Is student-centered pedagogy impossible in Hong Kong? The case of inquiry in classrooms

Hong Kong has been actively promoting a student-centered approach to teaching since the 1980s. Despite this effort, students in Hong Kong still tend to be traditional learners who rarely experience and gain from real student-centered learning. While teachers hold a “quantitative” concept of learning and focus on transmitting declarative knowledge to students (Biggs and Watkins, Classroom learning: Educational psychology for the Asian teacher, 1995), students generally practise “rote learning.” Constructive learning models such as inquiry remain little used by students in most Hong Kong classrooms. This article reports a study that examines the feasibility of implementing inquiry method in Kong Kong’s primary classrooms. It analyses the implementation and some outcomes of an inquiry-based project conducted in two local primary schools—a traditional elite Catholic school and a progressive, less-privileged school. Finally, it discusses the contextual factors as well as cultural issues on teachers’ perception and implementation of inquiry in teaching. These factors include the following: impacts of prevailing ideology in the community of Hong Kong, and the top-down policy-making and management by the government.

Single-sex school boys’ perceptions of coeducational classroom learning environments

Reviews in many countries have found little evidence of consistent advantages in either single-sex education or coeducation. Over the last three decades, coeducation has been introduced into many single-sex schools, but there is a dearth of evidence from the student perspective of the impact of such changes on the classroom learning environment. The Individualised Classroom Environment Questionnaire (ICEQ) was administered to 309 elementary and secondary boys from a single-sex school over 3 years prior to (T1), during (T2) and after (T3) the introduction of coeducation. Overall, boys perceived coeducational classrooms to be significantly more Personalised at T2, particularly at the secondary level, while Personalisation increased significantly from T2 to T3 at the elementary level. No significant changes were evident for the Participation, Independence, Investigation and Differentiation scales at either T2 or T3. These findings have implications for the ongoing single-sex/coeducation debate.     

Social-emotional effects of early childhood education programs in Tulsa

This article assesses the effects of Tulsa, Oklahoma's early childhood education programs on social-emotional outcomes, examining teacher ratings of children's behavior from the Adjustment Scales for Preschool Intervention and a measure of attentiveness using fixed effects regressions with propensity score matching. The sample includes 2,832 kindergarten students in 2006, of whom 1,318 participated in the Tulsa Public Schools (TPS) pre-K program and 363 participated in the CAP of Tulsa County Head Start program the previous year. Program participation was associated with lower timidity and higher attentiveness for TPS pre-K alumni and a marginally significant reduction in timidity for Head Start alumni. Results were similar for the free lunch-eligible subsample. We conclude that high-quality, school-based preschool programs can enhance social-emotional development.     

Individual differences in children's risk perception and appraisals in outdoor play environments

Child characteristics including age, gender, risk-taking behaviour and sensation seeking are thought to influence children's ability to appraise risks. The present study investigated children's risk perceptions and appraisals in the context of common outdoor physical play activities. Risk perceptions and appraisal of four- and five-year olds were assessed using a pictorial risk appraisal measure and through individual semi-structured interviews examining children's decision-making. Sensation seeking and risk-taking behaviour were assessed using self- and parent-report measures. Results revealed that the children were able to identify injury risk behaviours however differentiating the severity of the potential injury was less accurate. Furthermore, the children appeared to use these judgements in their play to inform their behaviour whilst using playground equipment. Whilst they actively sought out those activities that offered challenge and excitement, they were aware of their abilities and showed caution in engaging in activities that were beyond their current capabilities. The results have implications for the provision of calculated risk-taking in outdoor play and for adult responses to the risk-taking behaviour of children.     

Re-engaging disengaged pupils in physical education: an appreciative inquiry perspective

Many children and young people enjoy physical education (PE), yet many do not, and subsequently become disengaged from PE. Previous research that has explored pupil disengagement from PE has focused on what teachers should do to re-engage their pupils, or has encouraged dis-engaged pupils to create a curriculum that they perceive to be socially and culturally relevant. While this research is extremely important, it does not highlight enough what teachers bring to the teaching and learning process. An alternative approach to understanding (dis)engagement in PE is to start by asking both teachers and pupils: what is currently working, why is it working, and what could be in the future? This ‘appreciative inquiry’ (AI) approach is underpinned by the belief that everyone and everything has strengths that can be developed, and that those strengths should be the starting point for change. Consequently, in establishing the use of AI as an important means of understanding and potentially enhancing PE pedagogy, this research sought to understand the successful teaching strategies developed by PE teachers to re-engage disengaged pupils. Importantly, in recognising the value of understanding pupil experiences we also explored and shared the success stories of the ‘re-engaged’ pupils. Finally, in extending the research in this area, we examined the impact that teacher engagement in the AI process had on their professional learning. As the teachers engaged in the AI process, they discussed, listened to (each other and their pupils), reflected and shared their success stories. This, in turn, appears to have encouraged them to re-articulate and re-enact their practice and learning within the context of a more positive future. They designed (and in some cases, co-design with their pupils) meaningful and empowering PE programmes for their ‘disengaged’ pupils and have subsequently made a commitment to future professional learning and inquiry.     

