ethanporcaro/eric-fulltext-meta huggingface dataset:
Student Engagement in an Ottawa French Immersion High School Program
Author: Makropoulos, Josee
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: School Activities,Immersion Programs,Official Languages,Beliefs,French,Learner Engagement,Second Language Learning,Second Language Instruction,English,Cultural Capital,High School Students,Language Minorities,Eligibility,Civil Rights,Native Language Instruction,Parents

This article makes a contribution to the field of French immersion studies by examining the engagement realities of two groups of students in an Ottawa French immersion high school program: those with and without a parent who makes them eligible for minority French language instruction as outlined by Section 23 of the &quot;Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.&quot; Findings indicate that students from both official language groups, who came from varying class backgrounds, similarly demonstrated the ability and willingness to follow the secondary French immersion program offered at the university level. Although students with Anglophone parents were found to benefit from cultural capital such as family support and &quot;voluntary minority&quot; belief systems, students with a parent eligible for minority French language instruction benefited from French language capital acquired with family, in social contexts and sometimes in French school. At times, students also had overlapping and cross-cutting realities depending whether they came from EFI or LFI programs. To conclude, this article suggests that French immersion programming and related policies should take into consideration the multifaceted engagement realities of secondary student populations from the two official language communities. (Contains 1 table and 2 footnotes.)
Not Truly, Not Entirely ... &quot;Pas comme les Francophones&quot;
Author: Roy, Sylvie
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Junior High Schools,Immersion Programs,Foreign Countries,French,French Canadians,Self Concept,Student Attitudes,Ethnography,Observation,Interviews,Bilingualism,Teacher Attitudes,Administrator Attitudes,Language Proficiency,Work Environment,Inclusion,Second Language Learning,Second Language Instruction

In this study, I investigate how French immersion students in two junior high schools in Alberta see themselves in Canadian society. The data come from three years of ethnographic research that included classroom observations and 94 interviews with students, teachers, administrators, and parents. This study shows how French immersion students do not belong to either legitimized group in Canada; they develop their own bilingual world and identities, which are not recognized in Canadian society. I argue for inclusion of all learners of French with varying linguistic and cultural competencies in schools and workplaces so they can contribute to Canadian political, societal, and social spheres. (Contains 4 footnotes.)
Motivation to Study Core French: Comparing Recent Immigrants and Canadian-Born Secondary School Students
Author: Mady, Callie J.
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Student Motivation,Foreign Countries,French,Immigrants,High School Students,Learning Motivation,English,Native Speakers,Second Language Learning,Comparative Analysis,Acculturation,Second Language Instruction,Interviews,Student Attitudes

As the number of Allophone students attending public schools in Canada continues to increase (Statistics Canada, 2008), it is clear that a need exists in English-dominant areas to purposefully address the integration of these students into core French. I report the findings of a mixed-method study that was conducted to assess and compare the motivation and investment of secondary Allophone and English-speaking Canadian-born students to study core French. Both the quantitative and the qualitative results show that Allophone students are more motivated to study French than their English-speaking Canadian-born peers. (Contains 5 footnotes.)
Becoming Citizens: Racialized Conceptions of ESL Learners and the Canadian Language Benchmarks
Author: Fleming, Douglas
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Citizenship,Interviews,Foreign Countries,Immigrants,Benchmarking,English (Second Language),Second Language Learning,Questionnaires,Immigration,Program Attitudes,Social Attitudes,Migrant Adult Education,Foreign Policy,Racial Discrimination,Social Justice

In this article, I report a qualitative study that sheds light on how adult learners of English as a Second Language (ESL) are constructing new national identities in the context of the challenges associated with immigration. In particular, I trace how the common threads among their conceptions of citizenship compare with those embedded within official, national assessment, and curriculum documents. Using a broad questionnaire and a focused set of semi-structured interviews at a large ESL site in British Columbia, my research reveals the gaps between the experiences of these immigrants and how these documents construct and position idealized and racialized conceptions of second language learners. (Contains 1 footnote.)
Walking in Two Worlds: Engaging the Space between Indigenous Community and Academia
Author: Styres, Sandra
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Indigenous Populations,School Community Relationship,Foreign Countries,American Indians,Cooperation,Researchers,Partnerships in Education,Ethics,Indigenous Knowledge,Academic Achievement,Research Methodology

