Surface approaches to learning materials and tasks are a commonplace challenge to teachers, and they prove difficult to shift, even among students who are otherwise talented or motivated to learn. The present study investigates a theory that surface approaches are triggered by a suboptimal, aversive response to learning stimuli, which overrides…

Two approaches to the process of guided discovery learning are compared for their impacts on concept understanding. One, referred to as design, emphasizes invention and draws on the simulation literature. The other, referred to as case analysis, focuses on discovery and draws on the case-based reasoning literature. Following a lecture on four…

This paper presents evidence from a nationally representative sample of early career teachers about those likely to miss out on formal support, and the employment conditions associated with this absence of support. It uses survey data from the Staff in Australia's Schools Survey. Consistent with existing research, our results suggest a…

Online relationship formation through social networking sites helps to meet the developmental need for intimacy in emerging adults. Through the use of the "rich get richer" and the "social compensation" hypotheses, it is evident that personality characteristics such as extraversion and introversion impact online relationship…

A common complaint from business and industry is that employees entering the workforce are not "job ready." They often lack the practical skills, maturity, and workplace experience to perform well in their roles, leaving employers to fill the gap by providing training either at their own expense or with public funding. In contrast, a new…

The purpose of this study was to inform the deliberations of a policymakers' working group by investigating what key actors in the materials' marketplace are doing to align digital and print-based materials with the Australian Curriculum and what steps need to be taken to deliver aligned materials to schools. Content analysis method was used to…

This paper outlines a novel approach to engineering education research that provides three dimensions of learning through an experiential class activity. A simulated decision activity brought current research into the classroom, explored the effect of experiential activity on learning outcomes and contributed to the research on innovation decision…

This article reports on the results of a paper-pen questionnaire study involving certain key aspects of the nature of science. The questionnaire covers, among other things, aspects such as uniqueness of the scientific method, objectivity of scientific data, and immutability of scientific laws. The survey was given out to eighty trainee teachers…

TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study) is an international assessment of mathematics and science at the fourth and eighth grades that has been conducted every four years since 1995, with the most recent assessment in 2011. PIRLS (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study) is an international assessment of reading…