How do teachers in Ireland and England conceptualise dyslexia?

This paper presents the findings of a comparative study using data from questionnaire surveys carried out in England (n=57) and Ireland (n=72). The researchers examine how teachers and teaching assistants who are currently teaching pupils with dyslexia in primary schools describe dyslexia and what may have influenced their conceptualisation. The paper examines teachers' responses both in terms of how they view their pupils presenting difficulties in the classroom, and how far they link these to underlying differences in cognitive processing. The researchers suggest ways in which this might influence their teaching in terms of methodology. Findings have been mapped to the Morton and Frith causal modelling framework. The implications of these findings for the training and support of teachers are discussed in the light of recent national initiatives to improve the teaching of dyslexic pupils in both countries.     

Auto-Instructional Methods in Great Britain

Great Britain has a very active Association for Programmed Learning, started in 1962. It arranges courses in programming, publishes research and other P.I. information, and organizes conferences. At the latest annual general meeting (March 31, 1967) Professor E. A. Peel (The University of Birmingham) was re-elected as President, and Dr. C. K. Rouse (Goldsmith's College) as Chairman. Among those labelled ‘Vice-Presidents’ (no less than a dozen individuals hold this glittering title) or ‘Council members’ are many persons well known internationally through their publications within the P.I. field, among others: Dr. J. Annett, Professor K. Austwick, Dr. J. Hartley, J. F. Leedham, G. O. M. Leith, Derek Rowntree and D. J. Unwin. Dr. J. Hartley serves as a Foreign Liaison Officer and would therefore be a natural contact for individuals from other countries. The association will extend its name to be somewhat more inclusive: ‘Association for Programmed Learning and Educational Technology’.     

Synthetic speech and computer aided reading for reading disabled children

A simple way to partially compensate for word decoding problems is to let disabled readers have a micro-computer pronounce the words they are unable to read. Using a program developed for the IBM-PC/AT and a Scandinavian multilingual text-to-speech unit, children can read a textfile (of any size) on the monitor and use a mouse to request the immediate pronunciation of a word. In study 1, Grade-2 children did not perform better on a reading comprehension test when using computer-aided reading, but they rated their understanding significantly higher than when using a text. In study 2, the effect of computer-aided reading in special education settings was studied. Results indicated that older children, from grade 4 and up, benefited more from the computer aided reading than did younger ones. However, both experimental and control groups showed gains in several aspects of reading. Some children did not seem to have metacognitive skills enough to benefit from the computer-aided system. These children may initially need more extensive training in how to use the system and how to monitor their own reading. Reasons for letting the computer deliver the decoding aid as morphological segments are discussed.     

Assessment of teacher competence using video portfolios: Reliability, construct validity, and consequential validity

The richness and complexity of video portfolios endanger both the reliability and validity of the assessment of teacher competencies. In a post-graduate teacher education program, the assessment of video portfolios was evaluated for its reliability, construct validity, and consequential validity. Although video portfolio facilitated a reliable and valid assessment of teacher competencies, procedures to improve assessment quality were also revealed and are therefore discussed: more explicit grounding of assessment results in the data, peer debriefing, prolonged engagement with the assessment data, cross-checking to find confirmatory or counter examples.     

Bologna in Context: a horizontal perspective on the dynamics of governance sites for a Europe of Knowledge

This article presents a horizontal perspective on the dynamics of governance sites currently active for the European of Knowledge and places the Bologna process in this wider European level context. It introduces two dynamics of change in political organisation: a) institutional differentiation and specialisation and b) the interaction between institutional spheres and sectors. Signs of sectoral differentiation are identified in the history of European integration that is relevant to the Europe of Knowledge. The argument is that the nature and sequence of the differentiation process are key to understand current governance processes. It is illustrated by showing how a horizontal dynamics has been played out in the case of the EU's Lisbon strategy and in particular the cooperation taking place in the framework of the EU's “Education and Training 2010” work programme. The analysis shows how the Bologna process, although perpetuated as a sector internal governance site, has co-evolved and interacted with this strategy, partly as an object of emulation and source of support and partly as a competing governance site. A horizontal dynamics of change is also evident in the larger Lisbon strategy as it lifted research and higher education policy to the centre of the European integration project. It resulted in the development of several governance sites with different foci targeting European higher education. A more prominent place on the political agenda came together with demands that research and education should be integrated with the overall political and economic objectives of the EU.     

Navigating between an emic and an etic approach in ethnographic research. Crucial aspects and strategies when communicating critical results to participants

There is a fundamental tension in ethnographic research between trying to understand participants from within their own perspective and viewing them with greater distance. With this in mind, the aim of this article is to describe how a reflexive communication model was developed during the study of El Sistema Gothenburg, and to discuss aspects and strategies that are crucial when navigating between an emic and an etic approach. It is argued that by reflexive communication, researchers can make their results useful for participants and that reflecting upon the relationship is even more important when communicating critique. With the help of this model, communication of critical results was facilitated by the establishment of an integrative approach that combined the insiders’ and outsiders’ perspectives and was based on the formation of a strong relationship between the researchers and the participants, as well as by the participants’ own cultivation of theoretical understanding.     

新世纪我国医学期刊发展的思考

对《1999年度中国科技期刊引证报告》中555种医学期刊的影响因子、载文量、总被引频次的统计进行排序，分析我国医学期刊发展的不足，提出新世纪应如何更好地发展的建议。     

Knowing and teaching kinaesthetic experience in skateboarding: an example of sensory emplacement

The body has become a vital research object in several disciplines in recent years. Indeed, in the social sciences and humanities, a corporeal turn in which embodiment has become a key concept related to learning and socialisation is discussed. This cross-disciplinary paper addresses the epistemological question of how we know what we know and theoretically and empirically contributes to current arguments of a shift from embodiment to emplacement. In other words, this study strives for understanding of the intersection of mind, body and place through a focus on how bodily knowing is formed as part of a moving world. The purpose of the paper is to explore the kinaesthetic experience as bodily knowing in emplaced semi-formal teaching. Through long-term ethnography in a Swedish skateboard setting and in-depth analysis of digital visual material, this paper demonstrates how kinaesthetic experience might be viewed as knowing and how a particular type of this experience might be interpreted as explosiveness and, as such, an act of physical remembrance and energy transformation. Knowing is formed along paths of movement and rhythm, and kinaesthesia is identified as a multisensory experience. It is argued that a fruitful way of bridging the mind–body divide is to view the body as un/knowing, rendering it both knowing and not knowing simultaneously. Moreover, emplaced via its senses in a sociocultural and spatio-temporal environment, this conceptualisation of a moving body in a moving world might allow for re-thinking regarding how a body in context knows, teaches and, possibly, learns.