Understanding engineering educators’ pedagogical transformations through the Hero’s Journey

ABSTRACT

Many engineering education research faculty have put much effort into providing empirical evidence demonstrating the success of student-centred teaching strategies in the hopes that this evidence will result in widespread changes of engineering teaching practices. Unfortunately, these student-centred strategies have not been widely adopted as many engineering faculty still rely heavily on traditional lectures. In this study, we investigate three engineering faculty who have successfully made the transition to student-centred teaching strategies to uncover the complexities and nuances through their stories. This study uses Dewey’s Theory of Experience as a theoretical framework and Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey as a structural way to construct and analyse narratives of participant’s journeys. These engineering faculty narratives shed light on the stages involved in the process of changing teaching practices and how individuals interact with the environment to evolve over time.     

Fostering social connectedness among adolescents and adults with autism: A qualitative analysis

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) impacts approximately 1 in 44 children in the United States. Common characteristics of ASD are marked deficits in communication and social connectedness. As autistic children approach adolescence, there is a lack of interventions available to them. Mentoring can provide adolescents with a relationship that facilitates social connectedness with another person who has a shared life experience, filling a gap in services. The Autism Mentorship Program (AMP) was designed to provide autistic adolescents a meaningful relationship with an autistic young adult. Via participation in focus groups, mentees (n = 5), mentors (n = 6), and parents of mentees (n = 6) shared their experience of participating in an afterschool, youth mentoring intervention. Themes were developed from an open coding procedure. Results showed that AMP was associated with helping mentees find social connection within their mentoring relationship and among the group of mentees. Mentors also reported mutual benefits in social connectedness. Perceived benefits of the program, including improved academic performance, and suggestions for future programming are reported. AMP appears to be a promising program that provides social benefits for adolescents with ASD who may have few options for this type of support.     

Exploring the underlying factor structure of the home literacy environment (HLE) in the English and Spanish versions of the Familia Inventory: A cautionary tale

Few research-based measures of the family literacy environment are commercially available, especially in Spanish. One exception is the Familia Inventory (Taylor, 1995). The present study investigated the 10 subscales of this instrument and the factor structure they imply, using data from a low-socioeconomic (SES), largely Hispanic population. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to test the structure of the instrument as well as whether it is invariant across English and Spanish language versions. The scale was administered to 232 parents of preschoolers. Results of the CFA revealed that the a priori dimensions of the Familia Inventory were not supported for this sample. Follow-up analyses suggested poor fit both within and between subscales. The scale fit poorly within both English and Spanish, precluding testing of invariance across language. Supplemental analyses using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) on a subset of the items that had adequate variance suggested that a four-factor solution accounting for 53% of the variance best represented the English data and that a two-factor solution accounting for 43% of the variance best represented the Spanish data. Implications are discussed.     

Today Is a New Day

Your tomorrows are as bright as you want to make them. There is no reason to carry the darkness of the past with you into today.     

Development of the Biology Card Sorting Task to Measure Conceptual Expertise in Biology

There are widespread aspirations to focus undergraduate biology education on teaching students to think conceptually like biologists; however, there is a dearth of assessment tools designed to measure progress from novice to expert biological conceptual thinking. We present the development of a novel assessment tool, the Biology Card Sorting Task, designed to probe how individuals organize their conceptual knowledge of biology. While modeled on tasks from cognitive psychology, this task is unique in its design to test two hypothesized conceptual frameworks for the organization of biological knowledge: 1) a surface feature organization focused on organism type and 2) a deep feature organization focused on fundamental biological concepts. In this initial investigation of the Biology Card Sorting Task, each of six analytical measures showed statistically significant differences when used to compare the card sorting results of putative biological experts (biology faculty) and novices (non–biology major undergraduates). Consistently, biology faculty appeared to sort based on hypothesized deep features, while non–biology majors appeared to sort based on either surface features or nonhypothesized organizational frameworks. Results suggest that this novel task is robust in distinguishing populations of biology experts and biology novices and may be an adaptable tool for tracking emerging biology conceptual expertise.     

B. Telephone

DEMOCRATIZING COMMUNICATION? COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVES ON INFORMATION AND POWER edited by Mashoed Bailie and Dwayne Winseck (Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press “The Hampton Communication Series,”; 1997—$85.00/32.50, ISBN 1–57273–064–1 hard, 1–57273‐O65‐X paper, 450 pp., photos, tables, charts, notes, references, index)

INTERNATIONAL MEDAI RESEARCH: A CRITICAL SURVEY edited by John Corner, Philip Schlesinger, and Roger Silverstone (London/New York: Routledge, 1997—$100.00/24.00, ISBN 0–415–09035–0 hard 0–415–18496–7 paper, 238 pp., notes, index)

AN INTRODUCTORY HISTORY OF BRITISH BROADCASTING by Andrew Crisell (London and New York: Routledge, 1997—£12.99 [paper], ISBN 0–415–12802–1 hard, 0–415–12803‐X paper, 280 pp., bibliography, index, chapter recommended readings)

THE ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY RESEARCH SERIES (CRC Press, 2000 Corporate Blvd. NW, Boca Raton, FL 33431) offers three volumes on important Asian countries. Specifically:

THE KOREAN ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY by Michael Pecht, et al. (1997—$39.95, paper, ISBN 0–8493–3172–2, 126 pp., tables, charts, references, index).

