Learning to solve simple mathematical operations with electrical software.

There are students who, despite the class level they are attending as Vocational High School students, have not been able to learn the simple mathematical concepts taught in much earlier classes (e.g. in Primary School) In this study we investigate whether, with the help of a computer programme representing electrical devices such as resistors, voltage current sources etc, in parallel with the understanding of the rules of electricity, we can also increase the mathematical ability of the students. The study was carried out with 102 students aged from 17 to 35 in three island regions of the South Aegean. Nearly all the students had computer experience and had been involved with or engaged professionally the profession of electrician in parallel with their school or holiday time (summer holiday jobs etc). The results show that using computer software to simulate electrical devices familiar to them increases their ability to solve simple mathematical exercises and perform arithmetic operations. More importantly, however, the mathematical knowledge acquired on this way is preserved for the future. This was proved by a repeat survey carried out about two months later. 

Effects of school calendar on primary education. A study in Cantabria.

María Luisa Sevillano-García, Carolina Pascual Moscoso and Paula Sainz-Ezquerra Barrio

 The main aim of this research is to know whether the two-monthly school calendar implemented in Spain’s Autonomous Community of Cantabria was effective and satisfactory for the school community. Three important social and educational indicators were analyzed: school coexistence, the teaching-learning process and family work-life balance, within the framework of this new school calendar. Three questionnaires were used to gather data for the objectives, and were applied to the principal agents involved in education, students (19), parents (22) and teachers (30). The uniqueness and originality of this study lies in crucial socializing aspects that are largely ignored in research, as is the subject of different school calendars.

The analyses and comparisons show that the results, which can be extrapolated to other analogical contexts in Spain and Europe, have been positive since the two-monthly calendar was implemented. An analysis of the PISA reports for the other regions in Spain and other countries showed that the mean for the dimensions analyzed tends to fall whereas in Cantabria the values remained constant and even increased. Family work-life balance improved, as did student learning, well-being and school coexistence in Cantabria, and this is related to the new two-monthly school calendar.

 Teaching students to think critically about morality using the paradigm of sciences.

Arshak Balayan

In this paper I outline teaching ethics to university students and claim that one effective way to introduce students to moral philosophy is leading them to apply the paradigm of sciences to moral issues. The central claim in this paper is that ethics instructors should invite their students to view ethics as a (non-empirical) science and to accept a researcher’s stance towards morality.

I start with briefly presenting some common misconceptions about ethics among university students and move on to discuss possible aims of introductory ethics courses offered by universities. I contend that ethics instructors should aim at helping their students to think critically and systematically about ethics. I dedicate a larger section of the paper to discussion of ideas from epistemology and philosophy of science that beginning ethics students can benefit from.

This paper presents examples of such notions and outlines their application to moral issues. I conclude the paper considering some objections to the approach.

 Elements of critical thinking in the school standards of "chess" subject.

Heghine Khachatryan, Serob Khachatryan & Naira Movsisyan

 Problem formulation and research purpose. The students' knowledge of this or that subject is not enough to be ready for the rapid changes of the current society, for the challenges, for responding to the modern developments, having their own worthy place and role. In this context, a number of competencies have been underlined by experts, among which particularly critical thinking stands out.

In this article we refer to the development of critical thinking through "Chess" subject lessons, as well as the reflection of that competence in the standards of chess taught as a compulsory subject in the 2^nd-4^th grades of the public schools of the Republic of Armenia.

Chess as an educational subject provides wide opportunities for the development of critical thinking. One of the requirements of critical thinking is to consider any issue or situation comprehensively. In this regard, one of the most important rules of chess is to comprehensively analyze any position. Before making a move, the child should evaluate the situation, choose a plan, consider multiple options, which allows to avoid one-sidedness, moreover, the chess player should not only consider his, but also the possible plans and moves of the opponent.

This article introduces the purpose of the “Chess” educational subject, the principles of standard building, teaching approaches and methods, and the expected learning outcomes.

Teaching to the Test and the Italian National Assessment of Mathematics.

