SATISFYING THE ‘LEARNING IN DEPTH’ CRITERION
Kieran Egan
Faculty of Education, Simon Fraser University
It has long been argued that being educated entails satisfying two criteria: first, one must know many things about the world and, second, one must know something in significant depth. There have been a number of proposals for attaining the depth criterion, none either clear or very successful. A curriculum innovation from Canada called ‘Learning in Depth’ is a simple and practicable programme for ensuring depth learning for all students which merits experimental implementations elsewhere.
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ACHIEVEMENTS OF EARLY START PUPILS IN JUNIOR–INFANT CLASSES
Mary Lewis, Emily Shortt, and Peter Archer
Educational Research Centre, St Patrick’s College, Dublin
Teachers in junior-infant classes early in the school year rated pupils (N = 975) who had attended Early Start (a preschool programme in primary schools in disadvantaged areas) on a series of language and cognitive competencies (Time 1). A high level of competence was reported on many of the competencies, more so on the cognitive than on the language competencies. The mean ratings achieved by these pupils were higher than those achieved by pupils in the same classes who had not attended Early Start (N = 574). Later in the school year (Time 2), pupils were again rated. Early Start participants (N = 825) again achieved higher mean ratings than pupils who had not attended Early Start (N = 468). When Time 1 ratings were included in regression analyses to predict Time 2 ratings, attendance at Early Start did not make a significant contribution to prediction.
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LIVING IN AN ‘ELECTRONIC AGE’: CYBERBULLYING AMONG IRISH ADOLESCENTS
Pádraig Cotter and Sinéad McGilloway
Department of Psychology, National University of Ireland, Maynooth
The prevalence and nature of specific forms of cyberbullying (CB) in a sample of Irish post-primary school students, aged 12 to 18 years (n=122), are examined. Overall, CB was found to be less frequent than traditional bullying (TB). Although all forms of CB were largely short-term, CB was regarded by participants as worse than TB, with the notable exception of email. No significant relationships emerged between several background variables and CB. Overall rates of CB seem to be lower than in other countries, but further research would be required to determine its prevalence and nature.
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A MULTILEVEL MODEL OF SCIENCE ACHIEVEMENT OF IRISH STUDENTS PARTICIPATING IN PISA 2006
Judith Cosgrove and Rachel Cunningham
Educational Research Centre, St Patrick’s College, Dublin
A multilevel model of achievement in science using data from the OECD 2006 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is presented. School- and student-level variables are analysed as conceptually-related blocks. A combined model explains almost half of the total variance in achievement (42% within schools and 79% between schools). Over and above student-level variables, school-level variables explain just 1% of the variance. Of the total explained variance, about 5% is accounted for by students’ self-reported efficacy in science and enjoyment of science. The model confirms contributions of student and school socioeconomic status, home educational climate, take-up of science for the Junior Certificate, and general engagement in science. For students not taking science, boys have lower expected scores than girls.
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TRANSPARENCY AND DISCRIMINATORY POWER OF THE LEAVING CERTIFICATE EXAMINATION
Eoghan Mac Aogáin, David Millar, and Thomas Kellaghan
Educational Research Centre, St Patrick’s College, Dublin
Two major issues arise when the final marks for an examination are simply the aggregate of the marks awarded for individual subjects, which happens in the Leaving Certificate Examination (LCE). The first relates to transparency, that is, the assumption that all subjects contribute equally to the aggregate mark. The second relates to the discriminatory power of the examination, that is, its capacity to distinguish between different levels of achievement. Two sets of data were analysed to address these issues: the grades awarded to all candidates in the 2001 LCE in the examinations they took, and the frequency with which the different grades were awarded in LC examinations in the surrounding decade (1998 to 2007). Results indicate that (i) in the 2001 LCE, the weights achieved by subjects deviated considerably, and to different degrees, from expected weights and (ii) for the period 1998 to 2007, there were large and consistent differences between subjects in their discriminatory power, which declined over time. Of the two, the latter is more fundamental insofar as it concerns the validity of the examination, and the unfairness that arises when the same mark is awarded to candidates of different levels of achievement. Both problems stem almost entirely from differences between LCE subjects in the percentages of candidates who take the Higher level examination and in the average marks awarded candidates.
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