Examining teachers’ early writing knowledge and practices

Reading and Writing - This study examined preschool teachers’ writing knowledge and how this knowledge relates to classroom writing practices. Head Start teachers (N?=?47) across...     

The Black Women’s Gathering Place: reconceptualising a curriculum of place/space

ABSTRACT

This article de-centres imperialist, capitalist, patriarchal traditions of critical approaches in Curriculum Studies via an examination of experiences shared at The Black Women’s Gathering Place (BWGP), a non-traditional space where a diverse, intergenerational group of Black women engage with each other through the sharing of stories. In the BWGP, we enact components of Pinar’s [2004. What is Curriculum Theory? Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum] concept of currere, simultaneously re-entering our collective and individual pasts and re-imagining our futures in an effort to reconcile our public and private selves. Taking up tenets of Black feminist theory, theoretical framings of hidden curriculum, and components of Ng-A-Fook’s [2007. An Indigenous Curriculum of Place: The United Houma Nation’s Contentious Relationship with Louisiana’s Educational Institutions. New York, NY: Peter Lang] ‘Curriculum of Place,’ we reconceptualise a curriculum of place/space that negotiates dominant norms expressed in social environments. In this space, we validate traditional knowledges upheld in communities of Black women across the Diaspora. The BWGP allows us to argue for a re-presentation of extant knowledge by and about Black women.     

Perspective Taking: Training Procedures in Developmentally Typical Preschoolers. Different Intervention Methods and Their Effectiveness

Perspective taking, defined as the ability to take on the visual, cognitive, and affective perspective of others, is considered a highly adaptive skill, vital for the child’s social, intellectual, and emotional development. This article provides a critical analysis of scientific psychological literature from 1995 to the present on the main methods of intervention used to promote perspective taking in developmentally typical preschool children (3–5 years). The focus is on different methodological approaches, and how the cognitive and emotional dimensions that make up this capacity have been developed through specific operational procedures, emphasizing their strengths and critical factors. In particular, it focuses on the intervention methods based on three major analytical perspectives, specifically the cognitive approach [Theory of Mind (ToM)], the behaviorist approach [Relational Frame Theory (RFT)], and finally, the socio-constructionist approach, are compared. Analysis of the collected data has revealed that despite some critical yet controversial factors, it is actually possible to teach and improve perspective taking in preschoolers through different methods, applicable in different contexts and dependent on the involvement of significant adults, such as parents and educators.     

Lexical-semantic reading in a shallow orthography: evidence from a girl with Williams Syndrome

The reading skills of a girl with Williams Syndrome are assessed by a timed word-naming task. To test the efficiency of lexical and nonlexical reading, we considered four marker effects: Lexicality (better reading of words than nonwords), frequency (better reading of high than low frequency words), length (better reading of short than long words), and contextuality (better reading of words with one-to-one grapheme-to-phoneme mapping than words with context-sensitive graphemes). Results suggested that this girl has failed to develop efficient orthography-to-phonology mappings and is dependent upon a lexical-semantic reading procedure in which a word’s pronunciation is activated after its meaning is obtained.     

Continuous professional development and ECEC quality: Findings from a European systematic literature review

This article presents the findings of an analysis of the effects of CPD initiatives on the quality of the pedagogical practices of ECEC practitioners. It is part of a larger study commissioned by Eurofound and jointly conducted by VBJK, IOE and PPMI (Eurofound, 2015). In order to draw policy-relevant information that might support decision makers in designing effective ECEC policies in their countries, the study reviewed existing research evidence published on this topic not only in English, but also in all the languages currently in use in EU Member States. Therefore, it involved country experts from EU-28 Member States. The research question was framed by the political priorities identified by the Council Conclusions on Early Childhood Education and Care (EU Council, 2011). The systematic literature review methodology elaborated by the EPPI-Centre for informing evidence-based policies in the field of education and social sciences was adopted to review the evidence drawn from primary research studies cross-nationally. The study revealed that long-term CPD interventions integrated into practice, such as pedagogical guidance and coaching in reflection groups, proved to be effective not only in countries with a well-established system of ECEC provision and a high level of qualification requirements for the practitioners, but also in countries with poorly subsidised ECEC systems and low qualification requirements. CPD initiatives based on the active engagement of practitioners and on peer exchanges within a shared scientific framework, proved to be the most effective.     

Mentoring practices in workplace-based professional preparation: a critical analysis of policy developments in the Italian context

In recent years, the issue of early childhood staff professionalisation has been taking an increasingly prominent position in policy-making and academic debates at the international level. Despite this growing interest, studies investigating the content and delivery of professional preparation programmes for early childhood practitioners are still quite rare in European literature. Against this background, the article will describe and critically analyse the characterising features of the university degree for the professional preparation of pre-school teachers in Italy, with a special focus on workplace-based training. In particular, the theoretical underpinnings and shared understandings related to the implementation of mentoring practices within the university course will be explored by drawing on the data collected from documentary sources and interviews with local experts. Findings highlight that the main strengths of mentoring practices within such a programme are: (a) the extended placement periods in early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings which allow prospective teachers to live the culture of practice; (b) the critically reflective component of tutoring practices, which combines theoretical and experiential learning; (c) the strong partnerships built at the local level between ECEC services and universities, which generates reciprocal influences between academic research and educational practices and thus sustains pedagogical innovation. At the same time, the fact that the mentoring role of placement tutors in ECEC institutions is not adequately supported in terms of competence development and workload allocation might potentially undermine the benefits of workplace-based training for students. In addition, the contextualisation of our analysis within the broader landscape of national policy developments in the field of ECEC staff professionalisation revealed that the increased academisation of pre-school teachers professional preparation might lead – in the long term – to a risk of ‘schoolification’ of pedagogical practices enacted within ECEC services. In regards to these issues, the article will raise questions for further consideration and debate.     

Aeromonas sobria regulates proinflammatory immune response in mouse macrophages via activating the MAPK,AKT, and NF-κB pathways

Journal of Zhejiang University-SCIENCE B -...