Does teaching complex sentences have to be complicated? Lessons from children's online writing

This paper draws upon data from a research project, undertaken in 2 Year 6 classrooms during the 2006 World Cup, to analyse how children used complex sentence structures in their writing on a football web‐log. We explore how the confluence of a temporary, popular, global event and an online forum for communication created a moment of linguistic empowerment where pupils began to use high‐level forms of language, and we consider the implications of transience and interactivity for the teaching and learning of sentence grammar.     

New peace,new teachers: Student teachers' perspectives of diversity and community relations in Northern Ireland

This paper reflects upon student teachers' conceptions of inter-community relations and the preparation they receive to address issues of diversity and mutual understanding. The study in Northern Ireland is set against a backdrop of political, social and educational change, where a shared, peaceful future appears possible. Student teachers at a Catholic institution and a predominantly Protestant institution indicated a willingness to engage with issues concerning diversity and inter-community relations, despite having a limited knowledge of the concepts. However they also demonstrated clear views about the relevance and value of the preparation they received. The findings are evaluated using multicultural theory.     

‘School doesn't feel as much of a partnership’: parents' perceptions of their children's transition from nursery school to Reception class

This small‐scale study explores a group of English parents' perceptions of their relationships with their child's nursery school and, after the transition to Reception class, their primary school. It references current research and literature on the issues of transition and the role of parents in their children's education. Findings from semi‐structured interviews with parents, and with the children's key workers, were analysed for emergent themes. Parents felt very positively about their relationship with their child's nursery, and that they were fully involved in, and informed about, their child's learning. However, the transition to school heralded a change in their relationships. Most parents felt that they had a more distant and less reciprocal relationship with their child's teacher than they had had with their key worker at nursery. The paper concludes with recommendations for further research.     

Shaping a culture: oral histories of academic development in Australian universities

Academic development has had an approximately forty‐year history within Australian higher education, paralleling the major expansions and changes in the sector, both nationally and internationally. Its principal concerns have been the improvement of teaching and the professional development of the academics who teach. The history of academic development has gone largely undocumented and unexamined at a national level, in Australia and elsewhere. However, as university teaching has increasingly become important in relation to quality in higher education, academic development has become a central player in the work of universities. It becomes of particular importance at this time to garner a more thorough understanding of the continuities as well as the discontinuities in the meanings and practices of university teaching and in the work of those whose role has been to support its development. This article presents a discussion of two key themes identified from a set of oral history interviews conducted with early leaders in academic development in Australia. These themes offer different insights into issues and understandings of academic development in today’s university. The first concerns a perennial issue in academic development – the struggle to define academic development’s emerging ethos in relation to research and service to the broader university’s endeavour. The second theme represents an issue that has been forgotten or marginalised in the official accounts of academic development but which lives on in the ‘lore’ of the field – the role of activism in the shaping of university teaching and academic development.     

Teachers communicating about life-limiting conditions,death and bereavement

The number of children with life-limiting or life-threatening conditions in England is double what it was at the millennium. These conditions include cystic fibrosis, cancer, organ failure and severe neurological injuries. The Teaching for Life project aimed to explore the needs of teachers working in English schools in relation to working with children with life-limiting or life-threatening conditions. Ninety teachers completed a questionnaire and 38 completed individual and group interviews. About half the teachers interviewed had experience of working with children with life-limiting or life-threatening conditions, and half did not. The teachers expressed a number of anxieties about coping with illness, death and bereavement. They described difficulties in communicating with parents, children and health professionals. They worried about maintaining their professional role whilst needing to contain their own emotions and the emotions of others, within school cultures that did not feel supportive. The paper concludes that policies and practices that seek to support children with medical conditions need to acknowledge the weight of responsibility for teachers. They need to articulate with a whole school approach that protects and promotes teachers’ emotional well-being.     

