The Perception of Social Conventionality by Children and Adults

Numerous studies have found that by late childhood individuals recognize conventional norms as social contrivances that are arbitrary, relative, and changeable. However, this conclusion conflicts with other evidence that children and adults "reify" social formations by apprehending them as something other than social products. For example, it is difficult to reconcile the phenomenon of ethnocentrism with the image of people who perceive their social worlds as arbitrary and relative. Most of the studies have questioned respondents about comparatively "transparent" rules, that is, those whose arbitrary human origins are evident. Moreover, the customary questions used to measure perceived conventionality are often simplistic indicators of a complex phenomenon. The result is an exaggerated portrayal of children's and adults' awareness of the conventionality of the social world.     

Some Practical Considerations When Converting a Linearly Administered Test to an Adaptive Format

"We seek the truth and will endure the consequences." Charles Seymour President of Yale (1937–1950)     

Mechanization of library procedures in the medium-sized medical library. 8. Computer applications in hospital departmental libraries

To test the hypothesis that a standard library system could be designed for hospital departmental libraries, a system was developed and partially tested for four departmental libraries in the Washington University School of Medicine and Associated Hospitals. The system from determination of needs through design and evaluation, is described. The system was limited by specific constraints to control of the monograph collection. Products of control include catalog cards, accessions list, new book list, location list, fund list, missing book list, and discard book list. Sample data form and pages from a procedure manual are given, and conversion from a manual to an automated system is outlined.The question of standardization of library records and procedures is discussed, with indications of the way in which modular design, as utilized in this system, could contribute to greater flexibility in design of future systems.Reference is made to anticipating needs for organizing departmental libraries in developing regional medical library programs and to exploring the role of the departmental library in a medical library network.     

Teacher use of evidence to customize inquiry science instruction

This study investigated how professional development featuring evidence‐based customization of technology‐enhanced curriculum projects can improve inquiry science teaching and student knowledge integration in earth science. Participants included three middle school sixth‐grade teachers and their classes of students (N = 787) for three consecutive years. Teachers used evidence from their student work to revise the curriculum projects and rethink their teaching strategies. Data were collected through teacher interviews, written reflections, classroom observations, curriculum artifacts, and student assessments. Results suggest that the detailed information about the learning activities of students provided by the assessments embedded in the online curriculum motivated curricular and pedagogical customizations that resulted in both teacher and student learning. Customizations initiated by teachers included revisions of embedded questions, additions of hands‐on investigations, and modifications of teaching strategies. Student performance improved across the three cohorts of students with each year of instructional customization. Coupling evidence from student work with revisions of curriculum and instruction has promise for strengthening professional development and improving science learning. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 47: 1037–1063, 2010     

Student performance and attitudes under formative evaluation by teacher,self and peer evaluators

This study investigated the effects of teacher, self and peer evaluation on preservice teachers’ performance, knowledge and attitudes. Earlier research by the same authors revealed that students made significant improvements in their lesson plans under all three of these conditions, but the teacher-evaluation improved significantly more than the two student-evaluation groups. Therefore, relevant training and practice in the evaluation process were added in this study. All three groups made significant improvements from draft to final version of their plans, and the differences between the teacher-evaluation group and the two student-evaluation groups were non-significant. The authors attribute the stronger performance of the student-evaluation groups to their training on the evaluation task. Students’ overall attitudes were significantly more positive toward teacher evaluation than toward peer evaluation, but did not differ significantly between these two groups and the self-evaluators. Several suggestions are discussed for further improvements in the training of self and peer evaluators.

Education reform, indigenous politics, and decolonisation in the Bolivia of Evo Morales

The paper explores the relationship between education reform and Intercultural Bilingual Education (IBE) for Bolivia's majority indigenous peoples, as this has evolved since the 1990s into the era of Evo Morales, Latin America's first indigenous president, elected in 2005. In order to bring out the significance of the new Education Bill awaiting approval in parliament since 2006, the paper examines in detail the recent historical relationship between education reform and IBE, the role of the country's indigenous social organisations in evolving this relationship, and the ideological underpinnings of the new education reform legislation.