The birth of a new industry: entry by start-ups and the drivers of firm growth: The case of encryption software

The paper analyses the birth of the encryption software industry (ESI), a new niche in the software industry. Using a Chandlerian perspective, this work reports the main facts about firm entry and growth, with a particular focus on start-up strategies and actions.Since scale economies do not play a major role in ESI, the paper investigates the different sources of firm competitive advantages.This work shows that innovation and product differentiation, along with investments in co-specialised assets, are variables strongly correlated to young firm probability to survive and grow. In doing so, we have collected highly detailed information on product introduction, US patents granted, worldwide alliances and biographical data of firm founders.     

Historical Networks in Science Education

Science & Education - This paper discusses the potential of the creation and analysis of historical networks as didactic strategies in science education. To this end, we first argue the...     

Evaluating the Effectiveness of Physlet-Based Materials in Supporting Conceptual Learning About Electricity

To provide a good understanding of many abstract concepts in the field of electricity above that of their students is often a major challenge for secondary school teachers. Many educational researchers promote conceptual learning as a teaching approach that can help teachers to achieve this goal. In this paper, we present Physlet-based materials for supporting conceptual learning about electricity. To conduct research into the effectiveness of these materials, we designed two different physics courses: one group of students, the experimental group, was taught using Physlet-based materials and the second group of students, the control group, was taught using expository instruction without using Physlets. After completion of the teaching, we assessed students’ thinking skills and analysed the materials with an independent t test, multiple regression analyses and one-way analysis of covariance. The test scores were significantly higher in the experimental group than in the control group (p < 0.05). The results of this study confirmed the effectiveness of conceptual learning about electricity with the help of Physlet-based materials.     

Nurturing Emergent Readers Through Readers Theater

Readers theater is a familiar literacy strategy for children who can read independently; however, it can also be used with younger children who have not yet developed independent reading skills. The purpose of this article is to adapt the concept of readers theater for use with emergent readers. It focuses first on defining readers theater and its many benefits, particularly in the areas of literacy development. Finally, it includes suggestions for successfully implementing a readers theater program with young children.     

A review scrutinising the consequential validity of dynamic assessment

This literature review explored whether dynamic assessment procedures in psycho-educational practice might bridge the well-known gap between diagnosis and intervention. Due to a learning phase included in the testing procedure, qualitative information about the child’s learning needs can be revealed by means of dynamic assessment. The question is, however, what the consequential validity, i.e. the extent to which assessment influences instructional and learning processes, of dynamic assessment procedures really is. The review of 31 articles that met the inclusion criteria showed that proximal consequential validity of dynamic assessment is warranted, but distal consequential validity is warranted to a lesser extent (e.g. some guidelines for practice). Furthermore, it can be noticed that motivational aspects never played an explicit role during learning phases. In order to design student-tailored interventions following dynamic assessment, there is a need for more explicitness of learning phases and types of feedback in the development of these instruments.     

What can Learning Styles Research Learn from Cognitive Psychology?

People differ from each other in the manner in which they process information from the world. These individual differences are called learning styles’. The purpose of this paper is to explore how research in this field can benefit from certain findings in cognitive psychology. Following a review of some difficulties which afflict research on learning styles (e.g. inadequate construct validation of measures), attention is drawn to two relevant findings in cognitive research: the influence of prior knowledge on learning and the potential value to learners of ‘metacognitive’ awareness. Some implications of these findings for learning styles research are then discussed.