我在中国的精彩生活

我和Eric都是在上海中学国际部读书的外国学生。我叫Samantha Ciccone,是美国人，Enic有一半的中国血统。我们都是十七岁，但Eric来中国的时间远比我长，所以他的中文非常地道。     

Undergraduate students’ achievement goals for conducting research: examining the motivational benefits of laboratory classroom affiliation

Rooted in achievement goal theory, the buffering hypothesis posits that contextual factors serve to moderate the deleterious effects of personal achievement goals on relevant outcomes. The present study sought to test this hypothesis by examining the interactive effects of classroom affiliation perceptions and personal achievement goals for conducting research on participants’ goal strivings within physics, biology and chemistry laboratory classes. Participants consisted of 185 undergraduate students voluntarily engaged in faculty-led research. Results indicated that affiliation strengthened the positive association between research mastery goals and class-based mastery approach goals. In contrast, perceptions of affiliation in the laboratory environment weakened the relationship between research mastery goals and performance approach goals. The importance of academic climates as facilitators of goal striving in classrooms designed to cultivate research skill development is discussed.     

Let the Questions Be Your Guide: MBE as Interdisciplinary Science

From its inception, the field of Mind, Brain, and Education (MBE) has been conceived as an interdisciplinary science, and with good reason: The phenomena the field aims to understand often arise from interactions among multiple factors, span levels of analysis, and are context dependent. In this article, we argue that to reach its potential as an interdisciplinary science—and in order to explain such complex phenomena—MBE must be fundamentally organized around meaningful, discipline‐spanning questions, and the questions must determine tools and research methods (not the other way around). Using examples from three central questions in MBE—“who,”“when,” and “how”—we highlight the limits of single disciplines, and the value of a question‐driven interdisciplinary approach in MBE, with respect to questions that can be asked, the perspectives that can be considered, and the array of methods, tools, and models that can be made available. We believe that the future is bright for MBE, and that the field has a unique opportunity to provide meaningful answers to some of the most difficult questions in education today. However, realizing this potential depends on, as a first step, allowing the questions themselves to drive the field's work moving forward.     

Number Knowledge and Young Children’s Ability to Measure Length

Research Findings: In this research we explore the relationship between young children’s number knowledge and their measurement of length. First, we examined 4- to 5-year-olds’ (kindergartners’) understanding of and preference for using standard or nonstandard units to measure length. Second, we investigated whether the following tasks were related to children’s understanding of using standard (i.e., rulers) and nonstandard (i.e., blocks) units to measure length: (a) counting and written number identification knowledge, (b) symbolic or nonsymbolic number magnitude comparison ability, and (c) approximate number line estimation ability. Third, we examined whether understanding these number tasks predicted understanding how to measure length for both standard and nonstandard units. Our results show that young children prefer to use standard units of measurement when given a choice, and some of these children use a ruler correctly. Our results also show an important relationship between children’s understandings of numbers and measurement. Practice or Policy: Given children’s preference for rulers, introducing both nonstandard and standard units in early learning settings concurrently rather than consecutively is recommended for practice.     

Metrics and outcomes of conservation education: a quarter century of lessons learned

We conducted a systematic literature review to analyze evaluations of conservation education programs on a global scale in order to better understand (1) temporal and spatial trends in conservation education program evaluations over the last 25 years, (2) patterns in the types of conservation-related issues addressed through these programs, (3) metrics that indicate effectiveness of conservation education programs, and (4) methods and timeframes used to draw conclusions about program outcomes. Findings indicated that there is a need to better connect the types of issues addressed through conservation education programs with metrics that would indicate success in addressing these issues and the actual outcomes measured and reported. As well, there is an opportunity to employ a variety of metrics and methods for evaluating program outcomes, particularly in developing countries, by focusing on cognitive and behavioral components as well as social and ecological ones. Finally, shifting to a more comprehensive strategy for evaluating multiple outcomes in different cultural contexts would provide opportunities for utilizing mixed methods and qualitative approaches in partnership with community stakeholders.     

Social functioning among college students diagnosed with ADHD and the mediating role of emotion regulation

Despite the many studies that have documented the association between symptoms of ADHD and social difficulties in children and adolescents, few have examined this phenomenon in college students. In addition, the underlying factors contributing to such social difficulties are still poorly understood. We hypothesised that college students with symptoms of ADHD, namely inattention and hyperactivity/impulsivity, would continue to display social behavioural difficulties, and that emotion regulation would play a mediating role in that relationship. Ninety-nine 17–24-year-old college students filled out three questionnaires to assess Inattentive and Hyperactivity/Impulsivity Symptoms, Social Skills, and Emotion Regulation abilities. Analysis revealed that emotion regulation is a significant mediator between Inattentive Symptoms and Social Skills for female students. There was no significant correlation between ADHD symptoms and Social Skills for males. Female college students report social functioning difficulties associated with their inattentive and hyperactive symptoms, and impaired emotion regulation abilities mediate this relationship for inattentive symptoms only.     

Within-session changes in responding during delayed matching-to-sample and discrimination procedures

Two experiments examined within-session changes in responding during discrimination procedures. In Experiment 1, rate of responding changed significantly within sessions during symbolic delayed matching-to-sample tasks when the delay between the stimulus and the choice period was short (1–5 sec), but not when it was long (8–12 sec). The percentage of responses that were correct did not change within sessions. In Experiment 2, response rates increased and then decreased within sessions during both S1 and S2 when successive discrimination procedures provided high, but not low, rates of reinforcement. Discrimination ratios sometimes increased within sessions. These results question two potential definitions of attention as explanations for within-session changes in response rates. They are more compatible with explanations based on concepts such as arousal, satiation, habituation, and interfering responses.     

Seeing the wood for the trees: learning to teach beyond the curriculum. How can student teachers be helped to see beyond the National Literacy Strategy?

‘With the NLS—they can see how everything is important if we want our English to be good and it's helped me to see it that way too. Before, we just used to see it all separately. This way is much better' (Rebecca Graham, Year 4 English specialist after Final Block Placement). This quote was collected in the final stage of a study involving student teachers, four years after the National Literacy Strategy (NLS) was implemented. In this article I argue that this data shows it is possible (but by no means guaranteed) for student teachers to learn to use the NLS framework in a flexible, responsive, child‐centred way that links to a broader and deeper understanding of English. The quote contrasts with data taken in earlier stages of the study (and published in this journal: Twiselton, 2000 Twiselton, S. 2000. Seeing the wood for the trees: the national literacy strategy and initial teacher education; pedagogical content knowledge and the structure of subjects,. Cambridge Journal of Education, 30(3): 391–403. [Taylor & Francis Online] [Google Scholar]), which suggested that the NLS appeared to have led student teachers to a very restricted view of English. I argued earlier that it was possible that this might be a temporary ‘stalling’ to be compensated at a later time. In this article I review and explore the later data and argue for the importance of helping student teachers to develop broad and deep frameworks of understanding to underpin their knowledge of the curriculum.