Mandia Mentis

A Psycholinguistic Perspective on Bilinguals' Discrepant Questionnaire Responses

The Finding That Bilinguals Sometimes Respond Differently To The Same Item In Different Language Versions Of Questionnaires Is Usually Interpreted In Terms Of Social Psychological Processes Such As Accommodation, Ethnic Affirmation, Or Social Desirability. However, The Discrepant Responses Of Bilinguals May Be A Function Of The Way In Which The Languages Have Been Acquired. In Terms Of The Dual-Coding Model, Compound Bilinguals Should Have The Same Images Related To Interlingual Equivalents, Whereas Coordinate Bilinguals Should Function More Like Unilinguals, Since Their Two Conceptual Systems, Acquired Through Each Language, Are Clearly Differentiated. Thus Differences In Responses To Questionnaires In Two Different Languages Should Occur In Bilinguals Who Are Of A More Compound Type. Results Of A Study Testing This Hypothesis Are Reported.

Visibly learning: teachers’ assessment practices for students with high and very high needs

This paper examines the assessment practices of teachers working with students with special educational needs in New Zealand primary and secondary regular and special schools. A national survey was used to identify current assessment practices used by teachers working with students designated, through a resourcing policy, as having high and very high needs. Specifically, the survey sought to determine the type of assessment practices used, reasons for using different approaches, the role of the person carrying out the assessment and levels of confidence in assessing students in relation to learning. The use of learning stories as a form of narrative assessment was further explored through the questionnaires and in a relatively small number of interviews. The results showed that teachers were largely responsible for assessment, and that the three main assessment methods used included collecting examples of work, observations and anecdotal records. Teachers reported confidence in assessing students for learning, but not for funding applications and assistive technology applications. Approaches such as narrative assessment and learning stories were used by some teachers in school‐based settings. Learning stories and narrative assessment are strategies where parents, teachers, teacher‐aides and students engage in meaningful dialogue around learning. Teachers reported that through narrative assessment they could demonstrate that learners with high and very high needs were visibly learning. Through a sociocultural conceptualisation of formative assessment, the role of teachers and learners in assessment is explored.

Using Activity Theory to Evaluate a Professional Learning and Development Initiative in the Use of Narrative Assessment.

Analysis of the impact of professional learning and development (PLD) programmes for educators is complex. This article presents an analysis of a PLD initiative in which classroom teachers learned to use narrative assessment for students with ‘high’ and ‘very high’ learning needs. Using Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT), the analysis showed how various tensions arose across the activity system of participants during the initiative. Tensions were associated with the roles of those involved, the narrative assessment approach, and the rules of the initiative. While the new narrative assessment approach resulted in benefits for the students and their parents, role conflict emerged in relation to established assessment approaches already used by the educators. It is argued that CHAT enables a more nuanced understanding of the complex ways in which teachers actually engage with official curriculum, pedagogy or assessment PLD initiatives, than do theories that position teachers as simply resistant to change.

An assessment framework for inclusive education: integrating assessment approaches

Teachers committed to inclusive education have the potential to revolutionise pedagogical and assessment practices within regular classrooms simply because students with high needs challenge traditional assumptions about what it means ‘to learn’ and ‘to assess’. This creates opportunities for teachers to find creative ways to ascertain what and how a child learns, and how these assessment results can be communicated to the child, parents, the school and funding bodies to enable further learning. This paper explores diverse assessment practices including criterion-based, normative, ipsative and self-assessment, with both formative and summative functions, reported as being used by teachers in New Zealand who teach students with high needs. These multiple approaches can be integrated into learning stories to ‘narrate’ student learning. An assessment framework is introduced to support teachers to appreciate the functionality of an integrated assessment approach to document student learning and outcomes, arguably a framework applicable for all learners.

