Why Students Answer TIMSS Science Test Items the Way They Do

The purpose of this study was to explore how Year 8 students answered Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) questions and whether the test questions represented the scientific understanding of these students. One hundred and seventy-seven students were tested using written test questions taken from the science test used in the Third International Mathematics and Science Study. The degree to which a sample of 38 children represented their understanding of the topics in a written test compared to the level of understanding that could be elicited by an interview is presented in this paper. In exploring student responses in the interview situation this study hoped to gain some insight into the science knowledge that students held and whether or not the test items had been able to elicit this knowledge successfully. We question the usefulness and quality of data from large-scale summative assessments on their own to represent student scientific understanding and conclude that large scale written test items, such as TIMSS, on their own are not a valid way of exploring students' understanding of scientific concepts. Considerable caution is therefore needed in exploiting the outcomes of international achievement testing when considering educational policy changes or using TIMSS data on their own to represent student understanding.     

The Sun Sets on Old England: Contradictions in Conservative Educational Policy

ABSTRACT

The article describes the increasing discrepancy between the curriculum policies of the Conservative government and the policy directions argued for by business organisations and other advocates of a human capital perspective in education. It traces some of the origins of the current Conservative preference for cultural rather than economic goals in this area of policy, and suggests a new understanding of the relationship between neoconservative and neoliberal thinking on the educational right. It argues that a return to ideas and practices developed in the late twentieth century offers a basis for curriculum policy more productive than either human capital theory or Conservative traditionalism.     

The Principle of Mutual Exclusivity in Word Learning: To Honor or Not to Honor?

According to Markman and Wachtel, children assume that nouns pick out mutually exclusive object categories, and so each object should have only one category label. While this assumption can be useful in word learning, it is not entirely reliable. Therefore, children need to learn when to and when not to make this assumption. 6 studies examined whether knowledge about hierarchical organization of categories and about cross-language equivalents for object labels can help children limit their use of this assumption appropriately. These studies revealed that adults as well as children resisted assigning 2 novel names to the same object in some situations. By age 4, children also seemed to know enough about categorization to accept 2 names for an object if the names picked out categories from different levels of a hierarchy (e.g., animal and lemur) but not if they picked out categories from the same level (e.g., lemur and seal). Moreover, monolingual as well as bilingual children seemed to know enough about languages to accept 2 names for the same object if the names clearly came from different languages. Together, these findings suggest that even preschool children can make use of knowledge about language and categorization to fine tune the mutual exclusivity assumption in order to use it effectively in word learning.     

UNDP and educational development: An institutional policy analysis

The role of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in shaping educational development has been considerable. For more than half a century, the scale and reach of UNDP education projects have been significant, yet have not been adequately researched. For both UNDP and its precursors, the evolution of policies for development and for educational development is traced. UNDP's project priorities in education are considered, as is the role of UNESCO as a key implementing agency for UNDP. The rationale underlying UNDP's recent abandonment of education as a designated priority sector is also examined, as are its implications.     

创新与合作：来自开放大学的观点

该认为英国开放大学的新型学习模式主要体现在对开放学习提供的支持服务及先进的办学理念上。规模化教学传送、新技术的应用和对学生的支持服务是英国开放大学的三个优势领域，同时在课程和教学方面也面临新的挑战。作最后提出了国际远程教育合作的具体建议。     

Overcoming barriers to using precision teaching with a web-based programme

Precision Teaching (PT) is an evidence-based intervention, which research indicates is frequently not implemented following training, with few teachers using it in schools after training events. The web-based programme in this research focuses on word-level reading skills and targets blending and segmenting skills rather than whole word reading. This research, undertaken with 10 schools, explored whether a web-based PT programme would provide favourable implementation rates, and support the fidelity of the programme delivery. The study also measured the impact of the PT programme on word decoding and sight word reading using the Test of Word Reading Efficiency. Results suggest favourable implementation rates with 7 of the 10 schools implementing the programme. Full impact data for 34 children suggest that the programme has a positive impact on decoding (effect size 0.7) and sight word reading skills (effect size 0.6). A timed assessment provides evidence that fluency improved as well as accuracy. Gains were sustained at two-month follow-up.     

Theory,Practice and Performance in Teaching: Professionalism,intuition, and jazz

Accounts of the so-called 'crisis in professionalism' in teaching and teacher education in recent years have turned on the epistemological undermining of professional knowledge and the problems surrounding the synthesis of theory and practice which underpins teacher performance. It is argued that the concentration on performance in teaching and professional development is to be welcomed, provided that 'performance' is not defined in purely technicist or instrumental terms. In response to the trend towards evidence-informed policy and practice and mechanistic outcome-based educational effectiveness in contemporary educational debate, we conclude - drawing on the 'teaching as artistry' tradition and using arguments drawn from jazz music and insights gained from the jazz metaphor - that teacher professionalism can be enhanced through attention to the intuitive, improvisatory and existentialist spontaneity of teaching as artistic performance.     

The ADHD label,analogue methodology,and participants' geographic location on judgments of social and attentional skills

Two hundred fifty‐nine preservice teachers at a medium‐sized university in the Southwest participated in the current study. The participants were randomly assigned to a labeled condition, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or nonlabeled condition, and were presented a vignette in one of three forms: a written case study, a video clip, or a written case study with a video clip. The vignette described an elementary school aged child displaying disruptive behavior, while the video portrayed a similar aged child exhibiting disruptive behavior in the classroom. Following the presentation of the vignette, participants made judgments about the child's social skills and attentional skills by completing an examiner‐made rating scale. There was a significant main effect for the label condition on judgments of attention; participants in the labeled condition made significantly more negative judgment than did those in the nonlabeled condition. There were also significant main effects for the participants' high school location and vignette treatment. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Psychol Schs 41: 221–234, 2004.