Science education reform: What's wrong with the paradigm?

From previous and current efforts at science education reform, the author teases out a certain culture of reform, a set of assumptions about educational change that are no longer (if they ever were) appropriate to another task, namely managing change. With reference to a group of programs in undergraduate science instruction that work, she finds the research model, the preference for innovation, the dependence on short-term outside funding, and above all, the seeking after some universal curriculum or set of pedagogies that will solve the problem for all time, to be naive in terms of the reality and the politics of change. She would substitute what Gerald Holton in A Nation at Risk, Revisited calls cumulative improvement, and ends with some suggestions as to how such a model could be applied to the organization of college-level instruction in science.This is a portion of Chapter 1 of the bookPrograms That Work; The Implementation Challenge. Reprinted with permission by Research Corporation, Copyright 1991, all rights reserved.     

What makes science hard? A Karplus lecture

Many able students are deterred from science because of the way science courses are packaged. To find out what makes science hard for otherwise intelligent students, the author employed nonscience faculty and graduate students as surrogate students in science. Their responses to the sequence of units, demonstrations, homework assignments, examinations, and the pace and structure of the courses constitute an internal criticism of science education that cannot be ignored.Sheila Tobias is the author ofOvercoming Math Anxiety (W. W. Norton, 1978),Succeed with Math (The College Board, 1987),They're Not Dumb, They're Different (Research Corporation, 1990),Revitalizing Undergraduate Science: Why Some Things Work and Most Don't (Research Corporation, 1992) andBreaking the Science Barrier (The College Board, 1992).     

Text-belief consistency effect in adolescents´ comprehension of multiple documents from the Web (El efecto de consistencia en la comprensión lectora de los adolescentes de documentos múltiples provenientes de Internet)

ABSTRACT

Readers often comprehend belief-consistent information from multiple texts better compared with belief-inconsistent information (text-belief consistency effect). The aim of the present study was to investigate whether adolescents’ comprehension of multiple texts is similarly impacted by their beliefs. Moreover, readers’ prior knowledge and an alternating (compared with a blocked) mode of presenting multiple texts were expected to attenuate the text-belief consistency effect. High school students read two belief-consistent and two belief-inconsistent texts on one of two scientific issues in different modes of presentation (blocked vs. alternating). A recognition task was used to assess situation model strength for each text, and prior beliefs and prior knowledge were measured before the main experiment. As expected, in the blocked mode of presentation high school students had a stronger situation model for belief-consistent texts. In the alternating mode of presentation, participants had similar situation model strengths for the different texts. Moreover, high-knowledge participants experienced a text-belief consistency effect, whereas low-knowledge participants had weaker and similar situation models for the texts.     

Fostering students’ moderation competence: the interplay between social relatedness and perceived competence*

Using a longitudinal design, the present study examined whether two teaching concepts that varied in their capacity to foster students’ self-determination affected students’ sense of social relatedness and their perceived moderation competence, as well as the interplay between these two components and the students’ performance during a moderation exam. We conducted a quasi-experimental field study with university students (N?=?160), who were evenly distributed between an experimental (EG) and a control group (CG). The results of multi-group path analysis suggest that simultaneously fostering autonomy, competence, and relatedness (EG), in comparison to providing autonomy and competence support only (CG), leads to a stronger link between perceived competence and social relatedness. If students experience moderation competence, they in turn feel socially related to their teacher, which leads to an even higher competence perception thereafter. The crucial role of teachers’ behaviour, in particular relatedness support, in learning development is discussed.     

The use of genograms in educational psychology practice

This article explores the application of the genogram in educational psychology (EP) practice. It provides a brief overview of the historical and theoretical development of the genogram. It then reviews and critiques some of the current literature regarding clinical application of the genogram in casework with children and adolescents and their families. Finally, it provides a case example of the application of the genogram, as an assessment and intervention tool in EP practice, highlighting its strengths and limitations.     

African-Americans’ perceptions of organ donation: ‘simply boils down to mistrust!’

Five focus groups were conducted to better understand African-American adults’ (N?=?62) perceptions of organ donation. Applying the health belief model, results revealed that participants generally were aware of the need for organ donors and felt susceptible to needing a transplant in the future. Additionally, the number of perceived barriers greatly outweighed the number of perceived benefits to organ donation. Several novel barriers to organ donation, not currently identified in the literature, arose during focus group discussions, alluding to a larger source of mistrust among African-Americans. In respect to self-efficacy, participants’ responses further delineated the distinction between task and decisional efficacy. The results are discussed with an emphasis on how the current findings compare and contrast with previous work, as well as a focus on the practical implications for targeted organ donation campaigns aimed at African-American communities.     

Robuste Indizes für Projection Pursuit

Die moderne und hoch komplexe Fertigung, z.B. in der Halbleiterindustrie, erfordert für die dabei anfallenden Messdaten der Anlagen- bzw. Prozessparameter multivariate Analysemethoden. Eine dieser m?glichen Analysemethoden ist Projection Pursuit (PP). Dieses Verfahren ist durch geschickte Wahl des so genannten Projektionsindex in der Lage, verschiedenste Datencharakteristika zu detektieren und diese auf anschauliche Weise zu visualisieren. Bei den Projektionsindizes handelt es sich um Funktionen, die eine Projektion auf unterschiedliche Merkmale hin bewerten und dabei jeder Projektion einen Funktionswert zuweisen. Dieser Funktionswert spiegelt die Aussagekraft der Projektion (in Abh?ngigkeit vom verwendeten Index) wider. Die Auswahl bzw. der Aufbau dieser Indizes ist hierbei von entscheidender Bedeutung. Alle hier vorgestellten Indizes zeichnen sich vor allem durch ihren robusten Charakter gegenüber durch Ausrei?er kontaminierte Daten, wie sie in realen Datenszenarien vorkommen, aus. Die durch Anwendung dieser Indizes gewonnenen Einblicke in die komplexe Struktur der Daten erm?glichen es, hochdimensionale Parameterabweichungen und komplexe Zusammenh?nge innerhalb der Daten zu finden.