Nonscience majors learning science: A theoretical model of motivation

A theoretical model of nonscience majors' motivation to learn science was tested by surveying 369 students in a large‐enrollment college science course that satisfies a core curriculum requirement. Based on a social‐cognitive framework, motivation to learn science was conceptualized as having both cognitive and affective influences that foster science achievement. Structural equation modeling was used to examine the hypothesized relationships among the variables. The students' motivation, as measured by the Science Motivation Questionnaire (SMQ), had a strong direct influence on their achievement, as measured by their science grade point average. The students' motivation was influenced by their belief in the relevance of science to their careers. This belief was slightly stronger in women than men. Essays by the students and interviews with them provided insight into their motivation. The model suggests that instructors should strategically connect science concepts to the careers of nonscience majors through such means as case studies to increase motivation and achievement. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 44: 1088–1107, 2007     

Software engineering education: some important dimensions

Software engineering education has been emerging as an independent and mature discipline. Accordingly, various studies are being done to provide guidelines for curriculum design. The main focus of these guidelines is around core and foundation courses. This paper summarizes the current problems of software engineering education programs. It also proposes some important dimensions as integral parts of software engineering education: interdisciplinary skills, practice experience, communication, skills on continuing education and professionalism. In the current guidelines and studies these dimensions are not addressed specifically. Although there could be other dimensions to be considered in software engineering education, we believe that the proposed ones are very crucial as software engineering is evolving more rapidly than any other engineering discipline. This study also provides a survey of some major universities’ undergraduate software engineering programs to evaluate these dimensions.     

Balancing varied assessment functions to attain systemic validity: Three is the magic number

Accountability-oriented reforms demand immediate and continual gains on achievement test, for all students, and without diminishing other outcomes or undermining instruction. This paper describes a framework for aligning classroom assessment and external testing with the aim of negotiating these seemingly contradictory goals. The framework varies the sensitivity to instruction and the representations of knowledge across approaches to assessment. Cycles of design- based studies successively refine relationships between a curriculum and the frame that each assessment provides. Doing so, we argue, leverages the unique formative and summative balance across assessments in order to scaffold learning and demonstrate the “consequential” validity of our strategy without compromising curricula, instruction, or the “evidential” validity that warrants their continued use.     

Leisure time physical activity in Australian women: relationship with well being and symptoms

This paper explores the association between moderate levels of physical activity (PA) and health benefits in well being and symptoms such as tiredness, back pain, and constipation. Participants in the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health, 14,502 young women (ages 18-23 years), 13,609 middle-age women (45-50 years), and 11,421 older women (ages 70-75 years), answered questions about vigorous and less vigorous exercise (used to determine a physical activity score), well being (SF-36), symptoms, and medical conditions. There were significant associations between the PA score and SF-36 in each cohort. Odds ratios (OR) for a range of symptoms and conditions were lower for women who reported low to moderate activity than for sedentary women, for example, for young women or for constipation = 0.76 (CI, 0.65-0.89), for middle-age women or for tiredness = 0.70 (0.63-0.78). There was no threshold of PA at which health benefits increased significantly. Although cross-sectional, the findings suggest that low-to-moderate levels of exercise are associated with a range of health benefits for women of all ages. These preliminary findings will be followed up during the longitudinal study.     

The relationship between phonological awareness and word reading accuracy in Oriya and English: A study of Oriya‐speaking fifth‐graders

This study investigated the relationships between phonological awareness and reading in Oriya and English. Oriya is the official language of Orissa, an eastern state of India. The writing system is an alphasyllabary. Ninety‐nine fifth grade children (mean age 9 years 7 months) were assessed on measures of phonological awareness, word reading and pseudo‐word reading in both languages. Forty‐eight of the children attended Oriya‐medium schools where they received literacy instruction in Oriya from grade 1 and learned English from grade 2. Fifty‐one children attended English‐medium schools where they received literacy instruction in English from grade 1 and in Oriya from grade 2. The results showed that phonological awareness in Oriya contributed significantly to reading Oriya and English words and pseudo‐words for the children in the Oriya‐medium schools. However, it only contributed to Oriya pseudo‐word reading and English word reading for children in the English‐medium schools. Phonological awareness in English contributed to English word and pseudo‐word reading for both groups. Further analyses investigated the contribution of awareness of large phonological units (syllable, onsets and rimes) and small phonological units (phonemes) to reading in each language. The data suggest that cross‐language transfer and facilitation of phonological awareness to word reading is not symmetrical across languages and may depend both on the characteristics of the different orthographies of the languages being learned and whether the first literacy language is also the first spoken language.