The author's secondary school mathematics students have often reported to her that quadratic relations are one of the most conceptually challenging aspects of the high school curriculum. From her own classroom experiences there seemed to be several aspects to the students' challenges. Many students, even in their early secondary education, have difficulty with basic multiplication table fact retrieval. Difficulty retrieving multiplication facts directly influences students' ability to engage...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Semantics, Secondary School Mathematics, Memory, Multiplication, Cognitive...
To explore factors associated with college students' intentions to participate in Internet-based health research, data were collected from 502 undergraduate students enrolled in introductory-level business courses at a large midwestern university. Findings suggest that intentions to participate in Internet-based research are influenced by one's perceptions of social norms related to research participation and the extent to which one regularly discusses personal health information with others....
Topics: ERIC Archive, Undergraduate Students, Recruitment, Hygiene, Behavior Standards, Social Behavior,...
Most researchers agree that psychological/educational tests are sensitive to multiple traits, implying the need for a multidimensional item response theory (MIRT). One limitation of applying a MIRT in practice is the difficulty in establishing equivalent scales of multiple traits. In this study, a new MIRT linking method was proposed and evaluated by comparison with two existing methods. The results showed that the new method was more acceptable in transforming item parameters and maintaining...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Item Response Theory, Multidimensional Scaling, Multitrait Multimethod Techniques,...
This paper addresses to the question of how to empower research competence of a kind which would lead a peripheral university like SNU to becoming a world-class university. There have been noticeable achievements in building competitive, first class universities in many developing nations, particularly in Asian countries. This paper will examine the process by which SNU can be transforming SNU into a world-class university in Korea. The analysis will focus on the internal reforms implemented at...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Developing Nations, Research Universities, Educational Change,...
This paper presents an analysis of results from an evaluation of The Centers for Quality Teaching and Learning, a professional development program placing technology in the context of student-centered instructional practices. This analysis focuses on the relationship between the professional development and teachers' use of technology in their classroom and their general instructional practices. The results from this study indicate teachers increased their use of technology in ways viewed as...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Teaching Methods, Constructivism (Learning), Professional Development, Student...
This exploratory study investigated the perceptions of technology and academic decision-makers about open source benefits and risks versus commercial software applications. The study also explored reactions to a concept for outsourcing campus-wide deployment and maintenance of open source. Data collected from telephone interviews were analyzed, emergent themes identified, and a model of differentiators of open source versus commercial software was created, which was then used to evaluate...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Research Opportunities, Educational Technology, Risk, Computer Software, Decision...
Many schools are initiating projects that place laptop computers into the hands of each student and teacher in the school. These projects entail a great deal of planning and investment by all involved. The teachers in these schools are faced with significant challenges as they prepare for teaching in classrooms where every student has a computer. Using the Concerns-Based Adoption Model of change, this study investigated the concerns of teachers in the early stages of a one-to-one laptop...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Environment, Computers, Adoption (Ideas), Teacher Attitudes, Educational...
This study investigated differential effects of learning styles and learning orientation on sense of community and cognitive achievement in Web-based and lab-based university course formats. Students in the Web-based sections achieved higher scores at the "remember" and "understand" levels, but not at the "apply" or "analyze" levels. In terms of learning style, extrovert students outperformed introvert students in the lab-based sections, whereas...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Student Characteristics, Cognitive Style, Academic Achievement, Web Based...
This paper reports on an exploratory, longitudinal study that analyzes and interprets the evolution of teachers' beliefs regarding learning, teaching, and technology, and their instructional practices, in the context of integrating technology-based information-rich tasks in six 4th-6th grade classrooms. The study used multiple research tools, interviews, questionnaires and observations, focusing on both teachers' beliefs and classroom practices. The findings reveal that following multi-year...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Teaching Methods, Research Tools, Classrooms, Teacher Attitudes, Interviews,...
Growing perceptions that students exploit information technology to evade academic assignments prompted surveys of student attitudes about unethical uses of information technology (e.g., cutting and pasting excerpts from Web sites without attribution) at two institutions. Students at a private church-affiliated college rated cheating behaviors as more offensive than their counterparts at a regional campus of a major research university. However, ordinal rankings of academically dishonest...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Student Attitudes, Personality Traits, Research Universities, Ethics, Cheating,...
