Excellence in coaching: the art and skill of elite practitioners

During this study, 10 expert coaches were interviewed to examine their views on aspects of their individual coaching practice. Four themes emerged from the interviews: (a) the long-term approach, (b) the authentic coaching environment, (c) creating a learning environment, and (d) the quality and quantity of training sessions. These coaches were consistent in their attempts to facilitate learning experiences for the athletes, while setting high standards in both training and competition. The study's findings show that expert coaches have to orchestrate a large number of variables when planning and executing a training session, and their success depends on their coaching knowledge and their skill at contextualizing the necessary components for specific situations.     

Ethanol-glycerin fixation with thymol conservation: a potential alternative to formaldehyde and phenol embalming

Anatomical fixation and conservation are required to prevent specimens from undergoing autolysis and decomposition. While fixation is the primary arrest of the structures responsible for autolysis and decomposition, conservation preserves the state of fixation. Although commonly used, formaldehyde has been classified as carcinogenic to humans. For this reason, an adequate substitute was developed. Ethanol-glycerin fixation and thymol conservation are described and compared with formaldehyde and phenol in this technical report. The setup, tissue qualities, financial aspects, and health concerns of this method are discussed. Ethanol-glycerin fixation and thymol conservation provide outstanding haptic and optic tissue qualities. Typical formaldehyde and phenol effects, such as skin, airway, and eye irritation, as well as carcinogenic effects, can be circumvented by using ethanol-glycerin and thymol instead. Ethanol-glycerin fixation is more expensive than formaldehyde and requires an explosion-proof facility. However, the absence of health effects and its convincing tissue qualities balance these higher costs. Therefore, ethanol-glycerin fixation and thymol conservation provide a potential alternative and complement established fixation techniques. The use of carcinogenic formaldehyde and toxic phenol can be effectively restricted through the use of the described method.     

The footprint of a tennis ball

The Hawk-Eye line-calling system in tennis uses a footprint of the ball to determine whether the ball was in or out. However, the footprint itself is not measured. It is the ball trajectory through the air that is measured. Measurements of the footprint are presented in this paper, showing how the high initial rate of expansion of the footprint and other technical difficulties can lead to potential errors in the Hawk-Eye system. The footprint was measured for vertical and oblique impacts, and is compared with recent results presented at a tournament where Hawk-Eye was installed.     

Language skills,mathematical thinking,and achievement motivation in children with ADHD,disruptive behavior disorders,and normal controls

Recent models of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) suggest that the association between achievement motivation and school performance may be stronger in children with ADHD than in typically developing children. Therefore, the present study investigated associations between achievement motivation and performance on language skills and mathematical thinking in children with ADHD (n = 23; M = 9.4 years, SD = 1.1 years; 78% boys) and two matched control groups, i.e., a clinical control group (children with related disruptive behavior disorders; DBD), and a non-clinical control group (NC). Results confirmed stronger associations between achievement motivation and performance on receptive language and mathematical thinking in children with ADHD than in NC. Specifically, performance of children with ADHD was equal to NC for highly motivated ADHD children. These results underscore the importance of achievement motivation as a more essential key factor in the performance of children with ADHD as compared to typically developing children.     

Young girls’ arithmetic and spatial skills: The distal and proximal roles of family socioeconomics and home learning experiences

The present study addressed girls’ (N = 127) early numerical and spatial reasoning skills, within the context of a critical environment in which these cognitive skills develop, namely their homes. Specifically, proximal links between distal family socioeconomic conditions and first-grade girls’ arithmetic and spatial skills were examined (mean age = 6.72 years; SD = .34). The proximal roles of two factors were considered: the general learning characteristics of girls’ homes, and the kinds of math and spatial learning activities in which girls participated. General quality of the home learning environment and specific math activities mediated the relation between family socioeconomics and girls’ arithmetic skills. In contrast, socioeconomics and home learning experiences were related to girls’ spatial skills indirectly only through their verbal skills; spatial activities were not proximal predictors of spatial skills. For both arithmetic and spatial skills, mothers’ spatial skills were a strong predictor. Future research and intervention implications of these findings are discussed.     

Adolescent bully-victims: Social health and the transition to secondary school

This study aimed to investigate the causal pathways and factors associated with being involved in bullying behaviour as a bully-victim using longitudinal data from students aged 11–14 years over the transition time from primary to secondary school. Examination of bully-victim pathways suggest a critical time to intervene is prior to transition from the end of primary school to the beginning of secondary school to prevent and reduce the harm from bullying. Negative outcome expectancies from bullying perpetration were a significant predictor of being a bully-victim at the end of the first year of secondary school. The findings show an association between peer support, connectedness to school, pro-victim attitudes, outcome expectancies and level of bullying involvement. Implications for intervention programs are discussed.     

Teaching in linguistically diverse classrooms: difficulties in the implementation of the language-in-education policy in multilingual Kenyan primary school classrooms

Kenya’s language-in-education policy supports mother-tongue education as the ideal approach to developing language and literacy skills of young learners. The policy has been informed by findings of various past national education commissions as well as international declarations such as the UNESCO declaration on the use of Vernacular Languages in Education of 1953, the World Declaration on Education for All of 1990 and the Dakar framework of 2000. The country’s Constitution of 2010 re-affirms this policy. However, available reports indicate that little progress has been made in implementing the use of Kenyan mother tongues in education. This paper reports on impressions gained in the process of collecting and analysing data for a doctoral study still in progress. Preliminary findings indicate that in most urban and peri-urban schools, where the learner population is highly multilingual, the policy has been implemented in such a way that in effect either the notion of ‘mother tongue’ seems to have been redefined or the term is used in an unconventional way. Even in rural areas where, comparatively, there is minimal diversity, practical aspects of the use of mother tongue in education seem not to be in accordance with policy provisions. Learning materials and assessment systems are not suitably structured to enable mother-tongue education to take place. The paper (1) gives an impression of the status quo regarding use of language in multilingual primary school classrooms in Kenya, (2) considers the different interpretations given to the term ‘mother tongue’ in current classroom practices and (3) provides pointers to the gap between de jure and de facto policy, which may eventually be helpful in improving the implementation of the current language-in-education policy, in such a way that it will strengthen mother-tongue literacy and facilitate eventual transfer to English as medium of instruction.     

A Qualitative Inquiry of the Counseling Dissertation Process

The authors in this consensual qualitative research study explored the dissertation experiences of 42 graduates (27 counselor educators, 13 counselors, 2 administrators) from 4 midwestern states. Identified domains included impact of environment, competing influences, personality traits, chair influence, committee function, and barriers to completion. An emergent theory reflected the interconnectedness of the dissertation process across internal, relational, and professional factors. Implications related to motivation, personal traits, and identification of barriers in the dissertation process are provided.     

Storytelling as dialogue: how teachers construct professional knowledge

This study shows how a group of English language lecturers use storytelling as a form of professional dialogue. The aim of the study is to highlight the dialogic role of storytelling in supporting the construction of lecturers' professional knowledge and not to identify lecturers' professional knowledge. In a professional development project, 12 lecturers created digital stories about their experiences of professional development. These stories were shared with colleagues who then responded with their own digital stories. A narrative framework was used to analyse stories for the types of connections lecturers made between stories. Five dialogic processes were identified: connecting, echoing, developing, questioning and constructing. Excerpts of stories are used to demonstrate how lecturers construct professional knowledge through storytelling. The study concludes by outlining the potential and limitations of storytelling as an approach to professional development and proposes further research into the dialogic capacity of storytelling in a professional development context.