How do Students Feel about Grammar?: The Framework and its Implications for Teaching and Learning

Grammar's place in English teaching seems to be constantly under review. This paper reflects on the status and methods of grammar teaching at the moment. In particular, it explores both the positive and negative impact of the Key Stage 3 Framework for Teaching English on teaching and learning. It goes on to analyse the writer's experiences of teaching grammar as a student teacher, and asks whether the methods we are using today are adequate for the needs of young writers.     

‘Beyond 2015’, within the modern/colonial global imaginary? Global development and higher education

Efforts to emphasize higher education’s role in development have grown in recent years, but important questions remain about the motivations and effects of these initiatives. In this paper, we employ the concept of a ‘modern/colonial global imaginary’ to consider the impact of the enduring power relations and uneven politics of knowledge in the relationship between higher education and development. Specifically, we consider the Association of Commonwealth Universities’ (ACU) ‘Beyond 2015’ campaign, which was launched in anticipation of the new UN Sustainable Development Goals. We argue that despite the ACU’s intention to provide ‘a platform for diverse voices, particularly from the global South’, the campaign was structured in a way that discouraged dissenting perspectives. More broadly, we consider available possibilities and limitations for challenging mainstream development agendas.     

The role of university-based induction in beginning elementary teacher enactment of effective mathematics teaching

The purpose of this paper is to describe the school-based contextual constraints perceived by beginning elementary teachers as they attempted to enact their visions of effective mathematics teaching and the components of a mathematics-specific, university-based induction program designed to support elementary teachers in their teaching of mathematics. A significant number of beginning teachers in the program indicated that curriculum pacing guides and grade level teachers often discouraged their enactment of effective mathematics teaching. We describe the components of the induction program in general and then discuss the specific ways that program mentors, who were elementary teachers with expertise in mathematics teaching, supported beginning teachers in navigating the constraints identified. Data suggest that supporting teachers’ pedagogical agency to navigate local school contexts should be an additional consideration in teacher preparation and induction programs.     

The PhD – is it out of alignment?

ABSTRACT

Globally there is recognition that doctoral programmes need to offer the opportunity for career pathways beyond academia, as PhD graduates are entering a range of careers. Consequently, some doctoral programmes now provide opportunities to develop a broader skill set. However, most PhD programmes in the United Kingdom and Australasia still concentrate on disciplinary knowledge and developing research skills. Moreover, the assessment has remained narrowly focused on a written thesis and an oral examination. Here we apply the notion of ‘constructive alignment’ to doctoral education and find that, even in terms of preparing PhD graduates for academic and research careers, the curriculum lacks opportunities to develop and assess relevant skills. The situation is even more extreme for wider careers beyond academia. To achieve alignment, we suggest providing more structured learning opportunities and personalised professional development plans with formative portfolios. If wanting true alignment in the PhD, a portfolio would be the summative assessment, but this is likely a step too far for a conservative academy.     

Training in phonological strategies improves Chinese dyslexic children’s character reading skills

This study investigated Chinese dyslexic children’s efficiency in employing phonological strategies (i.e. the use of orthography-phonology correspondence rules) in reading and the effectiveness of training phonological strategies in improving Chinese dyslexic children’s reading performance. An Experimental Group of 15 Chinese dyslexic children received a five-day intensive training in phonological strategies while a comparable Control Group did not. The results showed that Chinese dyslexic children did not use the phonological strategies as efficiently as Chinese average readers, and the training programme was effective in significantly improving the Experimental Group’s reading performance. This suggests that Chinese dyslexic children can benefit from training in phonological strategies.     

The Long and Winding Road from Promise to Fulfilment in Science Among Gifted Females in Israel

A long and winding road awaits gifted females in Israel in their quest to actualize their potential in the sciences. The present state of affairs can be pieced together from a series of studies on various aspects related to the development in the sciences of females in general and gifted females in particular. Gender differences observed in the participation of students in challenging science programs and in their consequent achievement can be attributed to cognitive differences, to environmental and cultural emphasis, or to an interaction between cognitive and environmental factors, reflected in different preferences for methods of inquiry and differences in styles of problem solving. Examples of recent efforts in Israel that attempt to deal with observed gender differences and encourage females to fulfil their talents include group counseling programs, such as “Trapped in Blue and Pink” and instructional programs integrating counseling, such as “Na'aleh — Girls toward degrees in engineering” and a crosscultural intervention program for enhancing gifted females' achevement in the sciences via reattribution training.     

The role of feedback in implicit and explicit artificial grammar learning: a comparison between dyslexic and non-dyslexic adults

The importance of feedback for learning has been firmly established over the past few decades. The question of whether feedback plays a significant role in the statistical learning abilities of adults with dyslexia, however, is currently unresolved. Here, we examined the role of feedback in grammaticality judgment, type of structural knowledge, and confidence rating in both typically developed and dyslexic adults. We implemented two artificial grammar learning experiments: implicit and explicit. The second experiment was directly analogous to the first experiment in all respects except training format: the standard memorization instruction was replaced with an explicit rule-search instruction. Each experiment was conducted with and without performance feedback. While both groups showed significantly improved learning in the feedback-based explicit artificial grammar learning task, only the typically developed adults demonstrated higher levels of conscious structural knowledge. The present study demonstrates that the basis for the grammaticality judgment of adults with dyslexia differs from that of typically developed adults, regardless of increase in the level of explicitness.     

Universal Interventions: Fully Exploring Their Impacts and Potential to Produce Population-Level Impacts

In this article we seek to promote a deeper understanding of the value of universal intervention research in education as well as other fields and to call for greater interdisciplinary learning and discourse. Our goal is to deepen the conversation regarding how to build a stronger research orientation toward longitudinal, population-level outcomes in education and mental health. After highlighting the value of universal approaches targeting entire populations and their relevance to education, we raise issues regarding the traditional benchmarks of efficacy when applied to universal intervention trials and suggest alternative metrics for judging the impact of universal approaches. We conclude with lessons based on exemplar studies to help shape future research and policy regarding universal interventions.