Young Children's Ability to Adapt their Drawings of the Human Figure

5‐year‐olds, 7‐year‐olds and 9‐year‐olds were asked to draw three figures, one standing still and facing them, one standing still in profile and one running in profile. Half drew from imagination and half drew from models. The 5‐year‐olds made fewest distinctions in the way they drew the figures, the most notable being the greater spread of the legs of the running figure. With increasing age, more features were used to differentiate the three figures. There was little evidence of 5‐year‐olds adapting their figures in the presence of a model. Only among the older children was there a significant effect of the presence of a model when the 7‐year‐olds and, to a greater extent, the 9‐year‐olds drew their running figure with bent arms and legs and also with more transparencies and partial occlusions.     

Logical connectives in science: Some preliminary findings

Logical connectives are words or phrases which serve as links between sentences, or between propositions within a sentence, or between a proposition and a concept. The Logical Connectives in Science Project has identified about 200 such terms commonly use in school science text material, and has prepared over a thousand test items in order to measure secondary school students’ comprehension of these terms. The primary aim of the research is to identify students’ specific difficulties; a secondary aim is to explore the relationships between students’ ability to comprehend logical connectives and other variables of interest to educational researchers. The research is still in progress; the present paper reports on recent work in four areas: (1) early findings on pupils’ difficulties with logical connectives, based on data obtained from the trial testing of the items; (2) the relationship between logical connective ability (LCA) and socio-economic status (SES); (3) the relationship between LCA and cognitive preferences; and (4) the relationship between LCA and attitudes to a textbook (PSSC Physics) which makes extensive use of a wide range of logical connectives. Significant correlations were found between LCA and SES; however, LCA was found to be uncorrelated with either cognitive preferences or with attitudes to the PSSC text.     

Does Online Comprehension Monitoring Make a Unique Contribution to Reading Comprehension in Beginning Readers? Evidence from eye movements

The goal of this study was to investigate the nature of online comprehension monitoring, its predictors, and its relation to reading comprehension. Questions were concerned with (a) beginning readers’ sensitivity to inconsistencies, (b) predictors of online comprehension monitoring, and (c) the relation of online comprehension monitoring to reading comprehension over and above word reading and listening comprehension. Using eye tracking technology, online comprehension monitoring was measured as the amount of time spent rereading target implausible words and looking back at surrounding contexts. Results from 319 second graders revealed that children spent greater time fixating on inconsistent than consistent words and engaged in more frequent lookbacks. Comprehension monitoring was explained by both word reading and listening comprehension. However, comprehension monitoring did not uniquely predict reading comprehension after accounting for word reading and listening comprehension. These results provide insight into the nature of comprehension monitoring and its role in reading comprehension for beginning readers.     

A perspective on knowing about global warming and a critical comment about schools and curriculum in relation to socio-scientific issues

The focus of this response to Virginie Albe and Marie-José Gombert??s (2011) article on a research study of students?? school science conference on global warming is to develop some thoughts on covert assumptions which underpin any such conference. My comments refer to the politics behind the production of scientific knowledge of climate change and the institutional barriers to action on socio-scientific issues presented by schools working predominantly on neoliberal agendas.     

Integrating environmental sustainability into universities

Universities play a fundamental role in addressing global environmental challenges as their education, research and community involvement can produce long-lasting environmental effects and societal change. By demonstrating best practice in their operations, research and teaching, universities have both multiple and multiplier effects on society. For universities to comprehensively address sustainability, a ‘learning for sustainability’ approach needs to be embedded across every aspect of institutional operations in a synergistic way. Using semi-structured interviews, this research explored the factors that influence the integration of sustainability into the operations, teaching and research activities of universities in Australia and England. The research found that individuals, committed to the goal of a more sustainable world, play a vital role in the success of integrating environmental sustainability into universities. The factors critical to enabling universities to undertake the transformational changes necessary to embed environmental sustainability into all university areas included: a strong policy environment, resourcing of strategies, and encouragement of leaders and environmental sustainability advocates. Educating and building the awareness of university staff of the importance of environmental sustainability to future generations was key to a successful strategy.     

Film Technology

Ralph N. Sargent's Preserving the Moving Image (Washington: Corporation for Public Broadcaiting and National Endowment for the Arts, 1974---$3.95, paper)

Rene L. Ash's The Motion Picture Film Editor (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1974---$6.00)

John Hales (ed.) Computer Animation (New York: Hastings House, 1974---$20.00)

George Fox's Earthquake: The Story of a Movie (New York: Signet Film Series, 1974---$1.25, paper)     

Foreign and International

Isaiah Litvak and Christopher Maule's Cultural Sovereignty, The Time and Reader's Digest Case in Canada (New York: Praeger Special Studies, 1974---$13.50)

Survey of Public Attitudes Towards the Computer (Ottawa: Department of Communications, 1973---$1.00, paper)

Bernard Rubin's Propaganda and Public Opinion: Strategies of Persuasion (Middletown, Conn.: Xerox Educational Publications, 1973---copies on request, paper)

Jim Richstad, Michael McMillan, and Ralph Barney's The Pacific Islands Press: A Directory (Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1973---no price given, paper)

Judith Tegger Kildow's Intelsat: Policy-Maker's Dilemma (Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books/Heath, 1973---$12.50)     

Commonwealth Media

Television, Censorship and the Law, by Colin R. Munro (208 pp.---$22.00)

Characteristics of Local Media Audiences, by Ray Brown (130 pp.---$23.00)

Newspapers as Organizations, by Lars Engwall (288 pp.---$29.0O)

Broadcasting and Youth (London: Calouste Gulbenian Foundation, 98 Portland Place, London W1N 4ET, 1979---£1.70 or about $4.00, paper)

Carl Gardner, ed. Media, Politics & Culture: A Socialist View (London: Macmillan/Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanties Press, 1979---$21.50/9.75)

Asa Briggs, Governing the BBC (London: British Broadcasting Corporation, 1979---£10.00 or about $22.00)

Graham Cleverley's The Kettering Standoff: A Study of a Strike (Southhamption: Aeropagus, 1978---price not given, but available in hardback and paper)

Paul Hoch's The Newspaper Game: The Political Sociology of the Press (London and New York: Marian Boyars Ltd., 1974, released US in 1979---$10.00)

Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC Information Services, Ottawa, Ontario K1A ON2, Canada---available free on request, paper)

Australia: Henry Mayer tells us of nine recent publications on page     

NEW TECHNOLOGIES

THE COMMUNITY MEDIUM, edited by Nancy Jesuale with Ralph Lee Smith (182 pages)

A GUIDE FOR LOCAL POLICY, edited by Nancy Jesuale with Richard M. Neustadt and Nicholas P. Miller (131 pages)

Jane Wilson, “New Information Technologies for the Nonprofit Sector,” (The Foundation Center, 888 Seventh Ave., New York, N.Y. 10106---$4.95, paper)

1982 CABLE ADVERTISING DIRECTORY (Nations Cable Television Association, 1724 Massachuse Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036---$30. paper)

THE INTERACTIVE CABLE TV HANDBOOK (Phillips Publishing , 7315 Wisconsin Avenue, Suite 1200 N, Bethesda, MD 20814---$49.00, paper)

COUNTDOWN: DIRECT-TO-HOME SATELLITE BROADCASTING IN THE EIGHTIES (65 pages---$75.00, paper)

VIDEODISC: BOOM OR BUST? THE STORY OF THE VIDEODISC IN 1981 FROM THE PAGES OF TELEVISION DIGEST (75 pages, $75.00, paper)