Epistemology,practical work and Academic skills in science education

This article discusses the inherent flaws in considering and using the epistemology of the natural sciences as equivalent to a pedagogic basis for teaching and learning in the natural sciences. It begins with a discussion of the difference between practising science and learning to practice science. It follows with a discussion and refutation of three commonly held motives for using practicals in science education. It concludes with the presentation of three new, better motives for their use.     

Technical secondary education in Togo and Cameroon — research note

This paper presents an evaluation of technical secondary education in Togo and Cameroon from the labor market perspective using tracer study data. Individuals face great difficulties in finding a job following training and the most common strategy used to avoid unemployment is to secure work in the informal sector. However, informal sector jobs provide low earnings and there appears to be a large discrepancy between an individual's expected earnings and actual earnings. One solution is to stimulate, and to enhance the role of, informal training through apprentice training centers.     

Socialisation into Teaching: the research which lost its way

The paper argues that in recent years sociologists have neglected the processes of occupational socialisation of leaching, despite research interest in everyday life in other educational settings. Shortcomings in the extant research on teacher socialisation and in the wider literature on professional socialisation are detailed to explain the lack of intellectual interest in teacher socialisation. Finally, the paper offers some potential lines for the development of research on teacher socialisation.

Just as we need to know more about how children are transformed into pupils, so must we know more about how young persons (usually college students) are transformed into teachers

(Wax & Wax, 1971, pp. 10‐11)

Two steps forward,one step back: Effect size reporting in gifted education research from 1995–2000

The APA Task Force on Statistical Inference recently recommended reporting effect sizes alongside results of statistical significance tests. The purpose of this article is to investigate effect size usage in gifted education research and to follow up on a similar investigation published by Plucker (1997). A content analysis of effect size reporting was conducted of articles published in the Journal for the Education of the Gifted, Roeper Review, and Gifted Child Quarterly from 1995–2000. Results of the present study were similar to the findings of Plucker (1997): No statistical difference in reporting was found across journals or across years, and a moderate difference was found between effect size reporting in univariate versus multivariate statistics. The benefits to gifted education research of understanding the relationship among sample size, effect size, and statistical power are discussed.