Vol. 17-2（2004/9）
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Yi-mei Lee, I-huei Wang, & Sieh-hwa Lin*
The Ministry of Education promulgates Grade 1-9 Curriculum Guidelines in 1998, and implements Grade 1-9 Curriculum gradually since the 90th school year. One of the traits of the curriculum is its focus on “core competence＂instead of “subject knowledge” to break the regulation and defects of traditional curriculum, and to build up the ten capacities for lifelong learning. The idea of Grade 1-9 Curriculum is holistic and prospective, but relatively has some challenges of the curriculum implementation. One of the challenges is to elucidate and transform competence indicators or benchmarks. Nowadays several schools and workshops are elucidating and transforming competence indicators or benchmarks to be instructional indicators. Considering that the teaching staffs are familiar with and often apply Bloom’s classification system of educational objectives, the study intents to elucidate and transform competence indicators or benchmarks of learning areas of Social Studies. First, the study interprets characteristics of competence indicators or benchmarks. Second, the study illustrates the content of Bloom’s classification system of educational objectives. Finally, the study applies the perspectives discussed above to analyze and evaluate competence indicators or benchmarks of learning areas of Social Studies of Grade 1-9 Curriculum Guidelines to provide reference resources for teaching, assessment, and further studies.
Keyword: learning areas of Social Studies, elucidation of competence standards, Bloom’s classification system of educational objectives（revised edition）
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The Study of the Context of School-Based Curriculum Development
Pei-hsuan Lin*
Recent curriculum innovations encourage teachers to demonstrate their professional wisdom by participating in school-based curriculum development (SBCD). As we know, the devolution of central curriculum policy doesn’t mean that teachers can conduct SBCD effectively. In Taiwan, there are few studies systematically to respond to the critics about SBCD. In order to gain a comprehensive understanding of the nature and problems of SBCD, this study investigates the context of SBCD based on 6 subsystems－external environment, curriculum, staff, school structure, resources, and evaluation. This study proposes several paradoxes founded in SBCD by analyzing the empirical survey data. Finally, it provides some implications for future curriculum practice and research in SBCD.
Keyword: school-based curriculum development, school-based curriculum evaluation, professional development
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Applying Hypermedia Assisted Concept Maps to Construct Accounting Inventory Teaching Material
Chei-chang Chiou, Hwa-shan Huang, & Jia-hwei Hsieh*
The hypermedia assisted concept maps use hypermedia assisted to expand twodimensional to multi-dimensional concept maps. Through sorting and recombining knowledge, the difficult and complex knowledge is extracted to put in the other dimensions to simplify the complexity of representation. For the general learners, they can learn simple and clear concepts in two dimensional maps; for superior learners, they can learn those concepts in depth and width. This study uses the hypermedia assisted and Novak concept maps to construct accounting inventory teaching materials, and further compares the learning effects of these two teaching materials and analyzes students’ learning satisfaction. The sample consists of 69 students from two classes of Management College of National Changhua University of Education. The two classes are assigned to be the experimental and control groups, applying the hypermedia assisted concept maps and Novak concept maps accounting inventory teaching materials respectively. The results reveal that the learning performance of the experimental group is superior to that of the control group, and most of the students in the experimental group are also satisfied with the hypermedia assisted concept maps.
Keyword: hypermedia, concept maps, accounting teaching material
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Ming-jane Chuang*
The purpose of this study is first to explore gender issues of knowledge and power in the Grade 1-9 Curriculum. It then investigates the interplay of knowledge and power in curriculum decision-making in an attempt to understand the position of gender issues in the integrated Grade 1-9 curriculum. Further, this study considers the proposed introduction of gender issues into the curriculum, both its content and educational goals, and looks critically at the contemporary curriculum implementation of gender equity issues in the Grade 1-9 Curriculum. Finally, this study views teachers not only as transformative intellectuals in pedagogy but also as practitioners of social equity through searching for their professional identity.
