A hypertext-based tutorial with links to the Web for teaching statistics and research methods

An online tutorial for research design and statistics is described. This tutorial provides a way for students to learn how scales of measure, research design, statistics, and graphing data are related. The tutorial also helps students determine what statistical analysis is appropriate for a given design and how the results of the analysis should be plotted in order to effectively communicate the results of a study. Initial research suggests that students using the tutorial are more accurate in their decisions about the design and statistics associated with a study. Students are also more confident in the decisions and find them easier to make when using the tutorial. Furthermore, practice with the tutorial appears to improve problem-solving ability in subsequent design and statistics scenarios. Implications for teaching statistics and research design are discussed.     

Memory for Textbook Covers: When and Why We Remember a Book by Its Cover

There is an important distinction between seeing something and paying attention to it, and this can influence memory. The current study examined incidental memory for the covers and authors of textbooks used in undergraduate psychology courses. Students in several courses were asked to recall the textbook cover design (Studies 1 and 2) and the name of the author of their textbook (Study 2). When the cover design was explicitly connected to a course concept, memory accuracy was positively related to performance in the course. While people may judge a book by its cover, remembering that cover may depend on how well it reflects a key concept of the book. The findings provide novel insight regarding how students attend to book covers and author information and when and why some students remember information that is not anticipated to appear on real‐world course assessments. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

学科领域知识和学业成绩对工作记忆广度的影响

引入Alexander领域知识概念形成数学学科领域知识,以七年级有理数单元为研究材料,编写问卷和E-Prime实验程序,筛选60名初中生为被试,考察数学学科领域知识和学业成绩对工作记忆广度的影响。研究发现:(1)学优生的认知过程知识和问题条件知识显著高于学困生,而学理内容知识差异不显著;(2)在简单加工任务上,学优生和学困生工作记忆广度差异不显著。在复杂任务上,学优生的工作记忆广度都显著高于学困生;(3)当工作记忆广度任务中存储部分的词语和数学学科领域知识相关时,问题条件知识分数和认知过程分数能够显著地预测工作记忆广度。而不相关时,仅问题条件知识分数能够显著地预测工作记忆广度。     

How and when do students use flashcards?

Previous survey research has documented students' use of self-regulated study strategies, with a particular interest in self-testing. These surveys indicate that students frequently use flashcards to self-test and that self-testing is primarily used as a way to monitor learning. Whereas previous surveys provide information about whether and why students self-test, they provide minimal information about how and when students choose to self-test. Accordingly, the primary purpose of the current survey was to explore how and when students engage in self-testing. We surveyed 374 undergraduates about the amount of practice and the timing of practice, two factors that strongly affect the efficacy of self-testing. Results indicate that students understand the benefits of practising to higher criterion levels (amount of practice) but do not typically implement or understand the benefits of practising with longer lags (timing of practice). We discuss practical implications for supporting more successful student learning.     

Gender discrimination may be worse than you think: testing ordinal interactions in power research

The authors reanalyze the data of a study by S. M. Elias and R. J. Loomis (2004), which aimed to determine how an instructor's gender may influence his or her ability to gain student compliance. S. M. Elias and R. J. Loomis observed few significant gender effects using traditional multivariate analyses of variance. The authors reanalyze this data using the more appropriate statistical techniques for detecting ordinal interactions recommended by M. J. Strube and P. Bobko (1989) and S. M. Elias (2004). An ordinal interaction occurs when 1 cell of a 2 x 2 design is responsible for a significant interaction (e.g., female instructors suffering only when rated by male students). Reanalysis of the data resulted in more robust findings.     

How and when do students use flashcards?

Previous survey research has documented students' use of self-regulated study strategies, with a particular interest in self-testing. These surveys indicate that students frequently use flashcards to self-test and that self-testing is primarily used as a way to monitor learning. Whereas previous surveys provide information about whether and why students self-test, they provide minimal information about how and when students choose to self-test. Accordingly, the primary purpose of the current survey was to explore how and when students engage in self-testing. We surveyed 374 undergraduates about the amount of practice and the timing of practice, two factors that strongly affect the efficacy of self-testing. Results indicate that students understand the benefits of practising to higher criterion levels (amount of practice) but do not typically implement or understand the benefits of practising with longer lags (timing of practice). We discuss practical implications for supporting more successful student learning.     

Teaching Paragraph Composition to Students with Emotional/Behavioral Disorders Using the Simultaneous Prompting Procedure

The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of the simultaneous prompting procedure in teaching paragraph composition to 4, 5th grade students identified with emotional behavioral disorder (EBD) and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The instructor taught students how to construct and proofread a 5-sentence paragraph using the simultaneous prompting procedure with embedded non-targeted information related to the writing process. A multiple probe design across participants assessed effectiveness of the procedure. Results indicated that all students learned to compose a paragraph, acquired the non-targeted information, maintained the skills up to 6 weeks later, and generalized the skills to other writing tasks.     