Certainly in the past and even in the present day, the term &quot;research&quot; for Indigenous people has been fraught with strong, negative, emotional associations; however, despite the many remaining challenges there is a shifting within the landscape of academia to recognize that research on Indigenous issues must cultivate respectful and reciprocal relationships with those communities. In this study, we demonstrate that to conduct research collaboratively based on elements of respect, relationship, relevance, and reciprocity, all collaborators must walk in two worlds to balance the needs of communities with the systemic realities of academia. To illustrate our point, we focus our story on one project that is currently underway between the Six Nations of the Grand River Territory and Brock University. In our narrative we illustrate how the relationships that were fostered call into question commonly accepted university practices as well as engage community partners in understanding some of the limitations and possibilities in some of those practices. This article focuses on some tough issues; however, the collaborators in this project are in the process of forging something new that may serve as one example of how such partnerships can be authentically created. (Contains 5 footnotes.)
Engineering Curricula in Early Education: Describing the Landscape of Open Resources
Author: Bagiati, Aikaterini
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: STEM Education,Elementary Secondary Education,Preschool Education,Engineering Education,Engineering,Internet,Teacher Education,Faculty Development,Access to Information

National debate about K-12 Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education has given rise to questions about appropriate materials for engineering education from prekindergarten through grade 12. Introducing engineering in the early years entails recognition of the need for teachers to understand its content and poses the challenge of preparing teachers to incorporate engineering education into their practice. Teacher preparation has historically included seeking information in books, journals, and magazines, and the professional development offered by universities, school districts, and other educational entities continues to provide the majority of formal options accessed by teachers. However, the advent of the Internet has expanded the ways that teachers undertake professional development and how they prepare to present new content. An online search for open source preschool through grade 12 (P-12) engineering materials revealed a wide variety of Web sites and online documents that included curricula, lesson plans, and descriptions of activities. Narrowing the search to the P-3 level revealed that the pedagogically and content-reliable sources available are limited in number and may be difficult to identify among the plethora of information. This study begins to describe the current landscape of open-access Internet materials in the field of early STEM with emphasis on engineering. The authors offer a guide-in-progress for selecting material for teachers and parents interested in introducing their young children to engineering. The authors also address emerging pedagogical fidelity and engineering content issues. (Contains 3 tables and 5 figures.)
The TangibleK Robotics Program: Applied Computational Thinking for Young Children
Author: Bers, Marina U.
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Young Children,Computer Science,Engineering,Kindergarten,Robotics,Technology,Program Effectiveness,Teaching Methods,Outcomes of Education,Interdisciplinary Approach

This article describes the TangibleK robotics program for young children. Based on over a decade of research, this program is grounded on the belief that teaching children about the human-made world, the realm of technology and engineering, is as important as teaching them about the natural world, numbers, and letters. The TangibleK program uses robotics as a tool to engage children in developing computational thinking and learning about the engineering design process. It includes a research-based, developmentally appropriate robotics kit that children can use to make robots and program their behaviors. The curriculum has been piloted in kindergarten classrooms and in summer camps and lab settings. The author presents the theoretical framework that informs TangibleK and the "powerful ideas" from computer science and robotics on which the curriculum is based, linking them to other disciplinary areas and developmental characteristics of early childhood. The article concludes with a description of classroom pedagogy and activities, along with assessment tools used to evaluate learning outcomes. (Contains 5 figures and 4 tables.)
Successful versus Unsuccessful Schools through the Eyes of Children: The Use of Interviews, Autophotography, and Picture Selection
Author: DeMarie, Darlene
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Urban Schools,Standardized Tests,Elementary Schools,Autobiographies,Interviews,Pictorial Stimuli,Research Methodology,Student Attitudes,Elementary School Students,Student Experience,Photography,Educational Quality,Age Differences,Friendship,Charter Schools,Disadvantaged Schools,Teachers,Educational Environment

Although &quot;top-down&quot; indicators, such as the ratio of adults to children in classrooms and program rankings based on standardized test scores, can predict some of the future impact of children's education, &quot;bottom-up&quot; factors, such as whether children feel welcome and whether they find the learning activities to be meaningful and engaging, may have a greater effect on children's long-term development. Yet little is known about children's perceptions of their schools and how their views may differ depending on the type and quality of schools they attend. In the present study, three methods--interview, autophotography, and picture selection--were employed to learn about children's perceptions of their schools and whether their perspectives differed depending on whether they attended schools labeled &quot;successful&quot; or &quot;unsuccessful.&quot; The 156 participants in kindergarten to fifth grade (ages 5 to 11) were interviewed about their school experiences. In the context of making books about their schools, children took photographs that they felt would show others what the schools were like. They also selected photographs from a standardized set of other photographs--one they thought &quot;best showed&quot; their school and one that showed what was &quot;most important&quot; to them. The following were among the results: (1) Participants at the unsuccessful school were more likely to identify school as being about academics and evaluation/tests and less about play/fun, especially in the early grades. (2) The importance of friendships was more evident among children at the successful school than among children at the unsuccessful school. (3) Among participants from both schools, the pictures that children selected that &quot;best showed&quot; their school usually differed from what was &quot;most important&quot; to them. (Contains 3 tables and 2 figures.)
Talking about Artifacts: Preschool Children's Explorations with Sketches, Stories, and Tangible Objects
Author: Evangelou, Demetra
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Preschool Children,Discovery Learning,Developmentally Appropriate Practices,Early Childhood Education,Learning,Engineering,Child Development,STEM Education,Freehand Drawing,Manipulative Materials,Kinesthetic Perception,Epistemology,Technology