Essential elements in a professional learning and development programme: a New Zealand case study of autism professional development to promote collaborative practices

Professional learning and development (PD) programmes play an important role in improving professionals’ ability to teach and provide for the children and young people they work with. This article reviews literature relating to components considered important to successful general and autism spectrum disorder (ASD)-focused PD. It then describes the methodology and findings from an evaluation of ‘tips for autism’ – a New Zealand PD programme developed for teams of people who work or live with five-year-old to 12-year-old children with ASD. The evaluation methodology involved an examination of seven data sources to identify 57 merit criteria that could be used to evaluate ASD-focused PD programmes. Applying these merit criteria, ‘tips’ was judged to be a high-quality, valuable, cost-effective PD programme. An examination of the evaluation findings and literature identified seven specific components as being pivotal to successful PD. These are: team interaction; cultural relevancy; expert facilitation; integration of PD with the child’s intervention; translation of theory into practice; provision of time for reflection, practice and action; and the application of learning to an authentic context. It is maintained that when a PD programme results in sustained benefits for children, the programme itself becomes part of the intervention.

Understanding the Learner—Environment Relationship A Matrix of Perspectives

This conceptual article re-examines the contribution of a contextual perspective to the practice of educational psychology. The two dimensions of environment and learner are placed along a continuum of active to passive. A range of theory is then situated within this matrix. The article explains and illustrates how the matrix encompasses different views on the learners developmental relationship with the environment and how each perspective leads to specific types of interventions. The model is applied to special education, school curricula and policy making. It is argued that the matrix can facilitate a comprehensive analysis of an individuals situation and inform communication among professionals working in different paradigms. Implications for professional practice are discussed.

An Ontology Supported Abductive Mobile Enquiry Based Learning Application

Ontologies have emerged as one of the most popular and widely accepted tools in technology enhanced learning supporting, among other things, knowledge representation and learning content creation. In this paper, we describe the development and evaluation of an ontology supported mobile learning application that supports abductive enquiry based learning. This application has been developed for a science content domain and tested with high school science students.

Scaffolding in Mobile Science Enquiry-based Learning Using Ontologies

The use of ontologies has become increasingly widespread in many areas, particularly in technology enhanced learning. They appear promising in supporting knowledge representation and learning content creation for domains of interest. In this paper, we show how ontology-based scaffolding has helped mobile learners to perform scientific enquiry investigations. Enquiry-based learning aims to provide educational activities and tools to assists students to learn science by doing science. In this study, a design science research approach was taken to creating an ontology-driven application for a science content domain, which has been evaluated with high school science students. The results showed the significant value of ontologies in scaffolding learning content in such enquiry-based learning environments. With this application, students were found to learn science in more meaningful and engaged ways as well as developing positive attitudes towards mobile learning.

Networked Teaching and Learning for Life-Long Professional Development

Our societies are in the midst of intense economic, social, and technological change, and around the world educators and policymakers are being challenged to ensure that education systems are cognizant of these changes and that education is relevant for the demands of twenty-first-century citizenship. In particular, the democratization and changing understandings of knowledge; the growing connectedness and diversity of societies; the need for life-long and life-wide learning; and the critical role that technology will play, have been shown to be some of the important considerations in the planning of twenty-first-century learning environments.

Between Theory and Practice Falls the Shadow : The Learning Theories Profile

Between the idea And the reality Between the motion And the act Falls the Shadow T. S. Eliot, “The Hollow Men” This article reports on the development and evaluation of a meta-cognitive tool for practitioners’ reflection on the ‘shadow’ between espoused theories and theories-in-use. The learning theories profile (LTP) was developed to support practitioners in education to identify and reflect on the theoretical perspectives that underpin their professional decision-making. In order to assess the usefulness of the LTP for reflection on professional development and practice, 15 special educators who were enrolled in a university course took part in a trial of the tool. Data from pre-activity and post-activity surveys suggested that the LTP helped students to critically consider contemporary and traditional theories of learning, raised awareness of the application of learning theories in education practice and supported users to reflect on their own professional practice, and interactions.