Building zones of proximal development with computer games in a UC Links after-school program

There is widespread agreement that further research is needed in order to identify afterschool program characteristics useful for understanding why some programs are more successful than others. The bulk of recommendations put forth by researchers, practitioners and policy makers focus on observable characteristics of the afterschool setting as a whole. While these characteristics can be recorded on checklists for later aggregation into a quantifiable evaluation of the system, it is important to remember that they are the products of interactional processes. In the present analysis I focus on the dynamic human interactions that comprise these system-level evaluations. Drawing on video documentation of adult-child computer mediated activities in a UC-Links afterschool program, I illustrate how UC-Links design principles - which focus on the creation of "cultures of collaborative learning" - promote the learning and development of participating youth. In particular, I show how implementation of these principles support one of the key tasks in achieving quality teaching-learning after school: the successful negotiation of a common ground of engagement between interlocutors in an instructional interaction. (DIPF/Orig.

Caring about and with Imaginary Characters: Early Childhood Playworlds as Sites for Social Sustainability

We investigate the concept of care in adult-child joint play through two cases that illustrate ways in which the development of care relations among researchers, pedagogues, and children—and the imaginary characters they create through their joint play—shape and sustain early childhood education and care research and practice. We focus on the ways that early childhood education and care pedagogues’ approaches to care provide insights into practices of social sustainability, specifically social inclusion. The cases we present are drawn from recent studies of early childhood play. The studies belong to a corpus of international research projects that are researcher-teacher collaborations. These studies explore a unique form of adult-child joint imaginary play known as playworlds. Playworlds are based on cultural historical theories of development and art, Gunilla Lindqvist’s studies of playworlds, and local theory and practice of early childhood education and care. Our analyses of playworlds are based, in part, on Winnicott’s concept of transitional objects. The two cases are drawn from ECEC playworlds in Finland and the US. Each exemplifies how playworlds, as forms of participatory design research, make social sustainability possible. Furthermore, these cases highlight how, by working with the boundaries between and moving between real and imagined, the participants are able to develop new ways of being that are radically inclusive. We argue that they do so by facilitating and maintaining the development of care relations among researchers, teachers, children, and, importantly, imaginary characters, in ways that create what we call transitional subjects. We conclude that social sustainability, like care, should be conceived of as an ecology of caring practices

Caring about and with Imaginary Characters: Early Childhood Playworlds as Sites for Social Sustainability

We investigate the concept of care in adult-child joint play through two cases that illustrate ways in which the development of care relations among researchers, pedagogues, and children—and the imaginary characters they create through their joint play—shape and sustain early childhood education and care research and practice. We focus on the ways that early childhood education and care pedagogues’ approaches to care provide insights into practices of social sustainability, specifically social inclusion. The cases we present are drawn from recent studies of early childhood play. The studies belong to a corpus of international research projects that are researcher-teacher collaborations. These studies explore a unique form of adult-child joint imaginary play known as playworlds. Playworlds are based on cultural historical theories of development and art, Gunilla Lindqvist’s studies of playworlds, and local theory and practice of early childhood education and care. Our analyses of playworlds are based, in part, on Winnicott’s concept of transitional objects. The two cases are drawn from ECEC playworlds in Finland and the US. Each exemplifies how playworlds, as forms of participatory design research, make social sustainability possible. Furthermore, these cases highlight how, by working with the boundaries between and moving between real and imagined, the participants are able to develop new ways of being that are radically inclusive. We argue that they do so by facilitating and maintaining the development of care relations among researchers, teachers, children, and, importantly, imaginary characters, in ways that create what we call transitional subjects. We conclude that social sustainability, like care, should be conceived of as an ecology of caring practices

Documenting and Assessing Learning in Informal and Media-Rich Environments

An extensive review of the literature on learning assessment in informal settings, expert discussion of key issues, and a new model for good assessment practice. Today educational activities take place not only in school but also in after-school programs, community centers, museums, and online communities and forums. The success and expansion of these out-of-school initiatives depends on our ability to document and assess what works and what doesn't in informal learning, but learning outcomes in these settings are often unpredictable. Goals are open-ended; participation is voluntary; and relationships, means, and ends are complex. This report charts the state of the art for learning assessment in informal settings, offering an extensive review of the literature, expert discussion on key topics, a suggested model for comprehensive assessment, and recommendations for good assessment practices. Drawing on analysis of the literature and expert opinion, the proposed model, the Outcomes-by-Levels Model for Documentation and Assessment, identifies at least ten types of valued outcomes, to be assessed in terms of learning at the project, group, and individual levels. The cases described in the literature under review, which range from promoting girls' identification with STEM practices to providing online resources for learning programming and networking, illustrate the usefulness of the assessment model

Documenting and Assessing Learning in Informal and Media-Rich Environments

An extensive review of the literature on learning assessment in informal settings, expert discussion of key issues, and a new model for good assessment practice. Today educational activities take place not only in school but also in after-school programs, community centers, museums, and online communities and forums. The success and expansion of these out-of-school initiatives depends on our ability to document and assess what works and what doesn't in informal learning, but learning outcomes in these settings are often unpredictable. Goals are open-ended; participation is voluntary; and relationships, means, and ends are complex. This report charts the state of the art for learning assessment in informal settings, offering an extensive review of the literature, expert discussion on key topics, a suggested model for comprehensive assessment, and recommendations for good assessment practices.Drawing on analysis of the literature and expert opinion, the proposed model, the Outcomes-by-Levels Model for Documentation and Assessment, identifies at least ten types of valued outcomes, to be assessed in terms of learning at the project, group, and individual levels. The cases described in the literature under review, which range from promoting girls' identification with STEM practices to providing online resources for learning programming and networking, illustrate the usefulness of the assessment model

