'The Area of a Triangle is 1800C’: an analysis of Learners' Idiosyncratic Geometry Responses through the Lenses of Vygotsky's Theory of Concept Formation
- Mhlolo, Michael K, Schäfer, Marc
- Authors: Mhlolo, Michael K , Schäfer, Marc
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141127 , vital:37946 , DOI: 10.1080/10288457.2013.826973
- Description: In this paper, we focus specifically on Vygotsky's theory of concept formation to gain initial insights into seemingly garbled and incoherent connections we observed in learners' responses to a geometry task. While acknowledging research that is supportive of the van Hiele model as being useful when analysing concept formation in geometry, in this paper we use empirical evidence to argue that today's geometry requires learners to reason with many tools which the van Hiele model does not seem to accommodate. Working with 470 written responses of 12–14-year-old learners to a geometry task, we then explored the potential of Vygotsky's theory of concept formation as an alternative framework. We conclude by discussing the paper's contribution both to theory and to classroom practice.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Mhlolo, Michael K , Schäfer, Marc
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/141127 , vital:37946 , DOI: 10.1080/10288457.2013.826973
- Description: In this paper, we focus specifically on Vygotsky's theory of concept formation to gain initial insights into seemingly garbled and incoherent connections we observed in learners' responses to a geometry task. While acknowledging research that is supportive of the van Hiele model as being useful when analysing concept formation in geometry, in this paper we use empirical evidence to argue that today's geometry requires learners to reason with many tools which the van Hiele model does not seem to accommodate. Working with 470 written responses of 12–14-year-old learners to a geometry task, we then explored the potential of Vygotsky's theory of concept formation as an alternative framework. We conclude by discussing the paper's contribution both to theory and to classroom practice.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
How does subjective well-being evolve with age? A literature review
- López Ulloa, Beatriz Fabiola, Moller, Valerie, Sousa-Poza, Alfonso
- Authors: López Ulloa, Beatriz Fabiola , Moller, Valerie , Sousa-Poza, Alfonso
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67185 , vital:29056 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s12062-013-9085-0
- Description: publisher version , This literature review provides an overview of the theoretical and empirical research in several disciplines on the relation between ageing and subjective well-being, i.e., how subjective well-being evolves across the lifespan. Because of the different methodologies, data sets and samples used, comparison among disciplines and studies is difficult. However, extant studies do show either a U-shaped, inverted U-shaped or linear relation between ageing and subjective well-being.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: López Ulloa, Beatriz Fabiola , Moller, Valerie , Sousa-Poza, Alfonso
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67185 , vital:29056 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s12062-013-9085-0
- Description: publisher version , This literature review provides an overview of the theoretical and empirical research in several disciplines on the relation between ageing and subjective well-being, i.e., how subjective well-being evolves across the lifespan. Because of the different methodologies, data sets and samples used, comparison among disciplines and studies is difficult. However, extant studies do show either a U-shaped, inverted U-shaped or linear relation between ageing and subjective well-being.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
Sexy girls, heroes and funny losers: gender representations in children's TV around the world edited by Maya Gotz and Dafna Lemish
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143505 , vital:38252 , DOI: 10.1080/10130950.2013.839116
- Description: Gotz and Lemish have brought together in this volume a range of research which derives from the project they initiated in 2007 from the International Central Institute for Youth and Educational Television (IZI). Researchers in 24 countries around the world participated in this unique project, and the results, discussed at the 2008 and 2010 Prix Jeunesse International, prompted hopes that the producers of children's television would be persuaded to pay more concerted attention to issues of gender in their programming. Whether or not such a utopian outcome might be expected from this initiative is open to future question. For our immediate purposes however, the value of this collection is that it draws together in one volume some of the results from both the original quantitative survey and the subsequent qualitative analyses that examined specific themes emerging from the data.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143505 , vital:38252 , DOI: 10.1080/10130950.2013.839116
- Description: Gotz and Lemish have brought together in this volume a range of research which derives from the project they initiated in 2007 from the International Central Institute for Youth and Educational Television (IZI). Researchers in 24 countries around the world participated in this unique project, and the results, discussed at the 2008 and 2010 Prix Jeunesse International, prompted hopes that the producers of children's television would be persuaded to pay more concerted attention to issues of gender in their programming. Whether or not such a utopian outcome might be expected from this initiative is open to future question. For our immediate purposes however, the value of this collection is that it draws together in one volume some of the results from both the original quantitative survey and the subsequent qualitative analyses that examined specific themes emerging from the data.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
South African quality of life trends over three decades, 1980–2010
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67145 , vital:29040 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0120-y
