The Coach Consult Method: A model for sustainable change in schools

Project work and in‐service training are methods used by educational psychologists (EPs) to promote systemic change in schools. These have some disadvantages, which can limit the long‐term effects of new developments. This paper outlines and evaluates an alternative approach. A new coach consult method combines effective aspects of project work and in‐service training to enable schools to manage their own projects and to encourage sustainable change, embedded within the school system. The evaluation consists of a tiered approach and considers the impact at the levels of direct, training and general effects. Results indicate that the coach consult method for delivering project work in schools has a positive impact at all three levels.     

Summation of responding to CSs and an excitatory test context

The influence of test-trial delay of CS onset in obtaining response summation of an excitatory CS and an independently conditioned context was investigated. Water-deprived rats were given tone-shock and click-shock pairings in the training context and unsignaled footshocks in the test context. Durations of lick suppression in response to the tone (Test 1) and the click (Test 2) were then assessed in the test context. Licking was more suppressed when CS onset occurred early in the test session (e.g., 0 sec) than when it occurred later in the test session (e.g., 300 sec). The results from control groups that had received shock in an irrelevant context rather than the test context indicated that this effect was due to fear of the test context rather than diffuse, nonassociative fear. With onset of the clicks early in the test session on the second test day, response summation of the test context with the clicks was observed. This suggests that appreciable spontaneous recovery had occurred from any test-context extinction that took place on the first test day. We conclude that early onset of the CS on the test trial favors response summation of CSs and test context.     

Making Real Analysis Relevant to Secondary Teachers: Building Up from and Stepping Down to Practice

Future teachers often claim that advanced undergraduate courses, even those that attempt to connect to school mathematics, are not useful for their teaching. This paper proposes a new way of designing advanced undergraduate content courses for secondary teachers. The model involves beginning with an analysis of the curriculum and practices of school mathematics and its teaching, and then using those to build up to the advanced mathematics – in this case, real analysis. After developing definitions, examples, theorems, and proofs, the model then reconnects to practice, asking the teachers to translate ideas from real analysis in ways that are appropriate for teaching high school content to students. To illustrate the model, we provide and discuss two example tasks.     

Hearing Status, Language Modality, and Young Children's Communicative and Linguistic Behavior

This study examined early pragmatic skill development in a group of 38 children with severe or profound hearing loss between 1 and 4 years of age who were enrolled in a simultaneous communication (SC) approach to language learning. Both their use of intentionally communicative acts and their use of language were studied in an analysis of 30-min play sessions between a child and the primary caregiver. Results were compared with previously published data from two age-matched groups: 38 deaf children who were enrolled in oral communication (OC) programs and 84 normally hearing (NH) children. All groups showed a significant improvement with age in the communicative behaviors measured; therefore, the overall trend was toward growth-in all age groups-even when the rates of growth differed. By age 3 years, a pattern of communicative function use had emerged in all three groups. Patterns exhibited by deaf children in the SC and OC groups were similar to each other and to younger NH children but dissimilar to NH age mates. Although the use of signed input by normally hearing parents and teachers did not serve to ameliorate the profound effects of hearing loss on communication development in SC children, it did provide some early advantages. The children in SC groups did not exhibit an advantage over children in OC groups in their overall frequency of communication or the breadth of their vocabulary but they began using words earlier and used mature communicative functions significantly more often. Although children in the OC groups did not exhibit a significant advantage in the overall amount of speech used, they showed an advantage in the breadth of their spoken vocabulary in a conversational setting. Implications for early intervention programming are discussed.     

