Game-Based Assessment of School Readiness Domains of 3-8-year-old-children: A Scoping Review

Precise assessment of school readiness is critical because it has practical and theoretical implications for children’s school and life success. However, school readiness assessment mainly relies on teacher reports and a few direct evaluations requiring a trained examiner. Studies indicate that 80% of games and apps target preschool children and education, suggesting that apps are familiar and fun for this age group. Previous reviews have focused on these apps’ training capability but not on their assessment of school readiness. This Scoping review examines 31 studies published from 2011-2019. The Evidence Centred Design (ECD) framework was used to evaluate game-based assessment (GBA) suitability to assess school readiness domains. Results show that it is possible to assess school readiness using GBA. Most studies assessed cognitive domains in school settings and adopted an external assessment of the tasks. However, most studies only evaluated one competency, and few intervention strategies targeted the enhancement of school readiness. Besides, few studies followed the ECD framework strictly. Implications include expanding the assessment to other school readiness domains with a real-time inbuilt assessment that conforms to the ECD framework. GBA provides a new approach to assess school readiness outside or inside the school settings in this online era.

Pelaksanaan Pengembangan Keprofesian Berkelanjutan Bagi Guru Sekolah Dasar

Tujuan penelitian untuk mengetahui: (1) Gambaran Pelaksanaan Pengembangan Keprofesian Berkelanjutan (PKB) bagi guru Sekolah Dasar (2) Faktor pendukung dan penghambat dalam Pelaksanaan Pengembangan Keprofesian Berkelanjutan bagi guru Sekolah Dasar. Jenis penelitian ini adalah jenis penelitian kualitatif. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa (1) Pelaksanaan Pengembangan Keprofesian Berkelanjutan bagi guru Sekolah Dasar melalui proses perencanaan program sepenuhnya dilaksanakan melalui forum Kelompok Kerja Guru. Pelaksanaan program dilakukan dengan keikutsertaan para guru dalam berbagai pelatihan, diimplementasikan ke dalam karya inovatif seperti media pembelajaran dan pembuatan video pembelajaran. Evaluasi program dilakukan dengan pembuatan evaluasi diri guru dan laporan yang terkait dengan program. (2) Faktor pendukung pelaksanaan Pengembangan Keprofesian Berkelanjutan adalah kemudahan sumber informasi yang diperoleh dari berbagai pihak yang terpusat pada forum Kelompok Kerja Guru dan sikap antusiasme guru yang tinggi mengikuti program, dukungan kepala sekolah. Sedangkan faktor penghambat adalah belum adanya anggaran khusus yang disiapkan dalam pelaksanaan Pengembangan Keprofesian Berkelanjutan , waktu guru yang terkadang bertabrakan dengan kegiatan lain, dan keterbatasan jaringan internet yang dimiliki untuk melaksanakan Pengembangan Keprofesian Berkelanjutan. The purposes of the study are to discover: (1) an overview of the Implementation of Continuous Professional Development (PKB) for primary School Teachers (2) Supporting and inhibiting factors in the Implementation of Continuous Professional Development (PKB) for primary School Teachers. This type of research is qualitative research using descriptive methods. The results of the study reveal that (1) an Overview of the Implementation of Continuous Professional Development (PKB) for primary school teachers of planning the program PKB fully implemented through the forum of the KKG. The implementation of the program PKB carried out with the participation of teachers in various training then implemented into the innovative work as a medium of learning and the making of the video learning. Program evaluation of PKB is also done with the manufacture of self-evaluation and teacher reports. (2) the supporting Factors in the implementation of PKB among them is the ease of the source of the information obtained from the various parties centralized on the forum of KKG and the attitude of the enthusiasm teachers is high when received information associated with the PKB, especially the support provided by head master of the school. While the inhibiting factors are not yet available funds, time teacher sometimes located in other activities, and the limitations of the internet network for PKB activities.

