JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL INNOVATIONS
Year:2018 | Volume:17 | Issue:65 |Papers Count:7

his study has been conducted with the aim of investigating the cluster differences of students in terms of components of the goal orientation, academic stress, self-efficacy and achievement motivation in academic burnout of the 2nd grade high school students of Tabriz. ý The research population included the male and female 2nd grade high school students of Tabriz in 1393-94 academic year. ý The research sample consisted of 375 students, who were selected using stratified sampling method and according to the Morgan and Krejcie table estimation. Questionnaires of general self-efficacy of Sherer, Hermens achievement motivation, academic stress, Waz goal orientation and Breso et al. ý academic burnout were used as research instruments. To analyze the data, the cluster analysis and MANOVA have been used. ý The results of this analysis led to discover two clusters of students: the first cluster which is named »negative emotion cluster «included students who had low scores in mastery approach, self-efficacy, and achievement motivation, while having high scores in performance approach, performance avoidance and academic stress. ý The second cluster of students which are named» positive emotion cluster «had low scores in performance approach, mastery avoidance, performance avoidance and academic stress, while having high scores in mastery approach goal, self-efficacy and motivation achievement. ý The results revealed that the academic burnout of» negative emotion cluster students «is significantly higher than the» positive emotion cluster students«.

Student's misbehaviors in classrooms can have an important impact on the teaching and learning effectiveness. Detection of the associated factors with these misbehaviors is the first step in designing any corrective program. The purpose of this study was to discriminate between the students with high and low stressful behavior based on early maladaptive schemas and family functioning components. The research approach was one person-oriented and discrimination function analysis was used for this differentiation. Students with high stressful behavior (n = 62) and low stressful ones (n = 55) were selected based on the first and third quartile points of a student's stressful behaviors questionnaire from a group of 360 tenth grade female students of Tabriz. Two predictor variables were measured by the early maladaptive schemas and the family functioning questionnaire. Findings showed that the students with highest degree of stressful behavior have higher mean in the early maladaptive schemas and family functioning components. The results of the discrimination function led to a significant discriminative function with average power. Function problem solving components had the highest power in the two group's discrimination. Based on this discriminative function, about 75% of the students were properly assigned in their initial groups. The findings emphasize the importance of paying attention to family components and student's schemas on their misbehaviors.

In this qualitative study, the opportunities and threats of education in mother tongue in Iran's formal education system from the perspective of experts and authorities has been investigated. Using qualitative content analysis method, a semi-structured interview was done with professors of linguistics, educational sciences and psychology and also with the authorities of education organization in the Kermanshah province who were selected using purposive sampling method. 18 articles, four books and five theses also were examined in this context and their analysis was continued up to the saturation point. The unit of analysis was the theme. To ensure the validity of the findings, member checking was used and to determine the reliability, inter-rater agreement was applied. At the end of the inductive content analysis, and through continuous comparison of the obtained codes it was turned out that from the perspective of experts, cognitive development, mental health, national unity and the spread of democracy are the most important opportunities for education in mother tongue. Authorities also noted the realization of development, improvement of academic performance and the development of human resources as opportunities and the poverty of linguistic resources as a threat for education in mother tongue. The results of this study included valuable points to the benefit of education in mother tongue for Iran’s educational policy makers.

