Education & Pedagogy

This study attempts to define the contradiction between cooperative learning, which has an important place in science education, and the relative evaluation system. The fixation of the situation which was done with the data obtained from the literature also has been supported with a semi-structured interview study conducted with eighteen science lecturers from Kazim Karabekir Educational Faculty. The qualitative analysis of the obtained data brought to light that the relative evaluation system has negative effects on the interaction among students. Such negativities have a quality that can be an obstacle to cooperative learning, which has an important place in science education. For this reason, it is considered that such a study will be beneficial to researchers who work on science education and education policies, and to science teachers.

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of peer-generated feedback versus visual feedback in inspiring preservice physical education teachers to produce reflections that are more critical than technical. The participants were junior-, senior-, and graduate-level health and physical education majors enrolled in an instructional methods course. Upon completion of four required teaching labs, participants were given either peer-generated feedback or a visual record of their teaching. They received reflective prompts and were asked to reflect upon their teaching. Among participants in this study, 61% of more critical, intermediate reflections were based upon visual feedback. Peer-generated feedback produced 73% of technical, novice reflections. It was concluded that visual feedback inspired more critical than technical reflection. (Contains 2 tables.)

There is a crisis relevant to the publicly funded education of Aboriginal students in Ontario. This article, which presents the details of the crisis, analyzes recent policy statements released by the Ontario Ministry of Education designed to address that crisis. By defining the nature of this critical juncture, presenting how these policies may be "widening the void" rather than "closing the gap," and offering opportunities to respond by improving the capabilities of teachers to enact those policies in their classrooms, the authors appeal to school boards, faculty associations, as well as Deans of Education, to act decisively to support Aboriginal self-determination. (Contains 1 table and 1 footnote.)

In the past three decades, higher education reforms have taken place almost everywhere in the world, and governance or the way that higher education is or should be coordinated has become a global topic. The governance reform in Chinese higher education emerged against such a background. The current studies on Chinese higher education reforms mainly tackle the reform processes and treat the Chinese government as the driver of the reforms, whereas how the Chinese government is susceptible to international pressures has remained under-researched. This article examines the mechanisms that facilitate the spread of global governance reform ideologies in Chinese higher education through the Chinese government, drawing on the concept of institutional isomorphism. Based on analysing recent literature and documents, it concludes that the Chinese government is affected by the global reform ideas and practices that have been legitimatised through international organisations' rhetoric and other countries' successful experiences.

Education is by far the strongest predictor of whether a non-economist will share the economic beliefs of the average economist. (Caplan, 2001) Is the effect of education as large as it seems? Or is education largely a proxy for cognitive ability? Using data from the General Social Survey (GSS), we show that the estimated effect of education sharply falls after controlling for intelligence. In fact, education is driven down to second place, and intelligence replaces it at the top of the list of variables that make people "think like economists." Thus, to a fair degree education is proxy for intelligence, though there are some areas--international economics in particular--where education still dominates. An important implication is that the political externalities of education may not be as large as they initially appear. (Contains 9 tables.)

The integration of some form of online learning in higher education and its adoption in distance and continuing education has increased exponentially in the last decade. This growth has been consistent in different parts of the world, although its implementation in mainstream educational systems varies according to the economic development of the region. But what is "online learning" and why is it used as a synonym of distance education? This article presents a review that goes through the last 10 years of literature on online learning. It presents the definitions by different authors, and describes its evolution, characteristics, benefits, and use and implementation in education and training. The review concludes with a summary of the development of online learning in Latin America. (Contains 1 note, 1 table, and 3 figures.)

Central to schools of education are the professional preparation and development of future educators, who will be responsible for preparing citizens to function and live in a global community. Globalization and schooling have the potential to successfully or unsuccessfully affect the skills that students need to succeed in an increasingly global world. The children who succeed will have the ability to penetrate the opportunity structure, and those who fail or leave schools will be locked out. With this in mind and with the increased immigration in the United States during the 1990s, along with the creation of new information and new technologies, teacher educators are faced with multiple challenges as they prepare teachers for the increased demands of a global society. In this article, the author discusses the major challenges faced by teacher education in an increasingly global society.

This study focused on how democratic values and citizenship education are promoted through environmental education in Costa Rica. Data were collected through the examination of textbook and curriculum guides and interviews with classroom teachers. The qualitative study utilized Bowers' (2001) and Gruenewald's (2003) theories of eco-justice and critical place-based pedagogy to analyze Costa Rican elementary environmental education curriculum and its relationship to social justice and democracy. Findings suggest that the curriculum did promote environmental sensitivity and, to a lesser extent, democratic values and social justice. More importantly, the study found that the curriculum allowed teachers to become environmental advocates who encouraged their students to actively interrogate and analyze contradictions between the reality in their communities and official economic and environmental policies. (Contains 2 tables and 1 note.)