- Description: publisher version , The South African Quality of Life Trends study has tracked the subjective well-being of South Africans in ten waves from 1983 to 2010. The paper presents the SAQoL trendline of life satisfaction, happiness and perceptions of life getting better or worse against the backdrop of the transition from apartheid to democracy. Subjective well-being peaked in the month following the first open elections in April 1994 when black and white South Africans were equally satisfied and happy at levels found in other democratic societies. But post-election euphoria was short-lived and levels of well-being dropped the following year and racial inequalities in evaluations of life re-emerged. The tenth and latest wave in the study was conducted a few months after South Africa’s successful hosting of the Soccer World Cup. In 2010, the proportions of all South Africans expressing satisfaction, happiness and optimism was among the highest since the coming of democracy—just over half stated they were satisfied, close on two-thirds were happy, and half felt life was getting better. Nonetheless, while the standard of living has increased for a minority of formerly disadvantaged South Africans and a small black middle class has emerged, there are still huge disparities in both material and subjective well-being. In 1997 and 2010, South Africans were asked what would make them happier in future. In 2010, the majority of citizens still hoped for basic necessities, income and employment, to enhance their quality of life.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Moller, Valerie
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/67145 , vital:29040 , https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-012-0120-y
- Description: publisher version , The South African Quality of Life Trends study has tracked the subjective well-being of South Africans in ten waves from 1983 to 2010. The paper presents the SAQoL trendline of life satisfaction, happiness and perceptions of life getting better or worse against the backdrop of the transition from apartheid to democracy. Subjective well-being peaked in the month following the first open elections in April 1994 when black and white South Africans were equally satisfied and happy at levels found in other democratic societies. But post-election euphoria was short-lived and levels of well-being dropped the following year and racial inequalities in evaluations of life re-emerged. The tenth and latest wave in the study was conducted a few months after South Africa’s successful hosting of the Soccer World Cup. In 2010, the proportions of all South Africans expressing satisfaction, happiness and optimism was among the highest since the coming of democracy—just over half stated they were satisfied, close on two-thirds were happy, and half felt life was getting better. Nonetheless, while the standard of living has increased for a minority of formerly disadvantaged South Africans and a small black middle class has emerged, there are still huge disparities in both material and subjective well-being. In 1997 and 2010, South Africans were asked what would make them happier in future. In 2010, the majority of citizens still hoped for basic necessities, income and employment, to enhance their quality of life.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2013
The supernatural detective: witchcraft crime narratives in the Daily Sun
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143447 , vital:38247 , DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2013.833420
- Description: Reports of witchcraft crimes are a staple feature in the South African tabloid newspaper, the Daily Sun. Instead of dismissing these sensational and seemingly implausible narratives, this paper examines them as ‘fictions’ through the lens of theory developed for the analysis of detective fiction. It draws on Huhn's (1987) model of the readerly relationships established by the narrative forms of the classical detective story and the hard-boiled novel in order to show how the reportage, together with its expected reception, reveals subliminal tensions within working-class black culture. Ironically, such a reading illustrates how the brazen and emotive nature of the tabloid text, which signals for some its untrustworthiness, perhaps comes closer to telling a ‘truth’ about contemporary South African society than the most ‘objective’ reports.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143447 , vital:38247 , DOI: 10.1080/1013929X.2013.833420
- Description: Reports of witchcraft crimes are a staple feature in the South African tabloid newspaper, the Daily Sun. Instead of dismissing these sensational and seemingly implausible narratives, this paper examines them as ‘fictions’ through the lens of theory developed for the analysis of detective fiction. It draws on Huhn's (1987) model of the readerly relationships established by the narrative forms of the classical detective story and the hard-boiled novel in order to show how the reportage, together with its expected reception, reveals subliminal tensions within working-class black culture. Ironically, such a reading illustrates how the brazen and emotive nature of the tabloid text, which signals for some its untrustworthiness, perhaps comes closer to telling a ‘truth’ about contemporary South African society than the most ‘objective’ reports.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
“Face the music!”: the Daily Sun's representation of adolescent sex in the Jules High sex scandal
- Boshoff, Priscilla A, Prinsloo, Jeanne
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A , Prinsloo, Jeanne
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143483 , vital:38250 , DOI: 10.1080/10130950.2013.834660
