Challenges and issues in designing inquiry on the Web

The purpose of this study is to discuss major issues in designing inquiries on the web. Instructional designers face a lot of difficulties and challenges to deal with in the course of designing inquiry experiences for learners in the online environment, a complex and ill‐structured learning environment. Facilitating inquiry or using an inquiry‐based learning approach on the web has both advantages and disadvantages. Instructional designers need to acknowledge the design issues arising in each and every phase of the design process. Utilising appropriate design strategies, instructional designers can provide positive learning experiences for their online learners. For this purpose, three representative cases in the context of teacher professional development were examined and six major issues were identified as follows: (1) seeking a balance between a system‐generated guide and human facilitator, (2) visual representation of the inquiry process, (3) motivating learners with the right question, (4) engaging learners in various learning activities, (5) guiding the inquiry process with various scaffolds, and (6) maximising learning by coordinating resources, tools and the community of inquiry. This study explains each issue in great detail and provides possible guides for instructional designers to handle the issue.     

Cultivating sustained teachers’ professional learning within a centralised education system

This study investigates how sustained professional learning for teachers within a centralised system was cultivated. Specifically, the sustained professional learning was initiated by officers from the headquarters (HQ) and involved interested teachers across schools in Singapore. Qualitative instruments were used to collect and analyse the data in examining the partnerships perceived by the participants. The enablers responsible to bring about sustained professional learning are proposed. A contribution of this study is to clarify how resources in the HQ and its schools can be bridged. Deliberate bridging of resources is critical particularly at the initial stage of the partnerships. This bridging is made possible through dedicated appointed champions. The appointed champions are passionate about the educational innovations and are willing to invest their time to understand the teachers’ needs. This paper argues that the enablers can offer opportunities for lateral networks to be forged within a hierarchical system.     

Language Use Among Singaporean Pre-School Children

This paper highlights the findings pertaining to the receptive and expressive language competencies of young children. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the relative sensitivity of five different language measures as a means for assessing pre-schoolers' oral language proficiency. The results show few significant differences in language scores as a function of age, sex or SES. There was a complex pattern of intercorrelations among the language measures used. Results of a home environment questionnaire administered to parents revealed homogeneity in home environments for stimulating child learning and cognitive development across socioeconomic groups. The findings are discussed in relation to the utility of these measures in assessing pre-schoolers' linguistic competencies.     

Home and Parental Influences on the Achievement of Lower Primary School Children in Singapore

This study investigated the effects of home environment and parental involvement in the achievement of pupils in the lower primary classes in nine schools found in four zones in Singapore. In total, 3,759 pupils and their parents participated in the study. The study was designed to answer four main questions relating to the effects of the home environment (SES, time engaged in television viewing, reading, school work and ethnicity of parents) and parental involvement in the children's school work and in other school matters. The findings indicated that significant differences in achievement were found for all combinations of SES categories and between most ethnic groups. A higher percentage of high-achieving pupils spent more time on television viewing, reading and school work. Parents of high-achieving children were more anxious about maximising every opportunity for their children including those not directly related to school work.     

Unpacking high and low efficacy teachers’ task analysis and competence assessment in teaching low-achieving students in secondary schools

This study adopted a pragmatic qualitative research design to unpack high and low efficacy teachers’ task analysis and competence assessment in the context of teaching low-achieving students. Nine secondary school English and Science teachers were recruited and interviewed. Results of thematic analysis show that helping students perform well in exams was identified by both the high efficacy teachers (HETs) and the low efficacy teachers (LETs) as the sacred task, but the HETs perceived more contextual support from school culture, school leaderships and collegiality than the LETs did. Although the HETs showed more confidence than the LETs in instructional strategies, classroom management and student engagement, both the HETs and LETs experienced struggles when their personality traits and beliefs were in conflict with required strategies or imposed regulations. Despite the LETs having a lower level of perceived competence, their hunger for learning reveals that their sense of efficacy could be enhanced if provided with courses that focus on coaching and mentoring experiences.     

