‘Teaching is a co-learning experience’: academics reflecting on learning and teaching in an ‘internationalized’ faculty

This paper reports on a study that took place in a faculty of humanities and social sciences at a UK university. The institution had recently undergone a radical restructure and the vision for the future presented by the new senior management team highlighted internationalization as one of four major areas for growth. The internationalization agenda was largely focused on increasing recruitment, but provided an opportunity to engage the academic community in a discourse about what internationalization meant for them and the challenges and opportunities it presented. Emerging themes relate to experiences and understandings of internationalization, with implications for learning and teaching, and student induction and support. The value of discourse about pedagogical development and practical innovations and the sharing of best practice are suggested as means to achieve conceptual change and a broader vision of internationalization.     

The contested professionalism of teachers meeting radicalising youth in their classrooms

In a diverse and unjust world, teachers experience difficulties to achieve inclusive education. In parts of the western world, including the Netherlands, the very possibility of a combination of ethnic and cultural diversity and common citizenship has come into question. Meanwhile some youngsters are in the process of radicalisation. We illustrate the problem definitions of teachers and teacher trainers with a case study of a professional learning activity in Amsterdam. This is followed by a critical discussion based on a pedagogical view on education.     

The effects of realism in learning with dynamic visualizations

Two experiments are reported that investigated the relative effectiveness of a realistic dynamic visualization as opposed to a schematic visualization for learning about cell replication (mitosis). In Experiment 1, 37 university students watched either realistic or schematic visualizations. Students' subjective task demands ratings as well as their performance in a multiple-choice test and a pictorial test clearly demonstrated the superiority of the schematic dynamic visualization. In Experiment 2, 83 students were given the two visualizations in four different orders of presentation. Students showed the same performance irrespective of whether they watched the schematic visualization twice, first saw the schematic and then the realistic visualization or vice versa. Only students, who watched the realistic visualization twice, had far lower learning outcomes. Contrary to our expectations, for both experiments, students' prior knowledge did not moderate the results.     

The theory of caritative leadership applied to education

Within caring science, the concept of caring leadership is well established. The aim of this study is to introduce Bondas’s theory of caritative leadership into education. The theory of caritative leadership is a theory of caring leadership with the ‘caritas’ thought of human love and mercy at its core. The article considers a hypothetical testing of the transferability of a nursing leadership theory, with its roots in caring science, into the field of education. The material consists of about 90 sources from the disciplines of nursing, education, management, and psychology. A caritative leadership would support Bildung – a comprehensive view of the edification of life, personal growth and maturity – as an ultimate goal of education. In the emerging model of a caritative leadership in education, a humanistic ethos of love, trust, and forgiveness shapes the culture of the educational organisation. The pedagogical leader supports the process of human becoming by implementing the idea of human beings as vulnerable, moral, dignified and unique individuals. The leader develops an ability to know which objectives to measure and which experiences of others to learn from, while performing such tasks as planning, reporting and directing in accordance with the mission of the organisation.     

The effect of a secondary cognitive task on landing mechanics and jump performance

Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries commonly occur during jump-landing tasks when individuals’ attention is simultaneously allocated to other objects and tasks. The purpose of the current study was to investigate the effect of allocation of attention imposed by a secondary cognitive task on landing mechanics and jump performance. Thirty-eight recreational athletes performed a jump-landing task in three conditions: no counting, counting backward by 1 s from a randomly given number, and counting backward by 7 s from a randomly given number. Three-dimensional kinematics and ground reaction forces were collected and analysed. Participants demonstrated decreased knee flexion angles at initial contact (p = 0.001) for the counting by 1 s condition compared with the no counting condition. Participants also showed increased peak posterior and vertical ground reaction forces during the first 100 ms of landing (p ≤ 0.023) and decreased jump height (p < 0.001) for the counting by 1 s and counting by 7 s conditions compared with the no counting condition. Imposition of a simultaneous cognitive challenge resulted in landing mechanics associated with increased ACL loading and decreased jump performance. ACL injury risk screening protocols and injury prevention programmes may incorporate cognitive tasks into jump-landing tasks to better simulate sports environments.     

A review of five African board games: is there any educational potential?

Studies of African indigenous games often focus on a specific game or on games from different regions. This article, rather, examines five popular African board games in order to find the similarities and differences among these games. The analysis shows similarities among them. However, these similarities do not necessarily mean that these games are identical. The review of the games indicates that these games are different when elements such as rules and play are used to study them. This article also demonstrates that these board games are tools that can be integrated into the curriculum through a discussion of the educational affordance of each game. The article is an invitation to educators and game researchers to broaden the definition and exploration of game-based learning.     

Evaluating the outcomes of a school based Theraplay® project for looked after children

Research shows that Looked After Children (LAC) may experience emotional instability which can reduce their capacity to engage with education. This study evaluates an attachment based therapeutic Theraplay® intervention designed to bridge the gap between the emotional well-being of LAC and their engagement in education. Twenty LAC between the ages of five to 11 from nine schools participated in the project over eight months. The mixed method study used a repeated measures design. Strengths and difficulties questionnaires were used pre- and post-intervention; semi-structured interviews with teaching staff were conducted and children’s views were gathered. Quantitative results show a reduction in the children’s total strengths and difficulties stress scores post-intervention. Qualitative feedback shows noticeable changes in the children’s relationship skills, confidence and engagement with education. The complexities of supporting LAC in education and implications for educational psychology practice are explored.     

Neighborhood and family influences on educational attainment: results from the Ontario child health study follow-up 2001

This study uses multilevel models to examine longitudinal associations between contextual influences (neighborhood and family) assessed in 1983 in a cohort of 2,355 children, 4-16 years of age, and educational attainment in 2001. Variation in educational attainment in 2001 attributable to between-neighborhood and between-family differences was 8.17% and 36.88%, respectively. The final model explained 33.64% of the variance in educational attainment, with unique variances of 14.53% for neighborhood and family-level variables combined versus 10.94% for child-level variables. Among the neighborhood and family-level variables, indicators of status (5.29%) versus parental capacity/family process (4.03%) made comparable predictions to attainment while children from economically disadvantaged families did not benefit educationally from living in more affluent areas.     

Instituting Change in Early Childhood Education: Recent Developments in Singapore

In an effort to improve preschool education, the Singapore government has embraced the need for change by identifying needed policies related to preschool education. These changes require teachers to rethink their approach to learning and teaching. A proposed tool suggested in this paper that may help facilitate curriculum change is the use of pedagogical documentation. This paper examines some impact, implications and challenges for adopting such a tool with the stakeholders in Singapore.