Daniel Doz & Jurka Lepičnik Vodopivec

Teaching to the test means to use part of the curricular school hours to prepare students to a test, showing them solving methods and focusing on the topics, which are more likely assessed by the test. In Italy, the INVALSI institute is responsible for preparing national assessments of knowledge for the evaluation of the quality of the educational system. Mathematics is assessed also in grade 8 and grade 10. In the present work, we investigated the presence of the phenomenon of the teaching to the test in North-Eastern Italy. Through an online questionnaire, we gathered the data among N=84 Italian middle and high school teachers, showing that the phenomenon of teaching to the test is present in the majority of those teachers, who teach to grade 8 or grade 10 students. Moreover, we found that more than half of the teachers, who prepare their students for the national assessment, solve some specific exercises taken from old national assessments; some teachers do also include some questions taken from national assessments in their formative and summative tests. When asked about the quantity of school hours invested in preparing their students for the test, we found that, on average, teachers spent M=6.98 hours, which represents 2-3 weeks of regular lessons. Teachers do however believe that national assessments should not influence students’ final grading; statistically significant differences were found among high school teachers who did and did not teach to grade 10 students.

Perceptions des pratiques des enseignants de mathématiques en fin de secondaire: quelles influences sur les choix d’études STIM?

Doriane Jaegers, Virginie Dupont & Dominique Lafontaine

The present research conducted on a sample of 6th year secondary school students in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation aims to study the influence of the perception of mathematics teachers' practices, on the aspirations for higher education with a strong mathematics component on the one hand and, on the other hand, on three motivational variables (self-perception, feeling of self-efficacy and perceived usefulness of mathematics) known to favour this choice of orientation. If the cognitive activation practices are directly favourable to aspirations for mathematical studies, the perception of relevant teaching is positively related to self-perception and the perceived usefulness of mathematics (particularly in courses with low hourly volume).

Problems with Teaching Critical Thinking.

Hasmik Hovhannisyan & Robert Djidjian

This paper outlines main difficulties arising in the process of teaching the different levels of critical thinking. The first of these difficulties concern the basic level of critical thinking, which we consider as the field of laws and rules of traditional formal logic. The principal task here is correcting the thinking of those students who allow invalid inferences in their judgments. The next level is related to the means of analytical thinking and forming the required competence of understanding subjects under discussion. Here teachers confront the problem of understanding the essence of understanding. The most serious difficulties may arise at the level of teaching students the ways of independent thinking. The core problem here is that of the mechanism of idea generation. This paper discusses also difficulties related to the meta-level of argumentation and methodology of scientific revolutions. The final section of this paper demonstrates the method of critical resolution of classical paradoxes – the versions of the “Liar” paradox and Zeno’s aporias. 

BOOK REVIEW.

Lin Wang & Gil Inana

Starting from the recent publication by Crombez Bart 2020 “ LEAN transformations : why LEAN works and how to introduce it with success” special attention is given in the domain of “Education Management” to the"Inconvenient truth" perspective concerning to dare to face, to take into account and to learn to deal with sabotage, thwarting, bullying, brainwashing (of victims). Between others it is crucial to recognize and to learn to deal with bullyboys, dyssocials, hypocrites, perverse narcissists… To be able to tackle efficiently these challenges, one must be aware that such people are rather becoming popular and successful and use these methods to promote their influence…

Abstract 

Stochastics - Virtual Simulation using Mobile Technology.
Aristides Tirkas and Rita Panaoura

The present study suggests the use of modern mobile technology, as part of ICT, in order to improve the understanding of the concepts of Probability and Statistics at the ages of the early high school years and to develop the respective programming and modeling skills. In particular, android apps and spreadsheets were used for generating multiple representations on the one hand and the virtual simulation of a chance experiment on the other. The specific didactic framework was expected to lead students to construct their own mathematical models. The sample was consisted of 355 students divided into experimental and control group. Students were divided into three levels of performance based on their written assessments in mathematics in order to examine the accountability of the intervention in respect to their initial mathematical performance. Results indicated that there were statistically significant differences on students’ performance, between the experimental and the control group and those differences were higher in the case of the students with medium and high performance in mathematics. Unanswered questions, which need to be examined further, were raised about the low-level students. There was not any gender effect on performance due to teaching intervention in eight out of the nine tasks. The discussion concentrates on the learning outcomes derived by the specific intervention program and the role of the use of new technological tools in order to fulfill the relevant goals which are posed at different educational levels.

