Distance learning and educational equity both began with an emphasis on access, on providing underserved students with an increased access to education. Today definitions of equity have gone beyond simple access to include equal or equivalent treatment and outcomes while definitions of underserved students have expanded to include girls, children of color, children with limited English proficiency and children with disabilities. At the same time the definition of distance learning has expanded to include new technologies, new audiences and new roles. Based on these new definitions and roles, the article raises a number of equity challenges for distance learning educators centering around who is taught, what is taught and how the teaching is done. To answer these challenges, a series of recommendations are suggested that educators can implement to make distance learning a leader in increasing educational equity for all students. The time to act is now. 相似文献
Although research in Computer Assisted Instruction (CAI) currently lacks a well-developed literature and experimental foundation, the number of papers relating to CAI at the 1985 NARST convention at French Lick Springs increased substantially over those presented at the 1984 meeting. This commentary critiques some of those papers and suggests implications for the conduct of research on computers in science learning. The spirit of inquiry and the willingness to share ideas at the 1985 NARST meeting at French Lick Springs enhanced the quality of the meeting and made possible the gathering of papers and information that are the basis for this commentary. One team of authors (Choi & Gennaro, 1985) was so generous as to provide us with software they had developed for their study. The willingness to share was impressive and can facilitate research and development. 相似文献
Background With the increased attention on the implementation of inquiry activities in primary science classrooms, a growing interest has emerged in assessing students’ science skills. Research has thus far been concerned with the limitations and advantages of different test formats to assess students’ science skills.
Purpose This study explores the construction of different instruments for measuring science skills by categorizing items systematically on three subskill levels (science-specific, thinking, metacognition) as well as on different steps of the empirical cycle.
Sample The study included 128 fifth and sixth grade students from seven primary schools in the Netherlands.
Design and method Seven measures were used: a paper-and-pencil test (PPT), three performance assessments, two metacognitive self-report tests, and a test used as an indication of general cognitive ability.
Results Reliabilities of all tests indicate sufficient internal consistency. Positive correlations between the PPT and the three performance assessments show that the different tests measure a common core of similar skills thus providing evidence for convergent validity. Results also show that students’ ability to perform scientific inquiry is significantly related to general cognitive ability. No relationship was found between the measure of general metacognitive ability and either the PPT or the three performance assessments. By contrast, the metacognitive self-report test constructed to obtain information about the application of metacognitive abilities in performing scientific inquiry, shows significant – although small – correlations with two of the performance assessments. Further explorations reveal sufficient scale reliabilities on subskill and step level.
Conclusions The present study shows that science skills can be measured reliably by categorizing items on subskill and step level. Additional diagnostic information can be obtained by examining mean scores on both subskill and step level. Such measures are not only suitable for assessing students’ mastery of science skills but can also provide teachers with diagnostic information to adapt their instructions and foster the learning process of their students. 相似文献
A study was performed in which attacks by four different types of “resident” rat (males housed with fertile females, males housed with sterile females, paired males, and isolated males) on six different types of intruder (isolated males, grouped males, castrated males, isolated females, grouped females, and ovariectomized females) were investigated. The objective was to study features of resident and intruder rats that would allow the designing of an aggression test that used a minimum of animals and produced a rapid behavioral response. In some combinations of residents and intruders, attack was generated within a 10-min test period. Isolated resident males attacked as much as males housed with females; however, paired rats showed only low incidences of attack. The fertility of the female partner did not influence the male’s aggressiveness. Most male attacks were directed towards like-sexed intruders. Only isolated males differentiated between the different treatment types of male intruder, attacking group-housed and castrated rats less intensely than isolates. Of the females, only those that were fertile produced significant amounts of attack behavior and almost exclusively attacked female intruders. Group-housed intruder females received more attacks than isolates. The results suggest optimal conditions for generating two models of attack behavior in the laboratory rat. 相似文献
Microcomputers and appropriate software have the potential to help students learn. They can also serve as appropriate media for investigating how students learn. In this article we describe a research strategy examining learning and behavior when students interacted with microcomputers and software. Results from two preliminary studies illustrate the strategy. A major feature of the strategy included recording students interacting with microcomputer software interfaced with a VCR. The VCR recorded the video output from a microcomputer and students' verbal commentary via microphone input. This technique allowed students' comments about their observations, perceptions, predictions, explanations, and decisions to be recorded simultaneously with their computer input and the display on the microcomputer monitor. The research strategy described can provide important information about cognitive and affective behaviors of students engaged in using instructional software. Research studies utilizing this strategy can enhance our understanding of how students develop and employ important concepts and scientific relationships, how students develop problem-solving skills and solve problems, and how they interact with instructional software. Results of such studies have important implications for teaching and for the design of instructional software. 相似文献
This study was designed to address two purposes. First, we wanted to test working hypotheses derived from previous studies
about the transformation of individual and collective knowledge in elementary classrooms. Second, we attempted to understand
the degree to which “ownership” was an appropriate concept to understand the process of learning in science classrooms. Over
a four-month period, we collected extensive data in a Grade 6/7 classroom studying simple machines. As in our previous studies
we found that (a) conceptual and material resources were readily shared among students, and (b) tool-related practices were
appropriated as newcomers participated with more competent others (peers and teachers) in the pursuit of student-framed goals.
We also found that for discursive change (“learning”) at the classroom level to occur, it appeared more important whether
a new language game was closely related to students' previous language games than who actually proposed the new language game
(teacher or student). Implications are drawn for the design of science curricula and classroom activities.
Both pedagogy and design are still tightly bound by rationalist, symbol-manipulating, problem-solving assumptions that hold
knowledge to be a property of individuals. Pedagogy still concentrates on the individual and individual performance, even
though most work is ultimately collaborative and highly social. (Brown & Duguid, 1992, p. 171) 相似文献
Information regarding why adults choose to participate in higher education is necessary if educators are to provide meaningful programs for these learners. This study was designed and conducted to explore the higher education needs and interests of adults. Factor analysis of interested adults' responses identified four major factors which could influence an adult's decision to participate or not to participate in higher education. Based on the nature of the items comprising each, the factors were designated self-development goal, affective barrier, career goal, and situation barrier. 相似文献
Psychological models of learning have been shaped by information processing models for four decades. These models have led
to teaching models based on information transfer from teachers to students. However, recent research in many fields shows
that information processing models do not account for much of human competence in everyday scientific and lay contexts. At
the same time, situated cognition models have been developed that better account for competence in widely differing situations.
The implications of situated cognition are rather different from those of information processing. Teaching and learning are
no longer conceived simply in terms of information transfer but as increasing participation in everyday practices. Conceiving
of science learning as a trajectory of increasing participation asks educators to rethink the purpose of science education
from preparing scientists to preparing citizens to participate in public enactments of science, and this entails deinstitutionalising
school science to take science beyond the classroom walls. 相似文献