Developing the scales on evaluation beliefs of student teachers

The purpose of the study reported in this paper was to investigate the validity and the reliability of a newly developed questionnaire named ‘Teacher Evaluation Beliefs’ (TEB). The framework for developing items was provided by the two models. The first model focuses on Student-Centered and Teacher-Centered beliefs about evaluation while the other centers on five dimensions (what/ who/ when/ why/ how). The validity and reliability of the new instrument was investigated using both exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis study (n=446). Overall results indicate that the two-factor structure is more reasonable than the five-factor one. Further research needs additional items about the latent dimensions “what” ”who” ”when” ”why” “how” for each existing factor based on Student-centered and Teacher-centered approaches

Learning 21st century science in context with mobile technologies

The paper describes a project to support personal inquiry learning with handheld and desktop technology between formal and informal settings. It presents a trial of the technology and learning across a school classroom, sports hall, and library. The main aim of the study was to incorporate inquiry learning activities within an extended school science environment in order to investigate opportunities for technological mediations and to extract initial recommendations for the design of mobile technology to link inquiry learning across different contexts. A critical incident analysis was carried out to identify learning breakdowns and breakthroughs that led to design implications. The main findings are the opportunities that a combination of mobile and fixed technology bring to: manage the formation of groups, display live visualisations of student and teacher data on a shared screen to facilitate motivation and personal relevance, incorporate broader technical support, provide context-specific guidance on the sequence, reasons and aims of learning activities, offer opportunities to micro-sites for reflection and learning in the field, to explicitly support appropriation of data within inquiry and show the relation between specific activities and the general inquiry process

Stakeholder engagement in water governance as social learning: lessons from practice

The OECD Principles on Water Governance set out various requirements for stakeholder engagement. Coupled with conceptualizations of social learning, this article asks how we define and enact stakeholder engagement and explores the actual practice of engagement of stakeholders in three fields of water governance. The results suggest that a key consideration is the purpose of the stakeholder engagement, requiring consideration of its ethics, process, roles and expected outcomes. While facilitators cannot be held accountable if stakeholder engagement ‘fails’ in terms of social learning, they are responsible for ensuring that the enabling conditions for social learning are met

Contributing to Quality of Life by Facilitating Music-Based Social Interaction for Adults with Intellectual Disability

The purpose of this mixed method investigation was to discern whether participation in a task-specific music therapy group contributed to quality of life for adults with intellectual disabilities. Engaging in social interaction had previously been shown to benefit physical and emotional health (Duvdevany, 2008) while lack of social connection had produced detrimental effects, most often loneliness and depression (de Belvis et al., 2008). Two research questions were posited: 1) Does the level of social interaction increase when individuals participate in a group activity as compared to unstructured leisure time? 2) Does active participation in the group activity contribute to the quality of life of the participants? Socialization was defined as a verbal statement. Intervention consisted of 12, 45-minute music therapy sessions during which each of the three small group (n = 3) engaged in the process of producing and ultimately publically presenting a music DVD of themselves singing. The control group (n = 4) participated in coffee breaks of equal duration, frequency, and location. Employing the Social Interaction Scale and Group Environment Scale (Moos, 2002), four categories of verbal response were measured quantitatively for each participant: Initiating with the therapist, responding to the therapist, initiating with a peer, and responding to a peer. In addition, session content, a pre-post session Quality of Life Interview (Snow and D’Amico 2009), and an informal post-performance interview were analyzed qualitatively. Quantitative analysis demonstrated no statistically significant increase in any of the identified interaction categories. The only notable finding was a moderate effect size (r = .40) for initiations with the group as demonstrated in the Mann Whitney U test results. Interestingly, the control group actually produced more verbal statements, However, the content of these conversations proved rote, repetitive, often non-reciprocated, and engaged in unequally by participants. Conversely, while the intervention groups talked less, the verbal exchanges were robust, varied, new, interesting, reciprocated, and all participants engaged with relative equality. Qualitative analysis produced two major themes: The need for social interaction, and prevailing loneliness. An additional theme of nervousness presented during the initial sessions, but later subsided. Overarching findings indicated participants’ strong desire to be socially engaged yet frequently expressing feelings of loneliness. The post-performance interview revealed that nine of the ten participants expressed a positive response to participation in the project and public event. Qualitative results also indicated that there was healthy group process and positive cohesion amongst participants, implying that quality of life was increased by participation in this project

Effects of Participation in a Summer Sports Camp on At-Risk Boys: A Self-Determination Theory Perspective

