bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Cross‐moderation: a useful comparative technique?
Authors: Johnson Sandra , Cohen Leslie 
Published: June 2007

AbstractOver the last decade inter‐board grade comparability investigation has relied exclusively on the cross‐moderation method, but the results have continued to prove disappointing. Pronouncements about differences in the grading standards of the participating boards have usually been heavily qualified and of uncertain validity. It has not been clear, however, to what extent the cross‐moderation method can be held accountable for this general failure to produce interpretable results, since many of the studies suffered design flaws which have undoubtedly been contributory factors.In response to this situation the Schools Council agreed to fund and to administer a series of pilot studies designed to evaluate the cross‐moderation technique itself. This paper summarises and discusses the results of these preliminary investigations.
Research Communities, The White Paper Chase and a New Research Ecumenism
Authors: Wilcox B. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThe period when the British Educational Research Association (BERA) was founded was one in which there was an increasing recognition amongst the research community that a wind of change had stirred up the settled traditions of educational research. It was a time which celebrated the promise of alternative paradigms for research. Ten or so years on we are entering another era where the emphasis is not on the reconceptualisation of what research is but on how it is organised. I think one can discern at least two factors, not wholly separate from each other, that will increasingly influence how a substantial part of research will be organised. These two factors are the changes which have taken place in the composition of the research community and the direction of current Government policy concerning the school system. I aim to show how these are leading to a fruitful form of collaborative research at local level which should be encouraged and supported —not least by BERA.
Teacher Competency and the Primary School Curriculum: a survey of five schools in North‐East England
Authors: Barnes L. R. , Shinn‐Taylor C. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractAn investigation into teacher competency and teacher expertise in five primary schools was undertaken by questionnaire and interview with 50 staff and five headteachers. Following a comparative review of all curriculum areas, two subjects are identified as giving serious cause for concern—music and science, and these are given more detailed reporting. The data are compared with other research reports and the conclusion drawn that this investigation reinforces and extends existing literature on the limitations of teacher competency in primary schools. By a more flexible use of teacher expertise it is possible and indeed necessary and desirable, to use teachers in a specialist capacity to cover gaps in class teacher knowledge skills and interests.
Evaluation of the First British Reading Recovery Programme
Authors: Wright Anna 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThis paper provides an evaluation of the progress of the pupils receiving Marie Clay's Reading Recovery Programme in its first year of implementation in the United Kingdom. The study investigates two questions; (1) whether this successful New Zealand programme could work with children in Surrey, UK, and (2) whether English pupils would show accelerated learning. Of pupils entering the programme with very poor reading and writing skills, 96.4% reached average levels of attainment in literacy, after a mean of 16.8 weeks of teaching. Gains were equivalent to those found in New Zealand children. The study concludes that Reading Recovery is as effective in Surrey, UK as in New Zealand, Australia and the USA.
Short‐ and Long‐term Follow‐up of Parental Involvement in Reading Projects
Authors: Topping K. J. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractParental involvement in children's reading has received considerable research and media attention over the last decade. This paper considers whether the gains on norm‐referenced reading tests widely reported as a result of this activity are maintained over time. The rather limited previous research is reviewed and it is noted that most data relate to the ‘Paired Reading’ technique. Substantial new follow‐up data with respect to this technique are reported from multi‐site field trials in one education authority. The new data confirm the trend from the previous literature, i.e. that although there is a deceleration in reading test gains after the initial project period, nevertheless follow‐up gain rates continue at above ‘normal’ levels and there is no evidence of ‘wash‐out’ of intervention effects.
Mathematics and the Real World
Authors: Hunter Jennifer , Turner Irene , Russell Charlotte , Trew Karen , Curry Carol 
Published: June 2007

