Enhancing orthographic knowledge helps spelling production in eight-year-old Chinese children at risk for dyslexia

We investigated the effects of enhancing orthographic knowledge on the spelling of Chinese characters and words in 131 eight-year-old Chinese children at risk for dyslexia. The traditional approach (37 children) emphasizing memory and repeated writing was the control condition. The analytic and synthetic approach (ASA, 33 children) stressed insight into character structure. The integrated analytic and synthetic approach added to ASA self-correction and metacognitive activities (INA, 61 children). The children were first asked to write down as many words as possible associated with pictures of home, school, and community; the correctly written words formed the baseline information. The children were then instructed by their classroom teachers in six especially designed short texts and assessed in eight measurable bujian or radical tasks subserving three constructs: morpheme completion, bujian analysis and synthesis and bujian compounding. Multivariate analyses of variance showed that the children in the INA condition outperformed those in the other conditions in three of the measurable bujian tasks. A confirmatory factor analysis verified the stability of the eight tasks and their clustering into three constructs. From these results, we tentatively propose a “bujian sensitivity hypothesis” as a means of helping young Chinese children at risk for spelling disorders.     

Identifying affective domains that correlate and predict mathematics performance in high-performing students in Singapore

Past studies have shown that distinct yet highly correlated sub-constructs of three broad mathematics affective variables: (a) motivation, (b) attitudes and (c) anxiety, have varying degree of correlation with mathematics achievement. The sub-constructs of these three affective constructs are as follows: (a) (i) amotivation, (ii) external regulation, (iii) introjection, (iv) identification, (v) intrinsic motivation; (b) (i) enjoyment of mathematics, (ii) self-confidence in mathematics, (iii) perceived value of mathematics; (c) (i) anxiety with mathematics and (ii) ease with mathematics. This study identifies, both within and across these three affective variables, the key sub-constructs that educators should focus upon when selecting learning process variables for mathematics achievement. Results were analysed using a series of stepwise regression analyses using data from 1018 Grade 12 students enrolled in a top pre-tertiary institution in Singapore, both for concurrent and predictive relationships, and also for both genders. Results of this study showed that after taking into account self-confidence in mathematics and ease with mathematics, all other sub-constructs of mathematics motivation, attitudes and anxiety were not significantly correlated with mathematics achievement. This is true for both concurrent and predictive relationships, and for both genders. Implications of the results of this study are twofold. First, results of this study provide educators with priority affective variables to focus upon in their efforts to enhance performance in mathematics via the affective domain. Second, in situations where administration time is limited, it may be possible to consider only self-confidence and ease with mathematics when investigating relationships between affect and mathematics achievement.     

Globalisation and localisation enmeshed—towards a framework for the development of guidance curriculum in Hong Kong

Hong Kong’s 150 years of colonisation by the British is a classic example of how globalisation comes into direct contact with a local Chinese culture and creates cultural hybridities. The paper presents a framework for developing a hybrid guidance curriculum, drawing together western traditions of developmental contextualism in guidance and Chinese traditions of Confucian humanism in moral education. The core of the framework is a hybrid self, integrating the individualist and the embedded self. The paper highlights the importance of culture and context in considering school guidance and the ‘fluid’ and dynamic nature of ‘glocalisation’ working towards integration.     

The Use of Immersive Virtual Reality in the Learning Sciences: Digital Transformations of Teachers,Students, and Social Context

This article illustrates the utility of using virtual environments to transform social interaction via behavior and context, with the goal of improving learning in digital environments. We first describe the technology and theories behind virtual environments and then report data from 4 empirical studies. In Experiment 1, we demonstrated that teachers with augmented social perception (i.e., receiving visual warnings alerting them to students not receiving enough teacher eye gaze) were able to spread their attention more equally among students than teachers without augmented perception. In Experiments 2 and 3, we demonstrated that by breaking the rules of spatial proximity that exist in physical space, students can learn more by being in the center of the teacher's field of view (compared to the periphery) and by being closer to the teacher (compared to farther away). In Experiment 4, we demonstrated that inserting virtual co-learners who were either model students or distracting students changed the learning abilities of experiment participants who conformed to the virtual co-learners. Results suggest that virtual environments will have a unique ability to alter the social dynamics of learning environments via transformed social interaction.     

‘We spend more time with the children than they do …’: education,care and the work of foreign domestic workers in Hong Kong

Despite the ongoing global financial crisis, there is an increasing deployment of migrant workers across the globe, and in Hong Kong the foreign domestic worker occupies a ubiquitous presence in the lives of many families. Seven domestic workers from Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand were interviewed to gain insight into their role in providing education and care for children in Hong Kong. This exploratory study focuses on the educational and care aspects of the work of foreign domestic workers. It considers the nature of their work and their relationship with the mother of the family. Findings reveal the difficulties of maintaining coordinated education and care of children in a culture where the dynamics of the unequal power relations are clearly demarcated. We raise new possibilities for interdisciplinary work to re-theorise the ways in which foreign domestic workers act as educators of young children and we call for new methodologies to enable their potential.     