Summer camps have received recent attention as an intervention to increase adolescents’ physical activity. To date, research has rarely focused how a summer camp influences at-risk boys’ motivation and physical activity through a self-determination theory. The purpose of this study was to examine changes of motivational and physical measures for at-risk boys participating in a summer sports camp. This study also investigated whether initiative games provide instructor support for autonomy, competence, and relatedness for at-risk boys. One hundred at-risk boys, aged 10-13 years, participated in a summer sports camp located in southwest U.S. for three weeks. The boys participated in scheduled camp activities on daily basis during the three-week camp period. Three motivational measure questionnaires (Psychological Needs Perception; Behavioral Regulation in Exercise Questionnaire II – BREQ II; Perceived Instructor Support) and PACER (Progressive Aerobic Cardiovascular Endurance Run) test were completed by the boys at the beginning of camp as pre-test and then, at the end of camp, the boys completed all the measures in the same manner again as post-test. In addition, fifty boys who participated in the initiative games were interviewed about perceptions of instructor support for autonomy, competence, and relatedness and observations were conducted to collect instructor’s supportive behaviors for autonomy, competence, and relatedness during initiative games. Results revealed the boys’ amotivation increased and their intrinsic regulation decreased across the camp period. The boys’ PACER test scores showed no significant changes across the two different time periods. Further, the boys perceived the instructor’s supportive behaviors (i.e., autonomy, competence, and relatedness support) during the initiative games. The findings suggest programs that allow more camper-centered options and de-emphasize competition may promote increased motivation and physical activity of at-risk boys through better meeting their needs

ESPAI OBERT. Mustidisciplinary cooperative learning experience

[EN] ESPAI OBERT is a pilot experiment to improve team-based collaborative learning that aims to promote transversal knowledge through developing skills and attitudes for effective performance of functions in work environments. To achieve this objective, the participants of the simulated work experience are organized into work teams and must respond to a challenge in the form of an open and contextualized problem, which requires learning and a functional use of knowledge. The challenge is to propose an artistic space in an uncultivated field of the Valencian Orchard (This project is part of the framework of the Cooperation and Development Project [P]Horta Oberta. Meeting place of participation for sustainable alternatives, selected by the Programme of activities of solidarity and social participation (GLOCAL 2020) of the Universitat Politècnica de València. Specifically, the activity is motivated by the participation of the proposals in the ideas competition Espai Obert. Sustainable ephemeral spaces, which aims to encourage creativity in the context of the ephemeral from an artistic perspective. The six-week experience is tested on a small group of students coming from the Higher Technical School of Architecture and the Faculty of Fine Arts. These students are either enrolled in the subject of Architectural Composition, 4th Degree in Fundamentals of Architecture or Project Methodology, 3rd Degree Fine Arts. The participating collective are structured into multidisciplinary teams. The methodology used for this experiment is Direct Instruction, a common practice based on two learning approaches: Experiential Learning and Inquiry Learning and the Project-Based Learning Method. Techniques such as the Whirlwind of Ideas will be used in the initial phase, while Structured Debate will be used in the final phase. Cooperative learning will be tested throughout the process using techniques such as Spontaneous Mentoring. In consideration of this six-week experience, the results, which are expected to motivate the repetition of the action and/or its improvement, are: 1. An improvement of teamwork skills, 2. Easy acquisition of flexible and contextualized knowledge, 3. Promotion of critical thinking and self-regulation skills, 4. Encouragement of positive interdependence between students and 5. An improvement of motivation to learn.Hernández Navarro, Y.; Dato, P.; Esteve Sendra, C.; Puerta Gómez, MF. (2020). ESPAI OBERT. Mustidisciplinary cooperative learning experience. IATED Academy. 5149-5156. https://doi.org/10.21125/edulearn.2020.1340S5149515

CRT And Educational Equity: Professional Development At The High School Level

The research question addressed in this project was, how can I create professional development designed to help teachers implement culturally responsive pedagogy in the classroom? It documents one teacher’s creation of a 20 week, 10 module, professional development surrounding the topic of culturally responsive teaching. The project and paper integrate combined knowledge of culturally responsive teaching, best practices for teaching adults, best practices for enacting effective professional development, as well as instructions for deep and thoughtful reflection. The author documents the details of the creation of the professional development sessions as well as the literature and research methods involved. She discusses both the successes and the struggles of implementing professional development focused on CRT and concludes that all teachers are capable of moving forward on the continuum of cultural responsiveness through dedication and honest reflection

Continuous Improvement in Education

In recent years, 'continuous improvement' has become a popular catchphrase in the field of education. However, while continuous improvement has become commonplace and well-documented in other industries, such as healthcare and manufacturing, little is known about how this work has manifested itself in education.This white paper attempts to map the landscape of this terrain by identifying and describing organizations engaged in continuous improvement, and by highlighting commonalities and differences among them. The findings classify three types of organizations engaged in continuous improvement: those focused on instructional improvement at the classroom level; those concentrating on system-wide improvement; and those addressing collective impact. Each type is described in turn and illustrated by an organizational case study. Through the analysis, six common themes that characterize all three types of organizations (e.g., leadership and strategy, communication and engagement, organizational infrastructure, methodology, data collection and analysis, and building capacity) are enumerated. This white paper makes four concluding observations. First, the three case studies provide evidence of organizations conducting continuous improvement work in the field of education, albeit at different levels and in different ways. Second, entry points to continuous improvement work are not mutually exclusive, but are nested and, hence, mutually informative and comparative. Third, continuous improvement is not synonymous with improving all organizational processes simultaneously; rather, research and learning cycles are iterative and gradual in nature. Fourth, despite being both iterative and gradual, it is imperative that improvement work is planned and undertaken in a rigorous, thoughtful, and transparent fashion