Extra-Curricular Activities and their Influence on Academic Performance in Primary Education.

Mª Ángeles Pascual Sevillano, Eduardo Fernández de Oliva and Carolina Pascual Moscoso

There have been various approaches to studying academic performance at school but few studies have analysed the influence of extra-curricular activities on student outcomes. This study is based on a quantitative non-experimental survey of a convenience sample of students in the final years of Primary Education, focusing on performance in Mathematics, Spanish Language, English, Physical Education and Art Education. The survey consisted of 79 students in fifth and sixth grade at two school centers. The out-of-school activities in which the students participated were classified in four groups (English, sports, creative and reinforcement) linked to the school subjects already mentioned. Academic performance in these subjects was measured in relation to the extra-curricular activities that the students do. The results show that taking English classes influences performance in that subject, with significant improvement in student grades. There is also a positive trend towards improvement in marks for Art Education and Physical Education among those students who actively participate in activities related to these two subjects.

Professional Authority and Teacher Agency.

Kathryn A. Caprino, Sally B. Crane, Angela M. Kohnen and Jane S. Townsend

Prospective teachers develop agency whilst negotiating input from competing and often conflicting authorities on pedagogy and subject-area curricula. In this article, the authors analyzed Julia’s—a student teacher and graduate from their university’s master's level, teacher-certification program in secondary English—experience with this negotiation. To explore Julia’s experience, the authors collected and analyzed a year’s worth of multimodal data: transcribed semi-structured interviews, field notes, lesson plans, post-lesson reflections, a video-recorded writing lesson, and a first-year-teaching survey—from which themes of agency and authority emerged. Exploring Julia’s negotiation of competing discourses in her development of agency and authority exposed the difficulty and complexity of this process. Julia’s transition from student to teacher challenged her to forego a desire to please outside authorities, such as school mandates and standardized assessments, and assume the authority of an expert, one with the agency to construct and organize effective instruction for her students. Julia grappled with a number of challenges in this process.

The Challenges of Nestors and Nestor Education.
Fernand Vandamme

On the basis of a series of gnosts (a concise expression concerning a scientific point of view), some challenges Nestors (people aged above 70years) are confronted with are described. Next the possibility is investigated to develop an education strategy for Nestors and the challenges, needs and targets that have to be taken into account to be relevant for these Nestors and society.

Educational discourse and digital media: toward co-regulated learning?

Anne-Marie Cotton

This paper reflects upon the triadic pedagogical relationship between teacher, learner and knowledge embodied through the educational discourse. When the discourse becomes dialogic, it implies more involvement and responsibility shared by both actors, teachers and learners, the latter acknowledging an increasing awareness of responsibility and engagement for their learning. The educational discourse also refers to specific socio-communicative practices activated when it is imperative to respond in real time to the ultimate educational questions being: what content is worth transmitting and how to optimally achieve the transmission from teacher and learner’s perspectives?

Adding that virtual environments are conductive to reflection the author analyses the use by a European team of lecturers and Master students of digital platforms set up as vectors of knowledge within an Erasmus programme and questions their added value to the educational discourse.

The findings highlight the nature of the interactions affecting the active participation, performance and learning of the students. Future programmes willing to embed collaborative work focusing on peers mediating each other’s actions toward a joint goal and aiming the use of asynchronous distributed virtual learning environment, could gain from co-regulation as a manifestation of emergent interaction within a Zone of proximal development with a teacher-indirect regulation.

FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT IN THE TEACHING AND LEARNING OF MATHEMATICS: TEACHERS’ AND STUDENTS’ BELIEFS ABOUT MATHEMATICAL ERROR

Athanasios Gagatsis, Paraskevi Michael-Chrysanthou, Theodora Christodoulou, Elia Iliada,Giorgio Bolondi, Ira Vanini,
Federica Ferretti and Silvia Sbaragli

The present paper discusses lower secondary school teachers’ and students’ beliefs about Formative Assessment in mathematics in Cyprus, Switzerland and Italy. Based on teachers’ and students’ beliefs related to formative assessment, this research is an attempt to compare the teachers’ and students’ beliefs in the different countries under study, regarding to the handling of the error in mathematics classroom. In total, 192 teachers and 1108 lower secondary school students participated in the survey and they completed a questionnaire about the formative assessment. The findings of the study reveal that the students’ beliefs in the three countries are identical, whereas teachers’ beliefs about mathematical error differ enough in the particular countries.

