Love acts and revolutionary praxis: challenging the neoliberal university through a teaching scholars development program

ABSTRACT

There has been significant interest in developing academics through Teaching Scholar Development Programs across the USA, Canada, the UK, and more recently in Australia. At their core, such programs develop academics across teaching scholarship, leadership, promotion, and award opportunities, where universities reap the benefits of developing such a cadre of leaders. This paper pays witness to one such a program in an Australian university to highlight enactments of caring passionately. We use qualitative survey evaluation data, metaphor analysis and reflective practice to nuance the pleasures, passions and challenges of the lived experiences using phenomenological and metaphor lenses to describe our experiences. Metaphors provide powerful insights into the dimensions of experience as they open up how programs are perceived and experienced. Our paper disrupts traditional linear writing through rhizomatic, multivocal and multitextual encounters to challenge dominant authorial voicing. The academic identity work and emotional work required in the program is unfolded through evolving, experiencing and reflecting on the program to inform design and highlight what we have come to (re)value in our academic work when we come together to learn, share, and lead. We forge ways to be and become with and against neoliberal agendas that have choked the soul of ‘the university’ to evolve rich spaces and practices of/for reciprocity and kindness where not only learning can thrive, but where love acts – a much needed revolutionary praxis for our time.     

Networking for Leadership,Inquiry, and Systemic Thinking: A New Approach to Inquiry-Based Learning

Recent changes in science education standards have mandated a prominent place for inquiry learning in science curricula. However, change from traditional teaching methods to a more inquiry-centered approach is difficult to enact. While research to date demonstrates a number of successful inquiry implementations, it also reveals a slow rate of change along with possible reasons for difficulty in adopting inquiry instructional methods. Further, inquiry reforms have failed in the past. The Networking for Leadership, Inquiry, and Systemic Thinking (NLIST) initiative, sponsored by the Council of State Science Supervisors and NASA, proposes to facilitate inquiry through systemic reform designed to avoid the mistakes of the past and incorporate new knowledge about teaching and learning. Systemic elements targeted for change include a standard conceptualization of science as inquiry, instructional materials, professional development, administrative support and leadership, facilities, community involvement, and technology infrastructure. To date, the initiative has created a detailed definition of inquiry learning and a rubric for evaluating instructional materials against this definition. This paper presents the theoretical and empirical foundations for the NLIST initiative, describes its progress, and outlines future goals.     

Syrians’ acceptance of digital lectures: a case study

Technology-based learning modules are mostly challenged by their acceptance. A single-case study and mixed research method are used to explore a unique situation of applying digital lectures at the postgraduate Programmes at the Faculty of Tourism at Damascus University as a solution for brain drain in the Syrian higher education system. Results indicate that Performance Expectancy, Effort Expectancy (EE), Personal Innovativeness and Satisfaction with the Quality of Services have a significant effect on students’ Behavioural Intention to accept digital lectures. This effect was stronger for males. However, EE was a better predictor for students under 30. In addition, students regarded the use of digital lectures as an alternative plan to continuing their postgraduate studies abroad within the current restrictions on Syrians. For the future successful implementation of e-learning modules, infrastructure-related issues should be taken into account. The study recommends universities going through brain drain and similar crisis situations to utilise digital lectures.     

Social Context Effects on Children's Performance of Number Conservation Tasks: plausibility and evidence

Abstract Recent controversy over Piagetian tasks concerns whether the experimenter's actions result in children misunderstanding the question. Evidence for this has been derived from differences in performance of conservation tasks according to whether the transformation is intentional or accidental. Studies reporting large differences according to transformation type are claimed to be flawed procedurally. Including a preliminary talk and restricting questions to one domain result in little or no transformation type effect. Whether children's correct judgments in accidental versions are reliable indications of their knowledge has also been disputed. They may reflect children's ignoring of the transformation or covert counting. Using an identity conservation pretest 192 Yemeni children were selected to be tested on number conservation tasks varying in transformation type, numerosity and equality. The results were analysed using a model‐fitting procedure. Identity nonconservers were affected by transformation type but not numerosity whereas identity conservers showed the opposite pattern. The identity nonconservers may simply have been so bemused by the adult experimenter introducing a soft toy in the accidental conditions that they guessed. For identity nonconservers guessing will result in greater success than reasoning.     

Understanding key drivers affecting students’ use of artificial intelligence-based voice assistants

Education and Information Technologies - Artificial intelligence (AI)-based voice assistants have become an essential part of our daily lives. Yet, little is known concerning what motivates...     

Writing fluency and quality in kindergarten and first grade: the role of attention,reading, transcription,and oral language

In the present study, we examined the influence of kindergarten component skills on writing outcomes, both concurrently and longitudinally to first grade. Using data from 265 students, we investigated a model of writing development including attention regulation along with students’ reading, spelling, handwriting fluency, and oral language component skills. Results from structural equation modeling demonstrated that a model including attention was better fitting than a model with only language and literacy factors. Attention, a higher-order literacy factor related to reading and spelling proficiency, and automaticity in letter-writing were uniquely and positively related to compositional fluency in kindergarten. Attention and higher-order literacy factor were predictive of both composition quality and fluency in first grade, while oral language showed unique relations with first grade writing quality. Implications for writing development and instruction are discussed.     

古老埃及陵墓的数字建构和保护

从吉斯的金字塔到底比斯的陵墓,古老埃及的璀璨历史就体现在这些著名的建筑上.不幸的是,每年近四百万的旅游者给上述古建筑,尤其是那些位于尼罗河西岸的陵墓带来了沉重的负担.用数字化技术帮助建立起传统陵墓的资料库,以便更好地保护这些重要的历史建筑.同时通过重建一个数字陵墓的例子,讨论了运用照片图像及数字建构技术应注意的新问题,例如需要消除图像的变形、矫正三维模型和调整光线的平衡等问题,来达到真实的数字感观.