Participatory creativities: developing a research design for children’s pastoral encounters with the natural world

ABSTRACT

In this paper, the author discusses the interrelationship between creativity, children’s experiences of the natural world and pastoral education. Based on a research design developed whilst undertaking a professional doctorate in education (EdD), and grounded in a theoretical framework of children’s rights, the author explores the creative uncertainties of collaboratively researching children’s educational experiences with nature. The paper considers the ways in which the research design supports a pastoral care agenda, whilst encouraging the emergence of ‘creative artefacts’, alongside the extent to which the focus of the research, encounters with the natural world, might be deemed pastorally minded in its own right. The children who have participated in the research then draw the paper to a close, sharing what their involvement in the project has meant to them. Images and excerpts of children’s own creative reflections are offered as illustration of the powerful confluence of the Creative and the Pastoral.     

Individual Differences in Theory of Mind, Aggressive Behavior, and Social Skills In Young Children

Research Findings. The present study examined relations between social-cognitive skills, aggression, and social competence using teacher questionnaires and tabletop tasks with preschool and kindergarten children. It was hypothesized that the acquisition of a theory of “mind”, as indexed by an understanding of false beliefs, might be related to social behavior for this age group. Overall, results indicated that both generation of forceful solutions in a traditional social-problem solving task and performance on the false belief tasks were significantly related to social competence, after controlling for the effects of age, language comprehension, and teacher ratings of aggression. In addition, theory of mind understanding was a better predictor of social competence than performance on a more traditional social information-processing task that involved the generation of alternative solutions to interpersonal problems. Practice. The implications of these findings for preschool and kindergarten peer relations and their potential relevance to treatment of deficits in social skills are discussed. Specifically, training in an understanding of counterfactual thinking (e.g., through increased and structured opportunities to engage in pretend play and storytelling) may enhance preschooler social skills.     

A Person-Centered Approach to Students' Evaluations of Perceived Fear Appeals and Their Association With Engagement

A person-centered approach was employed to investigate how students' evaluation of perceived teacher utility value messages, i.e., fear appeals, as a threat and as a challenge, combined within individuals and how these combinations related to student engagement. Two studies were conducted with students in their final two years of secondary education. Empirically distinct clusters emerged at two time points in the academic year. Evaluating the message in the fear appeal at a higher level of challenge than threat was beneficial. Unexpectedly, high threat was associated with high engagement, as long as high challenge was also present, however, this combination was also related to high emotional disaffection. Moderate threat combined with moderate challenge had the most detrimental relationship with student engagement. Educational interventions should aim to increase the likelihood of a challenge evaluation.     

What’s your goal? The importance of shaping the goals of engineering tasks to focus learners on the underlying science

Instructional Science - Engaging in engineering tasks can help students learn science concepts. However, many engineering tasks lead students to focus more on the success of their construction than...     

Analysis of Articles in The American Biology Teacher for Essential Features of Inquiry Representation

Research in Science Education - Most studies on inquiry have focused on student outcomes, teachers’ conceptions of inquiry, implementation of inquiry in science classrooms, and inquiry...     

Can typical game features have unintended consequences? A study of players’ learning and reactions to challenge and failure in an educational programming game

It is difficult to motivate learners to seek out and persist at challenging learning tasks where failure is likely. However, in game environments, people seem highly motivated to engage with challenges and respond productively to failure. Many typical game features purportedly enhance intrinsic motivation and self-efficacy, which should improve students’ reactions to challenge and failure, which should in turn enhance learning. An experimental study with early middle school students tested these assumptions by comparing a “Full” version of a typical, commercial programming game to a “Minimal” version of the same game where common game features such as narrative, performance metrics, high-quality graphics, and sound were removed. In contrast to our hypotheses, players of the Full Game were less likely to choose coding challenges, were less tolerant of coding failures and gained less coding knowledge. Intrinsic motivation and self-efficacy did not differ between conditions. Correlational analyses showed that failure tolerance and challenge seeking may critically affect learning from educational games. The current study offers an existence proof that some common game features can hinder players' failure tolerance, challenge-seeking and learning, in certain game contexts. Future research should isolate the effects of individual game features, test generalizability and explore which contextual variables influence the findings.     

The Italian adaptation of courage measure

International Journal for Educational and Vocational Guidance - This project developed and examined the psychometric properties of an Italian version of the Courage Measure, the reduced version...