Volume 2 Number 4
Published: 31 December 2009
Responsible Editor: Iuliana Marchis
1.Text comprehension – learning styles – school performance
Krisztina
Bartha, Rita Fóris-Ferenczi (Romania)
Abstract:
The following study interprets
the results of a research carried out in 2008 in Romania, on a smaller sample.
The aim of the study is the analysis of the text comprehension skills of 14
year old pupils, and the presentation of the connections with the social
background, learning styles and school performance. The gathering of the data
was completed during the survey with the analysis of the native language
curricula and textbooks, class monitoring, as well as with a questionnaire
addressed to teachers. The present paper presents the data on text
comprehension, as well as the correlations with social background and learning.
It summes up the result of the class monitoring, as well as those of the
teacher interviews, emphasizing the aspects which are relevant from the point
of view of text comprehension developing.
Key-words: text
comprehension, social background, learning styles, school performance,
developing text comprehension
Received 2 November 2009, accepted 17 December
2009
Pages 1-16.
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2. Adaptive teaching via e-learning form
Kateřina Kostolányová (Czech Republic)
Abstract: The proposal of the adaptive form of teaching stems from the analysis of
tested student characteristics. The testing involved modified questionnaires
localized to Czech conditions of teaching (LSI, ISL, …) in context with
e-learning teaching. Based on tipped, most frequently occurred groups of
student characteristics, the optimum procedures for presentation of the content
of study according to learning styles of individual students are proposed.
Students will be recommended the optimum method of the passage through the
course, but at the same time, they will be offered other forms and methods of
presentation of a particular topic of study. The contribution deals with the
proposal of teaching tools according to most frequently occurring clusters of
student characteristics.
Key-words: Adaptive teaching, eLearning
Received 22 November 2009, accepted 19 December 2009
Pages 17-20.
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3. Ways
to use ICT in schools to optimize the impact on teaching and learning
Ulf Fredriksson,
Elzbieta Gajek, Gunilla Jedeskog (Sweeden, Poland, Sweeden)
Abstract: The European eLearning Forum for Education 2 (ELFE2) is a project
initiated by the ETUCE (European Trade Union Committee on Education) and builds
on the conclusion of its predecessor ELFE1. ELFE2 aims, as ELFE1, to contribute
to a better
understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of using ICT in education. It identifies ways used to optimize the benefits of ICT in education. To
explore how ICT can be used to support teaching and learning two schools each
in Denmark, England, Latvia, Poland, and Slovenia were selected based on
information that indicated that they were regarded nationally as schools with
an advanced ICT practice. The idea behind this selection is that by studying
schools with what is experienced as an advance practice it will be possible to
get some hints about problems and challenges other schools will be faced with.
ELFE2 indicates that a number of ways are used in the schools to optimize the
positive impact of ICT. Most of these ways are perceived by teachers and
students as positive, but there are also factors that make the picture more
complex. Some factors seem to be an obstacle for the introduction of ICT in the
schools.
Key-words: e-learning, ICT, teaching, learning
Received 30 October 2009, accepted 28 November 2009
Pages 21-32.
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4. Risks associated with the use of the Internet and its
Impact upon students' awareness of perverse issues: literature review
Abstract. There are a lot of studies that have dealt
with the different facets of the use of the internet. Most studies have
identified entertainment and amusement as the major motivation for internet use
with seeking knowledge and making social relationships coming as distant second
and third respectively . Varying lines of investigation have been taken in this
regard by different researchers notable among which are the impact of internet
use on cultural and religious values, national language, loyalty to the home
country, family ties and relationships, psychological stability and well-being,
attitudes towards learning, educational usages…etc. While few question the
learning and educational benefits of internet use, many authors have voiced
their concerns over the adverse effects on religion and the national culture.
Fears have also been expressed of internet addiction and related problems which
may negatively affect the social behavior of youthful people. However, the
evidence on the impact of internet use remains somewhat mixed and more research
–work is needed.
Key-words: Internet
use, motivation, impact, learning benefits
Received 29 October 2009, accepted 3 December 2009
Pages 33-38.
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5. Experiences of meaning and the
multilingual existence
Abstract.
The aim of the article is to analyse the
qualitative and quantitative aspects of the skills of reading and
text-understanding, focusing on the comparative analysis of experiences of
meaning in native language, Romanian and English in the case of Hungarian
pupils. We attempted to present the qualitative indexes and factors of the
process of reading texts written in native, secondary and foreign language with
the help of questionnaires, the students’ data and tests measuring the
performances of reading. The collection of data was realized in the spring of
2009. Through the collected data we attempted to answer the following
questions: What kind of skills of
understanding text do the pupils in the last year of primary school (i.e. 8th
grade) possess? Which are the determining socio-cultural background factors?
Can we differentiate between the common and specific features of reading and
meaning-construction done in different languages? Can we speak about similar
difficulties of reading and about the phenomenon of transfer in the case of meaning-discovery
in different languages? The present study offers the possibility of creating
training programs and teaching strategies based on local specificities, as well
as of drafting curricula based on the pupils’ knowledge of language, desires and
interests.
Key words: bi- and multilingual existence, reading,
text-understanding
Pages 39-50.
