Kenneth Strike on Liberalism,Citizenship and the Private Interest in Schooling

After indicating a number of points of agreement with the argument 0eveloped by Kenneth Strike in his article Liberalism, Citizenship and the Private Interest in Schooling, this article identifies and explores a number of queries and criticisms which arise in relation to that argument. These queries and criticisms relate especially to the nature and extent of the expansiveness involved in Strike's conception of public or common educational influence, and to the implications and justification of the claim that private educational interests enjoy a greater salience and recognition on Strike's view of public or common educational influence than on some alternative views.     

Wittgenstein,education and religion

Conclusion Wittgenstein's approach to religion is an important part of any assessment of the significance of his thought as a whole for educational thinking and practice. As we have seen, although his view of religion is elusive and stands in need of definitive evaluation, it offers a number of insights and challenges.Whilst Wittgenstein's approach conflicts in important respects with the LR view of education in religion, because that view is based on important social and cultural realities which are significant for Wittgensteinian principles, it is not supplanted. The Wittgensteinian approach both supplies important perspectives which will enrich the LR view, whilst giving support to a greater pluralism in the way in which education in religion is conceived, including forms of substantial religious upbringing and schooling.     

Parametric adjustment in saccadic eye movements

During a change-of-fixation eye movement, the target toward which S was shifting his gaze was displaced 1° toward the original point of fixation so that the eye made an overshoot with respect to the new target position. When this was repeated several times in succession, the eye movement control system made an adjustment such that the overshoot gradually diminished. Ihe end-result of this “parametric adjustment” was that a visual target 10° from the fovea elicited an eye movement of only 9.1°.     

Changes in straight-ahead eye position during adaptation to wedge prisms

If S is instructed to look straight ahead before adapting to laterally displaced vision, he does so without noticeable error. After adapting, however, in response to the same instruction, he may rotate his eyes as much as 8° toward the the displaced visual target. This is the change in judgment of the direction of gaze which Helmholtz identified in 1867 as an important physiological mechanism in adaptation to prisms. It leads to more accurate reaching behavior by causing S to make a visual judgment that the target is closer to straight ahead than it was when he first looked through the prisms. This type of adaptive change (change in judgment of the direction of gaze, oculomotor change) can be measured either by manual judgments (difference between successive “straight ahead” and “visual target” judgments) or by changes in straight-ahead eye position. It may be described as a parametric adjustment in the oculomotor control system, and is closely analogous to the eye movement which subserves the recovery of binocular fusion in prism vergence.     

The NCATE Process and behaviorally-based special education

The National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) has long sought to identify effective programs for teacher preparation in this country. Recently, the Council has revised its standards to be more rigorous and demanding. This revision presents new and challenging standards for the accreditation of programs preparing educators. The most problematic but most important of these new standards is the requirement of a well-articulated knowledge base supporting a program's content and processes. Development of the knowledge base statement involves the articulation of the program's philosophy, theme, model, goals, objectives, primary research base, wisdom of practice, and evaluation procedures. A behavioral model serves well in meeting these requirements, particularly since behavioral applications in education are well researched and the approach is compatible with the emphasis on specific goals and objectives and evaluation of effectiveness. Effective educational methods are available and are mostly behavioral. The articulation of the NCATE knowledge base encourages education faculty, traditionally nonbehavioral, to examine the effectiveness of their programs and to demonstrate research and professional support for content and instructional methods. A behavioral knowledge base statement appropriate for NCATE is demonstrated through examples drawn from Gonzaga University's knowledge base for special education.     

Novice Strategies for Understanding Paintings

Visual analysis is taught in art history classes as a skill which aids a student in understanding a work of art in its appropriate conceptual or historical context. To provide a foundation for the design of computer-based lessons to train students in the skill, this study attempted to discover the strategies that novices employ when viewing a set of paintings. Verbal protocols obtained from novices in this study indicated that they described semantic features, or content, of paintings more than the formal elements, e. g. line, colour, shape, when viewing realist paintings. However, when presented with abstract, i. e. less semantically accessible paintings, novices shaply altered their approach and discussed formal elements over content. These findings suggest that an analysis of formal elements is not performed by a novice when a painting depicts a clear subject, but is attempted when the subject-matter becomes obscure. This implies that, at some level, novices realize that the meaning of a painting can be extracted from attention to the formal elements. Interestingly, novice protocols contained the same categories of strategies deemed important by experts. The lack of training in visual analysis was not notably manifest with respect to style. Of all formal dimensions, this one yielded the greatest discrepancy between novices and the expectations of instructors.     

Unreasonable Hope: A Critical Evaluation of Thomas Oord's Eschatology

Drawing upon his theology of essential kenosis, Thomas Oord maintains that God can effect miracles, resurrect Jesus's body, and redeem the entire created order in a definitive victory over evil without using any form of coercion. The author explores Oord's theology in order to evaluate this claim. Based on the criteria of both internal consistency and rational viability, the author argues that Oord's notion of essential kenosis makes the bodily resurrection of Jesus an extreme case of good fortune for God and thoroughly undermines any reasonable hope in an eschatological future in which all creatures experience resurrection and redemption in an evil‐free existence.