AbstractIt has been suggested that perception of mathematics as an academic exercise divorced from reality increases as children progress through school. The present study explores this suggestion with respect to primary school pupils; 144 pupils aged between 6 and 10 years, at four primary schools, were interviewed and asked for examples of everyday uses for familiar mathematical operations. Approximately 60% of suggestions were related to ordinary everyday activities and 30% related to demonstrating or practising mathematical procedures. Patterns of response were not related to age, gender or school. The results suggest that for many children, separation of school mathematics from everyday life starts early in primary school if not before.
The Fate of the Technical and Vocational Education Initiative in a Pilot School: a longitudinal case study
Authors: Williams Ralph , Yeomans David 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThis paper arises out of wider Economic and Social Research Council funded research on the legacy of the Technical and Vocational Education Initiative (TVEI) in a national sample of original pilot schools. It describes and analyses the development of TVEI in one school over the period 1983‐91 and draws on field‐work at the school in 1986 and 1991. The development and demise of a radical cross‐curricular course are explained. It is argued that the particular fate of the innovation was the result of the interplay between a range of system level, local ‘market’ and in‐school factors.
The First Mathematics Standard Assessment Tasks at Key Stage 1: issues raised by a five school study
Authors: Davies Julie , Brember Ivy 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThis paper assesses the value parents can put on the mathematical Standard Assessment Task (SAT) score as an indicator of what children are achieving in mathematics. The results of a study of a sample of all the Year 2 children (176) from five randomly selected primary schools within one Local Education Authority (LEA) are presented. Pupils' scores on Mathematics 7, a standardised mathematics test for 7 year‐olds (National Foundation for Educational Research INFER], 1987a), are compared to the mathematics Standard of Assessment Task (SAT) score elicited by them in the previous half term. Results show that children with the same NFER 7 score may be designated Level 1, 2 or 3 on the mathematics SAT. No child in social class three (unskilled, manual) or four (unemployed), comprising 50% of the sample, attained Level 3. Conclusions, based on such a small study, are tentative. There is a need to be aware that measuring a child's attainment in mathematics may be more complicated than simply looking at the SAT results.
Schools, Maternal Employment and Child Health Care
Authors: Dowswell Therese , Hewison Jenny 
Published: June 2007

AbstractFor primary school children episodes of illness are almost inevitable and their occurrence is frequently unpredictable. To examine whether maternal employment is a factor which is associated with school sickness absence a study was carried out in Leeds of 139 families with children aged 6‐7 attending five study schools. Some 282 episodes of illness leading to school absence occurred over two school terms. Children of mothers working full‐time had less than half the time off school than children whose mothers were not in paid employment. A number of factors could explain these differences including the use of differing severity thresholds in the two groups and social class differences in the distribution of illness. Perceptions about school policies and school staff were both taken into account by mothers in the decision‐making process leading up to school absence and before the return to school. They also influenced the way the illness episode was managed.
Using Activity Analysis to Investigate Primary Classroom Environments
Authors: Simco N. P. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThe purpose of this paper is to propose a methodology for the naturalistic investigation of classroom environments in primary schools. At its centre, this proposal is derived from a critique of the position of the classroom ecologist Walter Doyle. The paper has three distinct phases. The first strand is concerned with analysis of aspects of Doyle's work, especially in connection with his position on classroom ecology. This section will include an overview of his approach to naturalistic research, together with an outline of his view on the definitions of tasks and activities. Reference will also be made to the source of his work, ecological psychology. The second phase of the paper relates to Doyle's methodological position, including the use of classroom narratives as a research method together with an outline and critique of the role of dimensions of task ambiguity within naturalistic research. Finally the concept of dimensions of classroom activity ambiguity is proposed. This is used as a foundation for suggestions for empirical research methods for natural investigation.
The Effect on School Budgets of Different Non‐statemented Special Educational Needs Indicators within a Common Funding Formula
Authors: Marsh Alan J. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThe 1993 Education Act introduced a Common Funding Formula (CFF) for grant‐maintained schools. The Department for Education (DFE) proposes to use free school meals entitlement (FSME) as a proxy indicator to allocate money for non‐statemented special educational needs (NSSEN). This paper concentrates on the issue of NSSEN formula funding within the secondary sector. It examines the relative merits of using different proxy indicators and more direct measures of NSSEN. It also investigates the implications and impact on secondary school budgets of moving to a CFF which uses FSME as its NSSEN indicator, and contrasts that with a local education authority's (LEA) actual formula. FSME is shown to be sa poor predictor, at an individual pupil level, of later educational attainment. These proposed changes in funding arrangement will cause significant and arbitrary gains and losses in school budgets which are not related to the numbers of pupils with special educational needs as assessed by more direct measures.
The Use of Content Analysis to Explore Conversations between School Teacher Mentors and Student Teachers
Authors: Haggarty Linda 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThis paper describes research carried out within a school‐based model of teacher education and provides a case study of the use of content analysis as a research method. Mentors in school and tutors in a university planned in partnership a structured and integrated programme and within this, mentors agreed to discuss quite formally with pairs of student teachers their developing thinking on predetermined issues. These conversations were taped and subsequently analysed using content analysis. What was discovered from this quantitative analysis about conversations between school teacher mentors and student teachers was that whilst mentors seemed able to talk about their own practice, they seemed less successful in talking about practicability concerns they used in their decision‐making; in persuading student teachers to examine a range of sources to develop their thinking and in moving beyond ‘politeness’ to explore any lack of consensus between themselves and the student teachers.
Student Roles and Perspectives in Antiracist Education: a crisis of white ethnicity?
Authors: Gillborn David 
Published: June 2007