Ideology,class and rationality: a critique of Cambridge International Examinations’ Thinking Skills curriculum

This article undertakes a critique of the aims and objectives of Thinking Skills, one of the most widely and internationally used curricula in the teaching of thinking, offered by the University of Cambridge International Examinations. By engaging in a critical discourse analysis of how political and class biases are (re-)produced in the forms of thinking that are valued in the classroom, issues of power and ideology latent in curricular discourses of rationality are foregrounded. Specifically, it will be demonstrated that the text engages in the ideological project of shaping our commonsense understandings of what thinking and rationality is and should be, not only in instrumental forms that both connect to neoliberal commitments and privilege a particular fraction of the middle class, but also in ways that evacuate substantive notions of morality, social justice, and the common good from individuals’ deliberations. The article concludes by pointing to alternative conceptualizations of thinking curricula.     

Cross Cultural Differences in Online Learning Motivation

Globalization and technology are two of the many drivers that impact today’s education, locally and internationally. The purpose of the research study was to identify how online learners in Korea and the US perceived online learning motivation differently and what learner characteristics and cultural orientation affected the online learners’ learning motivation. Major findings revealed that there was a significant difference in learning motivation between the US and Korean online learners. The study also discusses how cultural orientation and learner characteristics affected the learning motivation of online learners for each country.

Différences interculturelles de la motivation de formation en ligne. La globalisation et la technologie représentent deux conducteurs qui ont l’impact sur l’éducation d’aujourd’hui localement et internationalement. Le but de cette étude de recherche était d’identifier comment les étudiants en Corée et aux Etats‐Unis perçoivent la motivation de formation en ligne différemment et comment les caractéristiques des étudiants et leur orientation culturelle affectent leur motivation de formation en ligne. Les conclusions principales révèlent qu’il y a une différence significante concernant la motivation de formation entre les étudiants en ligne des Etats‐Unis et de Corée. L’étude explique également comment l’orientation culturelle et les caractéristiques des étudiants affectent la motivation de formation des étudiants en ligne pour chaque pays.

Unterschiede zwischen verschiedenen Kulturen bei Online‐Lernmotivation. Globalisierung und Technik sind zwei der vielen Antriebe, die die heutige Bildung am Ort und international betreffen. Der Zweck der Forschungsstudie war, herauszufinden, wie Online‐Anfänger in Korea und den USA Online‐Lernmotivation unterschiedlich wahrnehmen, und wie die Anfängermerkmale und die kulturelle Orientierung die Lernmotivation der Online‐Anfänger beeinflussten. Die hauptsächlichen Befunde ergaben, dass es einen signifikanten Unterschied bei der Lernmotivation zwischen den US‐amerikanischen und koreanischen Online‐Anfängern gab. Die Studie erörtert auch, wie kulturelle Orientierung und Persönlichkeitsmerkmale die Lernmotivation von Online‐Lernern in jedem Land beeinflussen.     

昼夜浮影

日光拨开黑夜的长发,夜影裹起白昼的身躯。光与影欢乐又悲伤,无自觉地浮起、飘落,都是纷纷的美丽。黑夜敛起了忧郁的目光,白昼舞落了欢愉的长袖。光与影不相为伴,所见的,都是炫目的纯净。     

The Diffusion and Transmission of Cricket among European,Indigenous and Migrant Communities in the British Straits Settlements and Malay States during the Late Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century, 1786–1899

The British colonised Penang in 1786, Malacca in 1895 and Singapore in 1819. In 1874, the British, through its Residents, came to control the Governments of Perak, Selangor and Sungei Ujong, and wherever they went, they indulged in their leisure pursuits such as horse riding and cricket. This research attempts to show how the immigrant Malay Eurasian, Chinese and Tamil communities come into contact with the different British and European communities and were introduced to cricket. The process of diffusion and acceptance becomes evident when the local populations in turn set up their own sports clubs and cricket clubs. The study tries to identify the various means of the cultural transmission of sports by the different ethnic groups during British colonial rule from 1876 to 1899.