- Description: Rather than being merely a physiological stage, adolescence is variously constructed through social institutions. The media plays a significant role in such constructions, including that of adolescent sexuality. In the recent past there have been several cases of sexual acts involving adolescents that have received prominent media coverage as they have been considered shocking. The Jules High School sex scandal related to sex acts between a single adolescent girl and two adolescent boys. It was recorded on mobile phones by their peers and circulated on their mobile networks, or ‘went viral’ as the media continuously noted. The press coverage surrounding this incident and the legal process that ensued is the focus of this Article which undertakes a critical textual analysis of the coverage in the popular tabloid, the Daily Sun, in order to make explicit the contesting sets of discourses around adolescence and sexuality that were articulated in this popular public sphere. The Article uses a Foucauldian framework in order to probe the discourses of sexuality that are articulated and contested in this space. As the most widely read newspaper in South Africa it serves as a powerful site of definition of teen sexuality. The analysis suggests that, rather than allowing for teen sexuality, it is disavowed by villainising teen sex and responsibility for such ‘deviance’ is directed to various adult and social adult actors.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Boshoff, Priscilla A , Prinsloo, Jeanne
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143483 , vital:38250 , DOI: 10.1080/10130950.2013.834660
- Description: Rather than being merely a physiological stage, adolescence is variously constructed through social institutions. The media plays a significant role in such constructions, including that of adolescent sexuality. In the recent past there have been several cases of sexual acts involving adolescents that have received prominent media coverage as they have been considered shocking. The Jules High School sex scandal related to sex acts between a single adolescent girl and two adolescent boys. It was recorded on mobile phones by their peers and circulated on their mobile networks, or ‘went viral’ as the media continuously noted. The press coverage surrounding this incident and the legal process that ensued is the focus of this Article which undertakes a critical textual analysis of the coverage in the popular tabloid, the Daily Sun, in order to make explicit the contesting sets of discourses around adolescence and sexuality that were articulated in this popular public sphere. The Article uses a Foucauldian framework in order to probe the discourses of sexuality that are articulated and contested in this space. As the most widely read newspaper in South Africa it serves as a powerful site of definition of teen sexuality. The analysis suggests that, rather than allowing for teen sexuality, it is disavowed by villainising teen sex and responsibility for such ‘deviance’ is directed to various adult and social adult actors.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
Where angels fear to tread: online peer-assessment in a large first-year class
- Mostert, Markus, Snowball, Jeanette D
- Authors: Mostert, Markus , Snowball, Jeanette D
- Date: 2012
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/69289 , vital:29480 , https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2012.683770
- Description: In the context of widening participation, large classes and increased diversity, assessment of student learning is becoming increasingly problematic in that providing formative feedback aimed at developing student writing proves to be particularly laborious. Although the potential value of peer assessment has been well documented in the literature, the associated administrative burden, also in relation to managing anonymity and intellectual ownership, makes this option less attractive, particularly in large classes. A potential solution involves the use of information and communication technologies to automate the logistics associated with peer assessment in a time-efficient way. However, uptake of such systems in the higher education community is limited, and research in this area is only beginning. This case study reports on the use of the Moodle Workshop module for formative peer assessment of students’ individual work in a first-year introductory macro-economics class of over 800 students. Data were collected through an end-of-course evaluation survey of students. The study found that using the feature-rich Workshop module not only addressed many of the practical challenges associated with paper-based peer assessments, but also provided a range of additional options for enhancing validity and reliability of peer assessments that would not be possible with paper-based systems.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2012
- Authors: Mostert, Markus , Snowball, Jeanette D
- Date: 2012
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/69289 , vital:29480 , https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2012.683770
- Description: In the context of widening participation, large classes and increased diversity, assessment of student learning is becoming increasingly problematic in that providing formative feedback aimed at developing student writing proves to be particularly laborious. Although the potential value of peer assessment has been well documented in the literature, the associated administrative burden, also in relation to managing anonymity and intellectual ownership, makes this option less attractive, particularly in large classes. A potential solution involves the use of information and communication technologies to automate the logistics associated with peer assessment in a time-efficient way. However, uptake of such systems in the higher education community is limited, and research in this area is only beginning. This case study reports on the use of the Moodle Workshop module for formative peer assessment of students’ individual work in a first-year introductory macro-economics class of over 800 students. Data were collected through an end-of-course evaluation survey of students. The study found that using the feature-rich Workshop module not only addressed many of the practical challenges associated with paper-based peer assessments, but also provided a range of additional options for enhancing validity and reliability of peer assessments that would not be possible with paper-based systems.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2012
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