READING MATHEMATICS REPRESENTATIONS: AN EYE-TRACKING STUDY

We use eye tracking as a method to examine how different mathematical representations of the same mathematical object are attended to by students. The results of this study show that there is a meaningful difference in the eye movements between formulas and graphs. This difference can be understood in terms of the cultural and social shaping of human perception, as well as in terms of differences between the symbolic and graphical registers.     

e-Cognocracy and the design of public policies

Designing public policies using information technology as a communication support system is one of the most important current issues in the public policy making field. This work presents a methodology for the design and selection of public policies based on the cognitive democratic model known as e-Cognocracy. In addition to facilitating debate between representatives and the represented (deliberative democracy), this model allows for co-decision making between citizens and politicians. Furthermore, and of even greater importance, e-Cognocracy generates a process of continuing education that is concordant to the lifelong process of living systems (cognitive process). The methodology contemplates multiple rounds (usually two) when incorporating the preferences of the actors implicated in decision making and takes advantage of the creative capacity of human beings when solving complex problems. At the same time, the methodology permits the evaluation of both the individual and social learning that is derived from the scientific resolution of the problem and the democratisation of the knowledge that is extracted. This methodology was applied to a real-life experience in the Spanish municipality of Cadrete.     

Leisure participation: modelling the decision to engage in sports and culture

Participation in sport and participation in cultural activities are usually studied separately. However, since both activities dominate the leisure time of most individuals, it is reasonable to analyse simultaneously the determinants of participation in both activities. Informed by the economic household theory, this study examined the core factors of time, income, human capital as well as several socio-demographic factors. The results showed that there was as small but significant correlation between sports and cultural participation. Thus, both can be described as complementary and competing activities. Leisure time, gender, education, nationality and subjective well-being were significant predictors of both sports and cultural participation. Differences were found for the variables age and income. This paper also describes the characteristics of those individuals who are not likely to participate in either activity and emphasises the importance of social inclusion programmes.     

Civic education and visions of war and peace in the Spanish transition to democracy

Abstract

This article explores visions of war and peace in the education system during the Spanish transition to democracy. During those years, the Spanish state was faced with the challenge of leaving its authoritarian political past behind and forging a democratic civic culture. As the concepts of war and peace are inextricably linked to those of state and citizenship, they are a useful tool with which to examine changes in civic education. A wide variety of educational sources has been explored, with particular attention to the emotional nature of the depiction of both war and peace. This study reveals two opposing styles. The official discourse demonstrated a factual treatment of war and a tendency to concentrate on international bodies and their actions, when it came to fomenting peace. The treatment of peace in the circles of teachers’ local initiatives was different. First, peace was defined not only as the absence of war but also in terms of social equality and solidarity. Second, there was a conscious effort to get the students involved in opposing war, reinforced by emotionally charged messages regarding its horrors.     

Co/productive practitioner relations for children with SLCN: an affect inflected agentic frame

ABSTRACT

This paper examines how school-based practitioners supporting children with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) use particular social capital relations. Social capital theory together with selected ‘Productive Pedagogies’ items, are applied to re-frame and understand the co/production of support for such children. Empirical data from the ‘Language for All’ study, which investigates SLCN provision in schools in England, are analysed to understand support network social capital. Novel insights on the types and purposes of inter-professional connectedness within SLCN support networks, in particular how relational agency is inflected by affect, are offered.     

Modes of differentiation in children’s writing construction

In this paper we aim at analyzing the modes of differentiation in children’s writing development during the presyllabic phase that, in the theoretical framework developed by Ferreiro and Teberosky, comes before the discovery of sound correspondance. Seventeen Italian children were interviewed seven times during the implementation of research on «Educational Continuity» between «scuola materna» and primary school. We first examine how minimum quantity and internal variation rules appear in Italian children as organizing principles for controlling quantity and quality of writing, and as necessary conditions for the differentiation process. Starting from this, it is possible to find two differentiation modes in writing; aformal one, and a mode in which some type ofexternal referent is used (meaning or object features). For most children the two modes are alternatives, and passing from one to another is a possible but not necessary step. The external group (which is older) has significantly less quantity repertoire than the formal one: this can explain why looking for an external point of reference can be an outcome of the child’s formal research for differentiating writings.     

Academics’ perceptions of the impact of internal quality assurance on teaching and learning

Internal quality assurance systems are expected to improve the institutions’ core mission of teaching and learning. Using data gathered through an online survey, distributed in 2014/2015, to the teaching staff of all Portuguese private and public higher education institutions, this paper examines the impact of internal quality assurance systems on teaching and learning from the perspective of academics. Findings suggest that Portuguese academics feel that, despite the positive contribution of internal quality assurance towards an increased awareness of teaching quality issues at their institutions, the practical effects of these systems have been more related to increasing bureaucracy than to substantive improvements in teaching and learning. The use of information with a view to improvement and teaching staff involvement in the development of quality assurance were found to induce positive changes in teaching and learning, in academics’ perceptions. Based on the findings, the paper makes recommendations for institutional practice.     

Numerical modelling of the structural behaviour of Buti’s bell tower

The paper describes the numerical techniques implemented in the finite-element code NOSA for structural analysis of masonry constructions. The code is then applied to the analysis of “Buti’s bell tower”, a medieval structure located on the Pisa mountains, under two different conditions: firstly, with the structure subjected to its own weight alone, and then while subjected to both its own weight and a horizontal load, which models an earthquake. The displacement and stress fields, as well as the distribution of cracking have been calculated with NOSA, and the numerical results analysed and compared to the actual distribution of fractures in the tower.     

Teachers’ guidance,family participation and track choice: the educational disadvantage of immigrant students in Italy

In Italy, as in other European countries, students of foreign origin are over-represented in the vocational school tracks, with relevant consequences on their limited chances of attaining a university degree. While research has long underlined the weight that a family’s social, cultural and economic capital has on a child’s school performance, educational expectations and choices, the role that school and teachers themselves play in the transition from lower to upper secondary school has been rarely explored in Italian sociological research. The present study aims to bridge this gap in the literature, showing how teachers’ orienting practices, interacting with highly differentiated patterns of family participation in the school guidance process, can play a relevant role in reproducing foreign-origin students’ segregation into the lower tracks of the school system.