Keyword: Power & Knowledge, Gender Issues, Grade 1-9 Curriculum, Critical Pedagogy
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The Developmental Relationships Across Psychosocial Domains in College Students
Wen-bin Chiou*
The study based on the genetic epistemology and constructivism to explore the developmental relationships across self-identity, practical intelligence, social paradigm beliefs, moral reasoning, and good-life reasoning in college students. For the developmental relationships across domains, the so-called horizontal de’ calage existed across domains. The good-life reasoning (ethical reasoning) developed the latest, and dialectical thinking, practical intelligence, and moral reasoning had parallel developmental relations. As for the mutual influences between cognitive development and other domains, Cross-lagged panel analysis revealed that the dialectical thinking might be the developmental foundation for practical intelligence, moral reasoning, and good-life reasoning and this also means the relationship between dialectical thinking and these domains are necessary but not sufficient. Thus, the enhancement of dialectical thinking development should result in positive influence on the development of practical intelligence, moral reasoning and good-life reasoning.
Keyword: genetic epistemology, moral reasoning, postformal thinking, practical intelligence, psychosocial Domains
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Yao-tang Lin
The importance of leaders in the organization of school is that their influences could be over every individual in the organization. When a leader faces many contradictory realities in the organization, he can use the “competing values approach” of Quinn to analyze and respond the need of paradoxical leadership. Whether the “competing values approach” is essential narratives or just a strategically method, it's worth further discussion. Adorno, a scholar of the Frankfort School, suggests that the “non-identical thinking” could provide deeper reflection about the issue of “both / and.” By using the “competing values approach” with the “non-identical thinking,” this paper tries to illustrate when leaders face the contradictory and paradoxical situations in the organization of school, they can upgrade from the exclusive leadership of either/or model to the inclusive leadership of both/ and model.
Keyword: Competing values approach, Non-idential thinking, Paradoxical leadership
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Fang-chung Chang*
The main purpose of this study is to explore the relationships between the latent variables of the educational quantity and life expectancy at birth. The research employed the Structural Equation Modeling to test the causal relationships of these variables. These data are collected from World Development Report (1978/1981/1986/ 1991/1996/1997). It covers six years; that is, 1975, 1975, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995 data respectively. It used six variables to test the causal relationships. These variables included the ratio of the primary education (male/ female), the enrollment ratio of the secondary education (male/ female), and life expectancy at birth (male/ female.) Six structural equation models are constructed in this research. It also provided six null hypotheses to test the casual relationships among those variables. The results showed that the χ 2 values of six causal models in structural equations are not significant. In addition, the criteria values of AGFI, GFI, NFI, CFI, NNFI, IFI, and RFI are also near 1.0 in Structural Equation Models. That is, these models are fitted well and rejected six null hypotheses in this study. It meant that the casual relationships among the latent variables of the educational quantity and life expectancy at birth are fitted in 1975, 1975, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995 data respectively. But according to other criteria, there are some error terms in the research models. From these findings, some suggestions were given.
Keyword: human capital theory; structural equation modeling
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I-chung Lu & Hui-chen Tseng*
The purpose of this study is to compare the metacognitive behaviors during writing process among the sixth graders of different writing ability. Twelve children from an elementary school in Pingtung were asked to think aloud while they were writing. Then the metacognitive behaviors that appeared in their verbal and behavior protocols were compared.
The results suggested few differences among the three writing groups in the total number of the metacognitive behaviors in the planning, translating, or reviewing stages of writing. Before writing, the children seldom set writing goal or planned for the main idea of each paragraph. During writing, they focused on the usage of words and punctuation, but they did not consider whether what has been written was consistent with the title. After they finished writing, most of the children did not review what they wrote. For those who did look back and make corrections, the changes were made in the word level rather than the semantic level. These results indicated that the writing behaviors of these sixth graders as a whole were very similar to the knowledge-telling model of the writing novices.