This study investigated the effect of group discussions and question prompts on students' vicarious learning experiences. Vicarious experiences were delivered to 65 preservice teachers via VisionQuest, a Web site that provided examples of successful technology integration. A 2x2 factorial research design employed group discussions and question prompts as independent variables and students' perceptions of their competencies and self-efficacy for technology integration as dependent variables....
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Technology, Technology Integration, Self Efficacy, Preservice Teachers,...
The computer-supported Project Work classroom learning environment discussed in this paper represents a paradigm shift from teacher-centered to student-centered teaching and learning in Singapore schools. Besides the face-to-face weekly lessons in existing Project Work classrooms, the students engaged in computer-supported online forum discussions. Two hundred and sixty students and 26 teachers from seven high schools participated in this study. Their perceptions of this new learning...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Educational Environment, Student Attitudes, Test Validity, Item...
This review provides a comprehensive examination of the literature surrounding the current state of K-12 distance education. The growth in K-12 distance education follows in the footsteps of expanded learning opportunities at all levels of public education and training in corporate environments. Implementation has been accomplished with a limited research base, often drawing from studies in adult distance education and policies adapted from traditional learning environments. This review of...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Elementary Secondary Education, Public Education, Distance Education, Literature...
This study used a systems perspective to determine whether differences exist between classrooms of expert (n=35) and novice (n=35) teachers on the cohesion, communication, and flexibility dimensions of the Classroom Systems Observation Scale (CSOS). A 50-minute observation using the CSOS was conducted in elementary school classrooms in New York State. The study found classrooms of expert teachers had statistically higher levels of classroom communication and flexibility than classrooms of...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Teaching Experience, Classroom Communication, Classroom Environment, Beginning...
This study was conducted on informal aspects of an inquiry-based physics course and reports findings about learning interactions and discourse observed during the first three semesters the course was offered. The course offered an alternative to the large lecture instruction typical in introductory university physics and promoted learning in an informal environment. The course organization attempted to engage students in investigations with only a small fraction of time devoted to...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Physics, Investigations, Informal Education, Problem Solving, Interaction Process...
This study brings together insights from research on teaching and learning in specific subjects, learning environments research, and effectiveness research, by linking teacher interpersonal behaviour to students' subject-related attitudes. Teaching was studied in terms of a model originating from clinical psychology that was adapted to education. Teacher interpersonal behaviour was analysed in terms of two, independent behaviour dimensions called Influence and Proximity. This study investigated...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Teacher Influence, Statistical Analysis, Proximity, Motivation, Educational Research,...
The aim of the study was to gain insight into the occurrence of different types of peer interaction and particularly the types of interaction beneficial for learning in different collaborative learning environments. Based on theoretical notions related to collaborative learning and peer interaction, a coding scheme was developed to analyze the verbal interactions of student dyads in three collaborative learning environments: an environment with face-to-face interaction, an environment with...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Peer Groups, Educational Environment, Cooperative Learning, Computer Mediated...
This paper reports the results of two interventions involving the integrated study of mathematics and technology practice to girls in Years 6 and 7. The focus of the study was to look at factors that contributed to girls' disengagement with mathematics study and seek pedagogical solutions for this. The key mathematics concepts embedded in the two interventions were proportional reasoning and ratio. A design based research methodology was adopted. The study started with the assumption that by...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Research Methodology, Intervention, Females, Mathematics Education, Mathematical...
Computer-based technologies are now commonplace in classrooms, and the integration of these media into the teaching and learning of mathematics is supported by government policy in most developed countries. However, many questions about the impact of computer-based technologies on classroom mathematics learning remain unanswered, and debates about when and how they ought to be used continue. An increasing number of studies seek to identify the effects of technology usage on classroom learning,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Public Policy, Mathematics Education, Developed Nations, Educational Research,...
The authors' goal in this paper is to initiate a dialogue among educators who continue to make assertions about the usefulness of identifying students' learning styles with little or no research support. They discuss the status of learning style instruction and the unsubstantiated claims made by authors of learning style instruments and by instructors. They explore a number of key questions: (1) Are learning style instruments valid and reliable?; (2) Do students benefit when the type of...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Teaching Methods, Cognitive Style, Measures (Individuals), Validity, Reliability,...