The purpose of this study was to design and validate a competency model for teachers of Iranian public high schools. It was a developmental study according to the research objectives and a mixed methods study with exploratory design according to the research method. The materials in the qualitative section of the study included data of the interviews. The research sample in the qualitative section of the study consisted of the 4 groups (n = 23), i. e., scientific experts (n=6), education managers (n=5), high school principals (n=6), teachers of public high schools (n=6) in Tehran who were selected through purposeful sampling method. Also, the research sample in the quantitative section of the study included 350 scientific experts who were selected through multistage stratified sampling method. The research instrument consisted of deep interview and the researcher-made questionnaire including 75 items and 1 open-ended question, with α = 0. 95, showing high reliability. The qualitative data were analyzed using content analysis method. Findings of the qualitative data analysis were verified by interviewees using Delphi technique. The questionnaire data were analyzed using the descriptive statistics (mean, variance, standard deviation and drawing the diagram) and inferential statistics including the statistical tests of Kolmogorov-Smirnov, Chi-square test, Kruskal Wallis, Exploratory Factor Analysis, Confirmatory Factor Analysis and multivariate regression coefficients. Findings showed that the competency model for teachers of Iranian public high schools include 71 competency components which were classified into eight factors (principle components) namely, knowledge, abilities, skills, insight, attitude, ethical characteristics, personality characteristics and credibility. Based on the results, it could be concluded that the most important competencies of a teacher is having the abilities and skills required for doing professional duties and responsibilities.

The advent of new technologies has replaced physical manipulatives—which are physical models of equivalent representation of concepts—by virtual manipulatives which many learners and teachers find useful in the mathematics classroom. In the current study, we investigated students’ motivation to engage with virtual manipulatives as a tool in the mathematics education. The activity theory was used to develop a multi-componential instrument to be used in a survey of virtual manipulatives in education and it was administered among 442 Iranian high school students with the aim of examining students’ perception of various aspects of the manipulatives. Using the Rasch-Andrich rating scale model (RSM), an item response theory model, psychometric features of the instrument including item endorsibility, learners’ ability, fit, and unidimensionality was examined and a valid instrument was developed for measuring students’ motivation in using virtual manipulation. The validated instrument can be used to find the factors that could improve students’ perceptions of virtual manipulatives in the mathematics classroom. Investigating the relationship between the constructs in the validated instrument can cross the boundary of knowledge and enhance the quality of teaching and learning mathematics as well.

Although some reasearchers have shown the relationship between philosophy for children (P4C) and emotional intelligence (EQ), the quality of this relationship has not been investigated carefully. In this paper, authors seek to present a conceptual model to show the relationship between P4C (focusing on caring thinking) and EQ. The method of study was analytic-descriptive. The data showed that caring thinking as an inseparable part of P4C has cognitive, emotional and practical dimensions and includes activities such as definition and distinction of emotional terms and concepts, experiences of various emotions, exploring emotions, examining the relationship between emotions and judgments, approaches and situations, attention and valuation, empathy, moral and social experiences, emotional support and facilitation. These activities are in line with the four domains of EQ, i. e., perceiving and expressing emotions, facilitating thought through emotions, understanding and regulating them effectively; so that the abilities related to the domains of EQ grow, in parallel with training the caring thinking. As a result, it is suggested that while using the P4C program, relying to just caring thinking should be avoided and in the situations where the development of the EQ dimension is intended, training the caring thinking should be considered, respectively.

This research aimed at determining the exterior efficiency of technical and vocational curriculum in the selected fields. So, 400 graduates of electro-technic, industrial electronic, commercial accounting and financial accounting of Tehran province were randomly selected using multistage cluster sampling method. The required data were collected using researcher-made questionnaire and interview and then they were analyzed. It was an evaluative study. Findings showed that according to the definitions of the Iranian Center for Statistics, 82 percent of graduates are employed and 18 percent are unemployed. Because of low chance of employment with a diploma, most of technical and vocational graduates prefer to continue their education. About two thirds of the employed graduates have an unrelated job and there is no meaningful relationship between their education and employment. Graduates mostly have jobs related to the areas of sales and services. Most of the jobs are daily-paid, monthly-paid or paid by contracts. They mainly find jobs through the intervention of friends and relatives, or they work in their paternity, family and relatives’ business. Internship and apprenticeship of technical and vocational education are not effective and do not contribute to the employment of graduates. Graduates believe that the main reason of unemployment and the unrelated employment is the lack of job opportunities and lack of adequate and up-to-date training related to the job market needs. It seems that the mentioned curriculum does not have acceptable exterior efficiency in terms of employment, especially related employment and other related issues.