Families at risk of poor parenting: A descriptive study of sixty at risk families in a model prevention program

Sixty families assessed to be at risk of poor parenting were the subject of this study. These families were participants in a model multidisciplinary program designed for the secondary prevention of poor parenting and the extremes of child abuse and neglect. The model program consists of special medical, psychological, social and developmental services to families on an inpatient, outpatient, and in-home basis. Demographic information on these 60 families was tabulated. Each family was given a monthly rating on a simple measure of family function. Ratings over lime were observed, and families were characterized in terms of a family rating vector (up. up-plateau, plateau, fluctuating, and down). Families were also described in terms of the constellation of problems brought to the therapy situation. Problem lists for each family were subjected to factor analysis. Five factor constructs which made clinical sense emerged from the analysis. Each factor could be labeled as a “family type.” These types were: (I) Abusive Family. (II) Neglectful or Antisocial Family. (III) Family with an Emotionally Unstable Parent, (IV) Family with Cultural or intellectual Limitation, and (V) Family with Child-Rearing Difficulties. Approximately 20% of these families did not fit the typology. Families were then divided into two groups—those who were relatively long-term, ongoing recipients of services, and those who left the program in the observation interval. Families were categorized according to family function rating vector and “family type.” It was noted among long-term families, measured improvement in family function was most evident in families with transient situational crisis (who did not fit the typology) and those with intellectual and cultural deficits (Type IV). Among the families who dropped from the program. 15% were no longer at risk. Sixty-three percent of the remaining families were not improving. These techniques may be useful in determining which at risk families are more successful candidates for prevention efforts.     

Constructing an Inquiry Orientation from a Learning Theory Perspective: Democratizing Access through Task Design

Abstract

It is widely accepted in the mathematics education community that pedagogies oriented toward inquiry are aligned with a constructivist theory of learning, and that these pedagogies effectively support students’ learning of mathematics. In order to promote such an orientation, we first separate the idea of inquiry from its conception as a collection of methods. Then, by grounding those methods in a generally accepted theory of learning, we construct an inquiry-oriented pedagogy from a constructivist perspective. We then discuss the implications of this pedagogy for the design of mathematical tasks that democratize student access to inquiry. This work has implications for educators who wish to enact an inquiry-oriented pedagogy in their classroom in order to support their students’ problem solving and problem posing.     

From Seeing to Observing: How Parents and Children Learn to See Science in a Botanical Garden

How do children begin to make the transition from seeing the natural world to scientifically observing the natural world? This study explored how differences in parent conversational strategies and disciplinary knowledge impact children’s experience observing biological phenomena during shared informal learning. A total of 79 parent–child pairs with children ages 6–10 participated in a controlled study in which half of the parents used their natural conversational style and the other half were trained to use 4 conversational strategies during family observations of pollination in a botanical garden. Parents were also assigned to high- and low-knowledge groups according to their knowledge of pollination biology. Findings suggest that parents who received training used the conversational strategies more than parents who used their natural conversational style. Parents and children who knew more about pollination at the start of the study exhibited higher levels of disciplinary talk in the garden. However, the use of the conversational strategies also increased the amount of disciplinary talk in the garden. The extent to which families engaged in disciplinary talk in the garden predicted significant variance in what children learned from the experience. An extended example illustrates how shared family noticing and conversation may support learning to observe nature.     

The school playground experience: opportunities and challenges for children and school staff

The school playground experience is an inevitable part of school life for primary school children. For most children, the experience is a positive and enjoyable one that contributes to their physical and social well-being and has been associated with enhanced attention and learning in the classroom. For some children, however, the playground can be a frightening and dangerous place in which aggressive behaviour and bullying can be experienced and/or witnessed. The recognition of this fact has, in some cases, led to the reduction or elimination of playground time. Many intervention programmes aimed at promoting positive in-school behaviour and preventing negative behaviours, including bullying, have been developed and used with positive results in schools. This paper provides a research-based commentary on some of the positive and negative features of playground life for children and some of the successful intervention programmes that have been developed and used. It is argued that facing the issues and problems presented by negative playground behaviour and dealing with them in a positive way, rather than avoiding them with policies that restrict the freedom of children to interact and engage with peers in the playground, is essential for the well-being of children and school staff. The paper calls for further research to inform school policy and action in this area.     