This two-phase study integrated quantitative and qualitative research methods to investigate the relationship between success outcomes of two-year college students with disabilities and self-determination, and how students with higher and lesser degrees of self-determination understand and describe the outcomes of their post-secondary experience. The "ARC Self-Determination Scale" (Wehmeyer & Kelchner, 1995) and the "Demographic and Outcomes Survey" (researcher...
Topics: ERIC Archive, College Students, Disabilities, Research Methodology, Qualitative Research, Self...
In a previous article published in the "Journal of College Reading and Learning," we presented the results of a self-study of our commitment as faculty and staff members to providing a multicultural learning experience for our students. This follow-up article provides the findings of a study conducted during spring semester 2004 to explore student perceptions of their multicultural experiences within the same academic unit. In the discussion that follows, we also address differences...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Cultural Pluralism, Student Attitudes, Student Surveys, Individual Differences,...
A multiple baseline design across participants was used to determine how teacher greetings affected on-task behavior of 3 middle school students with problem behaviors. Momentary time sampling was used to measure on-task behavior during the first 10 min of class. Teacher greetings produced increases in students' on-task behavior from a mean of 45% in baseline to a mean of 72% during the intervention phase. Teacher greetings represent an antecedent manipulation that can easily be implemented in...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Time on Task, Teacher Student Relationship, Middle School Students, Middle School...
Professional development (PD) for the improvement of educational practice has attracted a great deal of attention in recent years. Although experts acknowledge the importance of PD, many PD programmes have little effect on educational practice. This article identifies influences on the effective implementation of Invitational Education (IE) within the framework of professional development that were identified during a qualitative study in schools in two states. Specific categories affecting the...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Practices, Professional Development, Educational Change, Research...
In this article, we have examined how historical events shape the research process, even when research is carefully planned and rigorously executed. Through an examination of our experiences conducting international data collection during a three-year SSHRC funded period in which the War on Terrorism and the War in Iraq began, we suggest that social context affects all aspects of every research project, from planning, to funding, to data collection, analysis, and dissemination. History,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Attitudes, Second Language Learning, Influences, Reliability, Social Science...
With this review, we explore the practices of arts-based educational research as documented in dissertations created and written over one decade in the Faculty of Education, University of British Columbia. We compile and describe more than thirty dissertations across methodologies and methods of inquiry, and identify three pillars of arts-based practice--literary, visual, and performative. In this review, we trace the beginnings of a new stream of practice that is interwoven in some of these...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Educational Practices, Doctoral Dissertations, Educational...
This paper addresses issues in relation to recent criticism of teacher education, set in the broader context of political agitation for changes to the purposes, role and outcomes of education within society. The paper raises questions around the purpose of schooling and its role in modern societies and argues for the pedagogical importance of critical dialogue to a democratic conceptualisation of education and promotes the idea of professional education as democratic practice. (Contains 1...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Outcomes of Education, Professional Education, Preservice Teacher Education, Role of...
This paper takes up the question of the way in which "the problem with educational research" is represented. It takes as its point of departure two recent views on "the problem"--one expressed by an educational journalist and one presented by the Australian Council of Deans of Education. It locates these within a larger frame of international debate about educational research and its problems and considers how these arise out of particular dispositions towards educational...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Fantasy, Educational Research, Problem Solving, Disadvantaged, Research Problems,...
Academic engagement with higher education research policy in Australia, and with education policy more generally, is in crisis. This time around, it is not just that our theoretical tools are blunt and irrelevant (Ball 1990), so are our politics. It seems our attention has been so consumed by "what is policy" (Ball 1994a) and with challenging its claims to authority, that we have missed or ignored imperatives to engage with its production. Even though some have attempted...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Higher Education, Politics, Cooperation, Educational Research,...
Group work is a widely used learning approach in higher education where it is seen as encouraging the development of collaborative skills and attitudes while producing an assessable product. Group assignments can, however, create dilemmas and tensions for both staff and students. Students often seek academic intervention in the form of support and dispute arbitration; and the types of interventions employed to deal with issues arising during and after group work, and the effectiveness of the...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Intervention, Assignments, Cooperative Learning, Higher Education,...
In our descriptions of things, we normally think that truth plays an important part; we value true statements over false ones and we prefer people to be truthful rather than deceitful. If these two facets of truth are important in our everyday lives, they assume even more significance in educational research because of the commitment researchers make to the pursuit of truth. For much of the time, truth is not a pressing problem for educational researchers who just get on with the job. But on...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Researchers, Qualitative Research, Educational Research, Ethics, Foreign...
