Developing Peer Mentoring Support for TAFE Students Entering 1st-Year University Early Childhood Studies

At Queensland University of Technology (QUT, Australia), in the Bachelor of Education (BEd) (Early Childhood) (EC), Technical and Further Education (TAFE) students with a diploma enroll with advanced standing (1 year’s credit). These students share many challenges faced by 1st-year university students—workload, technology, academic orientation, and application. They also experience feelings of isolation and uncertainty in dealing with the “university culture” (Cantwell & Scevak, 2004 Cantwell, R. H. and Scevak, J. J. 2004. Engaging university learning: The experiences of students entering university via recognition of prior industrial experience. Higher Education Research and Development, 23(2): 131–145. [CSA][CROSSREF][Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]; Dickson, 2000 Dickson, J. (2000, July). TAFE child care graduates beginning a university teaching degree. Paper presented at the Australian Association of the Research in Education, Sydney, Australia. www.aare.edu.au/00pap/dic00164.htm (Accessed: 5 March 2005).  [Google Scholar]). Often, they do not perform as well academically and their attrition rates are higher than those for 1st-year students and the remainder of the BEd (EC) cohort (Strategic Information & Analysis Division of Finance, Resources, Planning, QUT, 2003). This project addresses issues facing these students in their transition to university by developing an integrated and contextualized mentoring program designed specifically for their needs. Nine early childhood 3rd- and 4th-year students were enlisted as mentors to groups of approximately six transition TAFE students. In this paper we discuss the dynamics of the mentoring scheme and future directions for mentoring projects within the BEd (EC).     

Integrating privacy studies into teacher education curricula

Abstract

Privacy studies may be seen by some teacher educators as being ‘anti-technology’ in their character, with the potential to dim the enthusiasm of future teachers for new technological initiatives. However, privacy is taking on new significance in an age of the Internet and advanced information technologies, as the examples and sources outlined in this article demonstrate. Privacy issues have a strong influence on various pressing international political and economic concerns, and thus add important dimensions to curricula. Some technological developments (such as encryption) also provide hands-on dimensions to privacy topics that are likely to whet the interests of many students. Teacher educators can work to introduce privacy notions to future teachers in ways that will enhance both their information technology studies and their understanding of other curricular areas (including citizenship, business, and social studies). As described in this article, privacy exercises, scenarios, and hands-on laboratory sessions were provided in several teacher education courses in the United States. What teacher educators do in relation to privacy studies will help determine the future character of discourse and the direction of technological development pertaining to privacy.     

Are Textbooks Dead? Making Sense of the Digital Transition

College administrators and faculty are struggling to make smart decisions in the midst of a barrage of information. Some of what they??re hearing and reading is confusing, some of it is exaggerated and some of it is just wrong. Changes in digital course materials are moving forward swiftly, but not at warp speed. The challenge is to navigate digital opportunities without losing sight of learning outcomes, costs and wear and tear on students, teachers and institutions. A nimble but careful move forward requires dependable partnerships, fresh thinking and a genuine understanding of the risks and rewards. To help make sense of the digital transition, this is an assessment of how course materials will evolve and Follett Higher Education Group??s predictions for the near- and long-term future of digital learning.     

The New Way to Manage Content Across Platforms

Because the definition of content has expanded to include everything from text, graphics, audio, video, data, or any combination of these, determining the right mix of content to ensure relevance and profitability requires publishers to pay significantly more attention to the needs of their audience. This article guides publishers through the content strategy development process and shows how decisions made regarding content strategy influence the publisher??s content management and distribution functions as well. The article also includes a detailed list of the latest in content creation, management, production, and distribution trends, along with a clearly stated implication for each.     

A case study: the evolution of a ��facilitator model�� liaison program in an academic medical library

Question:

What type of liaison program would best utilize both librarians and other library staff to effectively promote library services and resources to campus departments?

Setting:

The case is an academic medical center library serving a large, diverse campus.

Methods:

The library implemented a “facilitator model” program to provide personalized service to targeted clients that allowed for maximum staff participation with limited subject familiarity. To determine success, details of liaison-contact interactions and results of liaison and department surveys were reviewed.

Results:

Liaisons successfully recorded 595 interactions during the program''s first 10 months of existence. A significant majority of departmental contact persons (82.5%) indicated they were aware of the liaison program, and 75% indicated they preferred email communication.

