Instructing Adolescents with Learning Disabilities: A Component and Composite Analysis

Instructional components that positively influence performance of adolescents are identified based on a comprehensive meta‐analysis of intervention studies for students with learning disabilities. Explicit practice and advanced organization are basic instructional components in a number of successful intervention programs. The purpose of this article is to identify the components of various instructional models that best predicted effect sizes for adolescents with learning disabilities. Three important findings emerged. First, 8 instructional factors (Questioning, Sequencing and Segmentation, Explicit Skill Modeling, Organization and Explicit Practice, Small‐Group Setting, Indirect‐Teacher Activities (e.g., homework), Technology, and Scaffolding) captured the majority of intervention programs for adolescents with LD. Second, only the organization/explicit factor contributed significant variance (16%) to effect size. This factor included only 2 instructional components: advanced organization and explicit practice. Finally, the single most important instructional component related to high effect sizes was explicit practice (treatment activities related to distributed review and practice, repeated practice, sequenced reviews, daily feedback, and/or weekly reviews).     

Planning models in higher education: Historical review and survey of currently available models

The use of planning models in higher education has been receiving increasing attention in recent years. The article summarizes the planning model literature from its earliest use to the present, emphasizing the generalized resource allocation models. An organizational chart is presented which allows a more specific categorization of models. Several examples of each category are cited from the current literature. Conceptual issues such as implementation, acceptance, suitability and effectiveness are discussed in terms applicable to models in general. The article concludes with an in-depth analysis of the six significant resource allocation models: HELP/PLANTRAN, RRPM, SEARCH, CAMPUS, TRADES, and EFPM.     

金沙县湖水生态林场森林资源的生态经济价值评估

森林资源的生态经济价值除传统意义上的林木、林地等有形价值外,还应包括其生态价值、社会价值在内.全面合理地评估这些价值是开展森林资源资产化管理的一项基础性工作.应用市场价值法、机会成本法、影子价格法等,评估了金沙湖水生态林场的生态经济价值,以期为制定和实施相应的保护、开发森林资源的政策提供一些科学依据.     

Learning opportunities from group discussions: warrants become the objects of debate

In the mathematics education literature, there is currently a debate about the mechanisms by which group discussion can contribute to mathematical learning and under what conditions this learning is likely to occur. In this paper, we contribute to this debate by illustrating three learning opportunities that group discussions can create. In analyzing a videotaped episode of eight middle school students discussing a statistical problem, we observed that these students frequently challenged the arguments that their colleagues presented. These challenges invited students to be explicit about what mathematical principles, or warrants, they were implicitly using as a basis for their mathematical claims, in some cases recognize the modes of reasoning they were using were invalid and reject these modes of reasoning, and in other cases, attempt to provide deductive support to justify why their modes of reasoning were appropriate. We then describe what social and environmental conditions allowed the discussion analyzed in this paper to occur.

Teachers’ Perspectives on a Professional Development Intervention to Improve Science Instruction Among English Language Learners

Our 5-year professional development intervention is designed to promote elementary teachers’ knowledge, beliefs, and practices in teaching science, along with English language and mathematics for English Language Learning (ELL) students in urban schools. In this study, we used an end-of-year questionnaire as a primary data source to seek teachers’ perspectives on our intervention during the first year of implementation. Teachers believed that the intervention, including curriculum materials and teacher workshops, effectively promoted students’ science learning, along with English language development and mathematics learning. Teachers highlighted strengths and areas needing improvement in the intervention. Teachers’ perspectives have been incorporated into our on-going intervention efforts and offer insights into features of effective professional development initiatives in improving science achievement for all students.

Geriatric community health workers’ views about aging,work, and retirement: implications for geriatrics and gerontology education

ABSTRACT

Seasoned geriatric community health workers offered valuable data that will inform educators and community health workers working with older persons. Geriatric community health workers’ views about retirement and about facilitators and barriers that keep them engaged with older adults during retirement were identified. Twenty geriatric community health workers participated in semi-structured, qualitative interviews conducted by the research team. Sixty percent of the participants (N = 12) reported plans not to work during retirement, although 40% (N = 8) expressed interest in full- or part-time employment post-retirement. When asked about their expectations to stay in the field of aging or gerontology in some capacity during retirement, 30% (N = 6) expected to stay in gerontology during retirement. The findings from this research will help organizations and educational institutions create programs and resources that will encourage geriatric community health workers to continue working in the field of aging during retirement.     

Is politics the problem and markets the answer? An essay review of Politics, Markets, and America's Schools

Politics, Markets, and America's Schools is an ambitious book that draws eclectically on concepts from political science, the sociology of organizations and educational learning theory. Chubb and Moe employ an extensive array of data seeking to link the mechanisms that control school operations to student achievement. They conclude that a total restructuring of the governance system of American education — from democratic to market control — is necessary. Our review scrutinizes a set of critical decisions made by Chubb and Moe in defining their key concepts and in the analytical models employed in this research. We argue that many of these decisions are not justified on either theoretical or methodological grounds. Moreover, the cumulative effect of the decision tends to tilt the empirical evidence toward supporting the authors' a priori beliefs. As a result, we conclude that Politics, Markets, and America's Schools is best viewed as a policy argument, where extensive, but not always solid empirical evidence has been artfully employed to advance the authors' preconceived notions about American schooling.     

Standards‐based reform and its unintended consequences: Implications for science education within America's urban schools

This conceptual article examines the influence of the current standards‐based reform upon science education policies and practices within urban schools. We identify four negative yet unforeseen effects of the reform movement: undermining urban teachers' professionalism, eroding teacher–student relationships, diluting the science curriculum, and disparate instruction based on predicted individual test performance. Our awareness of these nuisances emerged from our first‐hand engagement with urban science teaching and through our collegial relationships with exemplary urban teachers. In closing, we propose mechanisms by which university‐based science educators might address these issues by assisting exemplary urban teachers to resist the reform‐induced perils and by incorporating the urban milieu as a substantive aspect of science teacher education. © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 39: 114‐127, 2002