Prompting undergraduate students’ metacognition of learning: implementing ‘meta-learning’ assessment tasks in the biomedical sciences

To succeed at post-secondary education, it’s essential that students develop an understanding of their own knowledge and learning processes. This metacognition of learning, or ‘meta-learning’, helps students to become more effective learners, as they become more aware of their self-regulatory processes and recognise the effectiveness of their study strategies. To increase biomedical science students’ self-awareness, we have designed and implemented meta-learning assessment tasks across our biomedical science courses. Most students reported that meta-learning tasks had a positive impact on their learning, as they prompted self-regulatory processes of forethought and self-reflection. We found that students were equally likely to change or not change their study strategies across subsequent semesters. Those students that did not change were generally high achievers, believing their study approaches were most effective, but their performance did not improve across semesters. In contrast, students who adapted, mostly by modifying how they appraised and rearranged records or improved planning and time management, performed less well overall but significantly improved their performance across semesters. Meta-learning tasks may prompt students to become more self-reflective and independent learners by affecting their approach to learning, enabling them to reflect on their study strategies, adapt and improve performance, and may enable the development of lifelong learning skills.     

Assessing the importance of cultural capital on post-secondary education attendance in Canada

This paper extends the current literature on access to post-secondary education by investigating the role played by various family background characteristics related to the home environment and family habits and behaviours. Exploiting the extraordinary richness of the Youth in Transition Survey in this regard, we include whether the family ate dinner together, whether they discussed current affairs, and how often their children went to concerts – and if so, what kind of concerts. Many of these factors are found to have a significant relationship with attending post-secondary education, university in particular. Furthermore, these factors are in addition to – and at least to some degree independent of – more conventional influences such as parental education and family income. With appeal to the paradigm of ‘cultural capital’ – which refers to the knowledge, experiences, and connections which help individuals succeed in life – these results indicate how advantages in accessing higher levels of education accrue to those from families that are rich in this kind of asset, while others are left behind.     

Teachers’ emotional labour,discrete emotions,and classroom management self-efficacy

Extending research on teachers’ emotions beyond general educational contexts and Western samples, we examined how teachers’ emotions correlated with their emotional labour strategies and classroom management self-efficacy with an East-Asian sample in an English teaching context (127 Korean English teachers). Surface acting (emotional expressions modification) correlated positively with anxiety and frustration, whereas deep acting (internal feelings modification) correlated positively with enjoyment and pride and negatively with anxiety. Enjoyment and anger correlated positively and frustration negatively with classroom management self-efficacy. Enjoyment and frustration were documented as mediators in the relationship between emotional labour strategies and classroom management self-efficacy. The results suggest that deep acting is linked to experiencing positive emotions, which in turn is positively related to classroom management self-efficacy, whereas surface acting is linked to experiencing negative emotions, which in turn relates negatively to classroom management self-efficacy. Theoretical and educational implications will be further discussed.     

Designing Blended Inquiry Learning in a Laboratory Context: A Study of Incorporating Hands-On and Virtual Laboratories

This article reports on the development of a methodology that integrates virtual and hands-on inquiry in a freshman introductory biology course. Using a two time × two order-condition design, an effective combination (blend) of the two environments was evaluated with 39 freshman biology participants. The quantitative results documented no significant effect of presentation order but demonstrated a significant effect of the combined learning experience. The qualitative results showed a strong preference by students for the virtual work preceding the hands-on laboratory. The study provides practitioners an effective alternative to traditional instructional practices by combining virtual and hands-on inquiry learning.

我国自然旅游资源私有化后果动态管理研究

通过对"自然旅游资源私有化(NBTRP)"现象的机会和危险分析。NBTRP产生的影响既有正面影响也有负面影响,因此"NBTRP净影响监管模型"被设计用以动态综合评价目标目的地NBTRP的成效。     

Stakeholders and Senates: the governance of higher education institutions in South Africa

This article investigates the issue of the governance of higher education institutions and argues that governance by Senates is more appropriate than governance by stakeholders for such institutions. It discusses the ambiguous democratic credentials of stakeholder politics and argues against this mode of politics in the governance of higher education institutions, especially in respect to their ‘transformation’. In terms of distinctions between convergent and shared interests, service and constitutive institutions and the essential lack of transparency of academic practices, it argues that higher education institutions should be governed by the body of accomplished academics. The conclusion is not that Senates cannot be corrupt, but that to substitute governance by stakeholders for governance by Senates cannot solve that problem.     

Standards for Teacher Tests

States are increasingly requiring that public school teachers pass one or more tests as a condition for permanent employment. As a result of a recent federal court decision, these tests must now satisfy the same legal standards as other employment tests. Moreover, some of the measures used to assess teacher competence no longer rely on multiple-choice items. They now utilize various types of open-ended performance assessments. This article discusses how these developments may affect the adverse impact, reliability, validity, and pass-fail standards of teacher certification tests. The article concludes by recommending that such tests combine multiple-choice questions with open-end tasks that focus on the common or critical situations that are likely to arise across the full range of practice setting for which the teacher is being certified or licensed.     

Environmental Consciousness among Students in Senior Secondary Schools: the case of Hong Kong

This paper examines the level of environmental consciousness of students in an education system where curriculum objectives emphasised in the classroom are often strongly shaped by public examinations. The study sample was drawn randomly in 1993 from Secondary 5 geography classes taught by teachers who had earlier completed a survey on style and emphasis in the teaching of environmental issues. Respondents were asked to complete a questionnaire on environmental understanding, attitude and behaviour. A sample of them was given a further set of questions on participation in activities and lifestyle patterns with an environmental bearing. Findings indicate that respondents had only a limited understanding of environmental issues, especially with respect to higher order cognitive objectives like synthesis and evaluation and the comprehension of information presented in various diagrammatic forms. In terms of attitude and behaviour the degree of concern for environmental quality was also limited. Most respondents did not show much willingness to take an active role in environmental protection in cases where conflicts with personal freedom or demands on physical effort, expression of opinions or attempts to influence other people were involved. To a certain extent this pattern is the result of the rapid growth of materialistic values in society and the lack of attention to attitudinal and behavioural objectives in classroom teaching and public examinations. The coordinated efforts of teachers and supporting teams like curriculum planners, examiners and environmentalist associations are certainly required to improve the situation and promote the balanced development of environmental consciousness in schools.     

Standards for Teacher Tests

States are increasingly requiring that public school teachers pass one or more tests as a condition for permanent employment. As a result of a recent federal court decision, these tests must now satisfy the same legal standards as other employment tests. Moreover, some of the measures used to assess teacher competence no longer rely on multiple-choice items. They now utilize various types of open-ended performance assessments. This article discusses how these developments may affect the adverse impact, reliability, validity, and pass-fail standards of teacher certification tests. The article concludes by recommending that such tests combine multiple-choice questions with open-end tasks that focus on the common or critical situations that are likely to arise across the full range of practice setting for which the teacher is being certified or licensed.