Leader noticing of facilitation in videocases of mathematics professional development

In this article, we report on Researching Mathematics Leader Learning (RMLL), a project designed to support leaders in learning how to facilitate robust opportunities for teachers’ mathematical learning. Our two-phase research design allowed us to construct a set of videocase seminars, enact the seminar design with leaders, analyze these data, refine our seminar design, and implement a second set of seminars with a new group of leaders. We drew on the noticing literature to examine leaders’ pedagogical reasoning as they discussed videocases of professional development. In this article, we demonstrate how changes in our framework for leader development and the resulting changes in the prompts and tasks shaped leader noticing in three ways: (a) accounting for the mathematical work of the facilitator and teachers in the videocase; (b) linking the mathematical work to goals for teacher learning; and (c) reasoning around the facilitator’s work in advancing those learning goals. Analysis indicates that in Phase II, leader discussions were more focused on the mathematical and pedagogical work needed to advance teacher learning. Based on our research and development work with over 70 leaders, we offer a set of design principles for leader professional development.     

On the importance of comparative research: the case of folkbiology

If our goal as researchers is to understand the range and complexity of human conceptual development, increased attention to comparative research is essential. I draw on research in the domain of folkbiology-commonsense understandings of plants and animals--to argue that several lines of comparative research are needed to understand the acquisition of folkbiology in particular and conceptual development in general. First, comparisons are needed between children and adults within a given society. It is impossible to understand the process of conceptual development without a detailed look at adult endstates in a domain. Second, comparisons are needed between adult endstates in different contexts. For a complete understanding of conceptual development we must understand the range of variability of adult conceptual systems. Finally, comparisons are needed among children developing in different contexts. Such research complements comparative work on adults and would serve to distinguish between universal and particular patterns of development and thus to inform and constrain accounts of conceptual development.     

Evaluating an Integrated Science Learning Environment Using the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey

This article reports the validity and use of a new form of the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES). As part of a larger study, a comparative student version (CLES-CS) was developed to evaluate the impact of an innovative teacher development program (based on the Integrated Science Learning Environment, ISLE, model) in school classrooms. Two separate response blocks for 30 items comprising five scales are presented in side-by-side columns to measure students’ perceptions on a five-point frequency response scale of the extent to which certain psychosocial factors are prevalent in the science class taught by a teacher who had attended the ISLE program (THIS), as well as their perceptions of other science and non-science classes taught by other teachers in the same school (OTHER). The five scales of the CLES are called Personal Relevance, Uncertainty of Science, Shared Control, Critical Voice, and Student Negotiation. Using data collected from 1079 students in 59 classes in north Texas, principal components factor analysis with varimax rotation and Kaiser normalization confirmed the a priori structure of the CLES-CS. The factor structure, internal consistency reliability, discriminant validity, and the ability to distinguish between different classes and groups were supported for the CLES-CS. Students whose science teachers had attended the ISLE program (THIS) perceived higher levels of Personal Relevance and Uncertainty of Science in their classrooms relative to the classrooms of other science and non-science teachers in the same schools (OTHER). Similar results were found when comparing the classroom environment perceptions of students whose science teachers had attended the ISLE program with the perceptions of students whose science teacher had attended alternative field trip programs (non-ISLE).     

Psychological factors capable of preventing the inhibition of antibody responses in separated infant monkeys

The capacity of infant squirrel monkeys to mount an antibody response to viral challenge was evaluated after removal from their mothers in several social and physical environments. Control and separated infants were injected with a benign virus, the bacteriophage X174, and levels of neutralizing antibody were assessed for 3 weeks. Infants separated alone in an unfamiliar environment showed a significant reduction in antibody levels as compared to control infants. Allowing infants to remain in the home environment, either alone or with peers, prevented this inhibition of antibody responses from occurring. Similarly, providing familiar peers in the novel environment facilitated the normal expression of antibody responses. These results indicate that the trauma of maternal separation is significantly reduced when infants are familiar with the separation environment or familiar social companions are available. The reduced antibody response was associated with the highest level of adrenal activation induced by the unfamiliar separation condition, but antibody titers and plasma cortisol levels could not be specifically correlated in individual infants.     

Out-of-school care and problem behavior trajectories among low-income adolescents: individual, family, and neighborhood characteristics as added risks

Using a developmental systems approach, this study considered longitudinal links between adolescents' out-of-school care experiences and behavioral trajectories within a random sample of 819 adolescents ages 10 to 14 years at Wave 1 from low-income, urban families. Multiple aspects of context were considered, including the location, supervision, and structure of adolescents' care arrangements, as well as parenting practices and perceived neighborhood environments. Regression models indicated that out-of-home care, whether supervised or unsupervised, showed modest longitudinal relations with heightened rates of delinquency, drug and alcohol use, and school problems. Out-of-home care was linked with particularly deleterious outcomes for adolescents with high earlier rates of behavior problems, low parental monitoring, and low perceived neighborhood collective efficacy.     

Research on classroom and school effectiveness and its implications for improving big city schools

Research on effective teaching has produced useful knowledge regarding instructional techniques dealing with classroom management, teacher-centered direct or explicit instruction, student time-on-task, questioning, and cognitive instruction for low-achieving students. Research on effective schools has produced useful knowledge regarding the characteristics or correlates of schools that are unusually successful in enhancing student achievement. Projects that utilize these research findings in working to improve teacher and school effectiveness have been and are being conducted in many big cities. While encouraging results have been registered in some locations, achievement is still unacceptably low in many cities. Efforts in the future should draw systematically on research dealing with effective classrooms and effective schools.     

Are measured school effects just sorting?: Causality and correlation in the National Education Longitudinal Survey

Youth who share a school and neighborhood often show similar levels of academic achievement, but some studies find all or most of this correlation is due to sorting (not causation). We analyze the National Education Longitudinal Survey (NELS) in three ways to decompose sorting versus causality: We first control for much richer measures of family background than other analysts have used. We next use characteristics of the students’ future high school as an instrument for family background (as future high school quality is correlated with unobserved family background but cannot cause junior high test scores). Finally, we use regression and semi-nonparametric matching methods to look at changes in test score when youth change schools. The results create a collage of evidence that a significant fraction of the correlation is causal.     

Reciprocal longitudinal relations between nonresident father involvement and adolescent delinquency

Using a representative sample of low-income, primarily minority adolescents (N=647, aged 10-14 years at Wave 1), this study examined bidirectional longitudinal relations between nonresident father involvement, defined as contact and responsibility for children's care and behavior, and adolescent engagement in delinquent activities. Autoregressive and fixed effects models found that higher nonresident father involvement predicted subsequent decreases in adolescent delinquency, particularly for youth with initial engagement in delinquent activities. Adolescent delinquency did not predict subsequent changes in father involvement. However, the two factors covaried: As adolescent delinquency increased, so too did father involvement, suggesting that nonresident fathers may increase their involvement in the face of adolescent problem behavior, with this pattern driven primarily by African American families.     

Teaching Introductory Business Statistics Using the DCOVA Framework

Introductory business statistics students often receive little guidance on how to apply the methods they learn to further business objectives they may one day face. And those students may fail to see the continuity among the topics taught in an introductory course if they learn those methods outside a context that provides a unifying framework. The DCOVA problem‐solving framework that presents discrete steps to define, collect, organize, visualize, and analyze data addresses these concerns while helping to enhance the perceived value of taking statistics courses.