Education as Citizenship: Appropriating a new social space

This article presents a reflection on teaching and curriculum which promotes citizenship education and raises the issue of the purpose of higher education. I embrace a concept of education as action and reflection upon a world in order to change it - or as bell hooks calls it, education as a practice of freedom. I argue for the need to conceptualise students first as citizens, then as employable graduates. My experience involved a shift in focus from what is taught and an emphasis on examinations and essays, to how and what students learn and the process of learning. The article argues, however, that teaching and learning which attempts to balance tensions between values of the market-place and values of education as a practice of citizenship requires more than better teaching and assessment: it requires broader institutional support to be truly effective.     

世界上的新闻是什么样

祝建华 :本文采用跨文化比较以及兼用定性和定量方法来研究新闻传播学中最基本的理论问题 ,实为近年来少见的力作。陈力丹 :现任《传播学研究》杂志 (CommunicationResearch)两主编之一的休梅克 ,几年前访问过我国。她领导的研究小组最近对世界不同地区的 1 0个代表性国家 (包括中国 )的媒体进行了跨文化比较研究 ,从新闻理念入手 ,给人相当多的思考。本期发表的是她研究报告的一部分。     

Computers and six PACs: An infused approach to computer literacy at the preservice level

One of the big questions in teacher education today is, “How does a college of education insure that its graduates are computer literate?” The addition of a microcomputer course in the preparatory program is the obvious answer; however, it may create programmatic and certificate complications. In order to address the concern for computer literacy and its accompanying complications, the elementary education preparatory program at Northern Illinois University reflects an infused curriculum approach. That is, courses were identified in each of the three professional semesters of the program in which self-paced courseware packets, called STUDY-PACs, were required.     

Investigating the Validity of a Locally Developed Critical Thinking Test

What can be done at the local school level to study the validity of measures of critical thinking? What information other than test scores should be analyzed? What validity can a test have for diagnosis, monitoring achievement, or curriculum reform?     

Lake Wobegon: Where All Teachers Are Competent (Or, Have We Come to Terms with the Problem of Incompetent Teachers?)

The major purpose of this study was to assess the presence of evaluation system components that assist principals in responding to incompetent teachers. According to Virginia principals, 5 per cent of the teachers in their schools were incompetent; however, only 2.65 per cent were documented formally as being incompetent. The typical principal with a staff of 100 teachers identifies 1.53 incompetent tenured teachers per year and remediates 0.68 teacher, encourages 0.37 teacher to resign or retire, reassigns 0.29 teacher, and recommends dismissal for 0.10 teacher. The four evaluation system components of remedial procedures, evaluation criteria, evaluator training, and organizational commitment were found to predict 69 per cent of the variance in the principals' effectiveness rating of their evaluation systems, but none of the evaluation system components were found to predict administrative responsiveness to incompetence. Such findings suggest that principals and school systems are avoiding a serious problem that undermines the education of millions of children, staff morale, and the publics perception of education.     

The relationship between sexual abuse during childhood and parenting outcomes: modeling direct and indirect pathways

OBJECTIVE: This study examined the association between childhood sexual abuse (CSA) and parenting outcomes including parenting stress, feelings of competence and discipline strategies. Maternal depression and current partner violence were hypothesized to be mediators of the association between CSA and parenting. METHOD: This study is based on secondary data analysis of archived data. The participants were 263 primiparous mothers (107 with a history of CSA and 156 comparison mothers recruited from a prenatal clinic prior to the birth of their first child. Mothers were interviewed twice: once when they were between 28 and 32 weeks gestation and again when their child was between 2 and 4 years of age. During the first interview, women were asked about childhood experiences of sexual abuse. During their second interview, they were asked about current symptoms of pathology and experiences with partner violence and parenting beliefs and practices. RESULTS: Structural Equation Modeling indicated that the relationship between CSA and punitive discipline was mediated by maternal depression and current partner violence. CSA was associated with higher maternal depression and higher partner violence. CSA, maternal depression, and current partner violence were associated with more negative parental perceptions and higher punitive discipline. Once maternal depression and current partner violence were in the model, the relationship between CSA and parenting outcomes was no different from zero. CONCLUSION: These results highlight the risks associated with CSA for parenting outcomes and suggest two potential pathways for this increased risk.     

Oral health beliefs and behavior among young adults in Appalachian Kentucky

We used communication infrastructure theory to investigate oral health beliefs and behavior among young adults in Appalachian Kentucky. We conducted 7 focus groups with 67 participants who reported poor oral health behavior, but this was not necessarily the result of poor oral health knowledge. Participants identified several sociocultural factors affecting their oral health, including lack of oral health prioritization among older generations, and risky health behaviors that competed with good oral health. These sociocultural factors create a context in which standard oral health recommendations are commonly seen as excessive. Participants described various responses to the poor oral health in the region, including fatalism and a distrust of dentists, and that oral healthcare professionals may be using potentially problematic communication tactics. Practical implications for designing effective oral health promotion campaigns in the region and theoretical implications for developing social-contextual frameworks of oral health promotion are discussed.