Enhancing pre-service teachers’ technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK): a mixed-method study

Educational technology research and development - The main aim of this two-step mixed-method study was to explore the effectiveness of the strategies used to prepare pre-service teachers for...     

The balance model: Hindrance or support for the solving of linear equations with one unknown

The use of concrete models for teaching students how to solve equations is often debated in scientific literature. This article aims to examine the balance model and to identify the issues that divide scientists. We based our reflections on the results of an empirical study and analysis of the various arguments put forward by supporters and opponents of the model. We describe learning situations that were the subject of the empirical study, which involved forty students in two 8th-grade classes. The aim was to teach the formal solving method, which involved performing the same operations on both sides of the equation using, notably, the balance model. Analysis of students' reasoning showed that the presence of negative numbers gave rise to many errors. The difficulties presented by negative numbers were reviewed, eight months later, during an interview with five students, chosen from those who took part in the experiment. Within that context, we discuss the relevance of the balance model and analyse the arguments put forward by researchers who either defend or reject its use.This revised version was published online in September 2005 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Education of gifted pupils in Hungary

where she directs the Department of Didactics. Main research interests: the teaching and learning process; curriculum theory; educational evaluation.     

Cultural Differences in Korean- and Anglo-American Preschoolers' Social Interaction and Play Behaviors

48 Korean- and 48 Anglo-American children were observed in their preschool settings to examine the role of culture in organizing children's activities and in shaping their pretend play behavior. Observers recorded the presence or absence of preselected social behaviors and levels of play complexity. Parents completed a questionnaire about play in the home, teachers rated children's social competence, and children were given the PPVT-R and a socio-metric interview. Korean parents completed an acculturation questionnaire. The findings revealed cultural differences in children's social interaction, play complexity, adult-child interaction and play in the home and in the preschool, adult beliefs about play, scores on the PPVT-R, and children's social functioning with peers. The results suggest that children's social interaction and pretend play behavior are influenced by culture-specific socialization practices that serve adaptive functions.     

Between tradition and modernity: girls’ talk about sexual relationships and violence in Kenya,Ghana and Mozambique

This paper interrogates the influence of a tradition-modernity dichotomy on perspectives and practices on sexual violence and sexual relationships involving girls in three districts of Kenya, Ghana and Mozambique. Through deploying an analytical framework of positioning within multiple discursive sites, we argue that although the dichotomy misrepresents the complexity of contemporary communities, it is nonetheless deployed by girls, educational initiatives and researchers in their reflections on girls’ sexual practices and sexual violence. The analysis examines variations between communities in patterns of and perspectives about sexual relationships, transactional sex and sexual violence. It illuminates ways in which features of ‘modernisation’ and ‘tradition’ both exacerbate and protect girls from violence. Across contexts, girls actively positioned themselves between tradition and modernity, while positioning others at the extreme poles. Education initiatives also invoked bipolar positions in their attempts to protect girls’ rights to education and freedom from violence. The paper concludes by considering the implications for educational intervention and the potential for the analytical framing to generate richer, more contextualised understandings about girls’ perspectives, experiences and ways of resisting sexual violence.     

Psychological foundations of instructional design for emerging computer-based instructional technologies: Part I

Computer-based instruction (CBI) has strong historical roots in behavioral psychology. In many cases, behavioral CBI is very effective in meeting instructional needs. Criticisms of CBI, centering around inadequate attention to higher-level learning, underline some of the shortcomings of rigid adherence to behavioral design paradigms. Recent advances in cognitive psychology have revealed alternatives rarely applied outside of experimental settings. Whereas both behavioral and cognitive influences are potentially important, few attempts have been made to extrapolate the contributions of both to the design of CBI. In this article, the contributions of behavioral and cognitive psychology to the design of CBI are reviewed and analyzed.     

Employability and higher education: the follies of the ‘Productivity Challenge’ in the Teaching Excellence Framework

This article considers questions of ‘employability’, a notion foregrounded in the Green and White Papers on the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF). The paper first questions government imperatives concerning employability and suggests a series of mismatches that are evident in the rhetorics in this area. This summary opens up elements of what I am calling the first ‘folly’ in the field. The second section of the paper considers recent research with individual academics engaged in employability activity. This research suggests another series of mismatches in the aims and outcomes of ‘employability initiatives’ and opens up a further series of ‘follies’ in the day-to-day practices of academics and students’ responses to them. The third section of the paper turns to academics’ reports of student behaviour in relation to the outcomes of their degree. This section develops an argument that relates to the final ‘folly’ associated with the current focus on employability. I argue that students’ focus on outcomes (which at face value suggests they have internalized the importance of employment) is contributing to the production of graduates who do not have the dispositions that employers – when interviewed – say that they want. The highly performative culture of higher education, encouraged by the same metrics that will be extended through the TEF, is implicated then in not preparing students for the workplace.     

“You need a phone and camera in your bag before you go out!”: Children’s play with imaginative technologies

Early childhood settings value play as the way young children learn and educators encourage children’s re-enactment of cultural practices in the imaginative play spaces provided. From a cultural-historical perspective, children expect these imaginative play spaces to contain objects from their social contexts, but what happens when technologies are not provided? The aim of this study was to explore children’s imaginative play involving working and imaginative technologies within two kindergartens (the year before formal schooling). Imaginative play spaces are designed to replicate social situations relevant to the cultural context in which they occur and as technologies increase in society, their proliferation is reflected within early childhood settings. Understanding the role that imaginative technologies can play in children’s digital literacy learning is important for the early childhood field. Also, these devices are often absent from literature and overlooked in conversations about children’s digital participation. The findings show how the children engaged with the imaginative technologies and raises questions around the influence of these technologies on children’s imaginative play and their technological understandings. The findings have implications for educators’ understandings of children’s play with technologies and the objects they provide in an era where children’s lives are increasingly immersed in technology.     

Connectedness to Campus and Likelihood of Help-Seeking for Suicidality among College Women

The goal of the present study was to examine the link between connectedness to campus and the likelihood of help-seeking from a mental health professional/school counselor for thoughts of suicide among college women. An online survey was administered to college students to assess perceived likelihood of seeking help, feelings of connectedness to campus, sense of togetherness with peers, and presence of a supportive group of friends on campus. Findings indicated that feeling connected to campus was positively associated with perceived likelihood of help-seeking for suicidal ideation. Furthermore, this association was stronger among participants reporting either a sense of togetherness with peers or a supportive group of friends. Efforts to increase students’ sense of connection to the larger campus community and build peer relationships may promote help-seeking for suicidal ideation among college women.     

International approaches to the definition,philosophical tenets,and core elements of physical literacy: A scoping review

PROSPECTS - This paper addresses the inadequate understanding of the concept of physical literacy (PL), often originating from complex terminology and philosophical language used in the current...