Perpetual development journalism? Balance and framing in the 2006 Singapore election coverage

This study sought to determine if Singapore's press model has evolved beyond the development model to take on characteristics of other press models. It examined balance and framing in election coverage in the Straits Times, Singapore's dominant English newspaper, over 16 days before the 2006 Singapore General Election. As expected under the development model, and contrary to expectations under the social responsibility model, we found coverage of the competing parties lacked balance, as indicated by more coverage with a more favorable tone for the ruling People's Action Party. In framing, we found game frames predominated over issue frames, as predicted by media intrusion theory, in which commercial media favor competitive aspects of campaigns as a result of following commercial journalistic values. This finding contradicts the expectation that development journalism would likely have more issue frames, since it emphasizes issues and policies, and suggests that some commercial journalistic imperatives outweigh development model imperatives in the Singapore press.     

Exploring the use of online space in an elementary school

This paper analysed how three teacher-researchers of Singapore’s elementary school used online space extensively in Grade 2–Grade 4 classrooms. Such online space, made possible by free and readily available web 2.0 and open source applications, was meant to complement the physical learning space as such space can allow learning activities, which were otherwise not possible in the typical classroom setting, to be carried out. The results revealed that students have positive learning experience but the learning impact was small. Despite such unfaltering results, the teacher-researchers were not daunted due to their strong conviction that technology is vital in their students’ learning.     

Exploring foreign undergraduate students’ experiences of university

Although international students are an important source of income to universities in the UK, the emotional impact of their experiences may be ignored and unacknowledged. This study explored the personal experiences of international students studying for an undergraduate degree in the UK. Semi-structured interviews with five participants were analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis, which aimed to capture the personal perceptions of these participants. Two analytical themes are presented: “adaptation and identity”, which reflects the difficulties in acculturation, adaptation and development of identity in a foreign country; and “us and them”, which pays close attention to the perception of disconnectedness, unfairness and exclusion encountered in trying to integrate into a different way of life. Findings are discussed in relation to the impact that participants’ experiences have had on their self-worth, confidence and ability to engage with domestic individuals.     

Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Test of Gross Motor Development-2

The purpose of this study was to examine the underlying structure of the second edition of the Test of Gross Motor Development-2 (Ulrich, 2000 Ulrich, D. A. 2000. Test of gross motor development: Examiner's manual, 2nd, Austin, TX: Pro-.  [Google Scholar]) as applied to Chinese children. The Test of Gross Motor Development-2 was administered to 626 Hong Kong Chinese children. The outlier test with standard scoring was utilized. After data screening, a total of 614 cases (N = 614) were used for further analysis. The two-factor structure of the Test of Gross Motor Development-2 was tested using confirmatory factor analysis with maximum likelihood estimation to compute parameter estimates and to select the appropriate item for each factor. The goodness-of-fit indices supported that the model was tenable (goodness-of-fit index = .95, root mean square error of approximation = .06, standardized root mean square residual = .04, comparative-fit index = .97). The findings of this study suggested that the two-factor structure proposed by Ulrich (2000 Ulrich, D. A. 2000. Test of gross motor development: Examiner's manual, 2nd, Austin, TX: Pro-.  [Google Scholar]) fit the data of Hong Kong Chinese children.     

Investigating the effectiveness of three-dimensionally printed anatomical models compared with plastinated human specimens in learning cardiac and neck anatomy: A randomized crossover study

Three-dimensional printing (3DP) technology has been increasingly applied in health profession education. Yet, 3DP anatomical models compared with the plastinated specimens as learning scaffolds are unclear. A randomized-controlled crossover study was used to evaluate the objective outcomes of 3DP models compared with the plastinated specimens through an introductory lecture and team study for learning relatively simple (cardiac) and complex (neck) anatomies. Given the novel multimaterial and multicolored 3DP models are replicas of the plastinated specimens, it is hypothesized that 3DP models have the same educational benefits to plastinated specimens. This study was conducted in two phases in which participants were randomly assigned to 3DP (n = 31) and plastinated cardiac groups (n = 32) in the first phase, whereas same groups (3DP, n = 15; plastinated, n = 18) used switched materials in the second phase for learning neck anatomy. The pretest, educational activities and posttest were conducted for each phase. Miller's framework was used to assess the cognitive outcomes. There was a significant improvement in students' baseline knowledge by 29.7% and 31.3% for Phase 1; 31.7% and 31.3% for Phase 2 plastinated and 3DP models. Posttest scores for cardiac (plastinated, 3DP mean ± SD: 57.0 ± 13.3 and 60.8 ± 13.6, P = 0.27) and neck (70.3 ± 15.6 and 68.3 ± 9.9, P = 0.68) phases showed no significant difference. In addition, no difference observed when cognitive domains compared for both cases. These results reflect that introductory lecture plus either the plastinated or 3DP modes were effective for learning cardiac and neck anatomy.