Taiwanese Learners’ Motivation and Attitude Towards Completing an Online Distance Education Course During a One Year Industrial Placement

This mixed methods study investigated language learning motivation in an one-year e-learning course for technological university students to bridge the geographical divide between students on industrial placements when studying graded readers using an e-learning course to improve their English competence and to pass the General English Proficiency Test. Data was collected through questionnaires and course feedback. The results of this study extend Gardner’s socio-educational model in an e-learning environment by adding the new category, Computer Attitudes, which was proven to be highly correlated with Motivation. Although the low proficiency English students had good computer skills, their habits of using the computer for entertainment and their lack of the skill of “technological communication efficacy” caused increased anxiety when using computers and thus provided them with a lower computer confidence over time. Consequently, it is recommended that sound e-learning training should be provided to all of the students prior to embarking on an e-leaning course so that these learners can benefit from online language learning in the future.

Analysis of pharmacists attitudes toward a distance learning initiative on health screening

A questionnaire was developed to investigate pharmacists' attitudes to distance learning (DL) as a vehicle for continuing education (CE). It was included in each of a two part DL course on Health Screening. Part One was mailed to all community pharmacists in England (16,400) and returns were received from 1487. The questionnaire in Part Two was returned by 436 pharmacists. Attitude statements were scored using a five-point Likert scale. The mean response to all attitude statements was positive. Participants were significantly more satisfied than non-participants with DL in general and the DL course studied (P less than or equal to 0.05). Over 80 percent of respondents completing the course found DL to be enjoyable and more suitable than other CE methods. More females and less males than expected (based on registration statistics) requested (P less than or equal to 0.001) and completed the course (P less than or equal to 0.001). Pharmacists of all ages participated, although those recently qualified showed greater interest.

Telephone survey evaluation of the educational impact of a distance learning course

The educational impact of a distance learning (DL) course entitled ''Health Screening for Health Promotion, was investigated using a telephone questionnaire survey. An introduction to the DL course was distributed to all community pharmacists in England (16,400); the main body of the course, on which pharmacists were examined, was distributed free of charge to all pharmacists who requested it (1,485). Pharmacists participating in the survey (868) were organized by random selection into groups and stratified according to age, sex and postcode. A matched control group was randomly drawn from those pharmacists who had not participated in the course. The DL course improved pharmacists' knowledge about health screening/health promotion issues (e.g., mean score of 66 percent achieved by a group who had completed the course; 51 percent achieved by the control group; P<0.001). Factors influencing score achieved included sex and year of registration. Males performed better than females (P<0.008) while performance decreased with number of years on the register (P<0.001).

Evidence from a Baseline Study of Teachers and Young People in Northern Ireland: Implications for Peace Education.

Peace education initiatives in schools are often based on social psychological theories assuming that social identity affects ingroup and outgroup attitudes and, in turn, behaviors relating to relevant outgroups. However, research evidence on the role of young people’s social identity has often failed to take account of different social identity dimensions or to conceptualise outgroup behavior in the context of young people’s understandings of the social world. While recent research relating to bullying and bystander behavior amongst young people has addressed the latter point, this has rarely been considered in conjunction with a differentiated view of social identity. This paper is therefore distinctive as it will address the role of social identity dimensions with regards to behavior as captured in bystander scenarios relating to intergroup discrimination. This is particularly important in the context of divided societies, where peace education initiatives are crucial in promoting positive community relations for the future and where such initiative may be hampered by communities’ concerns about loss of identity and hardened intergroup attitudes. Furthermore, previous research frequently highlighted teachers’ fears to tackle outgroup attitudes in the classroom, especially in contexts where pupils and the wider school community are seen as entrenched in community divisions (Hughes, Donnelly, Hewstone, Gallagher & Carlisle, 2010). However, there is no research investigating the relationship between pupils’ attitudes and teacher confidence to talk about such issues in the classroom, which is explored in this paper.

In the context of Northern Ireland, a divided society emerging from sectarian conflict, social identity, outgroup attitudes and outgroup behaviours have been key concepts addressed by peace educators for many years. Building on this work, this paper provides a detailed picture of young people’s strength of group identification and their willingness to explore ingroup perspectives, sectarian attitudes and their reported willingness to challenge sectarian bullying. Using data from a baseline survey, which forms part of a randomized control trial investigating the effect of an educational intervention aimed to promote reconciliation, the sample involved young people of different denominational backgrounds, attending separate school sectors. The baseline data will be used to compare with post intervention data. Therefore, the data and its findings would be of particular interest to educators and policy makers in other European countries who are working to develop peace education interventions in societies emerging from conflict. Additionally, this paper considers the results from a baseline teacher survey, collected before training and teaching of the intervention began. The teacher survey focused on confidence in tackling sectarian issues in the classroom, previous experience of teaching such issues and their hopes and concerns for the reconciliation intervention.

This paper therefore set out to investigate the relationship between dimensional concept of social identity, sectarian attitudes and pupils’ reported willingness to challenge sectarian bullying and to compare this with their teachers’ attitudes to teaching about sectarian issues in the classroom.