MENTORING IN PARALLEL UNIVERSES

Mentoring plays a vital role in the academic context. The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate the mentoring relationships I established with my students and to determine how my experiences and the mentoring I received from my university professors influence my mentoring practices. The results confirm the dynamic nature of the mentoring process, and the scenarios illustrate how my mentors influenced my practices but also show how I changed my approach when necessary to meet the needs of the students.     

Using guided reading to teach internet inquiry skills: a case study of one elementary school teacher’s experience

Employees in the twenty-first century must be equipped to effectively process information from print and online sources; yet, many students struggle with online research and comprehension skills, making them ill-prepared in college and careers. Utilizing a qualitative exploratory case study design, this study describes how a fourth-grade teacher developed her students’ online research and comprehension skills in small groups using the guided reading framework to frame her instruction. Key findings suggest that the teacher adapted many components of the guided reading framework to develop students’ online inquiry skills. Both the teacher and students experienced role changes and challenges related to the experience, yet students demonstrated high rates of engagement and collaboration. This paper provides a situated example of how a teacher adapted an existing instructional context in her classroom and implications for adapting other popular instructional context, frameworks, and models for supporting teachers in developing students’ digital literacy skills.     

The Effects of Same-Sex and Other-Sex Contexts on Masculinity and Femininity

The study addressed whether or not masculinity and femininity as indexed by state measures of gender-typed behaviors changed when participants worked with asame-sex or other-sex peer. In a within-subjects design, 80 college students (40 women and 40 men, M age = 19.5 years, SD = 2.10) worked with a man and a woman confederate on a collaborative task. State masculinity and femininity measures were created from existing trait measures (Bem, 1974; Boldizar, 1991). Men and women reported greater state femininity when working with an other-sex partner than when working with a same-sex partner. State masculinity did not vary as a function of same-sex and other-sex contexts. Implications of these findings for understanding how social interactions contribute to the construction of masculinity and femininity are discussed.     

Optimising self-regulated study: The benefits—and costs—of dropping flashcards

Self-regulation of study activities is a constant in the lives of students—who must decide what to study, when to study, how long to study, and by what method to study. We investigated self-regulation in the context of a common study method: flashcards. In four experiments we examined the basis and effectiveness of a metacognitive strategy adopted almost universally by students: setting aside (dropping) items they think they know. Dropping has a compelling logic—it creates additional opportunities to study undropped items—but it rests on two shaky foundations: students’ metacognitive monitoring and the value they assign to further study. In fact, being allowed to drop flashcards had small but consistently negative effects on learning. The results suggest that the effectiveness of self-regulated study depends on both the accuracy of metacognitive monitoring and the learner's understanding, or lack thereof, of how people learn.     

Using a modified constant prompt-delay procedure to teach spelling to students with physical disabilities

Current research suggests that constant delay is an effective means of teaching students through near-errorless learning. The current study examined how procedures used in previous research may be modified so that constant delay can be implemented with students who have physical disabilities that prevent them from engaging in fluent academic responding. A multiple baseline design with probes was used to assess the effectiveness of a modified constant-delay procedure in teaching spelling to students with physical disabilities. This procedure was found to be effective for all 3 students.     

空间位置对大学生逃生决策中从众行为的影响

空间位置与从众行为是影响紧急情况下人员疏散的两个重要因素,该研究在于探讨 这两个因素在人们的逃生决策中究竟如何发挥影响作用.研究采用3（空间位置）×4（人数分布）被试内实验设计对随机选取的60名大学生进行研究.结果发现,空间位置和人数分布均对疏散行为有显著影响,且两者之间存在显著的交互作用.多数人在对逃生出口选择对,距离出口的远近（所处的空间位置）是最先考虑的因素,有少部分人会表现出从众行为,而忽略空间位置.当所处位置在中间时,人数分布成为影响决策的重要因素.这说明空间位置和人数分布影响了人们的从众行为,进而影响逃生决策.     

Using Brief Academic Assessments to Determine Generalization Strategies

This study examined the utility of brief academic assessments to identify effective generalization procedures for individual students. Specifically, the study built on the proposal that brief assessments of antecedent and consequence manipulations can identify the most effective generalization strategy for individual students. The design was an alternating treatments design nested within a multiple baseline across six students. Students learned how to solve a set of multiplication facts using a common strategy while spontaneous generalization to other sets of facts was measured. Next, researchers determined whether an antecedent- or consequent-based generalization strategy would be more effective for increasing generalization across multiplication skills and conducted an extended analysis with an alternating treatment phase to confirm results of the brief assessment. Results indicated that the assessment correctly identified the most effective generalization strategy for five of the six students.     

Teachers use of fear appeals and timing reminders prior to high-stakes examinations: pressure from above,below, and within

Teachers often communicate to students the consequences of success and failure (fear appeals) and the timing (timing reminders) of forthcoming examinations. Prior research has examined how fear appeals and teaching reminders are evaluated by students and how they relate to educational outcomes such as engagement. Few studies have addressed the use of these behaviours from a teacher’s perspective. We examined teacher use of consequence and timing reminders, used prior to examinations, and its relation to perceived accountability pressure, teacher self-efficacy, perceived importance of tested outcomes, and the belief that students would interpret such messages as threatening. Data were collected from 854 English primary and secondary school teachers. Results showed that fear appeals and timing reminders were used more frequently when teachers believed that tested outcomes were important, when they had lower self-efficacy to engage students, and when they believed that students would interpret messages as threatening. Timing reminders, but not fear appeals, were used more frequently when perceived accountability pressure was greater. These findings help to understand why teachers are using such behaviours. In this study it was pressures from above, below, and within.     