Associations Between Self, Peer, and Teacher Reports of Victimization and Social Skills in School in Children With Language Disorders

Previous studies have shown that teachers and parents of children with language disorders report them to have higher victimization scores, a heightened risk of low-quality friendships and social difficulties, and may be more vulnerable to peer rejection than control peers. However, there are few studies of bullying in children with developmental language disorder (DLD) and reading difficulties (RD), and none has considered the mutual relationships between teacher reports, the perceptions of classmates, and children’s self-reports. We analyzed the experiences of bullying and peer relationships in primary school students with DLD and RD as compared to their age-matched peers using teacher reports, peer reports, and self-reports on victimization. Additionally, we explored how these three perspectives are associated. Results indicated lower levels of peer-rated prosocial skills in DLD and RD students compared to their peers, as well as higher levels of victimization as assessed by peers for students with DLD. In the same line, the teachers’ ratings showed that students with DLD presented poorer social skills, less adaptability, and more withdrawal in social interaction. Contrastingly, self-reports informed of similar rates of interpersonal relationships, social stress, and peer victimization between the three groups. Consequently, we found significant correlations between measures of peer reports and teacher reports that contrasted with the lack of correlations between self and other agents’ reports. These findings stress the importance of using self-reports, peer reports, and teacher reports at the same time to detect bullying situations that might go unnoticed.

Discrepancies between Parent and Teacher Reports of Motor Competence in 5–10-Year-Old Children with and without Suspected Developmental Coordination Disorder

Parents and teachers have knowledge of children’s daily motor performance yet may make different judgments about the levels of competence observed at home and school. The current study aimed to examine the discrepancies between parent and teacher reports using the Movement ABC-2 Checklist and the Developmental Coordination Disorder Questionnaire (DCDQ) on children with and without suspected Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD). The Movement ABC-2 Test was administered to 1276 children aged 5–10 years in China. The Movement ABC-2 Checklist and DCDQ were completed by both parents and teachers of all children. A total of 172 children achieving a score below the 15th percentile on the Movement ABC-2 Test were identified as children with suspected DCD. Both parents and teachers showed suitable agreement in judging children’s motor competence but low sensitivity in identifying children with DCD. Parent scores of children’s motor competence were more closely associated with test performance scores compared to teacher scores. Teachers tended to over-rate children’s motor competence. The motor difficulties identified by parents were associated with low Movement ABC-2 Test scores on Manual Dexterity and Balance components, while motor difficulties identified by teachers were associated with the Balance component only. The results demonstrated discrepancies between parent and teacher reports, suggesting the importance of using a range of measures to identify and describe motor difficulties in children.

Brief Research Report: Agreement Between Teacher and Student Reports on Students’ Acceptance and Rejection

Student-reported peer nominations are typically used to obtain information on the social status (i.e., acceptance and rejection) of students in their classrooms. However, under certain circumstances this assessment method cannot be used, for example for logistical reasons or with students with intellectual disabilities (ID) who are not always able to fill out peer nominations. In such instances, teacher reports on students’ expected nominations may serve as a proxy. As part of a larger study on students with ID, we evaluated the agreement between teachers’ and students’ peer reports regarding individual students’ acceptance and rejection using unlimited nomination procedures in Grades 4–6 mainstream classrooms. As many students with ID cannot fill out peer nominations, this evaluation study used a sample of typically developing students without ID. Teachers (n = 27, Mage = 34.24 years, SD = 10.85; 85.2% female) nominated all peers from the classroom who they believed individual students would report as “liked” and “not liked”. For direct comparison, students (n = 441, Mage = 11.36 years, SD = 0.89; 46.8% female) themselves were also asked to report their “liked” and “not liked” nominations. Students received both more “liked” and more “not liked” nominations from their peers than from their teachers. Students’ social status as calculated from teacher reports showed only partial agreement with social status as calculated from student reports, suggesting that in mainstream classrooms student reports cannot be easily replaced by teacher reports. Perspectives on the application of teacher-reported peer nominations in special needs settings are discussed.