Risks, rules, and roles

Summary Based on ten years of fieldwork with a focus on macro-micro linkages from organizational ethos and structure to language behavior and roleplaying, this report centers on institutional changes that affect cognitive, social, and linguistic development of youth. Argued here is the resilience of those young people who find their way to youth-based (as distinct from youth-serving) organizations during their out-of-school lives. These organizations provide an institutional force to fill the voids left by intergenerational communication and nurturance breakdowns and an absence of meaningful work for youth in community and family life. Part 1 gives an overview of areas of interaction, work, and support that institutions fail to give in post-industrial societies and sets up the framework to view the fact that some youth create an institutional force through youth-based organizations that take over key socialization roles. Here crossage peers become their own agents to create an ecology of learning significantly different from customary agents of transmissive socialization. Part 2 answers the questions of what happens in this ecology of learning, and how learning works in youth-based organizations that place high emphasis on the real work of production and performance. Within these organizations that offer a type of liminal zone between childhood and full entry into adult life, youth take risks, play roles, and set their own rules in order to achieve a group goal of excellence in performance. Part 3 looks at language use within these organizations and addresses the means by which youth-based organizations remain dynamic and responsive to the rapidly changing dimensions of youth needs. Part 4 sets out certain changes necessary in the thinking of adults about models of socialization and their role in helping to make possible learning ecologies young people will see as effective. Part 5 pulls together the macro and micro dimensions of the findings to highlight the importance of research on the ways that rules, roles, and risks play within the work of learning.

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Zusammenfassung Risiken, Regeln und Rollen. Jugendperspektiven zur Lernarbeit in der Gemeindeentwicklung Basierend auf zehn Jahren Feldforslchung mit dem Fokus auf den Makro-Mikro-Zusammenh?ngen zwischen organisationaler Struktur und dazugeh?rigem Ethos einerseits und Sprachverhalten und Rollenspiel andererseits konzentriert sich dieser Beitrag auf den institutionellen Wandel, der sich auf die kognitive, soziale und sprachliche Entwicklung der Jugend auswirkt. Auff?llig ist die Selbstbehauptungskraft derjenigen Jugendlichen, die in ihrer au?erschulischen Freizeit den Weg zu jugendzentrierten Einrichtungen finden. Diese Organisationen vermitteln eine institutionelle Macht, die die Leere der intergenerationellen Kommunikation, der Bildungsabbrüche und der fehlenden Aufgaben für Jugendliche im Familien- und Gemeindeleben füllt. Abschnitt 1 gibt zum einen einen überblick über Interaktionsbereiche, die Arbeit und Unterstützung, die Institutionen der postindustriellen Gesellschaft nicht geben, und zeigt dann auf, welche institutionelle Kraft manche Jugendliche durch Engagement in jugendzentrierten Initiativen entwickeln, denen Schlüsselfunktionen in ihrer Sozialisation zukommen. Hier werden altersgemischte Peergruppen ihre eigenen Interessenvertreter, um eigene Lernumgebungen zu schaffen, die sich signifikant von den herk?mmlichen, auf Stoffvermittlung bestehenden Ans?tzen unterscheiden. Teil 2 beantwortet die Fragen, was in diesen Lernumwelten geschieht und welch wichtigen Platz Lernen in diesen jugendzentrierten Einrichtungen mit ihrer deutlichen Betonung von ernsthafter produktorientierter Arbeit und Darstellung einnehmen. In diesen Projekten mit ihrem Angebot für den Zeitraum zwischen Kindheit und vollst?ndigem Eintritt in das Erwachsenenleben akzeptieren Jugendliche Risiken, spielen Rollen und setzen sich Regeln, um hervorragende Gruppenergebnisse, z. B. bei einer Theateraufführung, zu erreichen. Abschnitt 3 betrachtet die Sprache, die in diesen Organisationen benutzt wird, und benennt die Mittel, mit deren Hilfe jugendzentrierte Einrichtungen dynamisch bleiben und auf die raschen Wechsel der jugendlichen Bedürfnisse antworten. Teil 4 beschreibt einige notwendige ?nderungen im Denken der Erwachsenen hinsichtlich der Sozialisationsmodelle und beschreibt ihre Rolle für die effektive Gestaltung von Lernumgebungen für junge Menschen. Im fünften Abschnitt werden Forschungsergebnisse der Makro- und Mikroebene zusammengefasst, um die Wichtigkeit der Forschung zu unterstreichen, die darüber aufkl?rt, welche Rolle Regeln, Rollen und Risiken in der Lernarbeit spielen.

     

Explicating factual and subjective science knowledge: knowledge as a mediator of news attention and attitudes

Communication scholars have conflicting views on the relationship between exposure to science news and knowledge, and its subsequent influence on attitudes. Such mixed sentiments could arise from the vague definition of knowledge. Therefore, this paper explicates science knowledge into factual knowledge and subjective knowledge. It also compares the mediating roles of both types of knowledge between news attention and public support for science and technology (S&T). A survey of 967 Singaporeans showed that news attention was positively related to both factual and subjective knowledge. The findings revealed a stronger relationship between subjective knowledge and news attention than factual knowledge and news attention. Additionally, factual knowledge was positively related to public support for S&T, but subjective knowledge was negatively related to public support for S&T. The contrasting directions of these associations demonstrate that factual and subjective knowledge are two distinct dimensions of knowledge. Practically, the findings can inform policymakers and communication practitioners about effective public education and engagement initiatives. This study also provided guidelines for newsmakers in news reporting about S&T.