基于核心能力培养的高职英语教学实践探究

从核心能力的组成要素及其发展着手,阐述了其提出的理据,强调核心能力是指＂做成事＂的多方面能力的综合体现,进而提出在英语教学中,通过训练学生增强自主学习能力等四种策略途径培养其核心能力。     

Using a concept mapping strategy to improve the motivation of EFL students in Google Hangouts Peer-Tutoring Sessions with native speakers

This study examines four elements of learner motivation, attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction, in an EFL speaking course that uses the computer mediated communication (CMC) tool Google Hangouts. The study found that a preparatory concept mapping task before the CMC sessions improved students’ perceived attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction. However, follow-up reflective worksheets had no effect on perceived attention, relevance, confidence, or satisfaction. Instructors should use concept mapping in a pre-task to support learners engaged in CMC-based speaking activities with native and non-native speakers. When the students used concept mapping to prepare for the CMC-based speaking activities, they exhibited higher confidence in their oral practice activities with a native speaker.     

Socio-scientific reasoning and environmental literacy in a field-based ecology class

The complex environmental challenges humanity faces require citizens who are scientifically and environmentally literate. Many environmental education programs are situated in the field where students are immersed in their learning. These field-based activities are engaging but may lack opportunities for students to develop critical thinking and reasoning skills necessary to be environmentally literate. We suggest a socio-scientific issue (SSI) based teaching approach can increase epistemic engagement and lead to student gains in scientific and environmental literacy. This study describes how we modified an existing field-based ecology course, framing the learning around a local environmental socio-scientific issue. We used a convergent parallel mixed-methods approach to examine the changes in socio-scientific reasoning (SSR) over time for high school students in this course as a measure of scientific and environmental literacy. Results indicate that a focused SSI field-based environmental education curriculum can support development of socio-scientific reasoning and environmental literacy competencies among high school students.     

Strengthening internal quality assurance as a lever for enhancing student learning experiences and academic success: lessons from Namibia

Higher education plays an important role in the social, economic and political development of any given nation. In the Namibian context, quality assurance systems have been put in place at both national and institutional levels through the establishment of national quality assurance agencies and units responsible for quality in institutions. A critical literature analysis of quality assurance systems in higher education shows that although they claim to strike a balance between improvement and accountability, external quality assurance mechanisms tend to have an accountability and compliance focus and to promote managerialisation and bureaucratisation of academia. This article argues that internal quality assurance systems, built on a strong quality culture, tend to be more effective in enhancing the quality of student learning experience and academic success than externally driven quality assurance. Thus, to promote genuine quality, more energy must be invested in external quality assurance capacitating and strengthening internal quality assurance systems.     

Integration of the practice of mindfulness within action learning as an added component within a post graduate leadership programme: an account of practice

This account of practice provides a practical example of the use of mindfulness practice within action learning which was a component of a bespoke UK Business School post-graduate leadership development programme commissioned by an English NHS Mental Health Trust aimed at improving the leadership capacity of mid-level managers through work-based learning. The article discusses background and context of the programme followed by how application of mindfulness exercises was integrated within the action learning process to encourage participants to be ‘in the moment’ as an added component of their leadership development. The aim of the paper is to share examples of practice applied within action learning. Finally, the paper asserts that the application of mindfulness exercises helped to enhance the action learning process by creating a calm, focused space for individual and collective reflections, enhancing the quality of engagement and enabling action learning members to take a more pragmatic approach to addressing the work issues raised within the action learning sets.     

Empowerment for individual agency: an analysis of international organizations’ curriculum recommendations

Much recent research stresses the increasing relevance of international organisations (IOs) for national education policymaking. Yet, IOs’ curriculum recommendations have remained largely out of scope, although they provide a forceful example of ‘soft’ governance. Based on a content analysis of 83 documents from 42 inter/-nongovernmental, global and regional organisations involved in international education networks between 1990 and 2015, this paper identifies an expansive field of IOs directing growing attention to such curricular issues as student needs, educational goals and content, as well as issues of teaching and learning. In line with much cross-national curriculum research, analysis provides evidence for the trend towards a global curriculum model stressing empowerment, individual agency and psychosocial development. The article argues that the strong focus on human capabilities and human capital in IOs’ curriculum policies reflects wider cultural transformations in contemporary world society. The article concludes by arguing for an expanded analytical scope of IOs’ educational work and a reconsideration of causal explanations in curriculum theories.     

如何指导高职学生学习商务英语视听说

商务英语视听说课融视、听、说于一体,注重英语听说技能在常见商务活动中的实际应用,提供真实的商务环境,通过英语获取商务知识,提高技能。本文分析了商务英语视听说课程以及高职学生在学习目的、兴趣、词汇、听力和口语等方面的学习现状,重点探讨了指导高职学生学习商务英语视听说,掌握商务英语知识,提高商务英语交际能力的有效方法。     

A focus on time-lapse ethnography: learning to teach

This article makes the claim that developing ethnographic work through follow-up interviews can add to our understanding of researched phenomena and explores how using concepts from Bourdieu and theories on the social construction of time strengthen the research design and add a stronger longitudinal diachronic element to data analysis. Extending an ethnographic study of learning to teach by interviewing respondents nine years after the study and after the completion of their teacher education course is shown to develop insights around the initial research findings by focusing on the temporal aspects of data. Adopting this methodological approach can develop small-scale qualitative work and contribute to an accumulation of research findings to avoid simply revisiting familiar research ground.     

Ethnographical mapping of thick places – teaching and learning practices in teacher training schools

The aim of this study is to use an ethnographic method in order to map where understandings of teaching and learning practices (TaLP) are being discussed in three schools. The questions posed are: what are the relations between thick places, meaning, affect, and TaLP? This study uses an ethnographic method outside the classroom and in between different activities as a starting point for understanding TaLP and where many students at the same school produce thick places of affect and meaning. The main conclusion from this study is that matters of where, what, and who are shaping TaLP. Another important conclusion from this study is that training schools offer new conditions for teacher students, but also offer new opportunities for ethnographic studies that aim at understanding these school environments with a range of new questions.     

Self-regulated learning partially mediates the effect of self-regulated learning interventions on achievement in higher education: A meta-analysis

It is often assumed that interventions aimed at supporting students’ self-regulated learning (SRL) are effective for improving achievement because these interventions support SRL activity. In this study, meta-analytic structural equation modeling (MASEM) was used to test whether SRL activity indeed mediates the effect of SRL interventions on achievement in higher education. Contrary to popular belief, the results only provide evidence for partial mediation. Furthermore, three separate meta-analyses were performed to investigate the role of possible moderators of the relations between: (1) SRL interventions and achievement, (2) SRL interventions and SRL activity, and (3) SRL activity and achievement. Although SRL interventions were effective in improving SRL activity and achievement, most of the study, measurement, and intervention moderators did not explain significant variance of the investigated effect sizes. Other factors, such as task motivation and time on task, potentially influence the effectiveness of SRL interventions. Practical, theoretical and methodological implications are provided.