Playworlds as Ways of Being, A Chorus of Voices : Why are Playworlds Worth Creating? The Playworld of Creative Research

This paper discusses the playworlds of the Playworld of Creative Research (PWCR) research group. Playworlds are created from a relatively new form of play that can be described as a combination of adult forms of creative imagination (art, science, etc.), which require extensive real life experience, and children's forms of creative imagination (play), which require the embodiment of ideas and emotions in the material world. In playworlds, adults and children (or teenagers or seniors) enter into a common fantasy that is designed to support the development of both adults and children (or teenagers or seniors). The PWCR understands playworlds and the study of playworlds as ways of being. In this paper we present unique, individual playworlds that we truly love from the perspective of researchers, artists, teachers, children, administrators, and imaginary characters, who participate in playworlds. We use a master fiction writer's words on the love of literature to frame our discussion of playworlds, focusing on truth, time, human magic, infinite possibilities, fun, and the enriching and intensifying (and so, creating) of the real in playworlds in Japan, Finland, Sweden and the US.Peer reviewe

Telementoring Physics: University-Community After-school Collaborations and the Mediation of the Formal/ Informal Divide

For several decades improvement of science education has been a major concern of policy makers concerned that the U.S. is a “nation at risk” owing to the dearth of students pursing careers in science. Recent policy proposals have argued that provision of broadband digital connectivity to organizations in the informal sector would increase the reach of the formal, academic sector to raise the overall level of science literacy in the country. This dissertation reports on a longitudinal study of a physics telementoring activity jointly run by a university-community collaborative at a community learning center. The activity implemented a digital infrastructure that exceeds the technical and social-institutional arrangements promoted by policy makers. In addition to broadband internet access (for tele-conferencing between students at the community center and physicists at a university), supplemented by digital software designed to promote physics education, the activity included the presence of a collaborating researcher/tutor at the community learning center to coordinate and document the instructional activities. The current research revealed a fundamental contradiction between the logic, goals, and practices of the physics instructors, and the corresponding logic, goals, and practices of the participants at the community learning center. This contradiction revolves around a contrast between the physicists’ formal, logocentric ways of understanding expressed in the ability to explain the scientific rules underlying physical phenomena and the informal, pragmatic orientation of the youth and adults at the learning center. The observations in this dissertation should remind techno-enthusiasts, especially in the arena of public education policy, that there are no turnkey solutions in “distance” science education. Technically “connecting” people is not equivalent to creating conditions that expand opportunities to learn and a functioning socio-technical system that supports learning. Secondly, for designers and practitioners of informal learning in community-university collaborative settings, it is critically important to understand distance learning activities as developing “cross-cultural, ” collaborative encounters, the results of which are more likely to be hybrids of different ways of learning and knowing than the conversion of informal learning into a tool for instruction that will allow youth to “think like physicists.”

Building zones of proximal development with computer games in a U-C Links after-school program

There is widespread agreement that further research is needed in order to identify afterschool program characteristics useful for understanding why some programs are more successful than others. The bulk of recommendations put forth by researchers, practitioners and policy makers focus on observable characteristics of the afterschool setting as a whole. While these characteristics can be recorded on checklists for later aggregation into a quantifiable evaluation of the system, it is important to remember that they are the products of interactional processes. In the present analysis I focus on the dynamic human interactions that comprise these system-level evaluations. Drawing on video documentation of adult-child computer mediated activities in a UC-Links afterschool program, I illustrate how UC-Links design principles – which focus on the creation of cultures of collaborative learning – promote the learning and development of participating youth. In particular, I show how implementation of these principles support one of the key tasks in achieving quality teachinglearning after school: the successful negotiation of a common ground of engagement between interlocutors in an instructional interaction

Building zones of proximal development with computer games in a U-C Links after-school program

There is widespread agreement that further research is needed in order to identify afterschool program characteristics useful for understanding why some programs are more successful than others. The bulk of recommendations put forth by researchers, practitioners and policy makers focus on observable characteristics of the afterschool setting as a whole. While these characteristics can be recorded on checklists for later aggregation into a quantifiable evaluation of the system, it is important to remember that they are the products of interactional processes. In the present analysis I focus on the dynamic human interactions that comprise these system-level evaluations. Drawing on video documentation of adult-child computer mediated activities in a UC-Links afterschool program, I illustrate how UC-Links design principles – which focus on the creation of cultures of collaborative learning – promote the learning and development of participating youth. In particular, I show how implementation of these principles support one of the key tasks in achieving quality teachinglearning after school: the successful negotiation of a common ground of engagement between interlocutors in an instructional interaction

Exploring the Influence of Language on Pitch Perception

(Statement of Responsibility) by Robert A. Lecusay(Thesis) Thesis (B.A.) -- New College of Florida, 1998(Electronic Access) RESTRICTED TO NCF STUDENTS, STAFF, FACULTY, AND ON-CAMPUS USE(Bibliography) Includes bibliographical references.(Source of Description) This bibliographic record is available under the Creative Commons CC0 public domain dedication. The New College of Florida, as creator of this bibliographic record, has waived all rights to it worldwide under copyright law, including all related and neighboring rights, to the extent allowed by law.(Local) Faculty Sponsor: Harley, Heid