A chimpanzee’s (Pan troglodytes) long-term retention of lexigrams

In this experiment, a chimpanzee’s (Pan troglodytes) long-term retention was examined. The chimpanzee, Lana, was trained to use lexigrams (geometric symbols representing linguistic units) for foods, colors, and objects when she was 2 years of age. At the age of 27, her recognition of three sets of lexigrams was examined. One of these sets (long term lexigrams) included five object lexigrams, one color lexigram, and one food lexigram, none of which had been seen by Lana for more than 20 years. The second set (different-referent lexigrams) contained lexigrams that are still present on current lexigram keyboards, but had been assigned new referents. The third set (same-referent lexigrams) contained lexigrams that had been kept on the keyboards Lana had used and that had retained the same referents. A food, a colored square, or an object was presented, and Lana had to select, by using a joystick, a lexigram on a computer screen. Lana chose the correct lexigram at a level significantly greater than chance for five of the seven lexigrams that she had not seen for more than 20 years.     

A gender comparison of contextualised study behaviour in higher education

The present study examines the manifestation of structural differences in the manner in which men and women students perceive and engage the content and context of learning. These differences are explored, and shown to be consistent, within a hierarchy of progressively more complex conceptual models of student learning. Conclusions are that structural gender variation differences emerge in terms of deep/strategic rather than surface, forms of learning behaviour: men students distinctively manifest and qualify deep/strategic learning behaviour in terms of operation and comprehension learning styles, while women students integrate these styles in a manifestation of style versatility that is clearly organised and not achievement motivated. An apparently separate female trait is distinguishable in terms of comprehension learning style and achievement motivation. It is argued that gender differences constitute a potentially important and neglected source of variation in student learning which, when detected in context, can and should be explicitly managed by academic practitioners.     

Who takes the cake in community and economic development? ‘Going along' with metaphor to problematize the collective impact of a place-based promise programme

ABSTRACT

Linguists understand metaphors to be shortcuts to an individual’s tacit knowledge about the world. As ethnographers and planners building a university-school partnership and seeking to understand residents’ perceptions of their urban neighbourhood, attention to use of metaphor allowed us insight into an insider’s mental model of who is in the community. In this article, we describe how, in our interview-based ethnographic needs assessment, one of our project participant’s metaphors helped us discern the lived nature of social stratification as racialised economic inequality. This insight not only informs our partnership work but subverts some important assumptions about programme impact. Our experience suggests metaphor analysis contributes an important tool for ethnographic interpretation.     

The role of feedback in the under-attainment of ethnic minority students: evidence from distance education

In UK higher education, the attainment of ethnic minority students is lower than that of white students, and this remains the case when differences in entry qualifications have been taken into account. The present study investigated whether the under-attainment of ethnic minority students might be due to the nature of the feedback that they received for their assignments. The assignments submitted by 470 ethnic minority and 470 matched white students taking a distance-learning course were compared using a computer system, Open Mentor, to categorise the feedback given by tutors based on a scheme devised by Bales. Asian and black students and students of mixed ethnicity obtained lower marks for their assignments than did the white students. However, there were only small differences between the ethnic minority students and the white students in terms of the pattern of feedback that they received, and these disappeared when the marks that they had received for their assignments had been taken into account. It is concluded that students from all ethnic groups received feedback that was commensurate with their marks, and that the origins of the attainment gap in ethnic minority students in UK higher education must be sought elsewhere.     

Measuring teachers’ knowledge of vocabulary development and instruction

This article describes the development of an instrument to measure teachers’ knowledge of vocabulary development and instruction, the Teacher Knowledge of Vocabulary Survey (TKVS). This type of knowledge has become increasingly important as all classroom teachers are expected to help students meet language and literacy standards that include vocabulary acquisition. While a few studies have measured teacher knowledge of reading, there are no known instruments for measuring teachers’ knowledge of vocabulary development and instruction. However, vocabulary is a crucial determinant of reading comprehension and content area knowledge, particularly for English learners (Graves, August, & Mancilla-Martinez, 2013). Statements about vocabulary development and instruction were gathered from foundational texts, reviewed by subject matter experts, and researched in cognitive labs for possible inclusion as items in the TKVS. The survey’s 52 statements comprise 6 categories, including one section on vocabulary development, four sections on instruction, and one section on instruction specifically for English learners. Ratings of item difficulty by subject matter experts were then used to distinguish three levels of teacher knowledge of vocabulary: emergent, intermediate, and expert. Fifty teachers completed the TKVS, and their performance was found to correlate with the experts’ predicted difficulties of the items. Initial analyses provide evidence for the content and construct validity of the TKVS as a measure of teacher knowledge of vocabulary development and effective instruction. The discussion considers implications for the use of the instrument, including as a needs assessment or guide for professional development for both preservice and inservice teachers.     

Use of an audience response system during peer teaching among physical therapy students in human gross anatomy: Perceptions of peer teachers and students

An audience response system (ARS) has become popular among educators in medicine and the health professions because of the system's ability to engage listeners during a lecture presentation. No one has described the usefulness of ARS technology during planned nonlecture peer teaching sessions in gross anatomy instruction for health professionals. The unique feature of each peer teaching session was a nongraded 12–15 item ARS quiz assembled by six second‐year doctor of physical therapy (DPT) students and purposely placed at the beginning of the review session for those first‐year DPT students in attendance. This study used a ten‐item questionnaire and a five‐point Likert scale in addition to three open ended questions to survey perceptions of both first‐year and second‐year DPT students about the usefulness of ARS technology implemented during weekly interactive peer teaching sessions during a semester course in Anatomy for Physical Therapists. First‐year students overwhelmingly acknowledged the ARS system permitted each student to self‐assess his/her preparedness for a quiz or examination and compare his/her performance with that of classmates. Peer teachers recognized an ARS quiz provided them an opportunity to: (1) estimate first‐year students' level of understanding of anatomical concepts; and (2) effectively prepare first‐year students for their weekly quizzes and future examinations. On the basis of the mutual benefits derived by both students/tutees and teachers/tutors, physical therapist educators may wish to consider using ARS technology to enhance teaching methods for a class in gross human anatomy. Anat Sci Educ 2: 286–293, 2009. © 2009 American Association of Anatomists.