Living in contradiction without shame: the challenge of intertextual response in GCSE poetry

Changes to the GCSE Literature syllabuses introduced in 2004 have raised a number of pedagogical challenges for teachers and their pupils. One of the most significant is the increased emphasis on intertextuality. In many ways, the fact that students are now expected to be able to make comparisons between texts, as well as to locate them within their political, social and historical context, is to be welcomed. However, this shift in emphasis from the relation between text and reader to one between text and text could threaten the importance of personal response. Insecure readers, particularly, may find it difficult to achieve and demonstrate the appropriate qualities of critical detachment—with their emphasis on complex skills of analysis, synthesis and evaluation—which the new assessment objectives demand. This article explores one young writer's response to an examination question designed to test these skills and seeks to offer some pedagogical explanations for the candidate's relative lack of success in meeting two key examination imperatives: ‘choose’ and ‘compare’.     

Students’ perceptions of the value of electronic feedback—Does disciplinary background really matter?

Feedback on student work is a key mechanism for improving learning in higher education (HE) and can be provided in a variety of forms. Recently, many institutions have moved to the provision of electronic feedback, although evidence for the effectiveness of this is mixed. While many studies evaluating the students’ perception of feedback are now available, there is little evidence of contrasting perceptions of its value according to different disciplines. This work aims to evaluate the relationship between students’ expectations and perception of feedback, especially electronic, and the disciplinary area of study in HE. Students (n = 1017) across different courses from a post-1992 university in the UK were surveyed and categorised into five disciplinary clusters: Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics; Business and Accounting; Art and Design; Media and Languages; and Psychology and Social Care. Perceived relevance as well as the most pertinent features and expectations of the quality of electronic feedback for students varies according to disciplinary cluster and thus closely aligns with a specific cluster’s learning and teaching practices. The findings of this study may help institutions to reflect on the role of electronic feedback as part of their ongoing assessment practice and how teaching in the different disciplines may result in different understandings of the value of electronic feedback.     

Supervisory Style: Its Relation to the Supervisory Working Alliance and Supervisor Self‐Disclosure

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between supervisor perceptions of their supervisory style and elements of the supervision process, including the supervisory working alliance and supervisor self‐disclosure. Data from 137 counselor supervisors demonstrated a significant positive relationship between attractive, interpersonally sensitive, and task‐oriented supervisory styles and the (a) goals, tasks, and bond components of the supervisory working alliance and (b) frequency of supervisor self‐disclosure. Limitations and implications for counselor supervision theory, research, and practice are addressed.     

Context and user needs in virtual learning in pursuit of qualities of learning

Learning is integral in the present dynamic environment characterized by factors, such as intense technological innovation and global economy. Thus, learning is constantly required as, for example, rapid development of technologies is both a push factor in learning requirements and a vehicle to advance the learning process. The global nature of the environment today calls for virtual learning because of convenience, time and cost factors. This research seeks to draw measures to promote virtual learning experience. The research is based on a virtual learning of a master’s level information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) course at the University of Tampere in 2016. This course was offered two times and to two sets of different student groups. A questionnaire was conducted at the mid-course stage to assess the virtual learning experience and propose the ways to improve learning process. The assessment included how well the virtual environment and pedagogy promoted qualities of learning, these are, active, constructive, collaborative, intentional, contextual, transfer and reflective learning. Excellence in learning should always be promoted and in virtual environment, there is always new opportunities because of the advances in technology. This research seeks to promote qualities of learning by considering context in terms of assessing the learning environment that is, participants’ virtual learning experience, study contents and learning technologies. Context is important in order to map the learning process that suits the learners and study contents. The results of this study include highlighting of pedagogical techniques and technological tools that fit the learners’ and study content requirements to foster learning in a virtual environment.     

Enhancing Career Development Through the Career Success Club

The career development of students, demonstrated by students performing appropriate career developmental tasks, is important to institutions of higher education because career developed students are more likely to have career objectives, persist in their academic goals, gain career-related work experience, find employment in their chosen fields, and graduate. The purpose of this study was to determine if the career development of students by class level had been enhanced by participation in a career management plan specifically prepared for undergraduates. The intervention of a career management plan (i.e., the Career Success Club) was successful, especially for seniors and middles, in enhancing the career development of undergraduates. Career management plans may help students that are academically undecided to become more connected to their majors by focusing more on academic and career matters.