The communication investigator: Teaching research methods to undergraduates

This essay explores the basic communication research course for undergraduates. Discussed are several key notions for making this course valuable to the undergraduate: the attitude of the instructor, the attitude of the students, course requirements and activities, and evaluation techniques.     

Effects of network treatments on perceptions of a political campaign film: Can rhetorical criticism make a difference?

Presented here are the findings from a quasi‐experimental comparison of three network treatments of “A New Beginning,” a campaign film that aroused considerable controversy when the Republicans substituted it for a speech at the 1984 Republican National Convention as a way of getting the networks to air it. Of paramount interest in the study were the effects on viewers of one network's critical preview of the film. Of the three major networks, only NBC elected to air the entire film, but they preceded its showing with a commentary on the film that was far more critical than those by CBS and ABC. Surprisingly, Ss predisposed toward Ronald Reagan did not derogate the NBC treatment of the film, but neither did NBC's criticisms adversely affect perceptions of the film. To the contrary, ratings of the film and network treatments of the film were highest for NBC viewers. The findings are discussed with a view toward assessing the uses and limitations of rhetorical criticism in television coverage of political campaigns.     

Economic rationalism and the politics of education in Australia

Until the mid‐1970s, the politics of urban school desegregation concentrated almost exclusively on the attainment of some form of racial balance. The racial balance paradigm became the focal point for desegregation planners and for local, state and national dispute about ‘forced bussing’. However, in its 1977 Milliken II ruling, the Supreme Court added critical new elements to the urban school desegregation paradigm. By affirming a desegregation plan which included remedial education components in all‐minority schools, and which required state participation in financing these components, Milliken II heralded a new era of urban school desegregation. Resource issues and school effectiveness issues joined racial balance issues in the crucible of desegregation politics. In this chapter, the post‐Milliken politics of urban school desegregation are highlighted through examination of the St Louis and Kansas City cases. New goals, new issues, new alignments of interests and new political strategies are apparent, presenting new challenges to students of urban education policy and politics.     

Statement of Theme

School accountability and student assessment are closely associated in educational jurisdictions’ attempts to monitor student achievement, focus instruction, and improve subsequent student and school performance. The research reported in this article examines the School Effectiveness Framework in Ontario, Canada, exploring the foundations upon which the framework is based and educators’ efforts to use assessment information to monitor the effectiveness of their reform efforts. Through document analysis and interviews, the researchers highlight the challenges and opportunities surrounding the accountability and assessment partnership.     

MATAL: the Israel Elementary Science Project‐‐a Retrospective

Summaries

English

In this article, the authors reflect on the development and implementation of the Israel Elementary Science Project (MATAL). The MATAL project, initially established in 1968, used British and American programmes as its foundation, but so modified them that they became applicable to the needs of less developed countries. The authors describe the structure and content of their project, as well as their work in teacher training and the development of ancillary and enrichment programmes. It is hoped that the Israeli experience in developing an elementary school science curriculum will be of interest and potential benefit to curriculum workers in other countries also.     

Functional Competence in Mathematics

Cognitive and educational researchers are paying increasing attention to the impact of instruction in the college classroom. Recent research has demonstrated that students' manipulated perceptions of control and success can impede or enhance the benefits of one effective teaching behavior, namely, instructor expressiveness. In this study, students' actual perceptions of control and success were assessed, rather than manipulated. In a simulated college classroom, students were classified into perceived control (low, high) and perceived success (low, high) categories based on their perceptions of control and success over their prelecture test performance. Students were presented with either unexpressive or expressive instruction; then they completed a postlecture achievement test and postachievement questionnaire. Under both instruction conditions, high-control/high-success students demonstrated the best achievement results, whereas, inconsistent with the hypotheses, students with low perceptions of control and high perceptions of success demonstrated the poorest academic performance and unique affects. These results are discussed in relation to the significance of individual differences across teaching conditions.     