AbstractWriting on race and education has tended to neglect questions of pedagogy and lived experience at the school and classroom level. The paper begins to redress this by using qualitative research to examine secondary schools that have given antiracism a high priority. In particular, the paper focuses on the roles and experiences of students (aged 11‐16) and explores their pivotal role in supporting and extending antiracist developments. The position of white students in these schools highlights dilemmas in antiracist theory and practice. The paper examines white students’ reactions to antiracist change and describes the schools’ attempts to involve them positively in the developments—forcing teachers to re‐evaluate their assumptions about the nature of race and racism. The paper concludes with a discussion of the concept of white ethnicity. Antiracism is opening up new and important debates about ethnicity and identity in education—debates that can sometimes seem to exclude white students. Constructions of whiteness are often constrained by rightist, nationalist and racist discourses. If antiracism is to challenge these ideologies, a pressing task is critically to address the idea of whiteness itself and to identify new emancipatory discourses such that white students can find a legitimate voice and role in antiracist struggles.
Exploring the Educational Experiences of Muslim Girls: tales told to tourists — should the white researcher stay at home?
Authors: Haw Kaye F. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThe title for this paper is partly taken from a book chapter by Anne Seller (1994), ‘Should the feminist philosopher stay at home?’ I use it because it encapsulates the ethical issues that arose for me as I did my research on the educational experiences of Muslim girls in a private Muslim girls’ school and a single‐sex state school with a high percentage of Muslim students. The paper considers the methodological and ethical issues involved in doing a piece of cross‐cultural research. It is a personal exploration of how I, as a white, non‐Muslim and not formally religious person, worked with two different Muslim communities. It argues for a feminist and post‐structural approach to the research process so that the subjectivity of the researcher is explicitly placed in any piece of research and the limitations of the research are then openly acknowledged. It further argues that using the Foucauldian notion of discourse as an analytical tool, allows for an explanation for the discursive framework in which the researcher operates but does not suggest that this is ‘set in stone’. On the contrary, through a personal and critical engagement with the discursive positionings of the researcher (and those of others), an exploration is possible which means that perhaps these limitations can be negotiated and even transcended. It further argues that, although the ‘stories’ I listened to and analysed are inevitably ‘coloured’ by both my own positionings and resultant interactions with the positionings of the participants, this can add to, and place another perspective on those told to other researchers in the area who differ in age, ethnic background, religious faith, class, sexuality etc. Such different perspectives can then be put into the theoretical ‘melting pot’ so that they can be critically examined, reworked and reinterpreted and in this way add to debate in the area.
The Use of Mental, Written and Calculator Strategies of Numerical Computation by Upper Primary Pupils within a ‘Calculator‐aware’ Number Curriculum
Authors: Ruthven Kenneth 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThe study reported in this article examines the use of mental, written and calculator strategies of numerical computation by 56 upper primary (Year 6) pupils, forming a sample structured by number‐concept attainment, sex, attitude to calculator use, and curricular experience. Pupils were drawn from neighbouring schools with very different traditions in the teaching of number. The ‘calculator‐aware’ approach employed in one group of schools encouraged pupils, from an early age, to develop informal methods of calculation, and to use calculators to explore number and execute demanding computations. Such pupils were found to make greater use of mental computation, particularly of multiplication strategies based on distribution and compensation. These aspects of performance were found to be more strongly associated with curricular experience than with number‐concept attainment. Findings and observations from the study raise important questions about the model of numerate thinking and learning underpinning current policy and practice in Britain.
Classroom Practice and the National Curriculum in Small Rural Primary Schools
Authors: Galton Maurice , Hargreaves Linda , Comber Chris 
Published: June 2007

AbstractWith the introduction of the National Curriculum primary teachers have come under increasing pressure from the Office for Standards in Education and other government agencies to change the ways they teach. However, the research evidence is equivocal as to the changes which have taken place at Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 over the last 5 years. This article argues that part of the problem stems from the way that characteristics of classroom organisation, such as whole‐class teaching, have been defined in various studies. From case studies of nine rural schools in which systematic observation and pupils’ diary records were collected, an attempt is made to chart the changes in classroom practice over a decade and to compare these findings with other recent studies.
Parents’ and Teachers’ Interventions in Children's Reading
Authors: Greenhough Pamela , Hughes Martin 
Published: June 2007