Conclusion:

The “facilitator model” provides a well-defined structure for assigning liaisons to departments or groups; however, training is essential to ensure that liaisons are able to communicate effectively with their clients.     

The disciplinary dimensions of nineteenth-century gymnastics for US women

This study examines the conditions and terms under which US discourses promoting gymnastics for women institutionalized those exercise regimens as vehicles of disciplinarity between 1830–1870. Specifically, it finds that those texts encouraged practices of medical examination and measurement along with a variety of additional, interconnected and significant disciplinary operations: economies of space, of distribution, and of order; logics of temporality, of individual development, and of social salvation; procedures of monitoring and of rendering normalizing judgments; mechanisms of review and of punishment through exercise; as well as the dynamics of panopticism and of self-monitoring. That array of disciplinary techniques, in turn, was meant to materially effect not only a healthy, orderly, and morally transcendent social body but also enlightened, disciplined, and idealized feminine subjectivities. As a consequence, this paper also asserts that the resistant potentialities of gymnastics for US women between 1830–1870 cannot be evaluated thoroughly without some consideration of modern power's nature, attributes, and applications.     

Twenty-metre shuttle run test performance of English children aged 11 – 15 years in 2007: Comparisons with international standards

Abstract

Recent international normative data for the 20-m shuttle-run test demonstrated a below-average performance index for UK children. The aims of the present study were to create an international comparison of 20-m shuttle-run test performance in a sample of English children and to identify age- and sex-specific differences in test performance. Mass, stature, body mass index, and 20-m shuttle-run test performance were measured in 2041 children aged 11 – 15 years (963 boys, 1078 girls). Performance was expressed as maximum running velocity and a performance index was created by generating z-scores. The shuttle-run test performance index was higher than the existing published value (?0.046, 95% confidence interval [CI] ?0.070 to ?0.022) for all children (0.061, 95% CI = 0.006 to 0.115), for boys (0.075, 95% CI = ?0.022 to 0.171), and for girls (0.048, 95% CI = ?0.010 to 0.106). Boys' relative performance increased significantly (F = 4.43, P = 0.002) throughout the measured age range, whereas girls' relative performance tended to decrease (F = 1.98, P = 0.096). The results were favourable when compared with existing values. Differences in performance index may be due to the different geographical areas from which present and past samples were drawn. Reasons for differences in the performance indices between boys and girls warrant further investigation.     

Effect of Guided Practice on Overhand-Throw Ball Velocities of Kindergarten Children

Abstract

Forty-five children from two intact kindergartens in one school were randomly assigned by sex to (a) an experimental group which received a movement program that included 120 min of guided practice in the overhand throw; or (b) a control group which received the same movement program but no exposure to the throw. A third group (N = 24), randomly selected by sex from a comparable school, received no movement program. Before and after the eight-week instructional period, ten trials of each child's overhand throw for force were filmed. Horizontal ball velocities were simultaneously recorded. ANOVAs on pre- and posttest ball velocities for each sex within each treatment group revealed no significant practice effect over ten trials (p > .05); thus, the trial mean was used as each subject's score. Two-way ANOVAs (treatment X sex) on the pre- and posttest data indicated no significant velocity differences (p > .05) between groups either before or after instruction. Boys had significantly greater velocities than girls (p < .05). Eight weeks of instruction that included 120 min of guided practice in the overarm throw did not significantly change the ball velocities of kindergarten children when compared to two groups with no formal throwing experience.     

Index for Volume 52 (1981)

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare fitness levels of children participating in a movement education (ME) program to Illinois fitness norms (control group). The AAHPERD Health-Related Fitness test was administered to children ages 7 through 12 during May in each of the three years, 1980–83. The skinfold measures showed that the ME children had more skinfold thickness regardless of age and gender. Scores for sit-ups and sit and reach over the three years for ME children showed that the 9- and 11-year-old ME males had more abdominal strength and 11- and 12-year-old ME females, less flexibility. Times in the mile run indicated that ME children were slower than the control group. Reference scores at the 50th and 25th percentile on the Illinois norm tables were located for each fitness measurement. These references were then used to determine the percentage of ME children who fell at or above the 50th percentile and at or below the 25th percentile. Data indicated that ME children need remediation in cardiovascular activity and reduction in subcutaneous fat.