The first time

Based on interview data from twelve beginning teachers describing their experiences in their first year of teaching; for PhD titled ’Firsts: Performing Ways First Year Teachers Experience Identity Transformation’.

Global forms and local forces : PhD enrollments and graduations in Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom, and the United States

 This chapter presents and discusses data from five different nations—Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom, and the United States—on doctoral candidates and graduates. These data are from governmental and institutional sources for the years 1998–2004, a sample that enables changes across a five-year span to be identified. They span important basic characteristics, such as gender, age, discipline, and study load (that is, full-time or part-time study). Therefore, readers can see national as well as international trends and differences in such characteristics and can match these to equivalent and/or contemporary data in their own nations. The five countries considered here are among those whose data were discussed at the 2007 CIRGE research synthesis meeting in Australia. Although these countries are not universally representative of doctoral education, their practices do offer a vivid sense of how vastly the enterprise of doctoral education differs in its scope and dimensions around the world

Teacher practice: a spotlight on the use of feedback and conferencing in the first year of schooling

With the prevalence of statements that refer to a need to “bridge”, “narrow” or “close” gaps in achievement it would appear that Government bodies have an appreciation for the fact that students need not be victims of circumstance. In addition to this, research has suggested that certain skills, such as the acquisition of phonemic awareness, need to be acquired in the early years to ensure that children do not fall behind their peers. Use of feedback is one way in which teachers have attempted to positively influence student outcomes. There are authors, however, who have suggested that not all forms of feedback are necessarily effective. In light of these perspectives, this study sought to investigate whether the incorporation of student/teacher conferences into a pre-existing program could be seen to support the development of phonemic awareness skills of students in their first year of schooling.

Qualitative and historiometric methods in leadership research: a review of the first 25 years of the leadership quarterly

In the spirit of the 25th anniversary edition of The Leadership Quarterly, as the world's premier outlet for leadership research, we have reviewed qualitative and historiometric research across those 25. years. Qualitative research is a complex and cluttered area of scholarship. This is not because there is an inherent confusion about it. Rather, it is because 'qualitative' research is a cover-all term for a wide range of research strategies, paradigms, parent disciplines, sources of data, and methods of analysis for them. More so than in previous journal review articles, we explored variation in qualitative analysis as well as variety in qualitative data. In terms of methodologies, our efforts concentrated on case study, content analysis, grounded theory and historiometrics. We also examined trends toward post-positivism, post-modernity and liquid modernity, and their resultant benefits for researching leadership. Future directions for leadership research are posited. © 2013 Elsevier Inc.

Sources and correlates of sodium consumption in the first 2 years of life

High sodium intake during infancy and early childhood can change salt preference and blood pressure trajectories across life, representing a modifiable cardiovascular risk factor. Describing young children's sodium intake is important for informing effective targets for sodium reduction.