Improving the Effectiveness of Critical Thinking Among Residents and Students of Surgical Departments

The purpose of the work was: the development of a non-costly, effective method for assessing students' knowledge, which would stimulate the interest of a medical student in the educational process. The assessment method consists in the fact that in advance the teacher will date the students or residents to prepare an analysis of the standard protocol of surgery for basic surgical pathology. During the lesson, the teacher reports that there are 3 errors in the protocol of the same operation, which he will now read. The student's goal is to find them. The mistakes are made by the teacher.

Examining Self-Efficacy of FCS Teachers Following the COVID-19 Modality Switch

This paper presents the results of a nationwide survey of educators for grades 6–12 who specialize in family and consumer sciences education (N 380). The paper examines teacher reports about their self-efficacy in online learning during the switch to off-campus instruction. Data revealed that district communication to teachers indicating that they were doing a good job and teachers having had prior online interactions with students were significantly related to the teachers' positive perceptions of self-efficacy.

Teaching Quality in Higher Education: Agreement Between Teacher Self-reports and Student Evaluations

Teaching quality is a crucial factor within higher education. Research on this topic often requires assessing teaching quality as a global construct through self-reports. However, such instruments are criticized due to the lack of alignment between teacher and student reports of instructional practices. We argue that while teachers might over- or under-estimate specific dimensions of teaching quality, their aggregation in the form of overall teaching quality reflects differences in teaching quality between teachers well. Accordingly, we test a ten-item measure that allows faculty to self-report their overall teaching quality based on the aspects distinguished in the SEEQ (Marsh, 1982, 2007). Using 17,508 student assessments of teaching quality in 889 sessions taught by 97 faculty members, we conducted Doubly Latent Multi Level Modelling while considering bias and unfairness variables to model overall teaching quality assessed by students, and simultaneously corrected for measurement error and potential distortions through the assessment situation. This global factor of teaching quality was strongly associated with teacher self-reported teaching quality (ρ = .74), which we interpret as evidence that global teacher reports of teaching quality can serve as sensible indicators of overall teaching quality for nomothetic research in higher education.

Developing a Coding System for Sulking Behavior in Young Children

Children’s sulking behavior is a salient yet understudied emotional phenomenon. It has been hypothesized to result from hurt feelings, humiliation, and anger, and might thus function as a nonverbal measure in the behavioral studies of these emotions. We conducted three studies that served to develop a comprehensive coding system for children’s sulking behavior. The first study explored sulking features in an online survey that used parental and teacher reports. In an event-based parental diary study, we reevaluated the importance of each feature based on its frequency across episodes of sulking behavior and analyzed the time course of sulking episodes. Finally, we analyzed YouTube videos and demonstrated that the coding system could be reliably applied. We also determined a minimal number of necessary features as a classification threshold. The resulting coding system includes the following features: becoming silent, distancing, turning away, gaze avoidance, crossing arms, lowering head, pouting lips, lowered eyebrows, and, probably, utterances of illegitimate devaluation, and relational distancing. Thus, all varieties of sulking seem to have withdrawal from an ongoing interaction in common.

Ντροπαλή ιδιοσυγκρασία στην παιδική ηλικία: διερεύνηση του ρόλου της μητρικής νοο-προσήλωσης

Relations between children’s temperamental shyness and mothers’ propensity to think and describe their children as individuals with minds (mind-mindedness) were examined. A between groups design was used to assess whether mothers of a group of 5- to 8-year-old shy children (n = 60) and mothers of a comparison group with non-shy children (n = 60) differed in the frequency and types of references they made to their children’s mental states. Mothers were asked to provide written descriptions of their children (Meins & Fernyhough, 2010, 2015). Descriptions were coded for references to three types of mental states: volitional (e.g. “want”, “need”, “try”), cognitive (e.g. “think”, “believe”) and emotional (e.g. “happy”, “sad”, “shy”). Shyness was assessed through separate parent and teacher reports of children’s temperament. As predicted, differences were found in the overall number of references to mental states, but also in the types of mental states to which mothers of shy and non-shy children referred. Temperamental shyness was associated with more frequent maternal references to children’s mental states and specifically to emotions. Findings are discussed in relation to the need to extend our understanding on the potential associations between child characteristics, such as temperament, and maternal mind-mindedness.