Foreword

Annals of Dyslexia -     

A twin-study of sleep difficulties in school-aged children

This study examines frequency, overlap, and genetic and environmental influences on sleep difficulties, which are understudied in school-aged children. The Sleep Self Report and the Children's Sleep Habits Questionnaire were completed by 300 twin pairs (aged 8 years) and their parents. Child report suggested more frequent sleep problems than parent report (e.g., regular sleep onset delay was reported by 45% of children and 17% of parents). Associations between most of the sleep difficulties were small but significant (e.g., r(s)=.16 for parent report of bedtime resistance and sleep onset delay). Twin correlations based on parent reports suggest greater genetic influence (M=50%) than those based on child self-report (M=18%). Possible rater effects should be considered when evaluating children's sleep problems.     

Doulas as community health workers: lessons learned from a volunteer program

Doulas, women who primarily provide social support during childbirth, have been associated with a number of positive health outcomes. Because the primary model of practice for doulas is a fee-for-service model in which families privately hire a doula, many expectant women who could benefit from doula support are unable to access the service. The Doulas Care program, located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, represents one model in which doulas provide services without charge. As a result of their extended role in the community, doulas who work with the Doulas Care program have unique educational needs. Through the use of focus groups with the program's volunteer doulas, educational needs related to overcoming barriers to being a doula working in the community were identified. Recommendations for education and training are made to improve the support doulas offer as community health outreach workers.     

Teachers’ perception of mobile edutainment for special needs learners: the Malaysian case

Study of Malaysian adoption of mobile learning (m-learning) is still in the early stages. However, there are numerous researchers in the country exploring the potential and application of m-learning in the Malaysian education system, including special education. A key question is whether teachers are prepared to incorporate mobile technology as part of their teaching tools or do teachers perceive mobile technology only as personal communication gadgets. This paper investigates teachers' perception of m-learning applications in special education classes. Interviews were conducted to collect related information on teachers' perceptions of m-learning in the selected schools. The teachers expressed that there are limited resources to cater to the attention of special needs learners and they believed edutainment technologies such as augmented reality, game-based educational software and animation projects could be the answer. The benefits and challenges of implementing blended learning for special education are also discussed. The paper concludes by summarising the current environment of m-learning in Malaysian special needs education, together with recommendations for future use of the technology.     

Community‐based early intervention for children with behavioural,emotional and social problems: evaluation of the Scallywags Scheme

Scallywags is a community‐based, early intervention programme for young children (aged 3–7) with behavioural, emotional and social problems, which integrates work in the home and school with a parenting curriculum and direct work with children. A pre‐post intervention study across multi‐sites of 340 participants is reported. Using standardised measures, the study found statistically significant reductions in problems at home and school experienced by children who completed the programme, and in parental stress levels. Participation was found to be high and the project acceptable to parents, many of whom would be described as hard to reach. The rigorous evaluation of this real‐life service and its positive outcomes highlight the potential of such programmes to tackle the needs of these children and families, and help prevent longer‐term problems associated with early onset behavioural problems, including social exclusion, antisocial behaviour and educational failure.     

Provision of Special Education Services to Youth in Local Jails

The Alexandria Virginia Office of the Sheriff and the Alexandria Virginia Public School Board participated for two years in a state funded grant which focused on the delivery of special education services and regular compulsory education services to juveniles and young adults through the age of 21 years who were committed to the Alexandra Adult Detention Center. Provision of special education services to eligible individuals in jails is a unique concept and rarely provided given the transient, short-term nature of the population and other demands of the setting. The program model of team teaching supported full time inclusion of special education students with the general and compulsory education programs in the jail.     

Making learning visible in initial teacher education: a pedagogical characterisation scheme

This paper reports the development of a scheme of characterising pedagogical practices in initial teacher education classes. The scheme is intended to provide baseline data on classroom pedagogical practices in Singapore’s sole provider of initial teacher education (ITE). This study is original in that the research team has found no reports of independent research to characterise, through video analysis of classroom practices, the pedagogical practices experienced during ITE. By characterising the pedagogical practices of a purposive sample of ITE lessons run at the National Institute of Education Singapore, this study contributes an initial scheme to produce detailed and layered representations of pedagogical practices through video recordings, which opens a new approach to research on teacher education. The implications with regard to teacher education policy and practice will be discussed.     

Developing Service Area Indices for Community Colleges: California's Method and Experience

The economic, educational and social environments of the students served by a community college are important factors in college performance accountability, policy analysis, program evaluation, and strategic planning. For example, previous research shows that income per county is a significant predictor of transfer rates for community colleges. However, conditions for the actual geographic area of the students served by a community college may differ, for various reasons, from the economic conditions for the county in which the college is located. This article describes the development of institutional or college-level indices as an enhancement to county-level data, their use as adjustment variables for California's Accountability Reporting for the Community Colleges (ARCC), and their applicability to other research and planning studies. The service area indices are created by combining the enrollment patterns of students by ZIP Code of residence with ZCTA (ZIP Code Tabulation Area) level economic and educational data from Census 2000.