CULTIVATING AN eLEARNING CULTURE

Jose Lloyd D. Espiritu, Kiran S. Budhrani

Emerging technologies have hugely shifted the behavior of students, reshaped teaching methods and challenged traditional learning structures. The influx of technology in schools is non-negotiable. However, the education sector consisting of major stakeholders including teachers, parents, school administrators, employers and the government agencies are known for being extremely slow in adapting emerging technologies into learning. Consequently, eLearning has not taken off. If students are to fully benefit from eLearning and what emerging technologies can offer, the authors argue that all stakeholders need to be involved in cultivating an eLearning culture. This paper begins with analyzing the issues that each stakeholder group is currently facing, followed by a synthesis on global trends and innovations in technology and pedagogy and finally provides recommendations that each stakeholder group can use.

THE DYSSOCIAL-SYNDROME AS A LEARNING/RESEARCH MANAGEMENT CHALLENGE

Lin Wang, Filip Muylle, Merlijn Balder

The role of the Dyssocial-syndrome in the dynamics of an organization, inclusive educational institutes and especially its self- destructive impact is discussed. The relevance of detection, treatment and follow-up of this syndrome are highlighted.

CARE, LEARNING AND EDUCATION

Vandamme Fernand, Zhi Dao

The notions gnost, aphorism and meme are differentiated from each other, On the basis of a selection of gnosts, a method to generate  challenging networks is proposed of interconnected ideas, targets, approaches, proposals, solutions, for ameliorating the understanding, the work and impact in and on care, education and pedagogics.

SPE 55, 2 (2018)

ABSTRACTS

Transculturality and Preschool Education – earnings from a Preschool Project in Wrocław/Poland.

E. Chromiec

Absrtact:

The article focuses on the current debate in the European scientific community on the change of the paradigm: from multiculturalism/interculturality to transculturalism/transculturality. Concepts of the theoreticians such as W. Welsch, A. Dagnino, M. Epstein are gradually gaining popularity in the Polish scientific community too. The text is also a presentation of an educational project “Multicultural Wrocław?” implemented in an English-language kindergarten in Wroclaw, with detailed accent on its multi-, inter- and transcultural background.

Designing a Strategic Framework for European Computing Education and Training.

P. Kaczmarski, M. Porta, B. Çiço, N. Frasheri, V. Cantoni, L. Wang, F. Vandamme

Abstract:

In this paper we summarize our research concerning the design of a long-term, large-scale strategic framework for European computing education and training programmes. Our conceptualization of the strategic framework for European ICT education is based on business process management (BPM) perspective, which is the key for defining a generic strategic framework. With this starting point, we review in this paper the generic strategic framework structure and discuss the design of the identified components from the perspectives of the European ICT education and European ICT job markets. The presented design focuses, among others, on the strategic goals, the priority areas, on convergence monitoring etc. We also present a new addition to the envisioned framework concerning standard ICT

curricula adoption which enhances our original approach presented in (Porta, 2016a). It is important to note that, to date, there has been no attempt to provide a strategic framework for the area of computing education (the closest realisation has been the Strategic Framework for European Cooperation in Education and Training (EU-SF, 2009; EU-SF, 2012), which however covers different application areas and problem sets). Since the topic of designing and implementing a strategic framework for ICT is quite extensive, we focus in this paper on the preparation and design phases, and leave the implementation description to our future publication.

The Nominalistic, Gnostic, Taoist, roots of Pedagogy.

F. Vandamme

Abstract:

With this study it is investigated if and to what extent the nominalistic, Gnostic and Taoist traditions have influenced modern developments of Pedagogics in general and more particularly the pedagogical practice and research of Marc Spoelders.