"Repräsentationen" Afrikas in deutschen Schulbüchern am Beispiel des Schulfachs Geschichte (Sek I und II). Eine Stichprobenanalyse

Dieser Artikel befasst sich mit der Repräsentation Afrikas in schulischen Geschichtsbüchern. Am Beispiel von drei aktuellen Lehrwerken zeigen die Autorinnen sowohl negative Darstellungsweisen als auch positive Entwicklungen in Bezug auf den Umgang mit dem Kontinent, seiner Geschichte und Bevölkerung auf. In einem abschließenden Teil stellen sie einen Zusammenhang zwischen den Analyseergebnissen und dem Bewusstsein über bis in die heutige Zeit reproduzierte Diskurse und über Alltagsrassismen dar. (DIPF/Orig.)

Rückkehr in die Heimat. Zur schulischen und sozialpsychologischen Situation griechischer Schüler nach der Remigration

Dieser Aufsatz berichtet über die Ergebnisse einer umfassenden empirischen Untersuchung zur Schulsituation griechischer Kinder und Jugendlicher, die aus der BRD in ihre Heimat zurückgewandert sind. An Stichproben aus Grundschulen und Sekundarstufen wird überprüft, welche Probleme in den Schulleistungen und im psychosozialen Befinden bei Rückkehrern im Vergleich zu Einheimischen auftreten. Die Informationen über jeden Schüler enthalten mehrere Perspektiven: Lehrerurteil, Einschätzung durch die Mitschüler, Selbstkonzept sowie Schulleistungsindikatoren. Es zeigt sich, daß die Rückkehrerkinder schulisch im Rückstand liegen sowie eine Reihe psychosozialer Belastungen aufweisen, die je nach Remigrationszeitpunkt, Geschlecht etc, unterschiedlich ausgeprägt sind. Unproblematisch verläuft die Rückkehr in die Heimat und die schulische Integration nur, wenn sie vor dem 8. Lebensjahr erfolgt. (DIPF/Orig.)

Wie denken Lehrer*innen über (das Unterrichten von) Musiktheorie?

Teaching music theory is an essential, yet a barely researched part of music education in secondary schools. This paper examines the expert knowledge of Bavarian teachers regarding this subject After discussing the background and the methodology of this study the differences among the music teachers' understanding of "music theory" are illustrated with three examples: While all three interviewees agree that music theory is a set of specific knowledge, they differ by a) locating it in the non-practical, b) connecting it with practical applications or c) isolating it as knowledge, that, at first, has to be learned in isolation. These conceptions of music theory can be understood as intrinsically connected with didactic assumptions and are founded in the teachers' biographies. (DIPF/Orig.)

Governing the transition to higher levels of education and differences between achievement and school grades by gender

The author will explore the performance of boys and girls in external examinations in Slovenia at the beginning of upper secondary and tertiary education. These are critical points in students’ educational career at which he/she has to choose a school/university. Since both transitions are managed centrally by appropriate authorities, this is also a question of Educational Governance. Transitions between levels of education should, above all, assure fairness in selection procedures. At the point of transition to upper secondary schools we will explore differences between students’ achievements in various school subjects tested at the national assessment of knowledge (NA), and their school grades by gender. Since only school grades are used as admission criteria to upper secondary schools, this comparison of school grades with external and more objective measure of students’ achievement will show possible bias. In Slovenia admission to tertiary education usually consists of (externally assessed) Matura results and school grades in the last two years of upper secondary school. The author will compare the effects of both most commonly used measures of academic achievement on admission in view of gender differences. Study courses where selection procedure was actually applied will be of specific interest since they can show signs of (un)fairness. Results show signs of bias and build case for better Educational Governance. (DIPF/Orig.)

The problem posed by exam choice on the comparability of results in the Finnish matriculation examination

The article focuses on the upper secondary matriculation examination in Finland as a school leaving and university entrance examination. The presented research addresses the question of whether increased choice of the subject-specific examinations has the potential to undermine the comparability of examination results and to direct students’ choices not only in the examination but already beforehand at school. The authors refer to Finland’s tradition of more than 160 years of a national examination connecting the academic track of upper secondary schools with universities. The authors explain the Finnish system by describing the adoption of a course-based (vs. class- or year-based) curriculum for the three-year upper secondary education and the subsequent reforms in the matriculation examination. This increases students’ choices considerably with regard to the subject-specific exams included in the examination (a minimum of four). As a result, high-achieving students compete against each other in the more demanding subjects while the less able share the same normal distribution of grades in the less demanding subjects. As a consequence, students tend to strategic exam-planning, which in turn affects their study choices at school, often to the detriment of the more demanding subjects and, subsequently, of students’ career opportunities, endangering the traditional national objective of an all-round pre-academic upper secondary education. This contribution provides an overview of Finnish upper secondary education and of the matriculation examination (cf. Klein, 2013) while studying three separate but related issues by using data from several years of Finnish matriculation results: the relation of the matriculation examination and the curriculum; the problems of comparability vis-à-vis university entry due to the increased choice within the examination; the relations between students’ examination choices and their course selection and achievement during upper secondary school. (DIPF/Orig.)

Perceived learning environments and metacognitive strategy knowledge at the upper secondary school level

There is evidence that students benefit from teachers’ explicit fostering of metacognitive strategy knowledge (MSK). However, there is insufficient understanding about the effect of implicit promotion of MSK in regular school instruction. This study investigates the relationship between perceived characteristics of learning environments (social climate, support, autonomy, self-reflection) and students’ MSK. A representative cohort of students (Nt1 = 1,272/Nt2 = 1,126) in Grades 10 and 11 at schools at the upper secondary education level (ISCED Level 3A) in Switzerland participated in this two-wave longitudinal study. Multilevel analysis showed effects on both the individual and the class level. Students who experienced higher social integration showed a higher extent of MSK at the beginning of the school year than students who experienced less social integration. Perceived autonomy was also positively related to students’ MSK on the individual level. In contrast, the results showed a negative relationship between perceived self-reflection and students’ MSK. On the class level, there was a negative relationship between self-reflection and students’ MSK. Teachers’ support did not correlate with students’ MSK on either the individual or the class level. Implications of these results for education and further studies are discussed. (DIPF/Orig.)