The impact of placing pupils with special educational needs in mainstream schools on the achievement of their peers

Background Over the past 20 years or so policy and practice on the education of children with special educational needs (SEN) has been aimed at placing increasing numbers of children in a mainstream school environment. Although this policy has been supported in principle by many teachers, parents and local authority officers, there has been much less agreement about whether this principle can be realized in practice, and even if it can, about what the impacts might be on the achievements of pupils with SEN in mainstream schools and, in particular, on their peers.

Purpose This paper discusses the key findings from a systematic review of the literature carried out by the Inclusion Review Group, on behalf of the Evidence for Policy and Practice Information (EPPI)-Centre, the purpose of which was to review research evidence on whether the placement of pupils with special educational needs (SEN) within mainstream schools has an impact on academic and social outcomes for pupils without SEN.

Design and methods The methodology followed the procedures adopted by the EPPI-Centre. Having agreed on the inclusion and exclusion criteria for studies that could be included in the review, an initial pool of 7137 papers were identified through electronic databases. After having screened all their titles and/or abstracts and having marked out possible papers to be included in the review, 119 paper copies were obtained—all of which were read by one or more of the authors of this paper. This led to a further reduction to 26 studies that were subjected to the EPPI data extraction process and synthesis.

Conclusions Overall, the findings suggest that there are no adverse effects on pupils without SEN of including pupils with special needs in mainstream schools, with 81% of the outcomes reporting positive or neutral effects. Despite concerns about the quality of some of the studies that were reviewed and the fact that the great majority were carried out in the USA, these findings should bring some comfort to headteachers, parents and local authority officers around the world at a time when concerns have been raised about the problems that schools face in responding to the twin agenda of becoming more inclusive and, at the same time, raising the achievements of all their pupils.     

Teacher and student: Designing a democratic relationship

Teaching is a practice that aims to develop appropriate relationships between the mature and the immature. The good teacher has learned to balance the personal and the impersonal dimensions of daily contact with young people. Classroom experiences are often so subtle and the time for reflection too frequently so minimal that teachers have to rely on momentary responses rather than careful analysis. But, when we tease out the meanings and the implications of our experience, we are able to spot the limitations of our assumptions, to examine the craft of our profession, and to contemplate the new horizons that our students open up. The moments considered in this paper all concern the opportunities and dangers of conversation in a school. The goal is to provide notes on the ways adults succeed or fail in their efforts to engage young people in meaningful conversation. The mutuality of the teacher/student relationship signifies the obligation of the mature to provide, as Dewey says, 'whatever capacity for sympathetic understanding' we have gained from our own experience to each educational occasion.     

The Physical Education Predisposition Scale: Preliminary development and validation

Abstract

The main aim of this study was to develop and test psychometrically the Physical Education Predisposition Scale, to assess secondary school students' cost–benefit assessment of physical education (PE) participation (PE attitude affective and attitude cognitive) and self-perceptions (PE perceived competence and self-efficacy). Secondary aims were to explore how the two variables were related, and to investigate age and gender differences. Altogether, 315 Year 8 and 9 students (aged 12–14 years) from four North West England schools completed the Physical Education Predisposition Scale. Principal components analysis revealed the presence of a simple two-factor solution explaining 60.7% of the variance. Factor 1 (labelled Perceived PE Worth) reflected attitude affective and attitude cognitive (α = 0.91), and factor 2 (Perceived PE Ability) represented perceived competence and self-efficacy (α = 0.89). Significant positive correlations were observed between the factors (r = 0.67 to 0.71, P < 0.001). Boys scored significantly higher than girls on Perceived PE Worth (P < 0.001) and Perceived PE Ability (P = 0.02). Similarly, Year 8 students scored significantly higher than Year 9 students on Perceived PE Worth (P = 0.005) and Perceived PE Ability (P < 0.001). Our results support the potential of the Physical Education Predisposition Scale as a concise measurement tool for use in the PE setting, for both teachers and researchers.