Laboratory materials: Affordances or constraints?

Laboratory instruction is critical to the understanding of biology and is a central piece of biological sciences instruction. Although much investigation has focused on the content of biology laboratory exercises, we contend that understanding the extent to which the laboratory materials can aid or limit experimental investigation is of equal importance. In this study, therefore, we investigate the role of timing and availability of laboratory equipment in the context of two different laboratory exercises. We use both case study and an experimental approach to investigate how laboratory materials guide the planning, context, creativity, and timing of ideas shared among students. Our data support the notion that providing students with laboratory equipment before students plan and consider different experimental approaches can constrain students' ideas and encourage tool‐focused solutions to experimental design tasks. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 48: 1010–1025, 2011     

The effects of cooperative learning on enhancing Hong Kong fifth graders' achievement goals,autonomous motivation and reading proficiency

Research indicates that cooperative learning with teacher‐guided instruction is more effective in helping young children to learn than cooperative learning with minimal guidance. In the present study, two different cooperative learning activities (jigsaw and drama) and a control condition (a traditional teacher‐led approach) were compared. The participants were 279 Grade 5 Hong Kong students located in nine classrooms. The two experimental conditions emphasised teachers' cognitive support in helping students to understand a text through both teacher‐led and student‐led activities. Post‐test data included a reading comprehension test and three questionnaires that investigated students' goal orientations, initial level of relative autonomy and perceptions of instructional practices. Findings indicate that students in the jigsaw group outperformed students in both the drama group and the control group in the reading comprehension test. The implications of conducting cooperative learning activities with well‐planned teacher guidance are discussed.     

Kindergarten teachers adjust their teaching practices in accordance with children’s academic pre‐skills

This study examined the extent to which kindergarten children’s academic pre‐skills are associated with their teachers’ subsequent teaching practices. The pre‐skills in reading and math of 1268 children (655 boys, 613 girls) were measured in kindergarten in the fall. A pair of trained observers used the Classroom Assessment Scoring System instrument to observe 49 kindergarten teachers on their emotional support, classroom organisation and instructional support in kindergarten in the spring. The results of the multilevel modelling showed that low levels of academic pre‐skills in kindergarten classrooms in the fall predicted high classroom quality in the classrooms later on. The results suggest that the overall level of children’s academic pre‐skills in the classroom plays an important role in the ways in which teachers adapt their instructional practices to the needs of a particular classroom.     

Understanding Student Attempts to Find a Line of Fit

The least squares method of fitting a line is not one that naturally occurs to students. We present three tasks to understand student views on how lines may be fit.     

Identification of ICD codes suggestive of child maltreatment

Objective

In order to be reimbursed for the care they provide, hospitals in the United States are required to use a standard system to code all discharge diagnoses: the International Classification of Disease, 9th Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9). Although ICD-9 codes specific for child maltreatment exist, they do not identify all maltreatment-related hospital and emergency department discharges. To increase the usefulness of medical data for public health surveillance of child maltreatment, this project sought to identify ICD-9 codes that are suggestive of child maltreatment.

Methods

After review of the literature and discussions with experts, injuries and conditions that should raise suspicion of child maltreatment (physical or sexual abuse or neglect) were identified and a list of corresponding ICD codes was compiled. Using a statewide electronic database of hospital discharges and emergency department (ED) visits for the year 2000, visits by children assigned these ICD codes were identified, a sample of visits was selected, and medical records were reviewed to assess the circumstances of the injury or illness that led to the visit. Based on information in the medical record, the injury or illness was classified as maltreatment-related, or not.

Results

There were 3,684 visits selected for review. Of these, 2,826 records were reviewed and classified; 1,200 (43%) records met the criteria for being maltreatment-related, 1,419 (50%) contained adequate information indicating the injury/condition was not likely maltreatment-related, and 207 (7%) records did not contain enough information to classify. Sixty-eight ICD codes had >66% of visits classified as maltreatment-related, the a priori criteria for a code to be considered suggestive of maltreatment. Codes suggestive of maltreatment include specific fractures, burns, and injuries of undetermined intent, among others.

Conclusion

Several ICD codes were found that, when used with age restrictions and other specific exclusion criteria, are suggestive of maltreatment. This information may increase the usefulness of hospital discharge data for public health surveillance of child maltreatment.

Practice implications

Use of these suggestive codes facilitates identifying conditions and injuries that are likely maltreatment-related in hospital discharge and ED visit data. When used in conjunction with ICD maltreatment-specific codes, these suggestive codes may enhance the use of medical data for monitoring child maltreatment trends.     

Gender and higher education in different national spaces: Female Palestinian students attending Israeli and Jordanian universities

This study examines the higher education experience among Palestinian Arab females in two national spaces and seeks to determine whether studying at an Arab institution of higher learning in a nearby Arab country can alleviate the emotional and economic difficulties that affect Palestinian women at Israeli universities. What can institutions of higher learning in Israel learn or derive from the proposed model to relieve the alienation and exclusion that their female Palestinian students experience? The study will compare two geographically distinct groups of women students. The first is a group of Palestinian women who attend university in Jordan, while the second consists of Palestinian women of Bedouin origin from southern Israel who study in the Jewish Israeli cultural space. The study seeks to shed light on the experience of Muslim students in Western and Muslim universities.     

