Theoretical framework and empirical evidence of students' cognitive processes in three dimensions of content,complexity, and time

In the literature, learners' cognitive development is mainly discussed with respect to changes in learners' content‐dependent knowledge (conceptual change or growth). Additional dimensions of time and complexity may also be taken into account to describe cognitive processes in at least three dimensions. We discuss these three dimensions of content, complexity, and time theoretically and show empirically what results can be found with such a framework. The primary database consists of 27 students who worked in groups of three on physics tasks during three sessions in an experimental setting. All activities were videotaped and analyzed in great detail. Results indicate that students' meanings always refer to a narrow area of content, are developed bottom‐up with respect to complexity, and show time‐dependent dynamics in which maxima of 30 seconds and 5 minutes are important time scales. Comparison with outcomes of additional experimental settings on the same topic with more and less advanced students indicate the results to have a greater validity. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 40: 616–648, 2003     

Training Interventions to Foster Skill and Will of Argumentative Thinking

Argumentative thinking requires not only the skill to apply argumentative strategies such as supporting theories with evidence but also the will to apply these strategies by considering argumentative thinking to be both reasonable and worthwhile. Focusing on direct instruction for the initial acquisition of both skill and will, we developed a new short-term computer-based training intervention. We tested its effects on learning processes and learning outcomes in an experimental study with 147 German high school students. Our intervention fostered facets of both skill (i.e. a declarative knowledge about argumentation) and will (i.e., epistemic orientation, intellectual values, and epistemic knowledge). We gained additional insights into learning mechanisms, such as the mediating effects of the learners' self-explanation activities and the advantage of addressing will before skill.     

Same Same,but Different: Word and Sentence Reading in German and English

The current study compared eye fixation patterns during word and sentence processing in a consistent and an inconsistent alphabetic orthography. German and English children as well as adults matched on word reading ability read matched sentences while their eye fixation behavior was recorded. Results indicated that German children read in a more small-unit plodder-like style with more diligent first-pass reading and less rereading. In contrast, English children read in a more large-unit explorer-like style with a greater tendency to skip words, and more regressions. It is important that these cross-linguistic processing differences largely persisted in the adult readers. Orthographic consistency thus influences both local word recognition and global sentence processing in developing and skilled readers.     

Managing the Process of International Collaboration in Online Course Development: A Case-Example Involving Higher Education Institutions in Ireland,Switzerland, Austria,and the United Kingdom

There has been significant growth recently in online learning and joint programmes of education involving collaborative partnerships between and among higher education institutions in different jurisdictions. Utilising an interdisciplinary team model (Care and Scanlan 2001), we describe in this article the process of collaboration among four European institutions in Austria, Ireland, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom in order to develop and deliver an accredited online course on the management of work-related stress for health and social care workers. This course was also one of the first to pilot a system of equivalency between two European vocational and higher education credit schemes to promote learner mobility and recognition of a new international qualification. Although this process of collaboration occurred within a pan-European context, important lessons may be drawn from this explanation that are of potential interest to the wider international audience.     

The Relation between Teacher Specialization and Student Reading Achievement

This study investigates the relationship between teacher specialization and the reading achievement of fourth-grade students in Sweden. The empirical base is data from PIRLS 2011. The main method of analysis is a two-level regression. Results revealed a positive relationship between reading achievement and teacher education relevant for subject and grade level while there was no relationship between reading achievement and teaching experience. The relation between reading achievement and teacher specialization remained significant when the influence of parents’ educational levels and students’ early reading abilities were controlled for. A tendency of compensatory effects could be observed, with teacher specialization having a stronger effect in low-performing classrooms. The findings support the conclusion that relevant teacher education is of importance for teacher effectiveness.     

