SCHOOL INTEGRATION and related topics

This five-year study examined the effectiveness of an innovative approach to service-learning embedded in a one year site-based alternative route to teacher certification. The ten-week school-based study investigated the influence of service-learning on the multicultural perceptions, cross-cultural communication skills, and social justice cognizance of future teachers. The study participants consisted of 73 secondary pre-service teacher candidates. Data sources included: participant reflective journals, debriefings and final reports, letters from and discussions with host school service recipients, and investigator interviews and field notes. Study results indicate that service-learning within the time constraints of a one-year alternative route to teacher certification can provide future teachers with insight into the politics of education, increase their interactive proficiency with culturally diverse students, teachers and administrators, raise their level of multicultural consciousness, and augment their educational foundations and content knowledge while connecting theory to classroom practice.     

Who says you need to teach reading to 11–13-year-olds?

Research indicates that as students move through the school system, many begin to experience difficulties with reading. With this mind, this study explored current practices and perceptions about reading programmes for 11–13-year-old students in New Zealand schools. The study employed an online survey designed to investigate current reading literacy practices in a sample of New Zealand primary in years 7 and 8. Observations of practice and interviews with literacy leaders, teachers, principals and students were also carried out at five case study schools. The survey indicated that teachers may underestimate the importance of learner engagement and direct teaching strategies. The case studies exemplify the need for good professional development, supportive leadership, effective class management strategies, a positive and engaging learning environment, teachers with a passion for literacy and exemplary and sustained guided reading.     

The Relationship of Self-Concepts to Changes in Cultural Diversity Awareness: Implications for Urban Teacher Educators

This study investigated the relationship between the self-concepts and cultural diversity awareness of 100 European–American pre-service teachers. The Tennessee Self-Concept Scale:2 and the Cultural Diversity Awareness Inventory were administered as a test–retest to ascertain if changes in cultural diversity awareness occurred during a stand-alone multicultural course, and if so were they related to the study participants' pre-test self-concepts. The findings indicate that a statistically significant relationship does exist between total self-concept and total cultural diversity awareness. However, not all five components of self-concept consistently predicted the direction or magnitude of change in the five elements of cultural diversity awareness. These results imply that urban teacher educators should consider both constructs when developing intervention strategies to thwart student resistance to multicultural tenets in stand-alone cultural diversity courses.     

The Rhetoric of Visual Play: An Analysis of Postsubject Voice in New York City

Through an analysis of the street artist Banksy's 2013 residency of New York City, I identify two major rhetorical themes: Images of Discontent and Re-Visions of the City. I argue that the Banksy images exert an influential postsubject voice into the visual discourse of New York City, which I define as a visual articulation that resists traditional markings of identity in favor of visual play. In visual play, elements of the city are turned into toys through a critical orientation towards the urban landscape, postmodern aesthetic codes, participatory rhetoric, and the logics of the virtual. I conclude by arguing that play may offer an effective and transgressive mode of engaging contemporary rhetorical argument, particularly within the materiality of place.     

Coursework Marks High,Examination Marks Low: Discuss

It is commonly believed that the standard of student performance in coursework tends to be higher than that achieved in formal examinations. This view was tested by analysing undergraduate performances in six subjects at four UK universities. Two measures of relative coursework performance were employed. The first is the difference between the mean coursework and examination marks for each module. The second considers the proportion of students in each module who achieve a higher mark in the coursework than in the examination. The measures showed that in English and History coursework performances are slightly higher, equivalent to one-third of one honours class (or division) while, in Biology, Business Studies, Computer Studies and Law, coursework performances are higher by as much as two-thirds of one honours class (or division). The differences observed in the latter subjects are very significant and have serious implications for parity of treatment in degree programmes where students may choose modules with contrasting modes of assessment.