Tracing Johnson's Circle: Practical Experiments With EAC-CPF

Interested in collaboratively exploring the potential of EAC-CPF, the Beinecke Library at Yale and the Houghton Library at Harvard embarked on a year-long project to gain experience with the new standard and, in the process, strengthen connections between disparate but deep holdings of lexicographer Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) and his circle. The project team set out to document metadata best practices while developing and maintaining one set of records and to discover the practical limits and possibilities of rich content within the EAC-CPF context. This article outlines the project's challenges, lessons learned, and remaining questions.     

Emerging Technologies: E-Textbooks,One Piece of the Puzzle

The Internet has not only brought about a new technological era, but also seen the introduction of a number of emerging technologies such as e-textbooks. However, the slow acceptance of e-textbooks is an issue of concern. The objective of this study is to investigate students’ perceptions and use of e-textbooks. Data was collected by using a self-completion questionnaire and a focus group discussion. The results showed that the two major obstacles identified in literature in adopting e-textbooks, access to electronic devices and the lack of computer skills, were not an issue of concern in this study. Unfortunately, the results of this study show that although students are positive about e-textbooks, this positive attitude does not necessarily result in high usage. This has real implications for academics, as the challenge will be to encourage students to try out e-textbooks by incorporating this as part of a pedagogical model, whilst providing safeguards against academic risks.     

“We're Trying to Take Action”: Transformative Agency,Role Re-mediation,and the Complexities of Youth Participatory Action Research

This article seeks to illuminate the complexity of youth participatory action research (YPAR) through the use of two concepts: (1) transformative agency, a collective initiative to address conflicts and contradictions in activity systems, and (2) role re-mediation, the disruption of power relations. We demonstrate that these concepts, in comparison to the concept of civic participation, allow for an expanded consideration of the cross-contextual processes that are involved in collective mobilization to enact justice. To explore this area, we examine an afterschool YPAR program involving the adult authors and youth of color with intersectional identities—including emergent bilinguals and youth perceived as struggling academically. We illustrate three avenues of transformative agency and role re-mediation within the YPAR program: (1) engagement with critical fiction and non-fiction texts that expose power relations; (2) interactions between individuals within and beyond the YPAR space; and (3) production and dissemination of knowledge. Through this exploration, we illustrate how the lenses of transformative agency and role re-mediation can provide new understandings of change-oriented action in YPAR.     

Expectations About Ethnic Peer Group Inclusivity: The Role of Shared Interests,Group Norms,and Stereotypes

This study investigated three factors that contribute to social exclusion: group norms, individual characteristics, and stereotypes. Non‐Arab American 12‐ and 16‐year‐olds (N = 199) judged their expectations about the inclusivity of Arab American and non‐Arab American peer groups toward new peers characterized by: (a) different ethnic identity but similar interests (e.g., hobbies) and (b) same ethnic identity but different interests. Participants expected that when groups had exclusive norms, Arab American peers would base inclusion decisions on ethnic identity, but that their own non‐Arab group would base decisions on shared interests. Participants who reported stereotypes expected their in‐group to be ethnically less inclusive. With age, ethnic‐based exclusion increased. The findings are discussed in light of current research on developmental intergroup relationships.     

The problem‐solving methods of mathematically gifted and older average‐attaining students

This paper examines some of the ways gifted students are said to be different from non‐gifted students by comparing the responses of 475, 9‐year‐old “gifted” students with those of 230 average‐attaining 13‐year‐old students on the same mathematical problem‐solving questions. The questions were specifically written for mathematically gifted 9 year olds as part of the World Class Tests project. The performance and approaches used by students in the two samples were found to be very similar, as was the frequency of different responses to the questions, suggesting that many of the mathematically “gifted” are not qualitatively different in their problem‐solving approaches from students of average ability, but are merely precocious.     

"Every boy & girl a scientist": instruments for children in interwar Britain

Historians of science have identified toys as part of their subject's material culture, but there has been little exploration of the production and use of educational or playful objects. Moreover, academic writing on science for children has focused on the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This essay argues that our understanding of historical science education can be enhanced by exploring twentieth-century instruments. It uses the example of Construments sets, with which children could build a wide variety of optical instruments from a series of standardized parts. Invented by C. W. Hansel, a school science master, Construments were founded in and responded to contemporary educational practices and debates over "general science," as well as addressing characteristic interwar concerns about adaptability and economy and older ideals of rational entertainment. By exploring the company's instruments, promotional literature, and magazine, and by drawing on the memories of contemporary users, I reconstruct the contexts in which Construments were used, emphasizing the creation of heterogeneous communities vital for the transmission of skills and knowledge.