Seeing Ourselves as Others See Us: Egyptian teachers’ views of science education in secondary schools in London,UK

Small differences in working patterns and social relationships can be indicators of deeper cultural differences. It is these non‐educational issues which point to the serious difficulty of making cross‐cultural comparisons. Data collected from Egyptian science teachers who have visited science classes in London are reported here. UK teachers may be habituated, or unaware of features of school life that are quite striking to the Egyptians as new observers. These include well resourced laboratories, considerable practical work done in small groups and a wide variety of classroom activities. However, it is the professionalism and the good interpersonal relationships that they see in the UK that the Egyptian teachers come to appreciate even more on their return to Egypt. Such a feature of UK teachers’ work cannot be identified by international test score comparisons.     

Gender,student perceptions,institutional commitments and academic dishonesty: who reports in academic dishonesty cases?

The academic dishonesty literature generally focuses on the causes of academic dishonesty, and outlines deterrence strategies, as well as the punishment methods used in formal sanction. Student self-monitoring techniques are becoming a more visible alternative that places greater emphasis on proactive prevention methods as opposed to reactive punishment policies. Increasing the formal level of student responsibility in deterring academic dishonesty assumes that students will actively monitor the behavior of their classmates. Our findings indicate that student perceptions of campus climate and gender differences are important factors when explaining student reporting of suspected academic dishonesty and may illustrate important prerequisite conditions that must exist prior to the establish of a successful student self-monitoring programme.     

Not by the hair of your chinny chin‐chin,I'm not so sure that we're letting you in

Abstract

It's no good telling people what you want if what you want is for them to know without your telling them.(Tannen, 1986, p.57)

Deborah Tannen cites conversations between men and women to explore how metamessages (rapport, directness/indirectness, connectedness/avoidance) in communication impact our relationships for the better and often for worse. In many ways, this dance of communication plays out in the female mentorship of males in early childhood preservice experiences. The metamessages of females impact their effectiveness in mentorship and impacts how males look upon their career choice and their own sense of efficacy to carry out their roles as early childhood educators.

Gender bias subtly weaves its ways into the fabric of professional ethos of educational practice. The female ethos in early childhood education often acts as a finely woven screen that makes it difficult for men to open the door to try out,let alone enter the profession. The invisible questioning screens of Do males care, notice detail, do they clearly see children's needs, do they understand the female way?need to be explored so that supportive mentorship can be consciously extended to male preservice educators. This article tells the stories of two male preservice educators and their struggles to open the door of the female ethos in their clinical experiences. Their stories point to the idea that we still have a long way to go to support males in their initial journey to become early childhood educators. © 2001 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.