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The purpose of this paper is to investigate and compare the effects of group-to-whole student-led oral discussion and small-group collaborative drafting as pre-writing tasks on Iranian intermediate English as a foreign language (EFL) learners’ writing performance. Additionally, the difference between the writing components was examined.

To achieve these objectives, a group of 120 intermediate EFL learners participated in a pretest–posttest study in which they were randomly assigned into two experimental groups and one control group. The students in all three groups were tasked with writing a textbook evaluation report for the pretest and posttest. The pre-writing process in the first experimental group consisted of a group-to-whole student-led oral discussion, while the second experimental group engaged in small-group collaborative drafting.

The results indicate that both pre-tasks were effective in improving the participants’ writing skill, while collaborative drafting was even more efficient. Furthermore, it was observed that more writing components improved through collaborative drafting. It is concluded, therefore, that the social atmosphere created through oral discussion and the scaffolding resulting from collaborative drafting can help in writing improvement.

The findings herein can have implications for first language (L1) composition instruction and second language (L2) writing teaching and, thus, underscoring the utility of the social constructivist approach to writing instruction.

As there has been no study conducted to explore the effects of group-to-whole student-led oral discussion on EFL learners’ writing skill and to compare its impacts to those of small-group collaborative drafting, the results of this study fill this gap in the literature.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the implications for student learning when accounting education is delivered in the student’s non-native language. It examines the impact on learning arising from the different components of English language competencies, namely, listening, reading, writing, and speaking.

The data are drawn from focus group interviews with students from Mainland China undertaking an accounting degree in Australia.

The findings indicate that students relied primarily on their reading instead of listening to seek understanding, and in turn, writing was considered less important compared to listening and reading. Notably, speaking was overlooked by many students as it was considered the least important skill necessary to achieve success as a student and to be a competent practitioner. Students developed a misconception that the quality of oral communication required of accountants in practice is unimportant.

The findings will assist accounting educators and the accounting profession in designing and implementing appropriate instructional strategies and assessment tasks for international students. One suggestion includes a more balanced weighting between written and oral assessment.

Few studies have specifically explored the impact of English language on learning accounting. While some studies examine specific aspects of language as a unitary concept, little has been reported on the impact of all components of the language skill-set on student learning.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a framework for conceptualizing three dispositional‐related stages that educators may experience in their professional careers and address the implications of these stages for integrating moral literacy perspectives into initial and advanced teacher and leader certification programs.

The dispositional conceptual framework is presented and discussed from the author's viewpoint. The contention is that there is at least some general consistency that teacher and leader program candidates, at various stages of their professional careers, may experience and reflect in the attitudes – a component of dispositions – that they bring to the university classroom learning environment.

Observations and insights about the consistency of dispositions within each of three program candidate groups are discussed. The dispositions emerged as: attitude formation; attitude adjustment; and attitude alignment. Within the context of course development and through that process of course delivery, the author describes how an understanding of candidates' attitudinal stages informed decisions about course content and instructional strategies to facilitate an ethos of values inquiry and reflection.

The framework may be useful to professors of education interested in integrating values inquiry and moral agency into their teaching.

This study examined the output quality of a US microenterprise training program created to help entrepreneurs develop business plans for their ventures. The program concludes with the entrepreneurs' plans being scored by a panel of experts. Hypotheses were developed and tested to determine the importance of feedback, key components of business plan scores, and differences between teams and solo entrepreneurs. Timely feedback on business plan homework was the most significant driver of business plan quality, contributing to higher scores on the written plan and on the plan's presentation to the expert panel. Plans developed by teams also scored higher than those prepared by solo entrepreneurs.

One of the main Common Core Requirements focuses on student use of authentic subject area skills. These skills are those used by professionals in the academic field of study. It is important that students develop and use appropriate historical thinking skills in the classroom. Historical skills include ability to read, write, speak, listen, and complete research based projects, and to appropriately analyze primary and secondary documents to make conclusions about what has occurred during a historical event. The implementation of instructional techniques requiring students to think like a historian are widely supported in the literature and are largely focused on the development of student historical literacy. This article examines how combining the use of children’s literature and primary sources can be used to construct a lesson promoting historical inquiry in the secondary classroom.

The purpose of this paper is to examine accounting students' experience of compulsory group work. The paper hypothesises that a student‐centered style of teaching‐involving activities, like case studies and group‐based learning encourages students to take a deeper approach to learning. The paper also sought students' suggestions to improve learning in a group environment and to identify areas for future research.

