The role of political factors, specifically of public opinion, in the relatively low penetration of charter schools into rural America remains unclear. We use 8 years of national survey data to demonstrate that rural residents express less support for charter schools than residents of other locales do. We attribute this gap to differences in…

The central purpose of this paper is to examine validity problems arising from the multiple-choice items and technical passages in the Test of English as a Foreign Language Internet-based Test (TOEFL iBT) reading section, primarily concentrating on construct-irrelevant variance (Messick, 1989). My personal TOEFL iBT experience, along with my…

To benefit teaching-learning processes, Individuals needing special education must be placed in suitable education environments after educational identification and evaluation processes. The least restrictive environment approach was employed considering peer interaction and academic skills. Inclusive education is one of the most chosen least…

This article focuses on the regulation of student writing by exploring a specific form of such writing, "the maturity test." In Finnish universities, the maturity test is a compulsory part of a bachelor's degree in which students demonstrate their familiarity with the topic of their bachelor's thesis, as well as their mother tongue…

In this article we present a reflection about the meaning attribution to the mathematical object "exponential function" that emerges from two mathematical modeling activities. The theoretical framework of the text contemplates considerations on Mathematical Modeling and elements of semiotics as theorized by Charles Sanders Peirce. The…

This study in Zambia examined 66 junior high school pre-service science teachers' familiarity with, conceptual understanding of and levels of interest in learning more about electrochemistry concepts. Data were collected using the Familiarity with Electrochemistry Questionnaire, the Conceptual Understanding of Electrochemistry Test and the…

A large-scale cross-sectional study (N = 4002) was set up to determine Flemish secondary school students' willingness to eat genetically modified food (WTE) and to link students' WTE to previously identified key variables from research on the acceptance of genetic modification (GM). These variables include subjective and objective knowledge about…

There is an established association between children's oral vocabulary and their word reading but its basis is not well understood. Here, we present evidence from eye movements for a novel mechanism underlying this association. Two groups of 18 Grade 4 children received oral vocabulary training on one set of 16 novel words (e.g., 'nesh', 'coib'),…

Effective communication requires knowing the "right" amount of information to provide; what is necessary for a naïve learner to arrive at a target hypothesis may be superfluous and inefficient for a knowledgeable learner. The current study examines 4- to 7-year-olds' developing sensitivity to overinformative communication and their…

Describing unfamiliar faces during or immediately after their presentation in a study phase can produce better recognition memory performance compared with a view-only control condition. We treated descriptions as elaborative information that is part of the study context and investigated how context retrieval influences recognition memory.…

Recent research on the overdistribution principle implies that episodic memory is infected by conjunction illusions. These are instances in which an item that was presented in a single context (e.g., List 1) is falsely remembered as having been presented in multiple contexts (e.g., List 1 and List 2). Robust conjunction illusions were detected in…

In recognition memory, "recollection" is defined as retrieval of the context associated with an event, whereas "familiarity" is defined as retrieval based on item strength alone. Recent studies have shown that conventional recollection-based tasks, in which context details are manipulated for source memory assessment at test,…

Background: In spite of the profound cognitive and physical problems, people with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities (PIMD) are able to develop joint attention behaviours (JAB) and benefit from positive interactions. Aims: To investigate which context factors influence the JAB of people with PIMD. Method: Based on video recordings of…

Research shows that the attitudes of children and adolescents towards bullying are influenced by the school environment and their peer groups. Given the increased vulnerability to bullying for autistic children, this study explored whether neurotypical children's attitudes towards bullying and autism varied according to school exposure and…

Many language teachers use Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in their classrooms to create tasks, quizzes, or polls with general online learning platforms. Few teachers have experience, however, of incorporating online corpus tools in their teaching or assessment practices. This paper will explore how autonomous learning can be…