‘I make sure I am safe and I make sure I have myself in every way possible’: African-American youth perspectives on sexuality education

High rates of pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections play a major role in the physical, mental, and emotional health of young people. Despite efforts to provide sexuality education through diverse channels, we know little about the ways in which young people perceive school- and community-based efforts to educate them about sexual health. Forty-eight African-American young people participated in six focus groups to discuss their sexuality education experiences. Three major themes emerged that highlight experiences and perspectives on optimal strategies for promoting sexual health. These themes were: (1) experiences with school-based sexuality education (SBSE), (2) seeking information outside of schools, and (3) general principles of youth-centred sexuality education. Young people in the focus groups expressed their varying satisfaction with SBSE due to the restricted content covered and lack of comfort with the instruction methods. Participants described how they reached outside of SBSE for sexuality education, turning to those in the community, including local organisations, health care providers, and peers, also expressing variability in satisfaction with these sources. Finally, participants identified three important principles for youth-centred sexuality education: trust and confidentiality, credibility, and self-determination. These findings give voice to the often-unheard perspectives of African-American young people. Based on their responses, it is possible to gain a better understanding of the optimal combination of school-, family-, peer-, and community-based efforts to support young people as they move towards adulthood.     

A novel method for the performance of isometric exercise in the home

There is a paucity of research on devices suitable for home-based isometric exercise. Our aim was to compare cardiovascular responses to isometric exercise using novel and established methods. Ten individuals (age 34.0?±?8.5 years, mass 68.2?±?10.4?kg, height 1.72?±?0.09?m; mean?±?s) performed three different isometric exercise protocols with 48?h between each. Each protocol involved four repeated exercise bouts of 2?min at 30% maximum voluntary contraction force using alternate legs (transducer), alternate arms (transducer), or alternate arms (novel device). Systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, mean arterial blood pressure and heart rate were measured every 30?s. The highest (peak) values during each 2?min bout of exercise were recorded (peak systolic blood pressure, peak diastolic blood pressure, peak mean arterial blood pressure and peak heart rate). At the end of each 2?min exercise bout, the participants rated their perceived discomfort using Borg's CR-10 scale. There was a statistically significant difference in peak systolic blood pressure between isometric arm flexion using the force transducer and the novel device [158.1?±?10.8 vs. 149.1?±?13.9?mmHg (mean?±?s); P = 0.02]. Further analysis showed that peak systolic blood pressure was on average 9?mmHg higher using the force transducer with limits of agreement of –?15.97 to 33.97?mmHg. Analysis of the peak diastolic blood pressure, peak mean arterial blood pressure, peak heart rate and CR-10 data revealed no statistically significant differences between the three protocols. These results suggest that this novel, home-based method elicited similar cardiovascular responses during isometric exercise to those of established laboratory-based methods. However, the lower peak systolic blood pressure using the modified scales warrants further investigation before this method is used widely in the home.     

Let’s Draw a Picture

In an undergraduate analysis course taught by one of the authors, three prompts are regularly given: (i) What do we know? (ii) What do we need to show? (iii) Let’s draw a picture. We focus on the third prompt and its role in helping students develop their confidence in learning how to construct proofs. Specific examples of visual models and their impact on student work are presented.     

Selection of Technical Communication Concepts for Integration into an Accounting Information Systems Course: A WAC Case Study

A project in writing-across-the curriculum was launched within a nationally ranked baccalaureate degree program in accountancy at a Boston area college. The project team, which comprised faculty from accountancy and technical communication, attempted to integrate technical communication skills, principally writing, into an accounting information systems course. To improve student writing in this way, the team had to determine what kinds of writing activities would successfully introduce accounting students to the discourse of their profession, and had to select, from all the communication skills that might be taught, only those that should be taught to complement the specialized content of the accounting information systems course. The team's collaborative process produced three critical planning decisions that greatly simplified the integration: 1) establishing Joseph Juran's TQM notion of fitness-for-use for evaluating the quality of student communications; 2) selecting only those forms of communication used in the profession's discourse community in assignments; and 3) teaching only those communication skills that support and enrich the principal technical skills taught in the accounting course. This strategy demonstrates that communication skills can be integrated within a technical course so as to enhance the students' understanding of technical content while improving the students' proficiency in written communication.     

The missing disciplinary substance of formative assessment

We raise concerns about the current state of research and development in formative assessment, specifically to argue that in its concentration on strategies for the teacher, the literature overlooks the disciplinary substance of what teachers and students assess. Our argument requires analysis of specific instances in the literature, and so we have selected four prominent publications for consideration as examples. These, we show, pay little attention to the student reasoning they depict, presume traditional notions of “content” as correct information, and treat assessment as distinct from other activities of learning and teaching, even when they claim the contrary. We then offer an alternative image of formative assessment centered on attention to disciplinary substance, which we illustrate with an example from a high school biology class. Assessment, we contend, should be understood and presented as genuine engagement with ideas, continuous with the disciplinary practices science teaching should be working to cultivate. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 48: 1109–1136, 2011     

Uncovering Multivariate Structure in Classroom Observations in the Presence of Rater Errors

We examine the factor structure of scores from the CLASS‐S protocol obtained from observations of middle school classroom teaching. Factor analysis has been used to support both interpretations of scores from classroom observation protocols, like CLASS‐S, and the theories about teaching that underlie them. However, classroom observations contain multiple sources of error, most predominantly rater errors. We demonstrate that errors in scores made by two raters on the same lesson have a factor structure that is distinct from the factor structure at the teacher level. Consequently, the “standard” approach of analyzing on teacher‐level average dimension scores can yield incorrect inferences about the factor structure at the teacher level and possibly misleading evidence about the validity of scores and theories of teaching. We consider alternative hierarchical estimation approaches designed to prevent the contamination of estimated teacher‐level factors. These alternative approaches find a teacher‐level factor structure for CLASS‐S that consists of strongly correlated support and classroom management factors. Our results have implications for future studies using factor analysis on classroom observation data to develop validity evidence and test theories of teaching and for practitioners who rely on the results of such studies to support their use and interpretation of the classroom observation scores.