Exploratory learning is recognized as a developmentally appropriate practice in early childhood education. During exploration, exposure to new things guides children in the acquisition of knowledge, while interactions with a range of familiar and unfamiliar artifacts can support developmental integration. Exploratory activity may occur spontaneously at any time, but it can also be structured and guided to achieve specific curricular and developmental goals. This paper explores preschool children's interactions during semi-structured exploratory activities in three different conditions. Thirty-five 4- to 5-year-old children, from six preschool classrooms, were randomly assigned to three different conditions. Each condition included the same set of 13 different artifacts that were either artistically rendered in black ink on white paper ("sketch condition"), included in a children's story book ("book condition"), or had the real artifact itself ("tangible object condition"). Children's exploration and interactions were videotaped and analyzed to see which, if any, of the three conditions would appear to stimulate and encourage early "engineering thinking" the most. Initial hypothesis was that the "tangible object" condition would appear to be the most beneficial. Findings showed that this condition elicited the longest discussions and interactions with the artifacts, and it was also the condition during which children were demonstrating more knowledge and ideas with regard to possible functions of the artifacts. Regarding whether there was a condition that stimulated more interest toward specific artifacts, no clear pattern among the three conditions appeared. Implications are discussed in terms of preschool Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) and child development. (Contains 4 tables and 3 figures.)
When 2-Year-Olds and 3-Year-Olds Think Like Scientists
Author: Forman, George E.
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Play,Experiments,Inquiry,Video Technology,Thinking Skills,Cognitive Processes,Science Activities,Scientists,Problem Solving,Experiential Learning,Young Children

In this article, which includes three video clips, the author argues that the small experiments, inventions, strategies, and pauses in young children's play seen in the clips reveal a legitimate form of scientific thinking. He notes that science and play both represent a frame of mind, an attitude toward the events one observes. (Contains 3 videos.)
What Happens at a Car Wash?
Author: Gallick, Barbara
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Student Projects,Motor Vehicles,Child Care Centers,Young Children,Student Interests,Play,Teaching Methods,Inquiry,Experiential Learning,Field Trips,Observation,Models

A class of 3- to 5-year-old children in a child care center in the midwestern United States chose to study a car wash as a group project. This article discusses how the project evolved, describes the three phases of the project, and provides the teachers' reflections on the project. Photos taken during the project and children's sketches are included. (Contains 57 figures.)
Counselors as Leaders in Schools
Author: Wingfield, Robert J.
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Distance Education,Continuing Education,School Counseling,School Counselors,Mental Health,Student Development,Principals,Interpersonal Relationship,Leadership Qualities,Professional Development,Inservice Education,Advocacy

There has been longstanding concern about school counselor because their roles have changed rapidly and significantly in response to societal trends. This has resulted in varying conceptions and misunderstandings of their roles. The present paper describes the emergence of school counseling as a profession, outlines the developmental history of school counseling models (e.g. vocational guidance, mental health movement, and developmental guidance), argues that school counselors should be promoted into leadership roles, and provides recommendations to school counselors seeking leadership status. Furthermore, the authors explain that tactical advocacy for marginalized students and purposeful partnerships with principals are integral to bolstering school counselors' efficacy. Recommendations for the ways in which school counselors can hone important leadership skills, particularly through professional development (e.g. in-services, distance learning, continuing education courses) are offered. How these efforts might promote student achievement, empower stakeholders, and improve school culture is discussed. (Contains 1 table.)
Promoting Self-Efficacy in Early Career Teachers: A Principal's Guide for Differentiated Mentoring and Supervision
Author: Elliott, Elizabeth M.
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Mentors,Self Efficacy,Teacher Persistence,Teacher Orientation,Logical Thinking,Faculty Mobility,Alternative Teacher Certification,Beginning Teachers,School Holding Power,Teacher Supervision,Teacher Education

