Student and Faculty Member Engagement in Undergraduate Research

Undergraduate research (UR) is a valued co-curricular activity that has involved an increasing number of students and faculty members in recent years. While there is a growing body of research on student participation in UR, there is less research available examining faculty perceptions of, participation in UR, and how those factors influence student participation in UR. This study examined approximately 110,000 responses to the National Survey of Student Engagement and 40,000 responses to the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement at over 450 four-year institutions. Findings revealed that individual and institutional characteristics predicted student and faculty member involvement and that the majority of faculty members perceived UR to be of importance. Implications for fostering faculty involvement, student success, and viewing UR as an institutional asset are discussed.     

Transformational practice: critical teacher research in pre-service teacher education

This article traces the experiences of three pre-service teachers as they engaged in teacher research as part of their teacher education program and considers how teacher research might disrupt dominant paradigms that aim to de-contextualize teaching and offer one-size-fits-all solutions to address inequities. In particular, the article examines: the role of the teacher’s personal and academic history in the design of their teacher research projects; how their research worked to disrupt and complicate classroom cultures and practices; and the ways in which the pre-service teachers interpreted their research in light of new contexts during their first year of teaching. This work has critical implications in an era when teacher education programs are under attack, including: the value of drawing on pre-service teachers' lived experiences as an entry point into inquiry; creating highly localized inquiries; and positioning novice teachers as knowledgeable practitioners who are able to share research with colleagues.     

Classroom teacher effectiveness research: a conceptual critique

Teacher effectiveness research now informs the rationale of much Australian education policy aimed at redressing student under‐achievement. The approach draws a ‘straight line’ between teacher practice and student outcomes, ‘controlling’ for and ultimately dismissive of other possible influences. The paper calls into question this conception of teaching–learning relations, particularly the extent to which teaching practice can be reasonably quantified and improvements in students' academic achievement can be solely attributed to and/or sole responsibility placed on the pedagogic strategies employed by teachers. Drawing on the theoretical resources of Foucault and Bourdieu, the paper argues further that teacher effectiveness research is flawed in both means and ends. It concludes that in its ranking of student and teacher performance, such research actually works against the purposes of education; specifically, authentic teaching and learning.     

The effects of Reading Recovery on children’s literacy progress and special educational needs status: a three-year follow-up study

Reading Recovery (RR) is an intensive one-to-one reading intervention programme designed for five- to six-year-old children who are the lowest literacy achievers after one year of formal tuition. RR has been shown to have impressive effects in the short-term, particularly on those measures tailored to, and designed for, the programme. However, less is known about the programme’s long-term effectiveness. The present study followed up at the end of Year 4: 120 comparison children, 73 children who had received RR three years earlier, and 48 children in RR schools who had not received RR. We found that the children who had received RR achieved an average National Curriculum (NC) level of 3b in reading which indicates being on track for Level 4 at the end of Key Stage 2. The comparison children were on average at Level 2a in reading, significantly lower than the RR. RR children were also significantly less likely than comparison children to be identified as having a special educational need at the end of Year 3. These findings indicate that effects of the RR programme are still apparent three years post-intervention.     

Reviews

BEYOND FORMULA: AMERICAN FILM GENRES. By Stanley J. Solomon. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1976; pp. x + 310. $5.95.

AN ORIENTATION TO NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION. By Thomas W. Benson and Kenneth D. Frandsen. Chicago: Science Research Associates, 1976; pp. 38. Paper $1.60.

UNMASKING THE FACE. By Paul Ekman and Wallace V. Friesen. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice‐Hall, 1975; pp. 212. $4.25.

BEYOND CULTURE. By Edward T. Hall. Long Island City, New York: Doubleday‐Anchor, 1976; pp. 256. $7.95.

LOUDER THAN WORDS, By Mele Koneya and Alton Barbour. Columbus, Ohio: Merrill Publishing, 1976; pp. 80. $2.95.     

Books

Curiosity and Enlightenment: Collectors and Collections from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Century , Arthur MacGregor     

Young Children's Reasoning About the Effects of Emotional and Physiological States on Academic Performance

This study assessed young children's understanding of the effects of emotional and physiological states on cognitive performance. Five, 6-, 7-year-olds, and adults ( N = 96) predicted and explained how children experiencing a variety of physiological and emotional states would perform on academic tasks. Scenarios included: (a) negative and positive emotions, (b) negative and positive physiological states, and (c) control conditions. All age groups understood the impairing effects of negative emotions and physiological states. Only 7-year-olds, however, showed adult-like reasoning about the potential enhancing effects of positive internal states and routinely cited cognitive mechanisms to explain how internal states affect performance. These results shed light on theory-of-mind development and also have significance for children's everyday school success.     

The Internet as network,world, co-construction,and mode of governance

The Internet is unlike anything else in the history of technology. It is neither a tool nor a machine, but a network. As such, it is a new type of technical system. It resembles the telephone system in some respects, but it also has similarities to broadcast networks that distribute entertainment, shopping malls that distribute goods, and transportation systems insofar as it opens new “worlds” to its users. What is more, the users of the Internet take on new capacities and identities through their participation in the network, most obviously the unprecedented absorption in mediated social relations exemplified by Facebook. This Perspective article will attempt to put some order in the understanding of the Internet in terms of three theoretical approaches, loosely interpreted to suit this new object. These approaches are actor network theory, the phenomenological concept of world, and Simondon’s concepts of individuation and concretization.