THE SINGAPORE AND MALAYSIA ELECTRONICS INDUSTRIES by Donald Beane et al. (1997—$39.95, paper, ISBN 0–8493–3171–4, 103 pp., tables, charts, references, index).

THE TAIWAN ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY by Chung‐Shing Lee and Michael Pecht (1997—price not given, paper, ISBN 0–8493–3170–6, 157 pp., tables, charts, references).

EUROPEAN MEDIA MANAGEMENT REVIEW (Media Group, Business Research &; Development Centre, Turku School of Economics, Turku, Finland [fax: 011–358–2‐3383–515 or e‐mail: mmr@tukkk.fi ]‐$195.00 per year/5 issues, ISSN not given, first issue January 1998)

CONTEMPORARY TELEVISION: EASTERN PERSPECTIVES edited by David French and Michael Richards (New Delhi/Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage “Communication and Human Values,”; 1996—$52.00/24–95, ISBN 0–8039–9282–3 hard, 0–8039–9283–1 paper, 371 pp., references, tables and figures, index)

TEACHING THE MEDIA: INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES edited by Andrew Hart (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum “LEA's Communication Series,”; 1998—prices not given, ISBN 0–8058–2476–6 hard, 0–8058–2477–4 paper, 208 pp., illustrations, notes, references, index)

GETTING TO WAR: PREDICTING INTERNATIONAL CONFLICT WITH MASS MEDIA INDICATORS by W. Ben Hunt (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1997—$49.50, ISBN 0–472–10751–8, 304 pp., tables, charts, appendices, notes, bibliography, index)

TELECOMMUNICATIONS: RESTRUCTURING WORK AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS WORLDWIDE edited by Harry C. Katz (Ithaca, NY: ILR Press/Cornell University Press “Cornell International Industrial and Labor Relations Report, No. 32,”; 1997— $49.95/19.95, ISBN 0–8014–3286–3 hard, 0–8014–8361–1 paper, 401 pp., tables, notes, references, index)

SECRET STATE SILENT PRESS: NEW MILITARISM, THE GULF AND THE MODERN IMAGE OF WARFARE by Richard Keeble (Luton: University of Luton Press, 1997—£14.95, paper, ISBN 1–860–20–539, 222 pp., bibliography, index)

EDUCATIONAL TELEVISION: WHAT DO PEOPLE WANT? edited by Manfred Meyer (Luton, England: University of Luton Press/John Libbey Media “Communication Research and Broadcasting, No. 12,”; 1997—$32.00 paper, ISBN 1–86020–528–3, 246 pp., photos, tables, diagrams, notes, abbreviations)

INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION AND GLOBALIZATION: A CRITICAL INTRODUCTION edited by Ali Mohammadi (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1997—$75.00/26.95, ISBN 0–7619–5553–4 hard, 0–7619–5554–2 paper, 228 pp., notes, bibliography, index)

TELECOMMUNICATIONS IN WESTERN ASIA AND THE MIDDLE EASI edited by Eli M. Noam (New York: Oxford University Press “Global Communications,”; 1997—$55.00, ISBN 0–19–510202–9, 244 pp., tables, charts notes, references, index)

TELECOMMUNICATIONS IN LATIN AMERICA edited by Eli M. Noam (New York: Oxford University Press “Global Communications,”; 1998—$65.00, 1SBN0–19–510200–2, 265 pp., tables, chapter references, index)

ELECTRONIC COMMERCE: OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES FOR GOVERNMENT (Paris: Organization for Economic Co‐operation and Development “STI: Science, Technology, Industry,”; 1997—$9.00 paper, ISBN 92–64–15512–0, 84 pp., annex, notes)

MEDIA COURSES UK edited by Lavinia Orton (London: British Film Institute/Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997 [5th ed.]—$15.95, paper, ISBN 0–85170–649–5, 230 pp., appendices, index)

MEDIA LAW AND REGULATION IN THE EUROPEAN UNION: NATIONAL, TRANSNATIONAL, AND U.S. PERSPECTIVES by Emmanuel E. Paraschos (Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1998—$44.95, ISBN 0–8138–2807–4, 288 pp., notes, bibliography, index)

STATISTICAL YEARBOOK ‘98: FILM, TELEVISION, VIDEO AND NEW MEDIA IN EUROPE (European Audiovisual Observatory, 76 Allee de la Robertsau, F‐67000 Strasbourg, France—890ff or about $150.00, paper, ISBN 92–871–3590–8, 412 pp., charts, tables, notes)

CHANGING CHANNELS—THE PROSPECTS FOR TELEVISION IN A DIGITAL WORLD edited by Jeanette Steemers (Luton, England: John Libbey Media, University of Luton Press, 1998—£14.95, ISBN 1–86020–544–5, 156 pp., figures, bibliography, index)

NETWORK COMPETITION FOR EUROPEAN TELECOMMUNICATIONS by Oliver Stehmann (Oxford University Press, 1995—£40.00, ISBN 0–19–828925–1, 327 pp., figures, tables, glossary, index)