Turning a Service Learning Experience into a Model of Student Engagement: The Lighthouse Heritage Research Connections (LHRC) Project in Hong Kong

The digital shift has provided easy access to academic library users, and yet, the usage of archival collections continues to be low. At the same time, the need for innovation in library services for cultural heritage scholarship and its advancement is emerging. This paper outlines a library-led service-learning program that connects students with lighthouse artifacts, archival collections, scholars in global academia, and wider communities. Student engagement cases are provided to illustrate the way in which the librarian utilizes the Framework of Information Literacy for Higher Education by ACRL to work closely with students. These cases also demonstrate how students can contribute to knowledge creation and preservation efforts for a specific cultural heritage topic that is not static, but which keeps receiving new contributions or additions to the depository. Thus, this paper is an answer to the ACRL's call for pilot projects to be assessed and shared with the wider community of academic librarians and support staff. It also builds on emerging roles for academic libraries like engaged learning. Librarians must move beyond simply seeing themselves as partners. Instead, librarians should see themselves as prime facilitators that co-create and co-develop cultural heritage research and historical projects by connecting actors and resources more effectively than any single actor can do alone.     

Opening classroom interaction: the importance of feedback

Efforts to encourage ‘interactive practice’ in the National Literacy (NLS) and Numeracy (NNS) Strategies in the UK, have led to an emphasis on teacher questions. Recent research into classroom interactions, however, indicate that the pattern of interaction remains largely unchanged since the introduction of these strategies in terms of the type and amount of questions teachers are asking, and the opportunities for extended pupil participation. This article uses evidence gathered from a large‐scale research project examining classroom interactions during literacy and numeracy lessons, and the researchers' critical reflections upon this process, to examine conceptions of interactive pedagogy. It is argued that in order to ‘open’ classroom interaction, emphasis should be less on the questions teachers ask, and more on the manner with which teachers react to pupils' responses to questions. Episodes of classroom interaction from video recorded literacy and numeracy lessons taken as part of the study are used to support this argument. They present evidence of teacher behaviours in reaction to pupils' responses which succeed in facilitating a more interactive learning environment. The implication that such behaviour will contribute towards a model of effective interactive practice is also discussed.     

Briefing Illustrators: Revisiting the Value of Sketch Images

In 1990 Steve Garner produced a school text book titled Design Topics: The Human Factors of Design. He briefed the various graphic artists engaged by the publishers, Oxford University Press, via nearly 140 thumbnail sketches. A comparison of these sketches with the final illustrations reveals important values of drawing. Not only do the comparisons enable the viewer to see something of the intent of the sender, they reveal processes of interpretation, selection, rejection and development, which are normally not available to examination. The paper seeks to contribute to substantiating the value of sketches to these processes of design team working. Since the author is also the originator of the sketches an additional level of insight and commentary is made available to the reader via a process of reflection.     

BOOK REVIEW

Contemporary Education: A Comparative Study of National Systems . John F. Cramer and George S. Browne.     

Heraclitean Thinking: Implications for Philosophy of Education

Heraclitus was the first presocratic Ionian thinker to describe the underlying nature of reality as a set of processes in flux and to affirm the constantly changing nature of the cosmos. In this essay, I discuss four major doctrines of his thought which constitute the crux of the Heraclitean worldview. I then expound some thoughts on the relevance and implications of Heraclitean thinking for philosophy of education.     

On-the-Job Training: Prescriptions and Practice

This article discusses the status of workplace training in the United States, describes a model of how to conduct effective on-the-job training, and presents the results of a questionnaire based on a model designed to assess on-the-job training practices aboard Navy ships. The model views the on-the-job trainer as a coach who guides the trainee through a task using three steps: 1) assessment, 2) training, and 3) evaluation. The questionnaire was sent to over 5,000 shipboard supervisors; 2,321 responded. Results indicate that nearly 50% of the Navy supervisors who responded are not as effective as they could be. The implications of these findings for the civilian workplace are discussed.