Contemporary Scientists and their Interactions with Non-Scientists: Alternative Companion Stories for School Curricula

Research in Science Education - Students learn more than science knowledge in a science classroom; they also acquire important messages about the purposes and contexts of science. Roberts (2011)...     

Public school size and Hispanic student achievement in Texas: a 5-year analysis

In this study, the researchers examined 5 years of Texas statewide data concerning elementary school size and Hispanic student performance on three state-mandated assessments in reading, mathematics, and writing. For each year of data analyzed here, student data from more than 1,200 elementary schools. After collapsing elementary schools into three sizes (i.e., very small <400 students; small 400–799 students; and large 800–1,199 students), multivariate statistical procedures revealed the presence of statistically significant differences in Hispanic student performance in reading, mathematics, and writing across all 5 years of data analyzed. In almost every analysis, Hispanic students in large elementary schools outperformed Hispanic students in very small elementary schools in reading, mathematics, and in writing. As such, our findings are in disagreement with other studies. Implications are discussed.     

Unfolding Case‐Based Practicum Curriculum Infusing Crisis,Trauma, and Disaster Preparation

The authors evaluated an unfolding case‐based approach to a practicum in counseling course infusing crisis, trauma, and disaster preparation for changes in students’ crisis self‐efficacy across a semester. The course, informed by constructivist‐developmental pedagogy and centered on the unfolding case, resulted in significant increases in students’ crisis self‐efficacy.     

Exploiting the Links between Theory and Practice: Developing Students' Cross-cultural Understanding through an International Study Tour to China

This paper describes and critiques a study tour to China of undergraduate and postgraduate business students in a large business faculty in a university with an emerging focus on internationalisation through building links with global business and industry. The study tour was designed to fit with the emerging trend towards internationalisation of business education wherein universities perceive themselves as being international universities based in one city rather than city-based universities who have international students. The literature on the difficulties of cross-cultural understanding and adjustment when business people sojourn to other countries is well documented. Yet, the same difficulties being encountered by students on short-term cultural immersion tours are yet to be adequately documented. This paper serves to address this gap in the literature by examining the experiences of 50 Australian and international students when confronted with a three week immersion into China's business, cultural and social practices. The paper explores the contributions of the study tour to academic understanding of globalisation.     

UNDERSTANDING THE OTHER/UNDERSTANDING OURSELVES: TOWARD A CONSTRUCTIVE DIALOGUE ABOUT "PRINCIPLES' IN EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH

The recent federal interest in advancing "scientifically based research," along with the National Research Council's 2002 report Scientific Research in Education ( SRE ), have provided space and impetus for a more general dialogue across discourse boundaries within the field of educational research. The goal of this article is to develop and illustrate principles for an educative dialogue across research discourses. I have turned to Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics and the critical dialogue that surrounds it to seek guidance about how we might better understand one another's perspectives and learn more about ourselves through the encounter. To illustrate these principles, I consider the dialogue between SRE authors and critics that was published in Educational Researcher shortly after the release of the report. I focus in particular on one of the many issues about which misunderstandings seem to arise — the nature, status, and role of generalizations — and point to some instructive challenges that each of the articles seems to raise for the others. Finally, I propose what I argue is a more prudent aspiration for general principles in educational research: developing the principles through which open critique and debate across differences might occur and through which sound decisions about particular programs for research might be made.     

Teachers' attitudes and policies regarding play in elementary schools

Research and theory concerning the value of play for children's development as well as current factors reducing the amount of play time that children experience are discussed. To ascertain play opportunities occurring in the schools, teachers' attitudes toward play, and provision of play for children in grades 1–6 were surveyed. The amount of recess time provided ranged from 0 to 65 min., with a mean of almost 19 min. Findings indicated that teachers from rural areas provided more play time than teachers from suburban areas, who in turn provided more play time than teachers in urban areas. Further, the amount of play time provided was influenced by the teachers' attitudes. That is, teachers who indicated generally positive attitudes toward play tended to allot more time for play in school. However, teachers from upper grade levels, who were more likely to perceive greater pressure to provide highly structured academic instructional programs, tended to de-emphasize the role and value of play and in turn allotted less time for play in school. The results of the present investigation demonstrate that children who are given less recess time are also likely to have teachers who report less positive attitudes toward play. It is recommended that school psychologists be aware of the adverse impact that restricted play opportunities may have on children's development. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

A “Deleterious” Driver: The “First Teacher” Reform in Sweden

This article investigates the implementation of the “förstelärare” or “First teacher” reform in Sweden. We draw upon the insights of a superintendent, union official, principal, three First teachers, and two of their colleagues in one school, and recent literature on career development reform. We employ Michael Fullan’s overview of the “right” and “wrong” drivers of educational reform to analyse the extent to which the First Teacher initiative cultivated productive “professional capital.” The research reveals: how broader national policy aims were in clear tension with municipal-wide school development, and school-level development efforts; the perverse effects of a strong focus upon salary on professional conduct; and how an emphasis upon teachers’ roles per se undermined the espoused policy focus on enhancing teaching. The research cautions against the problematic effects of the initiative on more profession-oriented prerogatives, and how more external, “deleterious,” drivers of reform militate against more productive professional capital.     

Governing teachers’ work and learning through data: Australian insights

This article reveals the multiple ways in which data are constituted as a vehicle for governing teachers’ work and learning. Drawing on the concept of governance, including in relation to the sociology of numbers, and data from one school in Queensland, Australia, the research reveals how teachers’ work and learning were constituted through practices of: establishing specific ‘targets’, including various ‘audacious goals’ for school and national testing; focusing upon ‘aligning’ all forms of school, regional and national data collected within the school; and participating in various ‘data conversations’ about specific students with senior members of staff. While the research reveals how teachers found such practices beneficial for improving their practice with students, it also shows how this learning was always and everywhere framed within a broader discourse of data, and how this data-centric focus came to constitute what was valued about their work and learning, and that of their students.     

Historicising teachers’ learning: a case study of productive professional practice

This paper reveals the significant historical traces which informed the learning practices of teachers at one particular school site in a rural and regional educational district in Australia. Drawing upon recent theorising into professional practice, the paper argues that teacher learning practices are intrinsically ‘ecologically’ related to teachers’ practices at specific sites. However, extending beyond this theorising, the research also reveals how teacher learning – in the case presented, in relation to classroom dialogue – is also significantly influenced by earlier learning experiences of the teachers involved. In this way, teachers’ practices are revealed as not only influenced by present-day, site-specific, whole-school teacher learning, but also by particular events encountered by teachers at an earlier phase of their careers. The research argues for a conception of teachers’ learning which is not only site-informed and ecologically arranged, but also deeply temporally embedded.