AbstractThe practice of children reading school books with their parents at home is being widely advocated as a means of raising literacy standards in the UK. However, little is known about what parents actually do when listening to their children read. This paper describes a study in which 32 children (mean age 6 years 4 months) were observed reading with a parent at home and with their teacher at school. Three analyses are reported. The first analysis showed that parents were more likely to intervene in children's reading to support their decoding of the text, while teachers were more likely to read to the children or to discuss the text with them—an activity we termed ‘conversing’. This analysis also found large differences between parents in the amount of conversing in which they engaged. The second analysis described in more detail four main Junctions of conversing—responding to the text, labelling and identifying, making sense, and priming. The third analysis showed systematic differences in parents’ views on literacy according to their levels of conversing: parents in the high‐conversing group were more likely to regard reading as a valuable and enjoyable activity for its own sake, while parents in the low‐conversing group were more likely to see literacy in instrumental terms. These findings are discussed in terms of their relation to previous research and their implications for policy and practice.
Mate Choice and Hybridization in Lake Malawi Cichlids, Sciaenochromis fryeri and Cynotilapia afra
Authors: Gerlai Robert 
Published: June 2007

AbstractLake Malawi is home to hundreds of cichlid species, most of which are endemic to the lake. Several of these species exhibit a remarkably similar behavioural repertoire including territorial and reproductive behaviours. Despite their diverse anatomy and body colouration, hybridization among Malawi cichlids has been observed in captivity and has also been reported to occur in nature. Here, possible factors underlying hybridization between two species, Sciaenochromis fryeri, a large piscivore, and Cynotilapia afra (Jalo reef), a small planktivore biocover grazer, were investigated in captivity. In a series of experiments the size of the territory, the size of the males and the availability of conspecific mates were manipulated. It was found that mate selection in these two species under semi‐natural conditions is dependent not only upon species‐specific cues but also upon the status of the male. Larger male body size and larger territory size was generally preferred by females and when these attributes characterized a heterospecific male they also increased the probability of heterospecific courtship. Given that spawning between the above‐mentioned species resulted in fertile offspring and that their geographical location and habitat overlap in nature, the effect of their mate‐choice strategies on hybridization and speciation is considered.
Cell proliferation and osteogenic differentiation of growing pig cranial sutures
Authors: Sun Zongyang , Lee Eugenia , Herring Susan W. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractBone growth at the cranial sutures relies on proliferation of osteogenic progenitor cells and/or differentiation of osteoblasts. The current study was undertaken to assess these events in relation to suture growth and fusion. A total of 21 pigs, divided into three age groups (0.5–1.5 months, 3–4 months and 5–7 months), were used for immunohistochemical evaluation of cell proliferation (BrdU) and osteogenic differentiation (Cbfa1/Runx2) in the interfrontal and interparietal sutures. Proliferation and osteogenic differentiation were both more prominent near the bone fronts than in the central zone. With age, both proliferation and osteogenic differentiation diminished. Proliferation ceased on the endocranial (dura mater) side by the age of 3–4 months. Proliferation on the pericranial side was accompanied by active bone formation and initiation of suture fusion from this side. In conclusion, (1) decreased suture bone growth with age reflects decreased cell proliferation and probably also osteogenic differentiation, and (2) suture fusion occurs from the pericranial side where activity remains relatively high.
Impure marbles from the UHP Brossasco‐Isasca Unit (Dora‐Maira Massif, western Alps): evidence for Alpine equilibration in the diamond stability field and evaluation of theX(CO2) fluid evolution
Authors: CASTELLI D. , ROLFO F. , GROPPO C. , COMPAGNONI R. 
Published: June 2007

AbstractTwo impure ultrahigh‐pressure (UHP) marbles, a calcite marble with the peak assemblage Grt + Phe + Cpx + Rt + (Arg) and a dolomite marble with the peak assemblage Crn + Chl + Rt + Dol (±Arg), from the same lens from the polymetamorphic complex of the Brossasco‐Isasca Unit (BIU) (southern Dora‐Maira Massif) have been petrologically investigated and modelled by calculatingP–Tphase‐diagram projections for H2O–CO2mixed‐volatile systems. Thermobarometric data obtained from the calcite marble suggest Alpine peak conditions in the diamond stability field (4.0 GPa at 730 °C), and allow reconstruction of the earlier portion of the Alpine retrogradeP–Tpath, which is characterized by a significant decompression coupled with a moderate and continuous cooling to 650 °C at 2.50 GPa. The modelled fluid compositions at peak conditions point to 0.025 ≤ X(CO2) ≤ 0.10 andX(CO2) ≤ 0.0012 in the calcite marble and dolomite marble, respectively, suggesting fluid heterogeneity at the local scale and an internally buffered fluid evolution of the studied impure marbles. The lack of micro‐diamond in the BIU marbles is explained by the very‐lowX(CO2) values, which favoured relatively highfO2‐conditions, preventing the formation of diamond at the UHP peak metamorphic conditions.