Keyword: writing process, metacognition, metacognitive behavior, elementary school children
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The Effects of Extensive Reading on Learners’Reading Ability Development
Samuel P-H Sheu*
This paper reported two studies on the effect of an extensive reading program (ERP) on the reading development and learning attitudes of Taiwanese 2nd-year junior high school students. In each study, two ERP groups using graded readers (GR) and books for native English speaking children (BNESC) respectively, and one control group receiving grammar-based instruction, were involved. The results showed that when the reading time was limited and only reading was involved in the experiment, the reading speed of the three groups was improved, but they performed differently in the language tests after the experiment, and also their attitudes became negative to English learning and reading. When the time was doubled and collaborative activities were included, the two ERP groups came out as clearly better to the control group in all aspects of language development, and also developed positive attitudes. This suggested that the longer the learners are immersed in a pleasurable and meaningful environment, the bigger the benefits they will receive. Implications are deduced for language policy in input-poor settings, and for such concepts as the use of L1 materials and supportive activities in the organization of ER programs.
Keyword：EFL reading, extensive reading, Graded readers, Books for native English speaking children, reading development, learning attitudes
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An Interpretive Study of Mothers’ Child-rearing Beliefs on Child’s Autonomy in Taipei Area
Hui-fen Lin*
Multicultural researchers have argued that the same concept may have different meanings in different cultures. The concept of child's autonomy is rooted in the western cultural, but not in Confucianism society like Taiwan. The purpose of this study is to explore how middle-class mothers construct the meaning of child's autonomy through their child-rearing beliefs within the social culture context of Taiwan. In other words, I discussed the mothers' child-rearing beliefs regarding the following issues: First, how do Taiwanese mothers interpret the meaning of children's autonomy? Secondly, on what ground do mothers grant autonomy to their children? And, on which domain can children make their own decisions? Thirdly, discussing the types of children rearing beliefs on children's autonomy. The mothers interpreted the competence of problem solving and self-care as the main meanings of children's autonomy. They reported infant and toddlers can gain a sense of security by bed-sharing with their parents. The results also indicate that the mothers treat health, security, ethics, and manners as issues that they should control while they let their children decide their own personal events. However, for the child's best interests, the mothers tend to give directions to guide their children on making decisions in personal domain. Five types of parenting styles based on mother’s child rearing beliefs on children’s autonomy were identified. The narrative account of these mothers can provide a framework to further develop indigenous perspective for child-rearing culture in Taiwan.
Keyword: child rearing belief, child-rearing practices, autonomy, independent, self, culture, in-depth interview
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Man-wei Sun & Su-ing Wang*
When English learning is imposed on a child and becomes the priority and the only goal of early childhood teaching, the meaning of early education is doubtful. When a teacher faces the overwhelming tendency of All-English teaching, how could she find the insight of language teaching? The researchers questioned the possibility that teachers can bring anything genuine to kids in such circumstance. Therefore, the oppression increased and teacher’s position is shattered. . Through Miss Straw’s sincere narrative, we are able to step into the overall picture of All-English teaching for young children. The story allowed us to strain our ears to her striving voice in the ringing of “No Chinese” alarm and witness how she strained her ear modestly to hundreds of voices from the fine and fragile hearts of children.
Keyword: early childhood education, All-English, language, kindergarten teacher, life story
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A Study of Foreign Language Anxiety of EFL Elementary School Students in Taipei County
Daniel Yu-ching Chan & Guo-cheng Wu*
Different from previous studies on foreign language anxiety which focused on either college or high school level, this study investigated foreign language anxiety of EFL elementary school students in Taiwan. The population of this study was all fifth graders in 205 elementary schools of Taipei County. The researchers used stratified purposeful sampling and cluster sampling to select 18 classes from the total nine educational districts. All the 601 students from the 18 classes were the participants answering the questionnaires. In order to have a further understanding of the students’ foreign language anxiety, 18 high-anxious students were selected as the interviewees according to their scores in the questionnaires. In addition, all the 9 English teachers were interviewed, too. In this study, questionnaires, interviews, classroom observations, and document collection were applied as instruments. The results were as follows. First, the analysis of the questionnaires showed that the foreign language anxiety tendency of elementary school EFL students was quite obvious. Six variables of English learning experience were found that might affect learners’ anxiety level. The result corresponded to that of the previous studies, in which there was a significant negative correlation between foreign language anxiety level and English learning achievement. Second, through a combinational analysis of multiple data sources, we found that low proficiency, fear of negative evaluation, competition of games, anxious personality, and pressure from students themselves and their parents were the five sources of language anxiety. Third, tests, speaking in front of others, spelling, incomprehensible input, and speaking to native speakers were the five anxiety-provoking situations. Fourth, both teachers and students in this study thought that the balance of instructional languages helped lower foreign language anxiety. Finally, the study revealed that teachers’ awareness of foreign language anxiety is insufficient. Based on the findings in this study, suggestions of reducing foreign language anxiety were given to teachers, students, and parents. The implications of this exploratory study include encouraging teachers to enrich their awareness of foreign language anxiety, carefully dealing with anxiety-provoking situations, encouraging teachers’ use of more comprehensible input, encouraging students’ participation in additional English activities, encouraging students to share their anxiety experiences, and encouraging parents’ involvement in their children’s English learning. Based on the findings and implications of this study, students, teachers, and parents can increase their awareness of foreign language anxiety. Accordingly, better ways of dealing with foreign language anxiety can be adopted, and an enjoyable and effective language-learning environment can therefore be developed.
