The etiology of mathematical self-evaluation and mathematics achievement: understanding the relationship using a cross-lagged twin study from age 9 to 12

The genetic and environmental origins of individual differences in mathematical self-evaluation over time and its association with later mathematics achievement were investigated in a UK sample of 2138 twin pairs at ages 9 and 12. Self-evaluation indexed how good children think they are at mathematical activities and how much they like those activities. Mathematics achievement was assessed by teachers based on UK National Curriculum standards. At both ages self-evaluation was approximately 40% heritable, with the rest of the variance explained by non-shared environment. The results also suggested moderate reciprocal associations between self-evaluation and mathematics achievement across time, with earlier self-evaluation predicting later performance and earlier performance predicting later self-evaluation. These cross-lagged relationships were genetically rather than environmentally mediated.     

School-psychological providers: A national survey of state departments of education

To identify professional groups that are providing psychological services in the schools, the present national survey of state departments of education was conducted. Fifty-nine percent of states currently mandate services of school psychologists by law, and a variety of allied professional groups were identified as also providing psychological services in the schools. Specific information about provider groups and service mandates is reported. Recommendations relevant to the provision of quality school-psychological services and utilization of multiple providers are given.     

Editorial

This paper analyses the experience of a teacher and her Year 6 class (10–11 year‐olds) over a school year, while participating in a pilot project introducing Personal Digital Assistants as a learning tool. The intervention was initiated and supported by the local City Learning Centre, which was concerned with how best to use technologies for learning, and the teacher was prepared to take risks to learn how to use the technology and apply it within the national curriculum. This paper focuses on the roles the teacher played in designing, managing and mediating multi‐modal approaches to teaching and learning, while meeting the curriculum requirements. Her creative approach was rewarded with high levels of student engagement, motivation and autonomy across the class, and higher than expected results in the national tests.     

Building a whole school approach and teacher efficacy with English language learners

Current professional development initiatives show a preference for whole school approaches. However, pedagogy related to English language learners (ELLs) is often not widely dispersed in New Zealand primary schools, impacting on teacher efficacy with these learners. This paper discusses findings from a qualitative study which aimed to identify influences shaping the dispersal of ELL-related pedagogy in two schools in contrasting socio-economic areas. Data from semi-structured individual interviews with teachers at different class levels revealed unique patterns for the dispersal of ELL-related pedagogy in each school. Teacher data indicated that these patterns were influenced by the performance of ELLs in national standards testing, as well as the special characteristics of ELLs in each setting and the distinctive nature of each context. The dispersal of ELL pedagogy in each school impacted differentially on opportunities to build a sense of collective teaching efficacy with ELLs in that setting, but also raised questions about whether one size should be expected to fit all.     

Making a Difference? An Evaluation of Professional Knowledge and Pedagogy in Art and ICT

The paper presents a research perspective on a Secondary school‐based project,, Art on the Net, which explored the interaction between practising artists, students and teachers using digital technologies in the visual and performance arts in school settings. The study illustrated the role that art education plays not only in providing an authentic context for the use of digital technologies, but also in offering insights into conceptualising the nature of ICT capability. The analysis for this paper highlights key themes arising for participants engaged in such intervention projects and illustrates the interaction between professional knowledge and pedagogy in Art and ICT.     

Computer-graphics and the literary construct: a learning method

This paper describes a third-year undergraduate module, Text Through Images (TTI; known at first as Texts with Computers) which ran for some years in the School of English, University of Exeter, UK. Instead of using only words, TTI students made their own computer graphics both to discover and to describe literary structures in texts of their choice. The results were surprising: whatever their “academic” ability, students on this course regularly produced genuinely original literary perceptions, and their natural creativity was released. The module's innovative methods are eminently transferable to other disciplines. This paper is designed to be read in conjunction with a website: for further details, go to http://www.blackwellpublishers.co.uk/asp/journal.asp?ref=0007-1013 presenting a selection of students' graphics produced on the course; these appear by generous permission of their makers, who hold copyright. The reasons for the module's success are elusive. Perhaps students feel unfettered by the attitudes associated with traditional verbal expression, the absence of preconceptions about the new process enabling them to bypass old habits of thought. Perhaps the interplay of word and image is particularly fruitful because images and words activate different areas of the brain. It may be that the computer creates the illusion of distance between design and designer, so that the latter feels less personally exposed than when drawing on paper. Perhaps success lies in the combination of individual freedom and on-screen group work, or on the way in which students are enabled to make small but publishable original discoveries. Educational psychologists may be able to explain why the mix works (it has been suggested that it represents a “constructivist/generative learning strategy that Dave Jonassen terms ‘elaboration’”) but more importantly, teachers may find the model useful. What interests me about the module is not the structure of the teaching, but the way in which the use of diagramming apparently enables the learner productively to bypass previous mental conditioning about how literature works, and what is acceptable in analysing it.     

Reading and Generalist Genes

ABSTRACT— Twin-study research suggests that many (but not all) of the same genes contribute to genetic influence on diverse learning abilities and disabilities, a hypothesis called generalist genes . This generalist genes hypothesis was tested using a set of 10 DNA markers (single nucleotide polymorphisms [SNPs]) found to be associated with early reading ability in a study of 4,258 7-year-old children that screened 100,000 SNPs. Using the same sample, we show that this early reading SNP set also correlates with other aspects of literacy, components of mathematics, and more general cognitive abilities. These results provide support for the generalist genes hypothesis. Although the effect size of the current SNP set is small, such SNP sets could eventually be used to predict genetic risk for learning disabilities as well as to prescribe genetically tailored intervention and prevention programs.     

Do we need more male primary teachers? Tensions and contradictions in the perspectives of male and female trainees

Primary teaching Initial Teacher Training courses across the UK have been under pressure from central government, Ofsted and the media to recruit more male students to their courses with the aim of increasing the proportion of males in the primary teaching workforce. This is because increasing the number of male role models in primary schools has been mooted as the solution to boys’ underachievement, especially in reading and writing. There is, however, little evidence showing any correlation between boys’ educational outcomes and the number of male primary teachers in schools. The purpose of the project reported in this paper was to ascertain the beliefs of the future primary school workforce about this focus on the need for male role models in schools. A mixed-methods approach was employed: 120 male and female primary trainees were surveyed and a further 48 took part in group interviews, all of whom were based in an Initial Teacher Training department in a university in North West England. Results indicated that although aspiring teachers felt that males and females could make equally good role models for children their personal value systems perpetuated the myth that boys need male role models to achieve better educational outcomes.