There is a paucity of research that examines the relationships between group work and the adoption of a deep learning approach. This research uses empirical data in the form of a questionnaire with open and closed response options. This paper uses a qualitative method, phenomenography, to analyse the responses of 362 students.

The findings reveal variations in conceptions of group work among students with evidence of both surface and deep approaches to learning.

The following limitations are recognised: the questionnaire may not have given students an opportunity to express their perceptions fully; the absence of demographic data did not permit consideration of cultural factors on the outcome and the analysis was able to focus only on perceptions of behaviour rather than actual behaviour. A major implication from the paper is the value of research into accounting education. The paper provides the opportunity to trial research, reflect upon and change curricula, delivery and assessment based on research findings.

Student experiences in group work in accounting, while not entirely new, is however, an area not widely reported on.

The purpose of this paper is to address the role of cognitive skills and extent of skill use at work in explaining the immigrant–native wage gap in Europe. The study targets immigrant–native disparities in literacy and numeracy cognitive skills, as important, yet not exhaustive factor behind immigrants’ wage penalty.

The research relies on the Program of International Assessment of Adult Competencies data for 15 European countries. The empirical analysis employs multivariate regression analysis and incorporates the full set of plausible values for each skill domain, to correctly measure cognitive skills. To estimate standard errors, the authors employ Jackknife replication methodology with 80 replication weights and final population weight.

The authors document that, on average, immigrants achieve substantially worse scores in literacy and numeracy test domains. Only highly educated immigrants tend to improve their skills over time in host countries. The results of wage gap analysis indicate that having cognitive skills, demographic profile and occupation category comparable to natives does not yield comparable wage rate. The remaining wage gap results from the systematic differences in skills application at work, as immigrants use their skills to lower extent, relative to natives.

The research employs a novel measure of productive human capital, which accounts for cognitive skills in literacy and numeracy domains, and frequencies of skill use at work. It allows to more precisely evaluate the immigrant–native disparity in human capital application and its reflection on the wage rate.

Presents an alternative lower bound to the elastic buckling collapse of thin shells of revolution, in comparison with results from geometrically non‐linear elastic analysis. The numerical finite element method is based on axisymmetric rotational shell elements whose strain‐displacement relations are described by Koiter’s small finite deflection theory, with displacements expanded circumferentially using a Fourier series. First, compares the reduced stiffness linear analysis, based on the buckling equation without incremental linear in‐plane energy components corresponding to the lowest eigenmode (for a particular cylindrical shell under external pressure), with the results obtained by Batista and Croll. Second, the non‐linear astatic (quasi‐static) elastic analysis to clamped spherical caps under uniform external pressure is carried out in order to compare the results from a reduced stiffness analysis from viewpoints of not only buckling loads, but also total potential energy. Argues that the astatic buckling loads may relate to reductions due to a specific imperfection effect on elastic buckling collapses.

This study aims to investigate the various competencies a graduate should hold to prepare them for graduate building surveying roles from employers’ perspective.

This study uses a sequential exploratory mixed-method approach by informing a quantitative study with the finding from a qualitative study.

Based on exploratory factor analysis, the study found that 13 essential competencies are valued by the employers when recruiting building surveying graduates, as they are requisites for effective job performance. Personal management skills, technical surveying knowledge and knowledge of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyor standards are the essential competencies based on the level of variance extracted by the three components. Other competency categories include client management skills, being goal-driven and self-motivated, optimistic personality traits, strong mental resilience, building maintenance and management knowledge and time management skills, among others that are explained in the paper.

The essential competencies were dependent on maintaining a balance between knowledge, skills and personality-based competencies. Measures and approaches for gaining the essential competencies, as well as their level of significance, are further discussed. The study will be of significant benefits to employers of graduate building surveyors, academic institutions that are seeking to improve their graduate employability, as well as students who are preparing for the world of work.

Describes a methodological framework for evaluating intervention programmes to establish and develop quality assurance systems in general hospitals, based on the authors’ experience in participating in a specific intervention programme in quality assurance. Both the approach and the design of the evaluation programme were shaped by the unique characteristics of this intervention programme. The evaluation programme was based on a model of organizational behaviour and change developed especially for the introduction of quality assurance systems into hospitals. With modification, the programme can also be used to evaluate other intervention programmes.