First Possession,History, and Young Children's Ownership Judgments

It is impossible to perceive who owns an object; this must be inferred. One way that children make such inferences is through a first possession bias—when two agents each use an object, children judge the object belongs to the one who used it first. Two experiments show that this bias does not result from children directly inferring ownership from first possession; the experiments instead support an alternative account according to which the first possession bias reflects children's historical reasoning. In Experiment 1, eighty‐five 3‐ to 5‐year‐olds only based inferences on first possession when it was informative about the past. In Experiment 2, thirty‐two 5‐year‐olds based ownership judgments on testimony about past contact, while disregarding testimony about future contact.     

COMMUNITY COLLEGE FACULTY: MAKING THE PARADIGM SHIFT

The author looks at contemporary research and surveys on community college faculty, administration, and students and diagnoses problems and obstacles for the shift from a goal of expanded access in the 1960s and 1970s to the 1990's goal of the community college: teaching and learning excellence. First the current state of teaching and teachers in the community college is examined. Problems are illustrated such as lack of support for new teachers in their vital first years and the many and growing responsibilities of faculty that take away from teaching. The article then identifies and defines three major challenges for the next decade: (1) facilitating and addressing the needs of a wider range of student ability and mastery; (2) conquering the high and accepted attrition rate; and (3) dealing with the differing and often contradicting perceptions of students, faculty, and administration. This particular disparity, or this "gap," among student, teacher, and administrator is discussed in detail. Aside from these three important challenges, however, the greatest challenge for community college faculty in the 1990s is stated as the diversity of student academic credentials and maturity. Several conditions are also cited, which seem to put two-year college faculty at risk. Factors such as increased enrollment, lack of funding, limited facilities and equipment, and lack of faculty involvement in change efforts. Finally, the author looks to research by Honeycutt in a search for solutions to the above challenges. Honeycutt suggests several guidelines that might help to minimize teachers at risk and maximize faculty motivation. If the shift is to be made successfully, suggests the author, then faculty, the administrator, and the student will have to collaboratively explore and adapt suggestions such as those by Honeycutt and pay close attention to, and try to eliminate, the gap that divides them.     

CURRICULUM SEQUENCING AND THE ACQUISITION OF CLOCK-READING SKILLS AMONG CHINESE AND FLEMISH CHILDREN

The present study addresses the impact of the curriculum on primary school children’s acquisition of clock-reading knowledge from analog and digital clocks. Focusing on Chinese and Flemish children’s clock-reading knowledge, the study is about whether the differences in sequencing of learning and instruction opportunities—as defined by the curriculum—result in differences in accuracy and development of clock-reading knowledge. By means of (1) an in-depth qualitative analysis of the Chinese and Flemish mathematics curriculum standards and textbooks and (2) a quantitative analysis of 11,743 students’ accuracy in reading the time, the current study mirrors the differential impact of alternative curriculum designs for primary education. The results of the analyses reveal that Chinese children acquire clock-reading knowledge—for analog and digital clocks—2 years earlier than their Flemish peers, due to a 2-year earlier exposure. Discussing these results, it is argued that the Flemish curriculum tends to underestimate what children are capable of and that clock-reading within the Flemish primary mathematics curriculum builds on dated assumptions and research results. Building on these outcomes, it is argued that curriculum development should be the result of collaborative inquiry involving policy makers, researchers, and teachers.