional Development of High School Chemistry Coordinators

The implementation of new content and pedagogical standards in science education necessitates intensive, long-term professional development of science teachers. In this paper, we describe the rationale and structure of a comprehensive and intensive professional development program of school-based leaders, namely school chemistry coordinators. The year-long program was designed so that the chemistry teachers who enrolled in the program were able to develop in three interrelated aspects: content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, and leadership ability. Several strategies for the development of these aspects were adopted from Loucks-Horsley, Hewson, Love, & Stiles (1998). The evaluation of the program focused on the changes that participating teachers underwent regarding their personal beliefs and their functioning as school chemistry coordinators in their schools.