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Alexander Fedorov (Russia)
Abstract. The author of this article thinks, that the
basic difficulties of wider introduction of media education in the Russian and
French universities & schools first of all are connected with patent defect
purposefully prepared of media educators; with the certain inertness of many
educational establishments; with traditional approaches of the education
ministry structures concentrating the attention on support of training
computers’ courses and information technologies and much smaller attention to
actual media education problems. The target to give media education movement a
new pulse is connects with the consolidation of all educational and media
educational organizations and media communities. As a whole the comparative
analysis modern media education in France and Russia in XXI centuries has shown that, despite of the certain distinctions, it
has common extremely actual in epoch refined media manipulations vector -
aspiration to development of critical and democratic thinking, creative
abilities on media material - at all levels of training.
Keywords: Media education, media
literacy, media competence, comparative analysis.
Received 29 August 2009, accepted 13 October 2009
Pages 51-64.
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7. Children
between sustainable development and commercials
Lilla Péter,
Szilvia Balázs (Romania)
Abstract: Our paper deals with the relationship between sustainability, media
advertisements and their effect on children. This topic is highly actual today,
as the children of today, who grow up in front of the TV will be the consumers
of tomorrow. The perpetual growth of consuming and sgathering material goods is
not serving the sustainable development.
However advertisements keep on telling us that we should purchase, buy,
have things, as we all are what we can buy. On can buy happiness or become like
protagonists featuring in the advertisements. Regardless of the actual
programme, this is the overall message of the advertisements. Adults may be
able to look at these ads from a critical point of view, but children, who are
much more vulnerable in front of the effects of television, tend to take a
dreamworld for reality. The aim of the paper is an empirical research on 7-9
years children. The primordial question of our research is the way how the
commercials had effect on the children’s view on the world, view on themselves,
their own and their family’s present and future consuming habits.
Key-words: children, sustainable development, commercials
Pages 65-74.
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Maria Eliza Dulamă, Oana-Ramona
Ilovan, Cornelia Vanea (Romania)
Abstract: The
purpose of our research was to test the following hypothesis: 6 and 7 years old
children’s representations were strongly influenced by the environment they
lived in. Representations are interiorised models of objects, phenomena and
events, independent of present use of our senses and of the presence or absence
of objects. We realised our research in Grădiniţa cu Program Normal Floreşti/Floreşti
Kindergarten, Cluj county, during the 2008-2009 school year. The sample was
represented by twelve children in their last year of kindergarten, preparing
for school. We analysed nine of those children’s drawings. We identified the
representations that appeared in several of children’s drawings and in the same
child’s drawings for several times, then we identified for each child her or
his singular representations and compositions as a reflection of the world they
were living in or of an imaginary world. After analysing children’s drawings we
realised that it confirmed the hypothesis that 6 and 7 years old children’s
drawings were influenced strongly by their environment. We noticed the
following: kindergarten children’s representations were very diverse, but they
were characterised by a certain peculiarity of the place they inhabited; some
objects appeared more often than others, and that meant that kindergarten
children knew them better and could represent them graphically more easily;
kindergarten children preferred drawing familiar objects that they had drawn
before; some drawings included the essential features of the represented
objects and that proved that kindergarten children had the respective concept
and could represent it in drawings, while one could not identify other objects
without writing down what the child said he or she meant.
Key-words: drawing,
perception, environment, concept, process, mental image
Pages 75-90.
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9. The units
tell you what to do
Simon
Brown (Australia)
Abstract: Many students have some
difficulty with calculations. Simple
dimensional analysis provides a systematic means of checking for errors and
inconsistencies and for developing both new insight and new relationships
between variables. Teaching dimensional
analysis at even the most basic level strengthens the insight and confidence of
students, and provides them with a tool that can be applied in almost any
context.
Key-words:
activity coefficient;
dimensional analysis; equilibrium coefficient; pH
Pages 91-100.
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10. Is algebra really
difficult for all students?
Gunawardena Egodawatte (Canada)
Abstract. Research studies have
shown that students encounter difficulties in transitioning from arithmetic to algebra.
Errors made by high school students were analyzed for patterns and their
causes. The origins of errors were: intuitive assumptions, failure to
understand the syntax of algebra, analogies with other familiar symbol systems
such as the English alphabet and interference from arithmetic. There were other
psychological factors such as carelessness, anxiety, overconfidence, and lack
of motivation. Three major error types are discussed with their causes using a
cognitive psychological approach. Solution methods of another group of students
show that they were eager to use algebraic methods over arithmetic procedures
even though arithmetic procedures are more straightforward. The paper argues
that creative methods used by some students should be used to reinforce the
learning of other students.
Key-words: Algebra,
error analysis, misconceptions in algebra
Pages 101-106.
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11. Chemistry
inreach: university employees’ children experiencing university chemistry
Amanda J. Shaw, Timothy G.
Harrison, Dudley E. Shallcross, Marcus I. Medley (United
Kingdom)
Abstract: Many university
departments provide public engagement activities, often referred to as
‘outreach’ to school students, their teachers and other members of the public.
It is less common for University Departments to run activities for their
employees let alone the children of these employees. This paper looks at the
value put on an engagement activity both by participating students and their
parents who are employees of the host university. Analysis shows that the
students welcome the opportunity to experience aspects of their parents’
workplace and those parents are extremely supportive of such initiatives.
Key-words: public engagement, inreach, chemistry,
aspiration raising.
Pages 107-112.
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