An International Orientation on Institutional Strategies and Governmental Policies for the Use of ICT in Higher Education

This article provides an international comparative overview of institutional strategies, collaboration patterns and governmental policies related to the use of ICT in higher education. It has been produced as part of an international comparative study on the use of ICT in higher education. A study commissioned by the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science and published as: “The Use of Information and Communication Technology in Higher Education: An International Orientation on Trends and Issues”, B. Collis and M. van der Wende (Eds). University of Twente, CHEPS, 1999. It covers the following range of countries: Belgium, Finland, the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States of America. Additionally some main initiatives at the European level have been taken into account. On the basis of this international comparison, the following main conclusions were drawn. Due in part to the fact that in many cases institutional strategies for ICT are still lacking, interesting experimentation does not generally lead to successful dissemination and adoption on a wider scale. In many cases, the push for a substantial use of ICT in distance learning programs has come from new educati onal markets, life-long learning and international education in particular. The response of higher education to these markets is leading in many countries to a convergence of distance and traditional (on-campus) education. Inter-institutional and inter-sectoral collaboration between universities and companies are characteristics of many successful ICT initiatives, although they do not generally continue into sustainable implementation in the individual institutions. Governments facilitate the use of ICT through the establishment of infrastructure, networks and inter-institutional and public–private partnerships, and try to create the right regulatory environment. Further deregulation will enable institutions to respond to new market demands and will inspire the necessary organizational change in higher education institutions.     

On the misinterpretation of histograms and box plots

Recent studies have shown that the interpretation of graphs is not always easy for students. In order to reason properly about distributions of data, however, one needs to be able to interpret graphical representations of these distributions correctly. In this study, we used Tversky’s principles for the design of graphs to explain how 125 first-year university students interpreted histograms and box plots. We systematically varied the representation that accompanied the tasks between students to identify how the design principles affected students’ reasoning. Many students displayed misinterpretations of histograms and box plots, despite the fact that they had the required knowledge and time to interpret the representations correctly. We argue that the combination of dual process theories and Tversky’s design principles provides a promising theoretical framework, which leads to various possibilities for future research.     

A study of the quality of practitioner research in secondary education: impact on teacher and school development

This study provides insight into the quality of practitioner research and the impact of this on the professional development of the individual teacher and the school as a whole. We examined the quality of practitioner research in relation to the goals of the research. We operationalized the quality of the research in terms of the validities outlined by Anderson and Herr. In our study we apply this way of thinking to 11 cases of teacher research in secondary education. We found at least some evidence of outcome validity and catalytic validity for the teachers’ practitioner research. However, evidence of process validity and democratic validity was only found in some of the projects. We conclude that the approach adopted in this study can be more generally used to increase the quality and thereby the impact of practitioner research.     

Biology Teachers Designing Context-Based Lessons for Their Classroom Practice—The importance of rules-of-thumb

In science education in the Netherlands new, context‐based, curricula are being developed. As in any innovation, the outcome will largely depend on the teachers who design and implement lessons. Central to the study presented here is the idea that teachers, when designing lessons, use rules‐of‐thumb: notions of what a lesson should look like if certain classroom outcomes are to be reached. Our study aimed at (1) identifying the rules‐of‐thumb biology teachers use when designing context‐based lessons for their own classroom practice, and (2) assessing how these personal rules‐of‐thumb relate to formal innovative goals and lesson characteristics. Six biology teachers with varying backgrounds designed and implemented a lesson or series of lessons for their own practice, while thinking aloud. We interviewed the teachers and observed their lessons. Our results suggest that rules‐of‐thumb, which differed substantially among the teachers, indeed to a great extent guide the decisions teachers make when designing (innovative) lessons. These rules‐of‐thumb were often strongly associated with intended lesson outcomes. Also, teachers’ personal rules‐of‐thumb were more powerful in determining the lesson design than formal innovative goals and lesson characteristics. The results of this study encourage more research into how rules‐of‐thumb reflect teachers’ practical knowledge, for which suggestions are made.     

A new look at learning-disabled and normal-achieving children's word-pair memorization ability

An 11-parameter Markov model of stages of learning, which was developed by Brainerd et al., will be presented. The focus will be on parameter interpretation in terms of long-term memory (LTM) processes. Next the model will be used to examine the contribution of these various LTM processes to Schooltype and Age differences in a word-pair memorization experiment. Subjects were 8 and 11-year-old normal-achieving (NA) children from regular elementary schools and 8 and 11-year-old children from special schools for learning disabled (LD) children. One of the main conclusions is that the Schooltype × Age interaction which was demonstrated for traditional performance measures, can be explained by LD children's little developmental progress in storage processes and deviations from normal development in aspects of the acquisition of retrieval algorithms. No deficiences were, however, detected in the LD children's rerention ability early in the task, and in the so-called heuristic retrieval operations.     

Second chance education for Maori school ‘dropouts’: A case-study of a community training centre in New Zealand

This article provides an overview of an innovative development programme in the field of second chance education for young Maori people who for various social and cultural reasons have failed at school and who have consequently low aspirations and little expectations for the future. In order to improve their disadvantaged position within the European-dominated society of New Zealand the Community Training Centre discussed in this article has developed a new approach to education and training by attempting to empower trainees so that they become aware of alternatives and can make choices about their future.