From Opposition to Engagement: Lessons from High Achieving African American Students

Influential research on African American students has examined their school failure in terms of students’ opposition to school achievement. Only a few studies have explored school engagement and success among these students, and even fewer have examined the experiences of high achieving black students. This study illustrates the school context and school processes that high achieving African American students identify as contributing to their academic success. The findings reveal three main school effects impacting the students’ performance: 1) teacher practices, engaging pedagogy versus disengaging pedagogy; 2) participation in extracurricular activities and; 3) the state scholarship as performance incentive. According to the students, teacher practices were the most instrumental school effect benefiting their outcomes. Recognizing the processes that promote high achievement among African American students can help to improve our understanding of student performance, while promoting success among these students. The author wishes to thank Ron DePeter and Tekla Johnson for their comments on a previous draft of this article     

Black on Black Education: Personally Engaged Pedagogy for/by African American Pre-Service Teachers

Public schools have increasing numbers of its teachers fitting into one demographic, white and female, while the numbers of African American teachers decrease (Ladson-Billings, Crossing over to Canaan: The Journey of New Teachers in Diverse Classrooms. San Francisco: Josey-Bass [2001]). Furthermore, African American collegiates who decide to enter teaching may face a chilly climate as a result of their cultural and educational experiences as they encounter devaluation in the classroom (Delpit, Other Peoples Children: Cultural Conflict in the Class room. New York: The New Press [1995]). As a result, African American pre-service teachers may question the validity of the formal curriculum presented in college as it conflicts with their perceptions of school, thereby, leaving teacher-educators largely responsible for the quality of life and subsequent devotion to profession of these students. Critical autoethnography, using fieldnotes/research journaling, and student memoirs all through a theoretical backdrop of critical race feminism provide a glimpse into the teaching and learning experiences and dilemmas of one African American female teacher educator utilizing what I call personally engaged pedagogy as a means of enhancing the quality of the learning experiences of her African American pre-service teachers.     

中国龙的品相由来与当代传媒的误读

根据金石文字和传世文献的记载,龙为天子标志出自秦始皇的创造,是对应秦朝为水德的阴阳术的诈言.刘邦故意将龙鼎新为天子神威标志,形成具象.司马迁等史家则将其历史化,于是龙成为天子的象征和神威一直延续到清代.现代人把中国人说成是龙的传人,完全是误读,误读的原因主要就像天安门表示北京和祖国一样,是元代开始的龙蟒分合的帝王政治扩展和当代流行歌曲的误导,也是文化转型的世俗化成果,因此我们应该抛弃这一封建政治的符号.     

High school students’ implicit theories of what facilitates science learning

Background: Research has primarily concentrated on adults’ implicit theories about high quality science education for all students. Little work has considered the students’ perspective. This study investigated high school students’ implicit theories about what helped them learn science.

Purpose: This study addressed (1) What characterizes high school students’ implicit theories of what facilitates their learning of science?; (2) With respect to students’ self-classifications as African American or European American and female or male, do differences exist in the students’ implicit theories?

Sample, design and methods: Students in an urban high school located in south-eastern United States were surveyed in 2006 about their thoughts on what helps them learn science. To confirm or disconfirm any differences, data from two different samples were analyzed. Responses of 112 African American and 118 European American students and responses from 297 European American students comprised the data for sample one and two, respectively.

Results: Seven categories emerged from the deductive and inductive analyses of data: personal responsibility, learning arrangements, interest and knowledge, communication, student mastery, environmental responsiveness, and instructional strategies. Instructional strategies captured 82% and 80% of the data from sample one and two, respectively; consequently, this category was further subjected to Mann-Whitney statistical analysis at p < .05 to ascertain ethnic differences. Significant differences did not exist for ethnicity but differences between females and males in sample one and sample two emerged.

Conclusions: African American and European American students’ implicit theories about instructional strategies that facilitated their science learning did not significantly differ but female and male students’ implicit theories about instructional strategies that helped them learn science significantly differed. Because students attend and respond to what they think and perceive to be important, addressing students’ implicit theories may be one way to enhance science education reform.     

《宠儿》中神话原型的意义指向分析

《宠儿》的创作灵感来源于丰富的《圣经》文化和黑人文化。在托尼·莫里森的作品中,神话原型的应用随处可见,这些原型都是黑人文化的内在组成部分。分别从《圣经》原型和神话原型角度对托尼·莫里森的《宠儿》进行深层剖析,深刻揭示奴隶制度的残忍,有助于对黑人文化产生更深刻的认识和理解,并挖掘出隐藏在文学文本最后的神话原型的意义指向。     

关于红山文化玉雕龙造型的考证——兼谈中国人不是“猪”的传人

从红山诸文化的经济结构、原始宗教信仰及民俗学、文字学等资料分析,红山文化玉雕龙造型的主根系应是雄性野猪,但野猪与猪龙是性质不同的两个概念,二者决不可混淆。     

论白居易两京时期山水诗

两京山水诗是白居易山水诗圆满的煞尾,诗作近百篇,优秀作品近15首,呈现出自然冲淡与精工雅致相互融合的特色,开启晚唐、两宋诗、词冲淡风格的先河,非传统定式所能规范.     

Regional themes and global means in supra-national higher education policy

The supra-national level has become increasingly important in educational policy formulation. This paper describes and compares two settings in which growth in these supra-national policies is evident—in Europe and in Africa. Key themes arising in policy documents in each context are examined. A distinction is drawn in analysis between themes classified as ‘global means’, such as qualification frameworks and quality assurance mechanisms, which are becoming international norms and which show close similarity across contexts, and regional goals or ‘themes’ in supra-national policy. The paper argues that although there are apparent similarities between the policy goals espoused in ‘regional themes’, context plays an important part in understanding the meanings of these policy goals. In closer analysis, there are differences both in the underlying problems which the policy goals are intended to address, and in the prioritisation given to these goals. This finding is examined in the light of debates regarding policy convergence, specifically drawing on Vaira’s (2004) framework for institutional analysis.     

祖先的遗产：美国黑人文学寻根主题的变奏曲

爱丽斯·沃克的短篇小说《外婆的日常用品》中遗产的象征意义实际上象征的是黑人文化。在小说中它是美国黑人认识自我、建立自我的强大的依靠,也是他们保持民族文化独立性的力量源泉。这样的主题是美国黑人文学导根主题的变奏曲。