Written numeracy assessment in the early years: The challenges of pronouns and noun groups

We examine the challenges of pronouns and noun groups in the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority’s (ACARA) Year 3 National Assessment Program - Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) Numeracy Example Test (ACARA, 2015a). Framed by discourses of Literacy as a General Capability (ACARA, 2015b) in the Australian Curriculum: Mathematics (ACARA, 2015c), the pronouns and noun groups used in the Example Test are mapped onto the Australian Curriculum: English Content Descriptions (ACARA, 2015d). The findings are that some of the pronouns and noun groups used in the Example Test are more complex than what Year 3 children are expected to achieve in the Australian Curriculum: English. We thus stress the need for early years teachers of mathematics to account for the unique mathematical register of written mathematics problems so that young children are not only prepared for high-stakes written numeracy assessments, but are also enabled as a numerically literate citizen.

Knowing about the English language: “a wrinkle in time”

Beryl & Gael discuss the ‘new’ metalanguage for knowledge about language presented in the Australian Curriculum English (ACARA, 2010). Their discussion connects to practice by recounting how one teacher scaffolds her students through detailed understandings of noun and adjective groups in reading activities. The stimulus text is the novel ‘A wrinkle in time’ (L’Engle, 1962, reproduced 2007) and the purpose is to build students’ understandings so they can work towards ‘expressing and developing ideas’ in written text (ACARA, 2010).

Working in groups

This chapter is a condensation of a guide written by the chapter authors for both university teachers and students (Fowler et al., 2006). All page references given in this chapter are to this guide, unless otherwise stated. University students often work in groups. It may be a formal group (i.e. one that has been formed for a group presentation, writing a report, or completing a project) or an informal group (i.e. some students have decided to form a study group or undertake research together). Whether formal or informal, this chapter aims to make working in groups easier for you. Health care professionals also often work in groups. Yes, working in groups will extend well beyond your time at university. In fact, the skills and abilities to work effectively in groups are some of the most sought-after attributes in health care professionals. It seems obvious, then, that taking the opportunity to develop and enhance your skills and abilities for working in groups is a wise choice.

A comparison of the hazard perception ability of matched groups of healthy drivers aged 35 to 55, 65 to 74, and 75 to 84 years

We examined differences in response latencies obtained during a validated video-based hazard perception driving test between three healthy, community-dwelling groups: 22 mid-aged (35-55 years), 34 young-old (65-74 years), and 23 old-old (75-84 years) current drivers, matched for gender, education level, and vocabulary. We found no significant difference in performance between mid-aged and young-old groups, but the old-old group was significantly slower than the other two groups. The differences between the old-old group and the other groups combined were independently mediated by useful field of view (UFOV), contrast sensitivity, and simple reaction time measures. Given that hazard perception latency has been linked with increased crash risk, these results are consistent with the idea that increased crash risk in older adults could be a function of poorer hazard perception, though this decline does not appear to manifest until age 75+ in healthy drivers.

Demographic category membership and leadership in small groups : a social identity analysis

Developing the social identity theory of leadership (e.g., [Hogg, M. A. (2001). A social identity theory of leadership. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 5, 184–200]), an experiment (N=257) tested the hypothesis that as group members identify more strongly with their group (salience) their evaluations of leadership effectiveness become more strongly influenced by the extent to which their demographic stereotype-based impressions of their leader match the norm of the group (prototypicality). Participants, with more or less traditional gender attitudes (orientation), were members, under high or low group salience conditions (salience), of non-interactive laboratory groups that had “instrumental” or “expressive” group norms (norm), and a male or female leader (leader gender). As predicted, these four variables interacted significantly to affect perceptions of leadership effectiveness. Reconfiguration of the eight conditions formed by orientation, norm and leader gender produced a single prototypicality variable. Irrespective of participant gender, prototypical leaders were considered more effective in high then low salience groups, and in high salience groups prototypical leaders were more effective than less prototypical leaders. Alternative explanations based on status characteristics and role incongruity theory do not account well for the findings. Implications of these results for the glass ceiling effect and for a wider social identity analysis of the impact of demographic group membership on leadership in small groups are discussed.

Critique groups : a technique for the author’s toolbox?

With a lack of places to gain an education in the craft of romance writing, novelists have few places to turn to gain real feedback. This paper investigates an alternative to textbooks, conferences, and workshops through an examination of the role provided to the writer by critique groups. How these groups work, how they benefit an author, and the critique groups as a whole are discussed. This work studies the form of Peer Assessment and Learning (PAL) and compares the technique used by educational institutions all over the world with the practice of author groups critiquing their own work. The research shows how a critique group can assist a writer to learn, grow and develop, helping to enhance the writer’s skills through constructive feedback, which gives them confidence to sell their work.