This paper presents an examination of the use of Rasch modelling in a major research project, "Improving Middle Years Mathematics and Science" (IMYMS). The project has generated both qualitative and quantitative data, with much of the qualitative data being ordinal in nature. Reporting the results of analyses for a range of audiences necessitates careful, well-designed report formats. Some useful new report formats based on Rasch modelling--the Modified Variable Map, the Ordinal Map,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Mathematics Education, Item Response Theory, Classification, Mathematical Models,...
This study uses Partial Credit Rasch analysis to study a complex data set of student responses to survey items relating to chance and data. The items were administered in the classroom and collected from 1993 to 2003 in the Australian state of Tasmania. Data were collected from a total of 5514 individual students across Grades 3 to 11 over the decade and of these students 896 provided at least one repeated measure. As students completed a core of common items, Rasch analysis could be performed...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Elementary Secondary Education, Foreign Countries, Longitudinal Studies, Mathematics...
In this article, the president of the National Association of Industrial and Technical Teacher Educators (NAITTE) responds to Charles Gagel's 2006 article recapping and comparing the 1993 and 2004 surveys of NAITTE membership. As they contemplate both of these surveys, she urges members to ask themselves a few questions: What are the characteristics of the past they should honor? What can they learn from the present? What parts of the future should they embrace? Here, she comments on the past,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Technical Education, Teacher Educators, Organizations (Groups), Reader Response,...
This article presents the universal design features that were identified during the alpha development of a scheduler software program, known as MySchoolDayOnline, for use in schools, and provides preliminary research on the usability of these features. The study presented here investigated the accessibility and usability of MySchoolDayOnline for students with visual impairments. Of the 12 high school students who participated in the field testing, 10 were blind (those with light perception or...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Vision, Field Tests, Visual Impairments, Partial Vision, Program Evaluation, Computer...
The Ticket to Work (TTW) program is a federally funded program meant to assist persons who receive disability benefits from the Social Security Administration (SSA) in obtaining employment, with the ultimate goal of terminating SSA benefits and thereby providing a cost savings for the government. With its focus on employment, the TTW program would seem to be an excellent opportunity for beneficiaries who are blind or have low vision, since lower levels of employment are a well-known problem for...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Program Effectiveness, Employment, Disabilities, Blindness, Vocational...
The toxic shock syndrome (TSS) crisis is a historical public health success story from which much can be learned and applied to contemporary public health issues. Following the first reports, multiple research teams initiated studies designed to ascertain the risk factors associated with TSS. Those studies evolved over several years--each building upon previous findings in an attempt to further understand both the nature and causes of toxic shock. After the first report of TSS in a May 1980...
Topics: ERIC Archive, History, Public Health, Sex Education, Risk, Legal Problems, Health Personnel,...
Adolescents and young adults are likely to be sexually active and interested in sexual ethics. In order to tap into this interest and assist in their intellectual development, a sexual ethics continuum teaching strategy was developed during four semesters with six sections of two different college courses. A total of 52 behaviors of interest to students were identified and rated by students as ethically ideal, ethically allowed, or ethically forbidden. A combination of quantitative and...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Teaching Methods, Educational Strategies, Adolescents, Young Adults, College...
The disproportionate representation of students of color in special education programs has been an issue in the field for decades. However, the literature on the topic tends to ignore the perceptions held by the families of these children. This paper shares the results of a qualitative study which explored the perceptions of one group of African-American parents that challenged their local school system on the placement and quality of services delivered to African-American children in special...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Special Education, Disproportionate Representation, African Americans, Parent...
State and national accountability initiatives are forcing educational administrators to seek curricular interventions that will yield the greatest improvement in students' academic performance in the least amount of time. Though volumes of documentation regarding the value of the arts in education line the shelves of professional libraries and support for the arts as part of a comprehensive educational program is the subject of articles, speeches, and symposia, when push comes to shove, when...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Role of Education, Academic Achievement, Intelligence, Music Education, Dance...