Effects of inspiratory muscle training on time-trial performance in trained cyclists

We evaluated the effects of specific inspiratory muscle training on simulated time-trial performance in trained cyclists. Using a double-blind, placebo-controlled design, 16 male cyclists (VO 2max = 64 - 2 ml·kg -1 ·min -1 ; mean - sx ¥ ) were assigned at random to either an experimental (pressure-threshold inspiratory muscle training) or sham-training control (placebo) group. Pulmonary function, maximum dynamic inspiratory muscle function and the physiological and perceptual responses to maximal incremental cycling were assessed. Simulated time-trial performance (20 and 40 km) was quantified as the time to complete pre-set amounts of work. Pulmonary function was unchanged after the intervention, but dynamic inspiratory muscle function improved in the inspiratory muscle training group ( P h 0.05). After the intervention, the inspiratory muscle training group experienced a reduction in the perception of respiratory and peripheral effort (Borg CR10: 16 - 4% and 18 - 4% respectively; compared with placebo, P h 0.01) and completed the simulated 20 and 40 km time-trials faster than the placebo group [66 - 30 and 115 - 38 s (3.8 - 1.7% and 4.6 - 1.9%) faster respectively; P = 0.025 and 0.009]. These results support evidence that specific inspiratory muscle training attenuates the perceptual response to maximal incremental exercise. Furthermore, they provide evidence of performance enhancements in competitive cyclists after inspiratory muscle training.     

Dietary supplements

For the athlete training hard, nutritional supplements are often seen as promoting adaptations to training, allowing more consistent and intensive training by promoting recovery between training sessions, reducing interruptions to training because of illness or injury, and enhancing competitive performance. Surveys show that the prevalence of supplement use is widespread among sportsmen and women, but the use of few of these products is supported by a sound research base and some may even be harmful to the athlete. Special sports foods, including energy bars and sports drinks, have a real role to play, and some protein supplements and meal replacements may also be useful in some circumstances. Where there is a demonstrated deficiency of an essential nutrient, an increased intake from food or from supplementation may help, but many athletes ignore the need for caution in supplement use and take supplements in doses that are not necessary or may even be harmful. Some supplements do offer the prospect of improved performance; these include creatine, caffeine, bicarbonate and, perhaps, a very few others. There is no evidence that prohormones such as androstenedione are effective in enhancing muscle mass or strength, and these prohormones may result in negative health consequences, as well as positive drug tests. Contamination of supplements that may cause an athlete to fail a doping test is widespread.     

The effect of alterations in foot centre of pressure on lower body kinematics during the five-iron golf swing

ABSTRACT

The research aimed to evaluate the effects of an intervention aimed at altering pressure towards the medial aspect of the foot relating to stability mechanisms associated with the golf swing. We hypothesised that by altering the position of the foot pressure, the lower body stabilisation would improve which in turn would enhance weight distribution and underpinning lower body joint kinematics. Eight professional golf association (PGA) golf coaches performed five golf swings, recorded using a nine-camera motion analysis system synchronised with two force platforms. Following verbal intervention, they performed further five swings. One participant returned following a one-year intervention programme and performed five additional golf swings to provide a longitudinal case study analysis. Golf performance was unchanged evidenced by the velocity and angle of the club at ball impact (BI), although the one-year intervention significantly changed the percentage of weight experienced at each foot in the final 9% of downswing, which provided an even weight distribution at BI. This is a highly relevant finding as it indicates that the foot centre of pressure was central to the base of support and in-line with the centre of mass (CoM), indicating significantly increased stability when the CoM is near maximal acceleration.     

Providing access to electronic information resources in further education

This article aims to provide a baseline for future studies on the provision and support for the use of digital or electronic information services (EIS) in further education. The analysis presented is based on a multi‐level model of access, which encompasses access to and availability of information and communication technology (ICT) resources, access to and availability of EIS resources, and the third leg of staff skills and their development. The research was conducted within the third cycle of the JISC (Joint Information Services Committee) User Behaviour Monitoring and Evaluation Framework, in 2001/2002. Evidence was gathered from library and information service web sites and various stakeholders, including library and information service staff, academic staff and students to generate insights into the provision of access to EIS in further education. Sector‐wide funding initiatives have had a significant impact on ICT infrastructures, and these attract a positive response from students. EIS are represented on some library web sites but both web site development and EIS availability is very much less advanced than in higher education. Staff, however, lack sufficient dedicated access to ICT to be able to develop their own skills and use. There remains a low level of access to electronic information resources, with only limited access to these resources through library web sites. LIS managers face a number of challenges in enhancing this provision, including licensing arrangements, tight budgets that need to be spread across many discipline areas, and the absence of EIS designed specifically for the further education student. The other key challenge lies in the provision of time and opportunity for academic and LIS staff to develop their ICT and EIS skills, and, more generally in the further development of the role of Information and Learning Technology (ILT) Champions.