Das MeDoc-System – ein elektronischer Publikations- und Nachweisdienst für die Informatik

Zusammenfassung.   Ziele des MeDoc-Projektes waren die Konzeption, prototypische Entwicklung und Erprobung volltextbasierter Informations- und Publikationsdienste für die Informatik, um den Informationsaustausch und die Literaturversorgung in der Wissenschaft effektiver gestalten zu k?nnen. Dazu wurde im Rahmen des Projektes ein internet-basiertes System entwickelt, in dem Informatik & Fachinformation im Volltext gespeichert, recherchiert, abgerufen und gelesen werden kann und das die Suche nach Informatik-Literatur in heterogenen, verteilten Informationsquellen im Internet unterstützt. Das Informationsangebot ist dabei teilweise kostenpflichtig. In diesem Artikel werden Ziele, Funktionalit?t und Architektur des MeDoc-Systems beschrieben. Eingegangen am 19. Januar 1998 / Angenommen am 27. April 1998     

Genetic and environmental influences on early literacy

Prereading and early reading skills of preschool twin children in Australia, Scandinavia and the United States were explored in a genetically sensitive design (max. N=627 preschool pairs and 422 kindergarten pairs). Analyses indicated a strong genetic influence on preschool phonological awareness, rapid naming and verbal memory. Print awareness, vocabulary and grammar/morphology were subject primarily to shared environment effects. There were significant genetic and shared environment correlations among the preschool traits. Kindergarten reading, phonological awareness and rapid naming were primarily affected by genes, and spelling was equally affected by genes and shared environment. Multivariate analyses revealed genetic and environmental overlap and independence among kindergarten variables. Longitudinal analyses showed genetic continuity as well as change in phonological awareness and rapid naming across the 2 years. Relations among the preschool variables of print awareness, phonological awareness and rapid naming and kindergarten reading were also explored in longitudinal analyses. Educational implications are discussed.     

Rechtliche Parameter der interuniversitären Studienangebots-Entwicklung

Die durch das UG 2002 mit größerer Autonomie ausgestatteten Universitäten nützen diese auch zur Kooperation bei der Einrichtung von interuniversitären Studien. Die rechtlichen Rahmenbedingungen für diese sind jedoch nur rudimentär. Es ist nicht möglich, gemeinsame Organe (Curriculakommissionen, monokratische Organe) für derartige Studien einzurichten. Möglich ist nur, ein Organ zu schaffen, das durch Personalunionen für beide Universitäten entscheidet. Bei der Durchführung der Studien kommt den Studierenden ein Wahlrecht hinsichtlich der Universität der Zulassung zu. Bei prüfungsrelevanten Fragestellungen richtet sich die Zuständigkeitsverteilung zwischen den Universitäten nach dem Curriculum und den dort vorgesehenen Prüfungen. Dies führt dazu, dass zB Studierende in einem interuniversitären Studium je nach Prüfungsuniversität eine unterschiedliche Anzahl von Prüfungsantritten haben können.     

A Framework for Electronic Coordination in the Air Cargo Market

The increasing need for faster, cheaper, and better logistical service has brought forwarders, carriers, and related services such as customs, banks, and handling companies closer together. This suggests a need to adjust coordination mechanisms. Neoclassical theory considers market-oriented coordination superior to hierarchic if the necessary information and communication can be handled. Since these tasks can be taken over by software instead of human agents, basic requirements seem to be fulfilled. This article outlines how market orientation can be realized in the field of air freight by applying easily accessible communication infrastructures and by considering qualitative aspects in price-finding mechanisms.     

Neural Network Agents for Learning Semantic Text Classification

The research project AgNeT develops Agents for Neural Text routing in the internet. Unrestricted potentially faulty text messages arrive at a certain delivery point (e.g. email address or world wide web address). These text messages are scanned and then distributed to one of several expert agents according to a certain task criterium. Possible specific scenarios within this framework include the learning of the routing of publication titles or news titles. In this paper we describe extensive experiments for semantic text routing based on classified library titles and newswire titles. This task is challenging since incoming messages may contain constructions which have not been anticipated. Therefore, the contributions of this research are in learning and generalizing neural architectures for the robust interpretation of potentially noisy unrestricted messages. Neural networks were developed and examined for this topic since they support robustness and learning in noisy unrestricted real-world texts. We describe and compare different sets of experiments. The first set of experiments tests a recurrent neural network for the task of library title classification. Then we describe a larger more difficult newswire classification task from information retrieval. The comparison of the examined models demonstrates that techniques from information retrieval integrated into recurrent plausibility networks performed well even under noise and for different corpora.