No two learners are the same. They take different approaches to learning tasks and they respond to formal education in different ways. Yet the current emphasis in education is on what is common in learners, from a common curriculum to a common teaching method. Individual Learners reviews and discusses recent research that shows that differences in personality contribute significantly to children's and adults' experiences of success and failure in education. It considers fundamental issues in the study of personality, and provides an up-to-date review and evaluation of the continuing nature-nurture debate. It then examines traits that can have an impact upon learning: aggressiveness, anxiety, achievement, motivation, self-confidence and shyness. It includes an account of the recent research into the links between personality and education and its implications for educational practice. With special dedication to SLar :) - stovokor
Inspired by the often uncomfortable interplay between autistic individuals, parents and professionals in understanding autistic spectrum conditions, Olga Bogdashina uses the concept of Theory of Mind (TOM) to consider these groups' different (and often conflicting) perspectives. TOM is the ability to imagine and make judgements about what others feel and think; its absence in autistic individuals is called 'mindblindness'. This book addresses the 'mindblindness' of people united in their interest in autism but divided by their different angles and perspectives.
Different Like Me introduces children aged 8 to 12 years to famous, inspirational figures from the world of science, art, math, literature, philosophy and comedy. Eight-year-old Quinn, a young boy with Asperger's Syndrome, tells young readers about the achievements and characteristics of his autism heroes, from Albert Einstein, Dian Fossey and Wassily Kandinsky to Lewis Carroll, Benjamin Banneker and Julia Bowman Robinson, among others. All excel in different fields, but are united by the fact that they often found it difficult to fit in - just like Quinn.
Adding a new introduction and two previously unpublished papers, Discourse and Practice: New Tools for Critical Discourse Analysis brings together van Leeuwen's methodological work on discourse analysis of the last 15 years. Discourse, van Leeuwen argues, is a resource for representation, a knowledge about some aspect of reality which can be drawn upon when that aspect of reality has to be represented, a framework for making sense of things. And they are plural. There can be different discourses, different ways of making sense of the same aspect of reality that serve different interests and will therefore be used in different social contexts.