Optimising self-regulated study: the benefits - and costs - of dropping flashcards

Self-regulation of study activities is a constant in the lives of students - who must decide what to study, when to study, how long to study, and by what method to study. We investigated self-regulation in the context of a common study method: flashcards. In four experiments we examined the basis and effectiveness of a metacognitive strategy adopted almost universally by students: setting aside (dropping) items they think they know. Dropping has a compelling logic - it creates additional opportunities to study undropped items - but it rests on two shaky foundations: students' metacognitive monitoring and the value they assign to further study. In fact, being allowed to drop flashcards had small but consistently negative effects on learning. The results suggest that the effectiveness of self-regulated study depends on both the accuracy of metacognitive monitoring and the learner's understanding, or lack thereof, of how people learn.     

Using HLM to Explore the Effects of Perceptions of Learning Environments and Assessments on Students’ Test Performance

The study examines the role that perceptions or impressions of learning environments and assessments play in students’ performance on a large-scale standardized test. Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) was used to test aspects of the Learning Errors and Formative Feedback model to determine how much variation in students’ performance was explained by students’ and school principals’ perceptions of learning environments and assessments. Results from sequential HLM testing indicated that students’ but not principals’ perceptions explained a significant, although modest, amount of the total variation in students’ test performance. These results suggest that when students perceive learning environments to be safe and valuable, and positive assessment activities to be taking place, they tend to perform better on standardized tests than when they perceive learning environments and assessment activities otherwise. These findings provide a rationale for investigating the variables that can help improve students’ perceptions in order to enhance their test performance.     

A Case Study of Teaching Social Responsibility to Doctoral Students in the Climate Sciences

The need to make young scientists aware of their social responsibilities is widely acknowledged, although the question of how to actually do it has so far gained limited attention. A 2-day workshop entitled “Prepared for social responsibility?” attended by doctoral students from multiple disciplines in climate science, was targeted at the perceived needs of the participants and employed a format that took them through three stages of ethics education: sensitization, information and empowerment. The workshop aimed at preparing doctoral students to manage ethical dilemmas that emerge when climate science meets the public sphere (e.g., to identify and balance legitimate perspectives on particular types of geo-engineering), and is an example of how to include social responsibility in doctoral education. The paper describes the workshop from the three different perspectives of the authors: the course teacher, the head of the graduate school, and a graduate student. The elements that contributed to the success of the workshop, and thus make it an example to follow, are (1) the involvement of participating students, (2) the introduction of external expertise and role models in climate science, and (3) a workshop design that focused on ethical analyses of examples from the climate sciences.     

Designing Computer Games to Help Physics Students Understand Newton's Laws of Motion

This research, explores, the design of a computer environment for helping science students to learn about Newtonian dynamics. The learning environment incorporates games set in the context of a Newtonian computer microworld, where students have to control the motion of a spaceship in order to achieve goals such as hitting a target or navigating a maze. The purpose of the games is to focus the students' attention on various aspects of the implications of Newton's laws. A set of general design principles guided the design of the games and microworld. These include: (I) represent the phenomena of the domain clearly; (2) eliminate irrelevant complexities from the computer microworld; (3) focus the students on as peers of their knowledge.that need revising; (4) facilitate the use of problem-solving heuristics; (5) encourage the application of relevant knowledge from other domains; and (6) encourage better ways of representing and thinking about the domain. A controlled study indicated that playing the games improved the students' ability to solve dynamics problems. The students utilized various components of their knowledge, including their intuitions concerning how forces affect motion and their partial understanding of the formal physics, to generate strategies for the games. The use of such knowledge is combined with the use of general problem-solving heuristics and feedback from the computer microworld to facilitate the evolution of the students' knowledge of Newtonian dynamics. An examination of the results in light of the original design principles suggested numerous improvements that could be made to the sequence of games and microworld. The design process could best be characterized as a series of successive refinements.     

Simultaneous Prompting and Instructive Feedback When Teaching Chained Tasks

This study evaluated the effectiveness of the simultaneous prompting procedure when teaching students with moderate to severe mental retardation a chained task (i.e., hand washing). This study also evaluated if students could acquire responses to instructive feedback stimuli presented during training sessions. The effectiveness of these procedures was assessed by using a multiple probe across students design. Acquisition, maintenance, and generalization data were collected and analyzed. Results indicated that the simultaneous prompting procedure was effective in teaching 3 of the 5 students to follow a 16-step task analysis to wash their hands. All students who met criterion maintained and generalized the skills with 100% accuracy. All students acquired some of the instructive feedback stimuli. Future research issues are discussed.