Keyword: EFL elementary school students, foreign language anxiety, sources of foreign language anxiety, anxiety-provoking situations
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Analyzing Preservice Physical Educators’ Teaching Behaviors through PETAI Systematic Observation
Min-hua Chung*
The purpose of this study was to analyze the preservice physical education teachers’ teaching behaviors in their field teaching experience. The subjects were 25 preservice students enrolled in the physical education teacher training program at the University of Northern Colorado. Each subject was videotaped twice during their field teaching experience. Twenty-two subjects completed lesson plans, teaching procedures, and videotape evaluations for teachers’ teaching behaviors. Twenty-four subjects completed those processes for students’ participation time and management time.
Physical Education Teacher Assessment Instrument (PETAI; Phillips, Carlisle, Steffen, & Stroot, 1992) was used to analyze each teaching videotape. Descriptive data were recorded to show the percentage of time in each behavioral category. Within the limitations of this study, the findings were: 1. The average for preservice physical educators’ instruction time was 78.97 percent of the total class period. The most frequent behaviors were monitoring and planned presentation. 2. The average for preservise physical educators’ management time was 21.03 percent. The most frequent behaviors were organization and equipment management. 3. The students’ average participation time was 83.90 percent. The most frequent behaviors were engaged skill learning time and listening. 4. The students’ average management time was 15.67 percent. The most frequent behaviors were organization and equipment management.
Keyword: PETAI, preservice teacher, systematic observation
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On Archetypal Model of Cai-Zi Jia-Ren Novels During Late Ming and Early Qing
Chi-hung Li*
This paper adopts the opinions of archetypal theory and archetypal criticism, and discusses the cai-zi jia-ren novels during late Ming Dynasty and early Qing Dynasty from the point of view of the myth of hero. Basically, three aspects will be descussed: first, cai-zi(scholar)/hero: cai-zi’s life style and myth; second, encountering the Goddess: the archetypal motif and meanings about the adventure of cai-zi/hero; third, inner exploration: the archetypal model and the process of individuation of the myth of cai-zi/hero. The studying result reveals that the basic narrative logic of cai-zi jia-ren novels matches the structure and narrative construction of the myth of hero. The narrative construction is composted of the adventure of cai-zi questing jia-ren(beauty). During the journey, cai-zi would combat many difficulties, and marry jia-ren. Finally, cai-zi would reach his quest of self ideal, and would fulfill his exploration of self personality.
Keyword: quest, the myth of hero, encountering the Goddess, the process of individuation, cai-zi jia-ren novel, narrative, archetype
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The Landscape Poem of Wang Shyn-chen
Ya-hsin Huang*
In this thesis, I try to analyse the features of Wang shyh-chen’s landscape poems in accordance with his tours to Yangchow, Si-Chuan, Nan-hai and the others in several phrases.