Method

The pupil sample included 35 primary and post-primary schools and about 800 pupils from 8-11 years old who completed an online questionnaire in December 2011 and January 2012. Main instruments for young people’s survey included an adapted version of the Multi-ethnic identity measure (Phinney, 1992) incorporating the dimensions identity affirmation and exploration, outgroup attitude scales, including an adaptation of the social distance measure (Bogardus, 1947), as well as a measure adapted from Palmer and Cameron (2011) involving scenarios to capture pupils’ intentions in bystander situations relating to intergroup discrimination. Results are analysed using regression analysis and take account of potential gender and religious differences. The teacher questionnaire was completed by the 35 primary and post-primary teachers who will deliver the intervention. Results are analysed in terms of how teachers’ responses compare with their pupil attitudes by considering their confidence in tackling sectarian issues in the classroom and how their previous experience and training relate to their hopes and concerns for the intervention.


Expected Outcomes

Results from the young people’s survey are discussed in the light of the role of social identity dimensions and their relationship to sectarian attitudes and reported bystander behaviour in sectarian school incidents. Furthermore, results related to pupils’ sectarian attitudes will be compared with teachers’ reported confidence in tackling sectarianism in the classroom. The teacher questionnaire also presents interesting findings in relation to teachers’ previous training and experience and how this may influence different perspectives on peace and reconciliation interventions and their expectations of what these could achieve. The paper concludes with potential implications for peace education initiatives and related teacher training in Northern Ireland and beyond. The implications will be of particular interest to policy makers, educators and those working in the area of peace education to design and implement interventions.


References

Bogardus, E. S. (1947) Measurement of Personal-Group Relations. Sociometry, 10: 4: 306–311. Hughes, J., Donnelly, C., Hewstone, M., Gallagher, T. & Carlisle, K. (2010) School partnerships and reconciliation: An evaluation of school collaboration in Northern Ireland. Belfast: Queen’s University Belfast. Available online: http://www.schoolsworkingtogether.com/documents/School%20collaboration%20in%20NI%202010.pdf. (accessed 27th Jan 2010) Palmer, S. & Cameron, L. (2011, May). What are the moderators and mediators of children’s bystander behaviour in the context of intergroup discrimination? Paper session presented at the UNA Global Biennial Conference 2011: Building Peaceable Communities: The Power of Early Childhood, Amsterdam, Holland. Phinney, J. S. (1992). The Multigroup Ethnic Identity Measure: A new scale for use with diverse groups. Journal of Adolescent Research, 7, 156–176.

Supervisor Continuity or Co-Location: Which Matters in Residency Education? Findings From a Qualitative Study of Remote Supervisor Family Physicians in Australia and Canada

Purpose: Changes to health care systems andworking hours have fragmentedresidents’ clinical experiences withpotentially negative effects ontheir development as professionals.Investigation of off-site supervision,which has been implemented in isolatedrural practice, could reveal importantbut less overt components of residencyeducation. 

Method: Insights from sociocultural learningtheory and work-based learning provideda theoretical framework. In 2011–2012,16 family physicians in Australia andCanada were asked in-depth how theyremotely supervised residents’ workand learning, and for their reflectionson this experience. The verbatiminterview transcripts and researchers’memos formed the data set. Templateanalysis produced a description andinterpretation of remote supervision. 

Results: Thirteen Australian family physiciansfrom five states and one territory, andthree Canadians from one province,participated. The main themes werehow remoteness changed the dynamicsof care and supervision; the importanceof ongoing, holistic, nonhierarchical,supportive supervisory relationships; andthat residents learned “clinical courage”through responsibility for patients’ careover time. Distance required supervisorsto articulate and pass on their expertiseto residents but made monitoringdifficult. Supervisory continuityencouraged residents to build on pastexperiences and confront deficiencies. 

Conclusions: Remote supervision enabled residents todevelop as clinicians and professionals.This questions the supremacy of co-locationas an organizing principle forresidency education. Future specialists maybenefit from programs that give themongoing and increasing responsibilityfor a group of patients and supportive.

Is Longer-Distance Migration Slowing? An Analysis of the Annual Record for England and Wales since the 1970s

This paper is prompted by the widespread acceptance that the rates of inter-county and inter-state migration have been falling in the USA and sets itself the task of examining whether this decline in migration intensities is also the case in the UK. It uses annual inter-area migration matrices available for England and Wales since the 1970s by broad age group. The main methodological challenge, arising from changes in the geography of health areas for which the inter-area flows are given, is addressed by adopting the lowest common denominator of 80 areas. Care is also taken to allow for the effect of economic cycles in producing short-term fluctuations on migration rates and to isolate the effect of a sharp rise in rates for 16-24 year olds in the 1990s, which is presumed to be related to the expansion of higher education. The findings suggest that, unlike for the USA, there has not been a substantial decline in the intensity of internal migration between the first two decades of the study period and the second two. If there has been any major decline in the intensity of address changing in England and Wales, it can only be for the within-area moves that this time series does not cover. This latter possibility is examined in a companion paper using a very different data set (Champion and Shuttleworth, 2016).