Initial and changing student teacher motivation and commitment to teaching

In an era of teacher shortages, what would motivate individuals to become teachers when the demands on teachers are greater than ever and there are plenty of alternative occupations from which to choose? This paper presents the findings of a study of student teachers' motivations to be primary teachers and their commitment to teaching after their first practicum. Results suggested that student teachers are multi‐motivated to be teachers. The most common reasons for choosing teaching reflected a positive self‐evaluation of their attributes and capabilities to be teachers, to work with children and because of the intellectual stimulation teaching would provide. Motivation and commitment changed to some extent over the first semester of initial teacher education, particularly as a result of the first practicum. Implications for policy, practice and future research are drawn from the results to help attract, retain and educate the next generation of teachers and in some way help offset forecasted teacher shortages.     

Metaphonological Abilities of Phonologically Disordered Children

There is currently a great deal of interest in the underlying metaphonological abilities of children with phonological output impairment and their possible relationship with both the continuing speech problem and later literacy development. We present data from 61 children with phonological output problems and 59 normal speakers on a range of metaphonological, speech output, language and cognitive assessments. While supporting an overall group difference in metaphonological ability, the range of individual variation is highlighted. Some weak relationships were found between metaphonological skills and other language and cognitive performance, but not between metaphonological ability and severity of speech performance. The accepted developmental order of phonological awareness tasks was not entirely supported; rather, subgroups of children were found who were showing quite different orders of difficulty. A distinction between segmentation and rhyming skills was confirmed.     

African international doctoral students in New Zealand: Englishes,doctoral writing and intercultural supervision

While the experiences of international doctoral students, especially those from Asian countries, have been well researched, fewer studies have explored the experiences of African students in Southern countries like Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand. This article reports on doctoral writing and student and supervisor perspectives on English languages in a small study of supervisors and African students in New Zealand. It challenges deficit constructions of African students and illustrates how the growing internationalisation of higher education is adding to the complexities of doctoral writing, raising questions as to how students and supervisors recognise and navigate differences in Englishes and doctoral writing. It makes a number of recommendations about how supervisors might work effectively with African and other doctoral students.     

The Chingford Hall School Screening Project: Can we have some more educational psychologist time please?

This paper describes the development of a tailor-made Special Educational Needs screening device developed between an Educational Psychology Service (EPS) and a large primary school. Soft systems methodology was used to structure and evaluate the work. The project began when school staff requested a significant increase in Educational Psychologist time to undertake 40 additional child assessments. What was required was a way of prioritising the school's concerns in line with local Special Educational Needs audit procedures. Working in partnership, the EPS and school devised a screening checklist. Of note is the unique scoring key, which factored in the school's level of concern and values about children's needs. As a consequence, some items were emphasised more than others were. An evaluation study by Kelly revealed that school staff found the screening checklist to be generally useful, not only in prioritising children for assessment, but also in assisting the construction of individual education plans.     

Preparing students for future learning with Teachable Agents

One valuable goal of instructional technologies in K-12 education is to prepare students for future learning. Two classroom studies examined whether Teachable Agents (TA) achieves this goal. TA is an instructional technology that draws on the social metaphor of teaching a computer agent to help students learn. Students teach their agent by creating concept maps. Artificial intelligence enables TA to use the concept maps to answer questions, thereby providing interactivity, a model of thinking, and feedback. Elementary schoolchildren learning science with TA exhibited “added-value” learning that did not adversely affect the “basic-value” they gained from their regular curriculum, despite trade-offs in instructional time. Moreover, TA prepared students to learn new science content from their regular lessons, even when they were no longer using the software.     

Trajectories of the home learning environment across the first 5 years: associations with children's vocabulary and literacy skills at prekindergarten

Children's home learning environments were examined in a low-income sample of 1,852 children and families when children were 15, 25, 37, and 63 months. During home visits, children's participation in literacy activities, the quality of mothers' engagements with their children, and the availability of learning materials were assessed, yielding a total learning environment score at each age. At 63 months, children's vocabulary and literacy skills were assessed. Six learning environment trajectories were identified, including environments that were consistently low, environments that were consistently high, and environments characterized by varying patterns of change. The skills of children at the extremes of learning environment trajectories differed by more than 1 SD and the timing of learning experiences related to specific emerging skills.