Keyword: Wang shyh-chen, landscape poems, the Qing Dynasty
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A Methodology for Analyzing Patterns of Theme Succession in Two-Piano Works
Shu-mei Yang & Shu-juan Yang*
Generally speaking, to a keyboard student practicing piano solos is his/her first priority. Similarly, one of the best approaches to advance his or her skills in instrumental music is to play ensemble along with other fellow students. The advantage of this is that, in addition to introducing a completely different method, it also enriches the musical skill of the players. The tacit agreement between/among players is the key ingredient for successful and perfect interpretation of ensemble works. Accordingly, each individual ensemble player should study and understand how the schemes in the scores alternate, and this was the incentive that brought about this study. In this paper I divided the patterns of theme succession into following six categories: direct succession, skipped succession, delayed succession, crossed succession, stretto succession, and independent subject. This paper demonstrates how to use this methodology as a tool, and the two-piano works by the Group des Six as examples. Hopefully this methodology may serve as a practical tool for analyzing patterns of theme succession for other two-piano works as well. In addition, it may also provide an alternative way of thinking so that both players may better understand how theme in two-piano works.
Keyword: Two-Piano, Theme Succession, Le Group des Six, French Music
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TACAM- Research on An Integration Curriculum Design Model
Shih-tsung Chang*
21 century is a time, which is full of opportunities for renovation as well as for challenge. One obvious renovation in Taiwan’s educational reform endeavors is -- “Curriculum Integration”; however, it is also a confusing and suffering experience for first-line teachers. Arguing that scholars in teacher-training organization and the first-line teachers should join together to form a “task force” team to face the problem–or, the challenge, this research intends to take the challenge and help teachers to meet the need. Based on the principles derived of “Curriculum Structure”, “Instructional System Design”, “Curriculum Integration”, this research goes ahead and develops out a five-step “TACAM” model as a reference tool for those first-line teachers who want to design their own school-based integration curriculums. The term, “TACAM”, represents five steps in the model as follow： 1. “Theme”, 2. “Analysis”, 3. “Concept”, 4. “Activities”, and 5. “Materials”. Hopefully, these five steps will guide teachers who are on their first step to become an educational researchers and developers.
Keyword: Integrated Curriculum, Curriculum Design, School-based Curriculum, Models.
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Reproducing Paintings with Mondrian’s Style During the Period of 1921~1933
Junewei Chen*
Piet Mondrian was one of the leaders of the De Stijl artistic movements. His paintings were representative of Neoplasticism and affected deeply European artistic creation at that time. In this paper, Mondrian’s painting style during the period of 1921~1933 was studied. By analyzing the ideas behind his creations, decomposing his sketches and consulting to critique literatures by specialists, this study tried to extract the rules used in Mondrian’s paintings that expressed his personal views. According to the findings, this study speculated that Mondrian’s painting process in the period of 1921-33 could generally be divided into three stages. Firstly, vertical and horizontal lines were arranged, then, three primary colors plus black were disposed, and lastly, these two parts were further harmonized. With a demonstrating program utilizing the rules compiled, a painting of Mondrian’s style during 1921-33 can be readily generated within no time.
Keyword：Piet Mondrian, form generation, style computing
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Hsiang Lin & Ing-jye Chang*
The purposes of the study are to understand the “drawing a diagram” strategies of mathematically gifted elementary students in solving problems, as well as what kind of different process responded to their questions. This study focused on the exam of students who were elected from the Pre-semifinal of Taiwan Olympiad Math competition in 2003. They were trained to compete in the Asia Pacific Olympiad for Primary Schools. Four students chosen from the contestants were interviewed in the semi-structure way. The research results show that there were four differences from their problem-solving process: (1) the different contents of the diagrammatic representation, (2) the different forms of the diagrammatic representation strategy, (3) the different applications of the diagrammatic representation, and (4) the different evaluations of the answer for the problems.