Increasingly, educational reform is linked to the concept of professional learning communities (PLCs). Definitions of PLCs vary, but generally the concept refers to a group of educators who "continuously seek and share learning, and act on their learning" (Hord 1997, 6). Stoll and her colleagues, concluding their review of the current state of PLCs and research, observe that there is a "paucity of longitudinal research" and that "little is yet known about the potential...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Change, Educational Research, Educational Cooperation, Educational...
Effective exploration of spatially referenced educational achievement data can help educational researchers and policy analysts accelerate interpretation of datasets to gain valuable insights. This paper illustrates the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to analyze educational achievement gaps in Arkansas. It introduces the Geographic Academic Policy Series (GAPS) and presents one example of GAPS as a case study using GIS in the education policy analysis. The Geographic Academic Policy...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Program Effectiveness, Maps, Policy Analysis, Information Systems, Academic...
Education accompanied by social mobility is the cornerstone of the American dream. Yet, each year scores of children, especially those from the underprivileged class, fail to meet even the most modest academic expectations and subsequently never reach their academic potential. This research rejects earlier explanations of academic failure and suggests that Modality theory, the idea that students differ in their ability to learn new and difficult material depending on the manner in which it is...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Grade 6, Teaching Methods, Academic Failure, Social Mobility, Academic Achievement,...
Plagiarism is an ugly word. Copying someone else's work and attempting to claim credit for one's self is an act that involves a number of ethical failings--theft, laziness, coveting, and lying among others. Many educators blame the Internet for what they perceive as the rise of plagiarism. Although the Internet certainly enables more efficient plagiarism, blaming it for widespread copying is akin to blaming a bank robbery on the presence of cash in the building. This article presents several...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Plagiarism, Internet, Prevention, Ethics, Student Behavior, Teaching Methods, Higher...
In this article, the author explores the promising practices of Audrey Union (all names in this article are pseudonyms), a white principal of Integration Middle School (IMS), which served nearly 400 students in sixth through ninth grades. Approximately 40% of the students were of color and a similar percentage qualified for free and reduced lunch. In particular, the author examines Audrey's influence in creating systemic, sustained, and differentiated professional development for social justice...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Change, Justice, Faculty Development, Principals, Social Integration,...
This article shares findings from a research study on 14 gifted dropouts. The first author designed the study after she came in contact with four gifted young men who chose to leave school rather than put up with what they described as low-level curriculum and a culture that disrespected them. The intent of the study was to explore why gifted students drop out of school and examine the effects of dropping out on their plans for the future.
Topics: ERIC Archive, Academically Gifted, Dropouts, Family Influence, Family Environment, Males, Dropout...
During the analysis of a survey of art therapy educators in 2001 (St. John, Kaiser, & Ball, 2004), issues of importance to art therapy and art therapy research education emerged. As a follow-up, the authors interviewed educators attending the 2002 Annual Conference of the American Art Therapy Association (AATA) to gain an understanding of their perspectives in three areas: emphasis on teaching qualitative and quantitative approaches, expected research competencies of graduates, and...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Statistical Analysis, Qualitative Research, Art Therapy, Educational Research,...
Wonderful schools do not simply have to be imagined. Phenomenal examples of education going right for children exist in the United States. These schools are serving all populations of children and families. What becomes clear, even with schools that appear quite different from one another, is that common themes emerge across effective schools and contribute to what makes them impressive yet replicable models (Newmann, Secada, and Wehlage 1995; Daggett 2005). An identifiable culture and a...
Topics: ERIC Archive, School Effectiveness, Educational Innovation, School Culture, Educational...
In this essay, the authors discuss what it might take to develop knowledge that can help education policymakers and schools attain their goals. In reading both the research and the current policy environment, the authors identify several fundamental reasons why it is so difficult to develop the knowledge needed to inform policies that might enable standards-based reform to succeed. First is an inadequate conception of the goal of the system and how proficiency should be measured. Second,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Policy, Educational Research, Academic Standards, Educational Objectives,...
In the current study, momentary time sampling (MTS) and partial-interval recording (PIR) were compared to continuous-duration recording of stereotypy and to the frequency of self-injury during a treatment analysis to determine whether the recording method affected data interpretation. Five previously conducted treatment analysis data sets were analyzed by creating separate graphic displays for each measurement method (duration or frequency, MTS, and PIR). An expert panel interview and...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Sampling, Intervals, Research Methodology, Data Interpretation, Comparative Analysis,...