Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Trainee Teachers' Attitudes Towards Students With Specific Learning Disabilities, Stuart Woodcock

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Policies on the inclusion of students with special educational needs in mainstream classrooms have focused attention on how general education teachers perceive these students. Furthermore with specific learning disabilities forming a large group of diverse students, and teachers' attitudes often not changing over the career span, preparing teachers for inclusive education is vitally important. This study aimed to identify the attitudes of trainee1 teachers towards students with specific learning disabilities and differentiation of the curriculum. Significant differences were found between the attitudes of primary and secondary school trainee teachers, and the influence of training. There were no differences in attitudes …

Final Report From The Key Stage 3 Phase: Influences On Students' Development From Age 11-14, Kathy Sylva, Edward Melhuish, Pam Sammons, Iram Siraj-Blatchford, Brenda Taggart

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Since 1997 the Effective Pre-school, Primary and Secondary Education project (EPPE/EPPSE) has investigated the attainment and development of approximately 3,000 children from pre-school to the end of Key Stage 3 (KS3). This current phase of the research explored how different phases of education, especially secondary school, are related to students' attainment, social behaviour and dispositions at age 14 (Year 9 in secondary school) and the factors that predict developmental change. However, schools are not the only influence on students' development; families and communities matter too and these 'social' influences are carefully studied in EPPSE 3-14. The net effects of neighbourhood, …

Influences On Students' Attainment And Progress In Key Stage 3: Academic Outcomes In English, Maths And Science In Year 9, Pam Sammons, Kathy Sylva, Edward Melhuish, Iram Siraj-Blatchford, Brenda Taggart, Katalin Toth, Diana Draghici, Rebecca Smees

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

The Effective Pre-school, Primary and Secondary Education Project (EPPSE) has investigated the academic and social-behavioural development of approximately 3,000 children from the age of 3+ years since 1997. This Research Brief focuses on the relationships between a range of individual student, family, home, pre-, primary and secondary school characteristics and students' academic attainment in English, maths and science in Year 9 at secondary school (age 14). It compares the latest findings with those found for students' attainment at younger ages. It also highlights the influences of secondary school on students' attainment in the core curriculum areas and studies their academic …

The Elephant In The Chat Room: Will International Students Stay At Home?, Thomas Birtchnell

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

FUTURE OF HIGHER EDUCATION: We continue our series on the rise of online and blended learning and how free online courses are set to transform the higher education sector. Today, Wollongong University’s Thomas Birtchnell looks at what online education will mean for the international student market.

University Students' Subject Matter Knowledge And Misconception Of Teaching Games For Understanding And Its Implication To Teaching Practice, Julismah Jani, Phil Pearson, Greg Forrest, Paul Webb

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

This study is to track the subject matter knowledge of and misconception about Teaching Games for Understanding (TGfU) of fourth year undergraduate pre-service teachers' physical education majors at an Australian university. The test of reliability on misconception scale are subjected to a Rasch analysis (KR-20 = .52) which consists of 20 dichotomous questions with true/false answers. Analyses of the data reveal that students achieve a credit on subject matter knowledge and attain four misconceptions about TGfU. There is a significant (p < 0.05) difference in the scores for subject matter knowledge and concepts of TGfU through paired samples t test. These results imply that subject matter knowledge does have an effect on students' concepts of TGfU but with very low relationship (r(53 = .19, p < 0.05). The implication of content knowledge to teaching is to resist the pre-concept or misconception of the subject matter. If pre-service teachers are to improve the quality of teaching and learning in content areas, he or she needs to possess a deep understanding of games both within and across categories in TGfU. Misconceptions tend to be very resistant to instruction because learning entails replacing or radically reorganizing student knowledge. This puts teachers in the very challenging position of needing to bring about significant conceptual change in student knowledge. Therefore pre-service teachers must know the subject matter they teach and their performance will be determined by the depth of their content knowledge in relation to teaching, making this an essential component to their teaching practice. Teachers must know the subject they teach and this is important to teacher competency.

Influences On Students' Dispositions In Key Stage 3: Exploring Enjoyment Of School, Popularity, Anxiety, Citizenship Values And Academic Self-Concepts In Year 9, Pam Sammons, Kathy Sylva, Edward Melhuish, Iram Siraj-Blatchford, Brenda Taggart, Rebecca Smees, Diana Draghici, Katalin Toth

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

The Effective Pre-school, Primary and Secondary Education Project (EPPSE) has investigated the academic and social-behavioural development of approximately 3,000 children from the age of 3+ years since 1997. This Research Brief reports on students' dispositions when they were age 14 (Year 9) in six main areas: 'enjoyment of school', 'academic self concept' (English and maths), 'popularity', 'citizenship values' and 'anxiety'. It examines how these dispositions have changed during Key Stage 3 (KS3) and the relationships between dispositions and a range of individual student, family, home, pre-, primary and secondary school measures. It shows how school experiences help to shape dispositions, …

