A review on the basketball jump shot

The ability to shoot an effective jump shot in the sport of basketball is critical to a player's success. In an attempt to better understand the aspects related to expert performance, researchers have investigated successful free throws and jump shots of various basketball players and identified movement variables that contribute to their success. The purpose of this study was to complete a systematic review of the scientific literature on the basketball free throw and jump shot for the purpose of revealing the critical components of shooting that coaches, teachers, and players should focus on when teaching, learning, practising, and performing a jump shot. The results of this review are presented in three sections: (a) variables that affect ball trajectory, (b) phases of the jump shot, and (c) additional variables that influence shooting.     

A Mixed Methods Examination of Gender Disparity in High Schools Implementing Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID)

This mixed-methods research study offers insights and explanations into gender imbalance in the college readiness program, Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID). Over 200 schools that have been implementing AVID for more than 4 years across the United States participated in this study. Three years of archived historical data pertaining to school demographic information and AVID certification information was accessed and analyzed to examine recruitment and retention of male and female students over time, as well as student enrollment in rigorous curriculum. Our research indicated that at the high school level, gender disparity became most apparent in the 11th and 12th grades. Results indicated that schools that struggled to recruit and retain boys continued to enroll AVID students, both boys and girls, into rigorous advanced placement curriculum at comparable rates as schools that did not struggle to recruit and retain boys in the program. This indicates that once in AVID, boys and girls are provided equal access to rigor; however, recruiting and retaining boys in AVID continues to be a challenge for AVID schools. Research participants indicated that academic identity, peer and family support, leadership and mentoring opportunities and male role models influence male participation in AVID.     

An Application of Score Equity Assessment: Invariance of Linkage of New SAT® to Old SAT Across Gender Groups

The College Board's SAT^® data are used to illustrate how the score equity assessment (SEA) can help inform the program about equatability. SEA is used to examine whether the content change(s) to the revised new SAT result in differential linking functions across gender groups. Results of population sensitivity analyses are reported on the linkage of the new SAT critical reading (CR) prototype to an old SAT verbal (OV). Based on the criteria used in this study, population invariance was achieved with respect to gender groups.     

Studying children's knowledge base of one-sided levers as force amplifiers

Attention to core concepts in science and engineering in early education has grown recently, and understanding levers as force amplifiers can be recognized as one of these. Previous studies focused on two-sided levers and do not provide sufficient information about children's knowledge of levers as force amplifiers, nor about their learning and its support from an education perspective. It is important to consider load distance and force distance separately, as may be done in one-sided levers, to understand children's knowledge of levers as “simple machines” thoroughly. Moreover, children's zone of proximal development and the possibilities to foster their knowledge should be explored to understand important features of teaching. We thus directed two studies with 6- to 7-year-old children. In study 1, we conducted a paper-and-pencil test in the context of wheelbarrows (N = 370; age M = 6.62). We investigated whether it is possible to empirically separate the features load, load distance, and force distance as well as to determine their level of difficulty. Our study showed that children's concepts of the three aspects load, load distance, and force distance are fragmented, with children finding it continuously more difficult to judge load, load distance, and force distance correctly. In study 2, we developed a 20-min intervention with a controlled 2 × 2 pre-post follow-up design for exploring the zone of proximal development of 304 6- to 7-year-old children in the domain of one-sided levers as force amplifiers, focusing on force distance and load distance. We implemented a structured learning environment that encouraged the children to manipulate wheelbarrows and supported them with pictures and/or verbal prompts. 6- to 7-year-old children had a higher learning gain when they were exposed to scaffolds that combined pictures and verbal prompts in the posttest as well as in the follow-up test four weeks later compared to the control group.     

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.     

Curriculum strategy framework: investigating patterns in teachers’ use of a reform‐based elementary mathematics curriculum

The goal of this paper is to introduce the curriculum strategy framework as a way to characterize teachers’ interactions with curriculum materials. The framework focuses on three key interpretive activities: reading, evaluating, and adapting curriculum materials. Describing an individual teacher’s curriculum strategy involves identifying the manner in which a teacher engages with each of these activities before, during, and after instruction. This paper presents the results of a study in which the framework was used to identify patterns in the curriculum strategies of 10 elementary‐school teachers who were using a reform‐based mathematics curriculum for the first time. It concludes with directions for further research using the curriculum strategy framework, and implications of this work for curriculum designers.     

University presidents as policy entrepreneurs: Evidence from U.S. universities engaged in prestige behaviour

This article examines how university presidents who led their institutions to achieve Carnegie “R1 Highest Research Activity” managed policy tensions created by prestige priorities and worked with groups and coalitions internally and externally. Striving to achieve R1 status requires U.S. universities to re-calibrate their focus, resources, and messaging both internally and externally. Using four elements of policy entrepreneurship (PE), the three cases included in this article illustrate the critical role of university presidents as PE in maintaining a sustained effort over an extended period. University leaders displayed their social acuity and built teams by cultivating their social and political capital with influential constituents and groups. As PE, university presidents were deliberate and thoughtful about the language they used to define and describe policy problems and solutions. The findings expand our understanding of the role of university presidents as PE.     

“Method is Education:” Making Informal Education Social and Substantive

This article examines 10 textbooks used in Jewish religion classes in Russian high schools in the final decades of the 19th century. The textbooks reveal an expectation of a low level of Hebrew background, an interest in promoting the practice of prayer, and two distinct approaches to teaching Judaism. While some of the books introduce students to their religion through Biblical or later Jewish history, others present the religion as a systematic set of beliefs and practices. Although it is difficult to ascertain exactly how the books were utilized in classrooms, they certainly provide a sense of the priorities of a group of educators, as well as of the relative freedom they had in defining Judaism for the next generation.