Preparing German pre-service teachers in special needs education for school development—Can we do otherwise?

Although school development can be viewed as an emerging responsibility of teachers, special needs education in Germany does not leave sufficient room for non-teaching tasks, leading to a knowledge gap in the professionalisation of pre-service teachers with regard to school development upon entering the profession. This study focused on the preparedness of pre-service teachers in school development as a professional task at the end of their initial teacher training. The respondents of the interview study are 12 pre-service teachers enrolled at master level in special educational needs at a German university. The findings of the study report on the marginal situatedness of school development in the curriculum, the associated understanding of pre-service teachers of school development and their low assessment of the relevance of school development within special needs education. The study closes with practical recommendations on how to tackle the low level of preparedness for school development tasks in German teacher education.     

Initial Efficacy of a Fraction-Vocabulary Intervention for Students Experiencing Mathematics Difficulty in Grade 4

This quasi-experimental study was designed to investigate the initial efficacy of a fraction-vocabulary intervention for Grade 4 students with mathematics difficulty (MD) and to explore its impact on relevant fraction competencies. Thirty-three students were assigned to either the intervention condition (n = 16) or a business-as-usual comparison condition (n = 17). The intervention occurred 3 sessions per week for 4 weeks, for a total of 11 sessions. Results indicated the main effect of the fraction-vocabulary intervention was significant for fraction-vocabulary posttest and one fraction competency—fraction arithmetic. That is, students with MD can successfully learn fraction vocabulary via a brief intervention, and improved fraction-vocabulary knowledge may positively affect their fraction competencies.     

Increasing teachers' use of communication-supporting strategies: findings from an exploratory study using the Communication Supporting Classroom Observation Tool (CSCOT) in primary schools in Brunei

The Communication Supporting Classroom Observation Tool (CSCOT) is used in the UK to identify how teachers support children's communication development. This study evaluates the feasibility and impact of collaborative training for teachers using the CSCOT, delivered by specialist teachers and a speech and language therapist. Classroom practice was observed twice using the CSCOT before the collaborative training (repeated baseline). Five teachers then received the collaborative training, informed by their baseline CSCOT results. The training consisted of detailed feedback, target setting and support from the school Special Educational Needs Assistant (SENA) over a period of 20 weeks. Five further teachers did not participate in this training but acted as a control group. The CSCOT observations were then repeated for all 10 classroom teachers. The total score of the CSCOT significantly increased for the five teachers who received training only. There was no increase during the repeated baseline phase, suggesting that the increase was due to the training. All five teachers who participated in training increased their use of their targeted communication-supporting strategies. The CSCOT can be used as part of collaborative training to increase teachers' use of communication-supporting strategies in primary schools in Brunei.     

Embodied Action Scaffolds Dialogic Reading

Educational Psychology Review - Might dialogic reading require previous or concurrent embodied activities to be effective? Twenty-nine preschool children, ages 3–5 years, were randomly...     

Is a picture always worth 1000 words? Website images of classrooms and perceptions of the institution

Learning Environments Research - When classroom facilities are out of date, students complain (Habaci et al., in Procedia Soc Behav Sci 64:58-64 2012, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2012.11.008...     

Margarita glasses and high heels: How attention to shape,age, and vocabulary impacts children's recognition of typical and atypical exemplars

Children's ability to recognize object shape is foundational for successful early word learning. However, the prototypical shape of objects may not be easily accessible—take margarita glasses, for instance. The current study examined 304 U.S. children 17- to 42-month-old (152 females) from 2017 to 2020, asking how shape, age, and vocabulary abilities predict recognition of everyday objects. Children's ability to recognize objects increases with age and vocabulary, replicating prior work. Moreover, performance was partially moderated by object's typicality and shape features, and children's own attention to shape (shape bias) may mediate the effect, especially with prototypically shaped objects. The current study highlights how both child-specific variables and context features interact to shape language abilities, underscoring the emergent and multi-causal nature of word learning.     

Improving the effectiveness of peer feedback for learning

The present study examined the effectiveness of (a) peer feedback for learning, more specifically of certain characteristics of the content and style of the provided feedback, and (b) a particular instructional intervention to support the use of the feedback. A quasi-experimental repeated measures design was adopted. Writing assignments of 43 students of Grade 7 in secondary education showed that receiving ‘justified’ comments in feedback improves performance, but this effect diminishes for students with better pretest performance. Justification was superior to the accuracy of comments. The instructional intervention of asking assessees to reflect upon feedback after peer assessment did not increase learning gains significantly.     

六招制胜就业前测试

Executive candidates often are surprised when asked to take a test or other assessments for a iob. They shouldn't be. Pre-employment testing is on the rise. In the past five years, 60% of companies have increased their use of workplace-behavior assessments,according to a survey of more than 500 human-resources professionals at U.S.companies from Spherion Corp., a staffing firm based in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.