Fostering radical conceptual change through dual‐situated learning model

This article examines how the Dual‐Situated Learning Model (DSLM) facilitates a radical change of concepts that involve the understanding of matter, process, and hierarchical attributes. The DSLM requires knowledge of students' prior beliefs of science concepts and the nature of these concepts. In addition, DSLM also serves two functions: it creates dissonance with students' prior knowledge by challenging their epistemological and ontological beliefs about science concepts, and it provides essential mental sets for students to reconstruct a more scientific view of the concepts. In this study, the concept “heat transfer: heat conduction and convection,” which requires an understanding of matter, process, and hierarchical attributes, was chosen to examine how DSLM can facilitate radical conceptual change among students. Results show that DSLM has great potential to foster a radical conceptual change process in learning heat transfer. Radical conceptual change can definitely be achieved and does not necessarily involve a slow or gradual process. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 41: 142–164, 2004     

Conceptual change through vicarious learning in an authentic physics setting

Recent research on principles of best practice for designing effective multimedia instruction has rarely taken into account students’ alternative conceptions, which are known to strongly influence learning. The goal of this study was to determine how well students of quantum mechanics could learn ‘vicariously’ by watching a student-tutor dialogue based on alternative conceptions. Two video treatments were created to summarize key aspects of quantum tunneling, a fundamental quantum mechanical phenomenon. One video depicted a student-tutor dialogue, incorporating many of the common alternative conceptions on the topic, and resolving inconsistencies in reasoning through discussion. The other presented the same correct physics material in an expository style without alternative conceptions. Second year physics students were randomly assigned to one of the two treatments and were tested before and after watching the video during a lecture. Results show a statistically significant (p < .01) advantage for the learners in the dialogue treatment (d = 0.71). Follow-up interviews of students yielded insight into the affective and cognitive benefits of the dialogue video.     

Teacher,team, and school change through reciprocal learning

This paper documents the first year of a qualitative case study investigating the experiences of reciprocal learning teams of teachers within a small, rural secondary school. The purpose of this study was to examine how teachers experienced collaborative professional development (PD) and how their experiences contributed to developing the culture and structure of their school. Collected data were analyzed using an iterative process of coding, categorizing, and abstracting data. Three themes emerged: (a) self- and co-regulated learning in teams invigorated collegial relationships and contributed to a sense of agency toward change at the school level; (b) differentiating support for collaborative inquiry among teachers and within teams is critical; and (c) creating structures to support collaborative inquiry among teachers engages teachers in their ongoing professional learning. This case study of a rural secondary school demonstrates how deep and substantial school change can happen when teachers co-construct and co-regulate their PD.     

Exploring global citizenship learning and ecological Behaviour change through extracurricular activities

ABSTRACT

This research paper aims to examine the effects of extracurricular activities in building knowledge, skills and attitudes that attempt to develop ecological citizenship as a subset of global citizenship among middle school students. I focus on one extracurricular programme entitled ‘The Friends of Nature’ that was provided in a Moroccan private middle school. Adopting a qualitative research method approach, data consisted of interviews with thirty students from 7th, 8th and 9th grades and two teachers (social studies and life and earth science teacher), and were collected over the course of three months through multiple data collection tools, namely observation, student focus group discussions and teacher interviews. A series of environmental activities offered students opportunities to: identify environmental problems, promote education for sustainable development and improve their environmentally conscious behaviour, develop creative solutions, and take actions for preserving nature in their community. The data were analysed using a content analysis method. The results reveal that students demonstrated cognitive development in terms of human rights, citizenship rights and responsibilities, environmental sustainability. While the program developed attitudes of empathy, respect, solidarity, it failed to instil a sense of responsibility to act for the betterment of the world, thus being a global citizen.     

Radical adult education and learning

How can we speak about radical education in these seemingly unpropitious times? I explore this question first by examining aspects of our radical heritage (self-directed learning, facilitation, democratic pedagogy, learning in hegemonic struggle, learning in social action, critical pedagogy) and then by discussing what radical learning and education mean now, in an era of capitalist triumphalism. I outline a method which helps practitioners to investigae and act on what people are actuallly learning and teaching each other in different sites—educational instititions, workplace families, communities, the mass media and social movements. Culture is ordinary: that is where we must start. (Williams, 1958a)     

New higher education president integration: change and resistance viewed through social power bases and a change model lens

This study investigates how new presidents of higher education institutions struggle to understand their organisations, paying special attention to campus resistance, and how new presidents manage institutional dynamics and expectations. A qualitative study using a phenomenological approach is conducted with 11 single-campus presidents of four-year institutions, all of whom had been in post for less than four years. Lewin’s change model, along with French and Raven’s bases of power model, provides the conceptual framework for the study. Participant responses are categorised into four themes: disequilibrium, change/transition, resistance and change readiness. The results show that institutional discord was common and all presidents struggled to navigate the change process. All presidents found their position to be more challenging than expected. Presidents who utilised good data presentation and communication alongside transparent leadership often earned referential or expert power; these presidents were better prepared to influence change efforts and reduce resistance to change initiatives.     

