Different underlying motivations and abilities predict student versus teacher persistence in an online course

Free online courses, including Massively Open Online Courses, have great potential to increase the inclusiveness of education, but suffer from very high course dropout rates. A study of 172 K-12 students and 114 K-12 teachers taking the same free, online, summertime programming course finds that student and teacher populations have different underlying motivational models that predict rates of persistence in the course despite having generally similar motivational levels. Student persistence is predicted by prior programming knowledge, intrinsic interest in the subject matter, and mastery approach goals. By contrast, teacher persistence is similarly predicted by intrinsic interest, but then also by self-identity as a programmer, performance approach goals, and negatively by performance avoidance goals. This sub-population discrepancy in predictive factors is novel, and may be reflective of differing environmental conditions or internal mechanisms between students and teachers. Future design of free choice learning environments can take these factors into account to increase rates of user persistence for different target user populations.     

Love, politics and science education on a damaged planet

Cultural Studies of Science Education - This article attempts to add to the conversation on equity and science education by arguing that activist work necessitates turning away from conservative...     

What Would He Say? Harold O. Rugg and Contemporary Issues in Social Studies Education

The purpose of this paper is to consider the continued saliency of the ideas of Harold O. Rugg, particularly for social studies education. Given the conservative political times in which we work, and the current educational emphases on academic standards, high-stakes standardized testing, and mastery of specified knowledge, and the impact of these developments on social studies education, it is useful to revisit Rugg’s contributions to the field. In this paper, we examine Rugg’s social and curricular theories. Then, in light of this examination, we imagine what Rugg would say about contemporary issues for social studies education, and what we, as curriculum scholars and social studies educators, can learn from his likely responses.     

Getting to No: Pragmatic and Semantic Factors in Two‐ and Three‐Year‐Olds' Understanding of Negation

Although infants say “no” early, older children have difficulty understanding its truth‐functional meaning. Two experiments investigate whether this difficulty stems from the infelicity of negative sentences out of the blue. In Experiment 1, given supportive discourse, 3‐year‐olds (N = 16) understood both affirmative and negative sentences. However, with sentence types randomized, 2‐year‐olds (N = 28) still failed. In Experiment 2, affirmative and negative sentences were blocked. Two‐year‐olds (N = 28) now succeeded, but only when affirmatives were presented first. Thus, although discourse felicity seems the primary bottleneck for 3‐year‐olds' understanding of negation, 2‐year‐olds struggle with its semantic processing. Contrary to accounts where negatives are understood via affirmatives, both sentence types were processed equally quickly, suggesting previously reported asymmetries are due to pragmatic accommodation, not semantic processing.     

Utilizing Student Socio-coordinated Mimicry: Complex Movement Conversations in Physical Education

This article explores Complexity Theory and applications of nonlinear dynamics in physical education (PE). The authors of this article discuss Complexity Theory and its applications to students and student learning. Additionally, there will be discussion of how the networking learning process associated with socio-coordinated mimicry creates a “movement conversation” between learners rooted in the relational complexity of students within a PE lesson. Finally, the authors discuss research opportunities within PE, allowing for a close collaboration between pedagogical researchers and biomechanists to examine the emergent qualities within the “movement conversations” between students. Overall, this article seeks to illustrate the possibilities of utilizing Complexity Theory within PE pedagogy and research.     

Equity in New Zealand university graduate outcomes: Māori and Pacific graduates

Higher education confers significant private and social benefits. Māori and Pacific peoples are under-represented within New Zealand universities and have poorer labour market outcomes (e.g., lower wages, under-represented in skilled professions). A New Zealand tertiary education priority is to boost Māori and Pacific success in an effort to improve outcomes for these graduates, their communities and society in general. Using information collected in the Graduate Longitudinal Study New Zealand, we compared Māori and Pacific university graduate outcomes with outcomes of other New Zealand graduates. Data were collected when the participants were in their final year of study (n?=?8719) and two years post-graduation (n?=?6104). Employment outcomes were comparable between Māori, Pacific and other New Zealand graduates at two years post-graduation; however, Māori and Pacific graduates had significantly higher student debt burden and financial strain over time. They were significantly more likely to help others (e.g., family) across a range of situations (e.g., lending money), and reported higher levels of volunteerism compared to their counterparts. Boosting higher education success for Māori and Pacific students has the potential to reduce ethnic inequalities in New Zealand labour market outcomes and may result in significant private benefits for these graduates and social benefits as a result of their contribution to society.     

Children with behavioral, non-behavioral, and multiple disabilities, and the risk of out-of-home placement disruption

Objective

This study examined the relative risk of placement disruption for 3-10 year-old children placed in out-of-home care based on the biological relatedness of the placement caregiver and child disability status: no disability, a non-behavioral disability only, a behavioral disability only, or both a non-behavioral and behavioral disability.

Methods

Data were used from the baseline and 36 month follow-up of the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being, a national probability study of children investigated for child abuse and neglect in the United States. Disability status was derived using several different nationally-normed measures of language development, daily-living skills, social skills, and behavioral problems.

Results

Around 1 in 4 children placed in out-of-home care experienced a disruption. Placement with kin decreased the likelihood of disruption for a majority of children, and children with different types of disabilities were no more or less likely to disrupt in kinship care compared to children with no disability. Older children with a behavioral disability only or both a non-behavioral and behavioral disability were more likely to disrupt compared to younger regardless of placement.

Conclusion

The study findings suggest that maltreated children placed with kin will be afforded the same stability provided to children without a disability.