The challenges in meeting the demand for highly qualified teachers are great. This is evident both at the individual school level and in national retention and turnover statistics. The need for individually targeted teacher induction activities based on teacher preparation routes--traditional and alternative certification--are needed to help ameliorate the early career teacher turnover and retention statistics. This study reinterprets data from a previous study of teacher confidence and self-efficacy in terms of mentoring and supervision needs (induction activities). The results suggest that mentoring and supervision activities at the school level can be implemented to improve retention in perception of key competency areas. As frontline supervisors, principals are in a unique position to meet the differential needs of early career teachers. (Contains 1 table.)
People's Empowerment through Blended Mentoring: The EMPIRE Project Experimentation in Spain and Italy
Author: Arenas, M. Begona
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Mentors,Information Technology,Pilot Projects,Lifelong Learning,Career Development,Professional Development,Immigrants

Mentoring works as a strategy for helping people and particularly disadvantaged groups of population such as the unemployed, young people or immigrants improve their professional opportunities and succeed in life. It helps give people the confidence, access to valuable resources, and skills they need to reach their potential. The article presents two out of four blended mentoring pilots conducted in the framework of the Lifelong Learning Project EMPIRE. The first considerations resulting from the pilot projects are: (1) The right mix of face-to-face and e-mentoring elements in addition to indirect communication varies from target group to target group; (2) The use of ICT tools appropriate to the goals of the pilot and its target groups increases the potential of mentoring; (3) the organisational structure needed to continuously support, motivate and follow the &quot;blended mentoring couples&quot; is key to promoting a fully successful Lifelong Guidance and learning experience; and (4) Blended mentoring is particularly effective in career development when combined with other professional development activities and tools such as internships or work placements. (Contains 3 figures.)
Activity Design in Online Professional Development for University Staff
Author: Macdonald, Janet
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Computer Mediated Communication,Open Universities,Tutors,Professional Development,Program Design,Learning Activities,Communities of Practice,Program Descriptions,Case Studies,Performance Factors,Barriers,Formative Evaluation,Participant Observation,Questionnaires,Network Analysis,Social Networks,Foreign Countries

Professional development for distance tutors is traditionally delivered through texts or websites, supplemented by face to face workshops. However, one of the major challenges is to ensure that they engage with the materials and carry away something which is of value to their practice. At the Open University (UK) our 8000 tutors work from home, and have few opportunities to meet fellow tutors on the course that they tutor. We have been exploring the use of online activity design to support tutors in learning by undertaking activities in online communities. This provides opportunities for professional development and discussion with their peers, while at the same time offering some flexibility in participation. This paper describes a case study of an award winning initiative at the Open University (UK) which now delivers professional development in online communities of distance tutors, operating at scale: some 2000 tutors have been trained to date, and our courses have a 75% completion rate. Drawing on data from 370 recent participants, it discusses some of the lessons we have learnt on the reasons for the widespread success of this initiative and the factors influencing effective activity design on the course. (Contains 4 figures and 2 tables.)
The &quot;Zurich E-Learning Certificate&quot;: A Role Model for the Acquirement of eCompetence for Academic Staff and an Example of a Practical Implementation
Author: Volk, Benno
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Electronic Learning,College Faculty,Program Development,Standards,Educational Quality,Program Descriptions,Reflection,Competency Based Education,Educational Cooperation,Faculty Development,Educational Certificates,Teacher Educators,Teacher Attitudes,Instructional Design,Blended Learning,Internet,Computer Mediated Communication,Educational Technology,Technology Integration,Questionnaires,Computer Software,Computer Software Evaluation,Media Literacy,Computer Literacy,Electronic Publishing,Web Sites,Professional Continuing Education

Since 2002 the &quot;Zurich E-Learning Certificate&quot; offers lecturers and academic staff from the three main universities in Zurich the possibility to take part in a professional development program which supports the acquirement of eCompetence. The program is the result of a cooperation between the University of Zurich (UZH), the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETHZ) and the Zurich University of Teacher Education (PHZH). In the near future a reform of the program will be realized in order to represent the increased significance of Web 2.0 applications for higher education as well as e-research and e-science for academic staff. Therefore a change of the topics and the different modules of the program will be necessary. Furthermore the didactical concept of the &quot;Zurich E-Learning Certificate&quot; offers a good basis for this change because of the flexible structure and the impact of self-organization for the participants. Based on the concept of this program and on a course in historical science at the UZH as a practical example, this article underlines the necessity for a science-based discussion of adequate didactical concepts how academic staff should become media-savvy and the importance of reflexive learning methods in further education programs to acquire e-Competence. (Contains 2 figures.)