The longitudinal association of childhood school engagement with adult educational and occupational achievement: findings from an Australian national study

The research investigated the association between school engagement and adult education and occupation outcomes, within the context of a 1985 Australian longitudinal national cohort study of the factors affecting children's long‐term health and well‐being. School engagement may be more modifiable than other factors related to academic success, such as academic attainment, which is influenced by family background. A School Engagement Index was constructed using questionnaire items on school enjoyment and boredom. Related school engagement items included learner self‐concept, motivation to learn, sense of belonging, participation in school or extra‐mural activities, and enjoyment of physical activity. In 2004–2006, participants (aged 26 to 30 years) reported their highest level of education achieved and current occupation. Potential covariates included age, sex, markers of socio‐economic status in childhood, personality and school‐level variables (i.e., number of students, single sex versus co‐education; government, private or independent). Logistic regression was used to estimate the odds of achieving post‐compulsory school education and achieving higher status occupations. Findings revealed that each unit of school engagement was independently associated with a 10% higher odds (OR 1.10 95% CI 1.01,1.21) of achieving a post‐compulsory school education. Maternal education, self‐concept as a learner, motivation to learn, all also significantly predicted achieving post‐compulsory school education. School engagement was found to mediate the association between the personality characteristic of agreeableness and education outcomes. Higher school engagement was also independently associated with achieving higher status occupations 20 years later (OR 1.11 95% CI 1.03, 1.20). Importantly, this was independent of a host of background factors.     

Cascading the use of Web 2.0 technology in secondary schools in the United Kingdom: identifying the barriers beyond pre-service training

This paper reports on research that took place at two universities in the United Kingdom, over two years. The research focuses on the use of Web 2.0 technology, specifically blogs, with pre-service teachers, both during their university programme and the first year of teaching as full-time newly qualified teachers (NQTs). The purpose of this research was to add to a developing body of knowledge by identifying whether technology used by pre-service teachers during their training course can be cascaded into their practice once qualified. Key findings identify a number of enablers and barriers to cascading technology in the classroom; these include curriculum time, pupil skills and support. The research concludes that early professional support and development should continue during the early years of teaching and assumptions about new teachers as champions of cascading innovative use of Web 2.0 technologies into their practice as NQTs may be over-optimistic.     

The effects of anxiety and strategic planning on visual search behaviour

The past decade has witnessed increased interest in the visual search behaviour of athletes. Little is known, however, about the relationship between anxiety and eye movements in sport performers or about the extent to which athletes' planned and actual visual search strategies correspond. To address these issues, we conducted two studies. In Study 1, eight expert female gymnasts were presented with three digital slides of a model performing a skill that is known to be anxiety-provoking in this sport--namely, the 'back flip' on the beam. By varying the height of the beam and the presence or absence of safety mats, the slides differed in the amount of anxiety that they elicited vicariously in the viewer. In the study, the gymnasts were asked to imagine themselves in the position of the depicted model and to describe the anxiety that they felt. As they viewed the slides, their eye movements were recorded. As predicted, anxiety was associated with an increase in the number of fixations to peripheral areas. In addition, the more 'threatening' slides elicited significantly more fixations than the less feared images. In Study 2, the plans of 15 equestrian performers (5 expert, 5 intermediate and 5 novice) were elicited as they engaged in a virtual 'walk' around a computerized show-jumping course. Contrary to expectations, the congruence between intended and actual search behaviour was not significantly greater for expert riders than for the less skilled groups. Also, the fact that the top riders allocated more fixations to slides than the less skilled performers challenged the prediction that expertise would be associated with economy of visual search. Finally, as expected, the expert riders were significantly less dependent on the overall 'course plan' than the intermediate and novice equestrian performers when inspecting the fences.     

To Plan,or Not to Plan,Is There Even a Question? A Select Annotated Bibliography of Urban Studies Periodicals Focused on Planning

A bibliography of periodicals focused on planning within the urban studies field is presented. The bibliography contains scholarly, trade, and popular titles. Each entry contains identical categories of information (where each category is applicable), including an annotation. The bibliography is meant to aid in collection development in this subject area.