Keyword: Elementary school, mathematically gifted students, Mathematical problem-solving, “Drawing a diagram” strategy
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Shih-chan Wen & Yuh-chyn Leu**
The purpose of this study is to investigate what affects the consistency and inconsistency between an elementary school teacher’s mathematics beliefs and teaching practice. The main methodologies and data were gathered through a belief questionnaire, classroom observations, interviews and document collection. The results were as follows: 1. The possible cause of the consistency between the mathematics beliefs and teaching practice of the elementary teacher in the case study is found to be her strong will in dominating her teaching. 2. The plausible cause of the inconsistency between the mathematics beliefs and teaching practice of the elementary teacher is found to be affected by several factors. (1)The teacher miscomprehends the intension of the questionnaire. (2)The teacher lacks the pedagogical mathematics knowledge; therefore, she cannot implement the teaching practice about the untraditional mathematics teaching beliefs. (3)Over-populated students in her class, excessive mathematics materials needed to be taught, and many other unfavorable conditions also contribute to the causes of the inconsistency.
Keyword: Case study, Belief of the nature of mathematics, Belief of learning mathematics, Belief of teaching mathematics, Teaching practice.
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The Relation between Constructivist Teaching and the School Mathematics Learning
Jing Chung & Chia-ling Li*
We investigated the high school students who had been taught a constructivist curriculum in elementary school on their mathematics learning since elementary school. Our emphases are: 1.the influence of discussion on students’ learning. 2.the effect of teaching by the postponement of standard arithmetic algorithm of multiplication and division.
These two points drew great public attention. We prepared a questionnaire on mathematics teaching and learning and asked 1997 graduates of National Taipei Teachers College Laboratory School (NTTCLS) to reply and encouraged them to invite their current classmates to reply as contrast group. We got the following conclusion： 1.The degree of liking dropped monotonically from elementary to high schools in both groups. For NTTCLS students, the dropping rate became obvious from grade 7 to grade 10. We found three major reasons：the uneasiness toward teaching by lecture, the materials being too hard and too many to comprehend, the pressure of preparing the entrance examination on mathematics. 2.The postponement of the standard curriculum did hamper the ability of calculation. However, the students of NTTCLS caught up later and their grades in the National Junior High School Graduation Achievement Test were compatible. 3.Both groups liked more discussion between their teacher and students to clarify mathematics concepts and formula in the classroom. However, there was cognitive difference on the degree and mode of the discussion between the two groups. From the viewpoint of the interaction value. The cognitions on the discussion of the NTTCLS students were more favorable.
Keyword: constructivism, mathematics teaching and learning
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Chow-chin Lu*
Based on the proposition knowledge statements of cell related curriculum and the analysis of alternative conception of the elementary and middle schools students, this research is aimed to organize the Reading Comprehension Tests of Cell-related Curriculum (RCTC). The purpose of the instrument is to test whether the students’ alternative conception is due to their poor reading comprehension. The contents of RCTC were divided into three parts: the elementary school test papers, the junior high school test papers and the senior high school test papers. RCTC contains four components: important concepts, scientific glossaries, logical inferences and analytical predictions. This research has established superficial validity, content validity and construct validity. RCTC is able to allow the contents of scientific articles to fully reflect the cell related curriculum in elementary and middle schools. The cell related curriculum examination items are also capable to fully reflect how students form their alternative conception. The four components of RCTC are constructed and the variation can be explained, 32.79%(elementary school test papers), 40.99%(junior high school test papers) and 34.95%(senior high school test papers).
This research took grade 5, grade 7 and grade 11 students as subjects who lived in Taipei areas. The results showed that the internal consistency reliability of RCTC were 0.7322 (elementary school test papers), 0.8063 (junior high school test papers) and 0.7594 (senior high school test papers). The research found that the reliability and validities of RCTC were satisfactory. The factor analysis revealed that the Difficulty Index for RCTC were 0.292~0.801 (elementary school test papers), 0.327~0.779 (junior high school test papers) and 0.298~0.902 (senior high school test papers); the Discrimination Index for RCTC were 0.005~0.700 (elementary school test papers), 0.038~0.711 (junior high school test papers) and 0.100~0.667 (senior high school test papers). Finally, inappropriate article paragraphs or test items were revised according to the results of difficulties and resolutions of RCTC.
Keyword: the Reading Comprehension Tests of Cell-related Curriculum, important concepts, scientific glossaries, logical inferences and analytical predictions.
