"Ability" is one of the most common concepts underpinning education. Generally, "ability" is central to notions of a meritocratic society. More specifically, schools are allocated the right to define, categorise and label students according to their ability. While there has been ample discussion of the role of ability in the…

Introduction: This paper describes the findings of a study of 1517 public library Websites in Australia, Canada, and the United States over a period of four years. These Websites are referred to as 'electronic branches' of the libraries, thereby extending the definition of physical library branches into the digital realm. The purpose of the…

Purpose: The vision or mission statement of a school outlines the school's purpose and defines the context, goals, and aspirations that govern the institution. Using vision and mission statements, the present descriptive research study investigated trends in Australian secondary schools' priorities. Research Methods: A stratified sample of…

Two approaches to the process of guided discovery learning are compared for their impacts on concept understanding. One, referred to as design, emphasizes invention and draws on the simulation literature. The other, referred to as case analysis, focuses on discovery and draws on the case-based reasoning literature. Following a lecture on four…

Purpose: This paper documents and evaluates collaborative learning processes aimed at developing farmer's knowledge, skills and aspirations to use seasonal climate forecasting (SCF). Methodology: Thirteen workshops conducted in 2012 engaged over 200 stakeholders across Australian sugar production regions. Workshop design promoted participant…

This paper reports on an action research project involving the redesign, implementation and evaluation of a peer tutor program in a first year design studio in higher education. The effectiveness of the revised program, particularly its capacity to support learning for commencing students in the environment of a creative studio, is examined…

This paper considers the responses of 115 school students to two problems based on information provided in two-way tables. In each case the question asks if one of the variables involved depends on the other. Contextual knowledge might suggest a dependent relationship in both but in one problem the data show independence while in the other the…

Systematic reviews of literature are studies that strategically search for published research on a specific topic in order to synthesize what is known about the topic. This systematic review describes 157 articles on synchronous online learning (SOL) from thirty-four different countries on instructional setting, content areas, participant…

Purpose: This paper aims to test the need in the Australian higher education (HE) sector for a national network for the peer review of assessment in response to the proposed HE standards framework and propose a sector-wide framework for calibrating and assuring achievement standards, both within and across disciplines, through the establishment of…

To succeed within scientific disciplines, using representations, including those based on words, graphs, equations, and diagrams, is important. Research indicates that the use of discipline specific representations (sometimes referred to as expert generated representations), as well as multi-representational use, is critical for problem solving…

Teachers are ideally placed to identify and refer pupils who self-injure, but are often unaware when pupils self-injure or unsure how to respond. The aims of this study were to explore and compare pre-service and in-service teachers' knowledge and attitudes towards self-injury, and their confidence responding to pupils who self-injure. Pre-service…

This study aimed to determine whether there have been shifts in news coverage of sun protection issues over a 12-year period in the context of an evolving skin cancer prevention agenda. A content analysis was performed on all relevant articles (N = 552) published in the two metropolitan daily newspapers in Melbourne, Australia, from 2001 to 2012.…

Capstone subjects are increasingly used in Universities worldwide to complete the undergraduate program experience and to transition graduates into the workplace. As such, capstones fulfil a large role consolidating one experience and traversing the gap to another. Yet, little is known or understood about their design, their implementation or…

Little research has assessed the fidelity, adaptation or integrity of activities implemented within community-based obesity prevention initiatives. To address this gap, a mixed-method process evaluation was undertaken in the context of the South Australian Obesity Prevention and Lifestyle (OPAL) initiative. An ecological coding procedure assessed…

Australian and Singaporean students have been exposed to different forms of teaching due to cultural differences in education. In each country, varying degrees of importance has been placed on explicitly teaching problem-solving heuristics. This paper highlights the different strategies employed by students from each country when solving a word…