Utilising multimedia ESP programme in enhancing flight attendants' safety knowledge and problem solving skills

A multimedia English for Specific Purposes (ESP) programme was developed to train flight attendants. The programme comprised of two units. Unit one is listening comprehension, which provides the flight attendants' with specific information of Airbus A340. Unit two is reading comprehension, which provides the flight attendants with the emergency procedures. The effect of this programme on the flight attendants' safety knowledge and problem solving was measured using an achievement test which comprises two parts; the first part includes 10 multiple‐choice questions based on listening comprehension and measuring safety knowledge; the second part includes 15 multiple‐choice questions based on reading comprehension and measuring problem solving situations. The sample of the study consists of 36 flight attendants divided into two groups. The test was administered as a pretest and a posttest for the equivalence of the groups and their achievement. The results revealed that the computerised ESP programme has a measurable effect on the flight attendants' recall of safety knowledge and problem solving skills. The researchers recommended that similar computerised ESP programmes should be designed in order for the flight attendants to be well equipped with skills and knowledge in dealing with emergency problems that they may occur during flight.     

Adaptive learning for ESL based on computation

In the conventional English as a Second Language (ESL) class‐based learning environment, teachers use a fixed learning sequence and content for all students without considering the diverse needs of each individual. There is a great deal of diversity within and between classes. Hence, if students' learning outcomes are to be maximised, it is important to know how to provide learning content using students' preferences, learning characteristics and knowledge background as a basis. A five‐step algorithm was proposed that was based on the four factors (gender, learning motivation, cognitive style and learning style) as the different learner characteristics. The percentage increase between the pretest and posttest scores was used to determine optimal adaptive learning sequences to accommodate a variety of individual differences. The algorithm included the following five steps—to obtain the learning performance, to distinguish the learning performance of the lowest and highest groups, to use the different learning sequences as a basis for categorisation, to test the four factors between the lowest and highest performance, and to reduce the number of handouts. Finally, an empirical study for validating the adaptive learning sequence was conducted. By analysing the students' characteristics and the optimal learning sequences, an attempt was made to develop an adaptive learning sequence system to facilitate students' learning and to maximise their learning outcome, thus addressing the problem of fixed learning sequences in conventional ESL instruction.     

Integrating ICT into classroom practice in modern foreign language teaching in England: making room for teachers' voices

Current government policy in the UK places teachers of all subject areas under pressure to embed ICT into their pedagogic practice to improve teaching and learning. This article attempts to compare that policy with the situated reality of a small number of Modern Foreign Language teachers striving to comply. The voices of four teachers are presented as they began to embed the use of ICT (primarily their newly acquired Interactive Whiteboards) into their existing classroom approach. The story of their developing practice is examined for signs of transformation; the complexity of a real situation is thus contrasted with a simplified ideal. By means of this investigation, examples of sophisticated pedagogical thinking are explored to demonstrate that it is perhaps not so easy to transform the learning process, with or without ICT.

La politique actuelle du gouvernement du Royaume‐Uni exerce une pression sur les enseignants de toutes matières pour qu'ils intègrent les technologies d'information et de communication dans leurs pratiques pédagogiques afin d'améliorer l'enseignement et l'apprentissage. Cet article essaye de comparer cette politique avec la réalité contextualisée d'un petit nombre de professeurs de langues étrangères qui font leur possible pour s'y conformer. Les voix de quatre enseignants y sont présentées alors qu'ils commençaient à intégrer l'informatique (et en particulier leurs tableaux interactifs récemment acquis) dans leur approche pédagogique actuelle. L'histoire du changement de leurs pratiques est remise en question pour trouver des indications de transformation. La complexité d'une situation réelle peut alors être mise en contraste avec une idée simplifiée. De par cette étude, on peut examiner des exemples de la réflexion pédagogique développée pour montrer que ce n'est pas tellement facile de transformer les méthodes d'apprentissage, avec ou sans l'outil informatique.

Die Gegenwärtige Regierungspolitik in Großbritannien setzt Lehrkräfte aller Schulfächer unter Druck, moderne Informationstechniken in ihre pädagogische Praxis einzubeziehen, um den Unterricht und den Lernprozess zu verbessern. Dieser Beitrag versucht, diese Politik mit der realen Situation einer kleinen Anzahl von SprachlehrerInnen zu vergleichen, die sich bemühen, den Anordnungen nachzukommen. Die Stimmen von vier Lehrkräften werden vorgelegt, die damit begonnen haben, Informations‐ und Kommunikationstechnologie (hauptsächlich ihre neu erworbenen interactive whiteboards (interaktive Tafeln)) in ihre gegenwärtige Unterrichtsmethode einzubeziehen. Es wird untersucht, welche Veränderungen es bei zunehmender Praxis gibt. Die Vielschichtigkeit einer realen Situation wird somit dem vereinfachten Idealfall gegenübergestellt. Mittels dieser Untersuchung werden Beispiele hochentwickelten pädagogischen Denkens erforscht und dazu verwendet, um zu zeigen, dass es doch nicht so einfach ist, den Lernprozess zu verändern—mit oder ohne ICT.

La política actuel del gobierno del Reino Unido sitúa a los profesores de todos los departamentos bajo la presión de arraigar ICT en la práctica de su pedagogía para mejorar la enseñanza y el aprendizaje. Este artículo intenta comparar esa política con la realidad de un pequeño número de profesores de idiomas extranjeros que se esfuerza por llevarla a cabo. La voz de cuatro profesores nos presenta como empoezaron a arraigar el uso de ICT (primeramente con la reciente adquisición de los Whiteboards Interactivos) como enfoque en sus clases actuales. La historia de su práctica en desarrollo está acompañada de indicios de cambios. Por eso la complejidad de una situación real se contrasta con un ideal más simplificado. Por medio de esta investigación, se exploran ejemplos de pensamiento pedagógico sofisticado para demostrar que quizás no sea tan fácil transformar el proceso de aprendizaje, con o sin ICT.