Broad changes in normative health behavior are critical to overcoming many of the contemporary challenges to public health. Reduction in tobacco use during the last third of the 20th century--one of the greatest improvements in public health--illustrates such change. The culture change from accommodation to intolerance of smoking is irrefutable.…

The present commentary considers the theoretical and applied implications of Froh, Bono, and colleagues' benefit-appraisals intervention to promote gratitude among youth. First, we discuss the developmental competencies that children need to master before they can benefit from this intervention. The target curriculum was successful among 8- to…

This case illustrates why school leaders must be culturally proficient to serve all students and lead effectively. I discuss one case in Ohio that is representative of many other American schools. In particular, I examine the cultural challenges educational leaders must commonly face. This case encourages administrators to participate in…

With the tertiary education mantra of creativity, critical thinking and innovation in mind, we consider the critical-creativity of error. Taking the university to model social orthography, or "correct writing", according to the norms of disciplines, we consider the role of error in the classroom. Looked at another way, error questions…

Moral formation is the core of all education, especially education for democratic citizenship. Moral formation requires, among other things, institutions with clear moral visions to which individuals can aspire. Moral clarity can be difficult in a society with broad diversity of moral commitments. In schools, the recognition of diversity has…

This article examines a Confucian conception of competence and its corresponding response to the competencies agenda that underpins international large-scale assessments such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). It is argued that standardised transnational assessments are undergirded by a technical rationality that…

The post-world war II American social and cultural setting was ambiguously featured with enforced conformity in the name of prosperity and Americanization of the nation. Despite of this fact, American writers, especially, dramatists conveyed their message against this fixation through variety and intellectuality. Edward Albee's "The Zoo…

This paper considers the landscape of early childhood education in England to be dominated by discourses of "readiness-for-school" and "readiness-for-learning" that act to heavily stratify the educational spaces inhabited by young children. The "ready-child" is constructed as a normative identity towards which the…

The transition to adulthood has received the attention of scholars, practitioners, and policy makers in recent years. For some, the transition is an extended period during which commitments to adulthood institutions are delayed, termed emerging adulthood. For others, the transition is brief and commitments to adulthood institutions begin without…

Functional behavior assessments (FBAs) and behavior intervention plans (BIPs) are critical components in the education of students with, or at risk for, emotional disturbance (ED). The purpose of this article is to compare the legal requirements with the professional requirements for FBAs and BIPs. The comparison is first according to the…

Stephenie Meyer's "Twilight" Saga has achieved extraordinary popularity and scholars have interrogated the nature of its appeal from a variety of perspectives. Its popularity raises questions because in many ways it mirrors romantic fictions from the 1960s and 1970s. Such fictions have been read by critics as expressions of female…

Within the frameworks of Sociocultural theory, particularly Vygotskian sociocultural theory and ZPD, Lave and Wenger's CoP, and contemporary sociocultural theory, this paper seeks to examine the unfavourable scholarly portrayal of learners and their identities based on learners' behaviours, attitudes, and beliefs about the social element of…

This article explores the possibility that "dyslexics" can be thought of as being "othered" and defined by the social norms and educational practices surrounding literacy; which can be termed "Lexism". As such the author, Craig Collinson, a postgraduate academic support officer at Edge Hill University, presents "Lexism" as a new concept that…

Gabriel Garcia Marquez is always keen on presenting to the people the various facets of their history. His literary language acts as effective means for describing the critical historical aspects of Latin America because the legacy of colonialism had destroyed so many important traces of the native culture of that area. This has led him to search…

The social integration of migrant populations has been defined as an intercultural, mutually enriching process, and can be distinguished from processes of assimilation that involve a more unilateral adaptation on the part of immigrants to the norms of the host country. In Spain, this distinction has become blurred in both political and educational…