Excursions to museums and science centres generally are great fun for students and teachers. The potential educational benefits beyond enjoyment, however, are rarely realised or analysed for their efficacy. The purpose of this paper is to describe four educational enrichment programs delivered at the Gravity Discovery Centre (GDC), near Gingin,…

This paper was born of the authors' discussions about the imbalance between critique and constructive thinking within the sociology of education, and work on education policy. They were concerned that their research--and the body of work to which their research contributes--is becoming increasingly irrelevant to policy and practice. For British…

Academic self-concept has received a great deal of attention in recent educational research because it mediates many other educational outcomes. Therefore, it is important to find out how students' academic self-concept develops. We examined the big-fish-little-pond effect (BFLPE) dynamically by investigating the effect of track changes in high…

International internships can assist pre-service teachers in beginning to build a repository of successful strategies for learning and becoming members of the global educational community. These include school settings and scheduling; use of curriculum and resources; instructional skills and strategies, including lesson planning; and classroom…

The authors propose the use of performance control charts as a useful tool for tracking student assessments that rely upon faculty administered exams and projects as well as assessing teacher performance. This quantitative, formative evaluation process can be integrated into the classroom during an actual semester and utilized as a means to…

Presented at AERA 2010 as the Social Justice Award Lecture, this article calls attention to the purposes of education in the 21st century and the need for a robust, social justice vision of education. Here, it is argued that education is about the cultivation of a flourishing life and not only the narrow preparation for employment. To realize…

Being involved in bullying places a child at risk of poor psychosocial and educational outcomes. This study aimed to examine the profile of behavioural, emotional and social functioning for two subtypes of bullying: direct and indirect (relational). Pupils aged between 7 and 11 years completed sociometric measures of social inclusion and bullying…

As out-of-school programs--and the expectations for them--grow, the field is struggling to identify the kind of training staff members need to meet those expectations. A variety of efforts have sprung up across the country to define and improve the quality of after-school staff, some of which bear resemblance to the quest to improve the…

In the context of encouraging the use of natural settings for educational experiences with young children, an exploratory study using survey research and photographs of outdoor settings was conducted to understand how preservice early childhood educators perceive these settings and what educational opportunities, motivations, and barriers they…

The significance of effective leadership and management for successful school and student outcomes is increasingly being recognised. This has led to consideration of the nature of preparation and development required to promote good leadership. There is now widespread acknowledgement of the need for specialised training for school principals. This…

Researchers, parents, counselors, and teachers share a common desire to ensure personal growth and academic development for children. At a very foundational level, they desire health and happiness for all children, as well as an education with quality schools and good teachers. They want all children to be in programs that appropriately address…

As institutions of higher education adopt more global learning initiatives to improve global competencies and increase global citizenship among their students, the creative implementation of intercultural exchanges is critical. This article is a reflection on the experiences of implementing a virtual classroom linking students at Kennesaw State…

The US is suffering from a school syndrome, which arises from Americans' insistence on having things both ways through the magical medium of education. Society wants schools to express the highest ideals as a society and the greatest aspirations as individuals, but only as long as they remain ineffective in actually realizing them, since one does…

The field of industrial arts education endured with little change for over half a decade. It was during this time that a group of like-minded individuals attended a meeting in Cleveland, Ohio and decided to form an association with the common purpose of promoting the profession and field of industrial arts education: the American Industrial Arts…

In this article, "Training" editors recognize innovative and successful learning and development programs and practices submitted in the 2012 Training Top 125 application. Best practices: (1) Edward Jones: Practice Makes Perfect (sales training); (2) Grant Thornton LLP: Senior Manager Development Program (SMDP); (3) MetLife, Inc.: Top Advisor…