Analysing and evaluating the linguistic benefit of residence abroad for UK foreign language students

This paper reports on a longitudinal study designed to assess the progress made by UK foreign language undergraduate students during the residence abroad (RA) component of their degree. The article first of all places the study within the international research context, and then describes the data collation procedures and methodology employed. It reports findings concerning proficiency gains and the predictive validity of factors such as gender, IQ, length of stay, prior levels of achievement and previous methodological exposure. The findings confirm significant linguistic gains in general for RA. They also appear to show that individuals vary greatly in their rates of progress during RA on holistic measures of proficiency but that previous methodological exposure is a key factor in determining gains on discrete measures. There is also evidence that longer stays do not necessarily lead to greater proportionate proficiency gains. Findings concerning progress, prediction of progress and individual performance variation are compared and contrasted with those of American and other British studies.     

How early maternal separation and juvenile experience with pups affect maternal behavior and emotionality in adult postpartum rats

To assess the effects of preweaning and juvenile experiences on adult maternal behavior, two experiments were completed. In Experiment 1, pups were separated for long periods or short periods or were left undisturbed over the 1st week. Following weaning, the rats were exposed to foster pups over a 5-day period or were left undisturbed. There were no effects of early experience on juvenile behavior. In adult postpartum maternal tests, short separations reduced latencies to express maternal behaviors, whereas long separations combined with juvenile exposure to pups increased latencies. In Experiment 2, pups were separated for long periods or were left undisturbed over the 1st week. Following weaning, the rats were exposed to foster pups for 4 days or 8 days or were left undisturbed. Long separation retarded maternal responding in juvenile animals but had no effect on the adults. Four days of juvenile experience had negative effects on adult behavior, whereas 8 days did not have an effect.     

Orientation Effects in the Development of Linear Object Tracking in Early Infancy

Infants' oculomotor tracking develops rapidly but is poorer when there are horizontal and vertical movement components. Additionally, persistence of objects moving through occlusion emerges at 4 months but initially is absent for objects moving obliquely. In two experiments, we recorded eye movements of thirty-two 4-month-old and thirty-two 6-month-old infants (mainly Caucasian-White) tracking horizontal, vertical, and oblique trajectories. Infants tracked oblique trajectories less accurately, but 6-month olds tracked more accurately such that they tracked oblique trajectories as accurately as 4-month olds tracked horizontal and vertical trajectories. Similar results emerged when the object was temporarily occluded. Thus, 4-month olds’ tracking of oblique trajectories may be insufficient to support object persistence, whereas 6-month olds may track sufficiently accurately to perceive object persistence for all trajectory orientations.     

Conceptualising the sociology of education: an analysis of contested intellectual trajectories

Abstract

This paper presents an account of the development of the sociology of education in the UK, by means of an analysis of papers published in the field’s flagship journal, the British Journal of Sociology of Education and its US equivalent, Sociology of Education. In particular, we examine the representation of two contrasting traditions in addressing social inequalities: ‘political arithmetic’; and the more recent ‘cultural turn’. We find that in the UK, the cultural turn dominates; whilst in the US, it is political arithmetic which does so. In accounting for these contrasting national profiles, we argue that they are underpinned by divergent social infrastructure and organisation. We also discuss some of the implications of the dominance of the cultural turn in the UK, specifically in terms of the relationship between the fields of academic research and policy and the development of a cumulative evidence base to address social inequalities in education.     

Education for enterprise: the state and alternative employment for young people

The state, industry and the voluntary sector are all investing resources in encouraging the development of the ‘enterprise culture’ among the young unemployed. Such measures can be interpreted as an attempt to sustain the work ethic while changing attitudes, aspirations and expectations towards employment. They constitute a major effort to change work cultures. The alternatives being advocated, such as self‐employment, small businesses, co‐operatives and community businesses have starkly opposing ideologies behind them.

So far there has been no systematic research on the development of alternative forms of work by young people, not even at the level of charting the extent and form in which they are emerging. This paper seeks to make a start by exploring the rhetoric behind the ‘education for enterprise’ movement and the patterns of support and advice on offer. It then discusses the implications of the fostering of the ‘enterprise culture’ for our analyses of state intervention in youth unemployment and the early labour market experiences of young people.     

Lifelong learning trajectories: some voices of those ‘in transit’

This paper illustrates the social determinants of lifelong learning histories as uncovered in a largescale survey and interview analysis carried out as part of the ESRC Learning Society Programme, and previously reported in this journal. The statistical ‘determinants’ of adult participation in learning as described there, such as family background or gender, are examined here in terms of individual stories as well as theoretical models derived from earlier phases of this project. The two forms of data and their analyses appear to accord, suggesting perhaps that concepts of structure (determinants) and agency (choice) are not mutually incompatible in explaining patterns of adult learning. Choices are anyway made within subjective opportunity structures (which include notions of what is ‘appropriate’ for each person).     

The classical classroom: enhancing learning for pupils with Acquired Brain Injury (ABI)

This paper seeks to draw parallels between different approaches to classroom instruction and two contrasting musical styles and to examine how pupils with Acquired Brain Injuries (ABI) might fare in each. A polyphonic classroom is defined as one where an awareness of multiple layers of meaning are encouraged to enhance the learning opportunities, whereas in a classical classroom most of the layers expressly support a single dominant line. While this analogy cannot be stretched too far, it is suggested that, after an ABI, a pupil might progress their learning more easily in a classical-style classroom.     

The ‘new vocationalism’: Further education and local labour markets

Current policies aimed at promoting a ‘new vocationalism’ through changes in vocational training in further education are based upon a particular functional model of labour market behaviour, which sees the relationships between technical qualifications, training and recruitment to jobs as unproblematic. In fact, however, this model bears little relationship to the realities of actual labour markets, especially given the enormous diversity which exists between economic conditions in different localities. What this implies, therefore, is that there are considerable tensions between the imperatives of a national training strategy, promoted centrally by the Training Commission (and previously by the Manpower Services Commission), and its local implementation mainly by the local education authorities and their colleges of further education. In many local labour markets, far from promoting closer responsiveness to the needs of employers, current policy initiatives may actually be making it more difficult for the colleges to react to employers' demands. These general arguments are illustrated here by reference to a large‐scale empirical study which was specifically designed to investigate the inter‐relationships between the labour market behaviour of employers and the implementation of the ‘new vocationalism’ in further education.     

The effect of schools on school leavers’ university participation

ABSTRACT

This paper considers the role that schools have in determining whether school leavers participate in higher education or not. It examines the association between schools and university participation using a unique dataset of 3 cohorts of all young people leaving maintained schools in Wales. School “effects” are identified, even after controlling for individual-level factors, such as their prior attainment, socioeconomic circumstances, ethnicity, and special educational needs. Schools appear to have a particular “effect” on the likelihood that a young person enters an elite university. However, the findings suggest the concept of a school “effect” on higher education participation is not straightforward – schools appear to have different levels of effectiveness depending on the gender of the young people and the nature of their higher education participation. These findings are considered within the policy contexts of school effectiveness and widening access to higher education.