Transforming an education system through professional learning: developing educational change at scale in Ontario

There has been increased attention to the importance of teachers and teacher quality in developing and sustaining successful education systems for some time now (Barber and Mourshed in How the world’s best performing school systems come out on top, McKinsey & Company, New York, 2007; Darling-Hammond et al. in Empowered educators: how high-performing systems shape teaching quality around the world, Jossey Bass, San Francisco, 2017). Germaine to the issue of teacher quality, however, is an acknowledgement of the value of supporting educator’s ongoing professional learning (PL). Drawing on findings from a large-scale case study of Ontario, Canada, this paper attempts to shed light on the question of how systems of PL can be developed and scaled? The research was conducted in several phases, including an extensive document analysis, followed by interviews with key respondents across the sector. The paper is framed within the notion of large-scale system change, with a focus on the importance of inter-professional relationships and joint work in establishing shared goals for educational improvement. As we noted in the larger study, a theory of action linked to knowledge of educational change and professional capacity building has informed the mindset, values, and strategies developed and implemented. This paper specifically illustrates Ontario’s whole-system’s focus on professional learning as part of this wider theory of action.     

Developmental action learning: Toward collaborative change

In this account of practice, the authors introduce a variant of classic action learning, called developmental action learning (DAL). The DAL model, derived from cognitive development theory, introduces conventional learning modules prior to the more intensive set experience. It also calls for facilitation designed to help participants, selected for their readiness to change, make the leap to deeper levels of personal and organizational development. The DAL approach is applied to a leadership development series among a group of high-level administrators within a university consortium. The case study gives promise to the use of developmental action learning to enhance collaborative leadership processes.     

Bridging scientific reasoning and conceptual change through adaptive web‐based learning

This study reports an adaptive digital learning project, Scientific Concept Construction and Reconstruction (SCCR), and examines its effects on 108 8th grade students' scientific reasoning and conceptual change through mixed methods. A one‐group pre‐, post‐, and retention quasi‐experimental design was used in the study. All students received tests for Atomic Achievement, Scientific Reasoning, and Atomic Dependent Reasoning before, 1 week after, and 8 weeks after learning. A total of 18 students, six from each class, were each interviewed for 1 hour before, immediately after, and 2 months after learning. A flow map was used to provide a sequential representation of the flow of students' scientific narrative elicited from the interviews, and to further analyze the level of scientific reasoning and conceptual change. Results show students' concepts of atoms, scientific reasoning, and conceptual change made progress, which is consistent with the interviewing results regarding the level of scientific reasoning and quantity of conceptual change. This study demonstrated that students' conceptual change and scientific reasoning could be improved through the SCCR learning project. Moreover, regression results indicated students' scientific reasoning contributed more to their conceptual change than to the concepts students held immediately after learning. It implies that scientific reasoning was pivotal for conceptual change and prompted students to make associations among new mental sets and existing hierarchical structure‐based memory. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 47: 91–119, 2010     

Managing change in English language teaching through a journey of learning: a case study from China

In the last two years, English language teaching at the level of basic education in China has been changing very fast due to the new Standard Curriculum. The paper takes a school in the northwest of China as an example, illustrating the process of implementing the Curriculum, summarizing the work the school has done, the problems encountered and arguing for the need to manage the change. The paper also gives some suggestions in conclusion.     

Schools as learning communities: Building capacity through network learning

This article reports on the results from a study which investigated the impact of guidance given in writing tasks on children's writing performance. Six hundred eleven year olds completed writing tasks with varying content and structural support and their writing was analysed for purpose and organisation, style, spelling, clause structure, word class, paragraphing and punctuation. The aim was to find out if support facilitated better writing and if the type of support had differing effects. The findings suggested that the support did not significantly affect performance in narrative and persuasive writing. Possible implications and initial indications from a follow-up qualitative study of children's thinking are discussed.     

Bearing worlds: learning to live-with climate change

Abstract

This paper explores the emotional experiences of some undergraduate sustainability students in a semester long course on climate change. Specifically, it attends to experiences of anxiety, frustration, overwhelm, guilt, grief and hope. I suggest these experiences are characteristic of a process I term learning to live-with climate change. Learning to live-with climate change involves attuning to the relational composition of the world and thus the self; mourning desirable relationships that are lost as the planet warms; and responding to these conditions in ways that may foster more liveable worlds. Collectively, these processes enrol people in practices of bearing worlds: enduring the pain of the end of the world they have known, and labouring to generate promising alternatives. As such, these processes reconfigure the self and its relations, and attunement to how climate change composes, recomposes and decomposes particular subjectivities is important. The paper argues that affective adaptation is therefore a crucial element of climate change education.