Influences On Students' Development In Key Stage 3: Social-Behavioural Outcomes In Year 9, Pam Sammons, Kathy Sylva, Edward Melhuish, Iram Siraj-Blatchford, Brenda Taggart, Diana Draghici, Rebecca Smees, Katalin Toth

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

The Effective Pre-school, Primary and Secondary Education Project (EPPSE) has investigated the cognitive and social-behavioural development of approximately 3,000 children from the age of 3+ years since 1997. This Research Brief focuses on the relationships between a range of child, family, home, pre-, primary and secondary school characteristics and students' social-behavioural development in Year 9 at secondary school (age 14). It compares these latest findings with those found for social-behavioural development at younger ages, highlights the specific influences of secondary school on students' social-behavioural outcomes in Year 9 and changes in these developmental outcomes between the ages of 11 and …

A Report On A Preliminary Diagnostic For Identifying Thermal Physics Conceptions Of Tertiary Students, Helen Georgiou, Manjula Sharma

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

A solid understanding of students' conceptions in thermal physics is absolutely necessary for successful development of instruction and for promoting understanding of and enthusiasm for the subject. This study reports on student understanding for a range of thermal topics. The sample included first and second year university students studying physics and the tool was a short, 15 question, concept inventory-like 'Diagnostic Survey' administered at the beginning of first semester 2009 at the University of *****. The results indicate that some thermal physics misconceptions exist for a large proportion of tertiary level students. More specifically, basic concepts, such as heat transfer, …

Peer Transition Programs: Run By Students For Students, Sarah Elizabeth O'Shea, Michelle Vincent, Alan Calder, Peter Hanley

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

This presentation will highlight the 'nuts and bolts' of peer transition programs that have been underway for some time at two universities. James Cook University first offered Kickstart in 1998 with an underlying philosophy of allowing experienced student mentors to design, develop and facilitate a short course that introduces first year students to the culture and environment of university life. University of Newcastle developed Uni-start in 2006 along the same lines, and both institutions have continued to evaluate and refine their respective transition programs. Participants at this session will hear how the two institutions have collaborated, how these types of …

Hearing The Student Voice - Examining The Processes Of Transition, Persistence And Engagement For A Group Of First Year, First In Family University Students, Sarah O'Shea

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

This paper outlines a qualitative, narrative study that focuses on the student experience as it relates to a particular cohort of students namely women who are the first in the family to attend university. Seventeen students were recruited to participate in a series of four semi-structured interviews conducted throughout one academic year. These interviews investigated the processes involved in transition as well as the perceptions held about engaging in tertiary study and the hurdles encountered during the year. The research accompanied the students as each travelled through the university environment, exploring what it means to be a 'first-year student'. The …

Exploring The Early Expectations And Ambitions Of First Generation Female Students Within An Australian University, Sarah Elizabeth O'Shea

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

No abstract provided.

The Ethics Of Pharmaceutical Industry Relationships With Medical Students, Wendy Rogers, Peter R. Mansfield, Annette J. Braunack-Mayer, Jon N. Jureidini

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

• Little research has been done on the extent of the relationship between the pharmaceutical industry and medical students, and the effect on students of receiving gifts.

• Potential harms to patients are documented elsewhere; we focus on potential harms to students.

• Students who receive gifts may believe that they are receiving something for nothing, contributing to a sense of entitlement that is not in the best interests of their moral development as doctors.

• Alternatively, students may be subject to recognised or unrecognised reciprocal obligations that potentially influence their decision making.

• Medical educators have a duty of care to protect students from …

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Options For The Assessment And Reporting Of Primary Students In The Key Learning Area Of Science To Be Used For The Reporting Of Nationally Comparable Outcomes Of Schooling Within The Context Of The National Goals For Schooling In The Twenty-First Century, Samuel Ball, Ian D. Rae, Jim S. Tognolini

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

The National Education Performance Monitoring Taskforce (NEPMT) was established in April 1999 by the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA). The taskforce was called upon inter alia to develop performance measures as the basis for national reporting. One such area was science.

The Accessing Of Geometry Schemas By High School Students, Mohan Chinnappan

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

In this study I examine the question, what is the nature of prior mathematical knowledge that facilitates the construction of useful problem representations in the domain of geometry? The quality of prior knowledge is analysed in terms ofschemas that provide a measure of the degree of organisation of prior knowledge. Problem-solving performance and schema activation of a group of high- and low-achieving students were compared. As expected, the high achievers produced more correct answers than the low achievers. More significantly, schema comparison indicated that the high achievers accessed more problem-relevant schemas than the low achievers. In a related task which …