Negotiating second-language identities in and through border crossing

In this article, I describe the ways in which two British university students negotiated their identity as second language learners during a year abroad in Italy and the extent to which their struggles helped them to ‘fit in’ into the new social and cultural contexts. Building upon the lived experiences of the two participants, I follow a poststructuralist discourse on identity, which considers identities as dynamic and in continuous evolution. In this article, I argue that the extent to which individuals are prepared to negotiate second-language identities, or conversely to resist them, can be directly influenced by the ways in which they perceive their relationships to the new contexts and by the ways in which such relationships are constructed over time and across space. I also argue that the continuous evolution of identities tends to change more rapidly in new sociocultural contexts, such as those embedded in specific experiences of border crossing.     

Dose–response relations between preschool teachers’ exposure to components of professional development and increases in quality of their interactions with children

The present study examined the pattern of associations over time between the quality of observed interactions and exposure to features of an effective coaching model for 170 preschool teachers enrolled in a study investigating professional development impacts. Using a treatment-on-the-treated approach, teachers exposed to a greater number of cycles of coaching showed more improvement in classroom interactions over the year. More specifically, of the two components of treatment examined, video exemplars and individual coaching prompts, exposure to prompts was associated with growth from baseline in instructionally supportive interactions while watching video exemplars was associated with growth in emotionally supportive behaviors in analysis of linear effects. Watching emotional support video exemplars was negatively associated with growth in classroom organization behaviors. The non-linear pattern of these associations suggested that the initial dosage of prompts created observable effects on instructional support, but after a certain point additional dosage was not effective. Conversely, initial dosage did not create observable effects on emotional support, but improvement was observed after exposure to a certain minimum dosage of time watching video exemplars. The results have implications for the design, delivery, and focus of professional development for early childhood educators.     

Field-Based Evaluation of Two-Tiered Instruction for Enhancing Kindergarten Phonological Awareness

Research Findings: This study reports on the outcomes of a multisite, two-tiered, response-to-intervention instructional model for delivering phonological awareness instruction and intervention to kindergartners. Fifty-seven kindergartners from 3 classrooms participated in a supplemental phonological awareness program, and 56 kindergartners from 3 classrooms received the prevailing school-adopted literacy curriculum. All children in the supplemental condition received supplemental classroom-based phonological awareness instruction in addition to the adopted literacy curriculum. At mid-year, 6 low literacy achievers were identified in each supplemental classroom (n = 18) to participate in an additional 12-week small-group intervention. The classroom-based supplemental curriculum did not produce statistically significant gains for typically achieving children on measures of letter–sound knowledge, word recognition, or developmental spelling. However, an add-on tier of supplemental instruction exerted a substantial advantage for low-achieving children on a measure of developmental spelling. Practice or Policy: Results suggest that a 2-tiered intervention model provides an effective means for improving the literacy outcomes of low-achieving kindergarten children.     

On-chip collection of particles and cells by AC electroosmotic pumping and dielectrophoresis using asymmetric microelectrodes

The recent development of microfluidic "lab on a chip" devices requiring sample sizes <100 μL has given rise to the need to concentrate dilute samples and trap analytes, especially for surface-based detection techniques. We demonstrate a particle collection device capable of concentrating micron-sized particles in a predetermined area by combining AC electroosmosis (ACEO) and dielectrophoresis (DEP). The planar asymmetric electrode pattern uses ACEO pumping to induce equal, quadrilateral flow directed towards a stagnant region in the center of the device. A number of system parameters affecting particle collection efficiency were investigated including electrode and gap width, chamber height, applied potential and frequency, and number of repeating electrode pairs and electrode geometry. The robustness of the on-chip collection design was evaluated against varying electrolyte concentrations, particle types, and particle sizes. These devices are amenable to integration with a variety of detection techniques such as optical evanescent waveguide sensing.     

Special and inclusive education in the Eastern Caribbean: policy practice and provision

The countries of the Eastern Caribbean have for more than a decade been committed to the implementation of a common educational reform strategy. At the heart of this strategy has been the policy of 'education for all', which includes establishing educational support services for children with special educational needs. In the past, many disabled children and children with learning difficulties have been excluded from the education system in these countries. For many more children, attendance at school has not given meaningful access to educational opportunities. This article discusses research carried out by the authors and reports on the implementation of the Reform Strategy and on the barriers to inclusive education that persist in the region.     

Being hurt and hurting others: children's narrative accounts and moral judgments of their own interpersonal conflicts

Children's narrative accounts and moral evaluations of their own interpersonal conflicts with peers were examined. Girls and boys (N = 112) in preschool (M= 4.8 years), first grade (M = 6.9 years), fifth grade (M = 10.9 years), and tenth grade (M = 16.2 years) provided one narrative of a time when they had been hurt by a peer ("victim"), and one of a time when they had hurt a peer ("perpetrator"). Victim and perpetrator narratives were equally long and detailed and depicted similar types of harmful behaviors, but differed significantly in terms of various measures of content and coherence. Narratives given from the victim's perspective featured a self-referential focus and a fairly coherent structure. When the same children gave accounts of situations in which they had been the perpetrators, their construals were less coherent and included multiple shifts between references to their own experience and the experience of the other. Children's moral judgments also varied by perspective, with the majority of victims making negative judgments and nearly half the perpetrators making positive or mixed judgments. These differences in moral judgments were related to the distinct ways in which victims and perpetrators construed conflict situations. Age differences were also found in both narrative construals and moral evaluations, but regardless of their age children construed conflict situations differently from the victim's and the perpetrator's perspectives. By integrating, within the study of moral development, children's interpretations of the social interactions that are at the basis of moral thinking, this approach brings us a step closer to conceptualizing the study of children's moral behavior.     

DEVELOPING A CULTURE FOR POSITIVE BEHAVIOUR MANAGEMENT

Positive behaviour management is high on the education agenda. This paper will describe the relationship between organisational culture and positive behaviour management. As an example of good practice the authors highlight a secondary Pupil Referral Unit which has undergone a significant change over the last three years leading to an enhanced ability to support, re‐direct and sustain the education of disaffected pupils. Many of the principles discussed are also considered to be of relevance to mainstream education.     

Supporting a School in Special Measures: Implications for the potential contribution of educational psychology

This article describes the experiences of an Educational Psychologist (EP) attached to a school placed in Special Measures following its OFSTED Inspection in October 1997. Requests for increased EP time were met with a specific piece of project work looking at the ethos of the school and relationships within it. The article draws out the strengths that EPs can bring to working with schools in Special Measures. These include a psychological knowledge base, skills in systems analysis and project evaluation, the delivery of training and working within a multi-agency setting. The article suggests that this is an important area of work to which EPs can make a contribution.     

Who benefits from public spending on higher education in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa?

Most countries are far from achieving the new sustainable development target of equal access to higher education by 2030, with those in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa furthest behind. This raises questions about the allocation of public resources across the education system to promote equity. We use data from Demographic and Health Surveys and UNESCO Institute for Statistics in 31 countries in these regions to assess who benefits from public spending on education. Our results reveal an overall pattern of pro-rich education spending, increasing with education level. We find that this pattern can be traced to an allocation of resources to higher education that is disproportionate to the sub-sector’s size: even when higher education spending overall represents a small proportion of total educational expenditure, per-capita expenditure is extremely high. Given that the richest predominantly gain access to higher education, the current spending patterns are likely to reinforce wealth-driven education inequalities.