Attitudes and outcomes of sex education received by North American women are examined via an Internet survey (N = 1,400). Mean age was 19.5, with 24% reporting one or more unplanned pregnancies. Women were more satisfied with sex education from informal sources than from parents, schools, and physicians. Those receiving sex education from parents or schools reported fewer pregnancies and abortions. In school, women receiving a combination of contraceptive and abstinence education and those receiving primarily abstinence education were least likely to experience unplanned pregnancy. Religious identification was significantly related to unplanned pregnancy and type of sex education received from parents. These factors seem to play a significant role in reducing unplanned pregnancy and abortion. (Contains 1 figure and 3 tables.)

Teachers are where the major strength of organizational control lies in the educational process; it is mainly they who restrict the quality of education and teaching and who are the irreplaceable factor in determining how well a school is run and its overall image. Therefore, once a teacher drain from higher education institutions begins, it is indicative of a serious problem of major proportions. While in recent years the teacher drain from higher education institutions has been well handled in some economically developed regions and key universities, for the vast majority of ordinary institutions around the country it shows no signs of abating and is indeed worsening, becoming almost universal. It is hoped that this study will arouse concern about this higher education teacher drain and promote the development of higher education in China. (Contains 2 notes.) [Translated by Sue Wiles.]

This article describes the action taken by a school regarding the numerous complaints and criticisms about students trespassing on lawns, picking flowers and fruits, and destroying trees. The school decided to take the opportunity to launch an environmental education campaign to teach students to protect flowers, plants, and the environment. Environmental knowledge was integrated into various courses. In addition, secondary educational activities were also organized. For instance, moral education was embedded in environmental education by celebrating Environmental Protection Day. By way of activities associated with "protecting flowers, plants, and the environment," the level of students' ethical thinking was elevated. Students learn to care about the environment and other human beings. It reinforces their collective spirit and attitude towards labor and environmental awareness. The school launched a series of activities based on the following principle: (1) combining large and small activities; (2) adopting various formats; and (3) endless efforts.

Background: Although a large number of children in foster care in the United States are receiving special education services, little is known about their educational experiences. Method: This exploratory study used focus group research to look more closely at the complexity of the problems and needs that this population experiences with the special education system. Results: Five major procedural issues, relating to identification and placement in special education and provision of appropriate services, were identified. Conclusion: There is an urgent need to address the complex problems that children in foster care experience with the special education system. Recommendations are presented for closer collaboration between the child welfare and school systems, and for the training of educators, social workers, court personnel, and caregivers in special education rights and services.

Most educators in the United States have had to confront the changed reality brought about by the federal reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, commonly known as No Child Left Behind (NCLB). This represents a set of initiatives that can radically transform the federal role in policing and controlling core aspects of education in general and teacher education. Using a number of key volumes that have been written to either criticize or support major components of NCLB, I provide a critical reading of the assumptions behind NCLB and point to a number of its key negative implications for educational policy and practice. In the process, I point to areas where educators might look for more critically democratic alternatives.

Changes of the shape and the size of higher education systems have been a key issue of both higher education policy and higher education research for more than four decades. It is widely assumed that the expansion of student enrolment was the most powerful factor in evoking structural change and has caused increasing diversification. This article shows, in contrast, that structural changes were less convergent until the 1990s across economically advanced countries, because policies responded not only to presumed common functional demands, but opted for varying political targets and took into consideration the national traditions of higher education systems. Moreover, "expansion and diversification" concepts were challenged and supplemented by "academic drift", "flexibilization" and "cyclical concepts". Most recently, other factors--notably growing international cooperation, globalization, new steering and management systems, and moves towards a knowledge society--contributed to an increasing complexity of underlying forces.

This article argues that the way in which research training is affected by national policies aiming at modernizing graduate education is shaped by the way in which national characteristics of state policies, academic institutions and disciplines interact. The argument is applied in an analysis of the consequences of policy changes and higher education reform in England, Norway and Sweden, focusing on how research training was shaped by reforms during the 1980s and 1990s. The article first presents the status before the reform period with an emphasis on the salient characteristics that affect research training and graduate education. Secondly, we briefly present the main lines of the reform policies and how they affected the higher education systems and careers to which researchers are supposedly trained. Finally, we focus on changes in research education and how the introduction of PhD training affected and was shaped by national system characteristics.