Academic self-concepts in adolescence: Relations with achievement and ability grouping in schools

The effects of ability grouping in schools on students' self-concept were examined in a sample of 23 secondary schools with a range of structured ability groupings. Measures of general self-concept, academic self-concept, and achievement were collected from over 1600 students aged 14–15 years and again two years later. Students' academic self-concept, but not their general self-concept, was related to the extent of ability grouping in the school attended. Subject-specific facets of academic self-concept were not related to the number of years of ability grouping students had experienced in English, mathematics and science; however, they were related to students' position in the grouping hierarchy, with students in high-ability groups having significantly higher self-concepts in all three subjects than students in low-ability groups. Students' intentions to learn in future were more strongly affected by self-concept than by achievement.     

In Physics Education,Perception Matters

Student difficulties in science learning are frequently attributed to misconceptions about scientific concepts. We argue that domain‐general perceptual processes may also influence students' ability to learn and demonstrate mastery of difficult science concepts. Using the concept of center of gravity (CoG), we show how student difficulty in applying CoG to an object such as a baseball bat can be accounted for, at least in part, by general principles of perception (i.e., not exclusively physics‐based) that make perceiving the CoG of some objects more difficult than others. In particular, it is perceptually difficult to locate the CoG of objects with asymmetric‐extended properties. The basic perceptual features of objects must be taken into account when assessing students' classroom performance and developing effective science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) teaching methods.     

Explaining organizational knowledge creation with a knowledge maturing model

Social media challenge knowledge management because of encouraging conversations, networking and participation in more distributed, diverse and dynamic ways of knowledge development and increasingly important individuals’ interests driving them. Hence, we need to understand the complex relationships between different qualities of knowledge developed in informal and formal processes as well as for overcoming misalignments in routines, tools and infrastructures supporting organizational knowledge creation. This paper contributes a maturation perspective towards explaining organizational knowledge creation and presents a knowledge maturing model, which is grounded in organizational practice and validated with qualitative and quantitative empirical and design studies. The results describe how characteristics of knowledge and support by IT change between phases of knowledge maturing. Our findings confirm theories of organizational knowledge creation with respect to expanding scopes from individuals through communities to organizations moving from interest-driven knowledge exploration in informal contexts to goal-driven knowledge exploitation in formal contexts. The maturation perspective adds to our understanding that organizational knowledge creation is not simply a continuous process. Phases that emphasize changeability alternate with phases concerned with stability. Knowledge develops in contexts that need to switch multiple times between opening up for new knowledge and filtering relevant knowledge and between de- and re-contextualization.