Social inequity and educational expansion in Slovenia

The study examines the relationship between social inequalities (stratificational, gender and other disparities) and schooling, including academic attainment, longitudinally, in Slovenia. The issue is indicated most clearly at the tertiary education level. The basic finding is the parallel between educational expansion and the diminution of social inequalities as measured by standard parameters. This was particularly evident in the 1990s. Inequalities are measured in terms of gender, parental education and occupation. The impact of parental education proves to be an indicative, observable and longitudinally comparative measure. Parental occupational status is also clearly linked to their children’s scholastic attainment, although there are difficulties in the formation of occupational strata. Further considered is the impact of school reforms over a lengthier period of time; there was not, however, any detectable impact. School and welfare policies, even financing, have little significance. There are clear indications that social disparities at school are continually regenerated, despite the decline established by standard measures. New forms of social disparities appear, through which the privileged ensure the continuation of privilege.     

Trying to Include but Supporting Exclusion Instead? Constructing the Roma in Slovak Educational Policies

Based on a social constructivist theoretical framework, this research study examines how the design of proinclusive educational policies and the general public construct the Roma students and parents in Slovakia. For this purpose, data from two selected educational policies and five focus groups conducted in five regions in Slovakia were analyzed. The findings demonstrate that the Roma are constructed negatively as irresponsible dependents and deviants not valuing education and incapable of making wise decisions about their lives. These findings can be considered relevant for policy formulation processes because proinclusive policies may sabotage their own goals if negative social constructions of a certain societal group are embedded in them.     

Das Volksbildungswesen der Sowjetunion (UDSSR)

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

From Green to Red Tomatoes or Is there a Shortcut by which to Change the Conceptions of Teaching and Learning of College Teachers?

No general shift from a teaching to a learning paradigm in higher education is possible without a parallel change in the conceptions that college and university teachers have of teaching and learning‐‐from teaching, conceived as transmission and reception of knowledge, to teaching as facilitation of student learning. Staff development and action research can play a useful role in “defreezing” the existing conceptions and attitudes. But for a substantial change in teaching practices in the direction of learning of high quality to occur, more substantial changes in organization, curricula, funding, staff recruitment, and professional development policies are needed. The international academic community can play an important role in this paradigm shift by presenting models of good practice as well as exchanges of experiences and incentives. Such assistance is especially important for small countries in transition, like Slovenia.     

Active recovery of the finger flexors enhances intermittent handgrip performance in rock climbers

This study aimed to (1) evaluate the effect of hand shaking during recovery phases of intermittent testing on the time–force characteristics of performance and muscle oxygenation, and (2) assess inter-individual variability in the time to achieve the target force during intermittent testing in rock climbers. Twenty-two participants undertook three finger flexor endurance tests at 60% of their maximal voluntary contraction until failure. Performances of a sustained contraction and two intermittent contractions, each with different recovery strategies, were analysed by time–force parameters and near-infrared spectroscopy. Recovery with shaking of the forearm beside the body led to a significantly greater intermittent test time (↑ 22%, P?P?P?相似文献   

Gap year students in Lithuania: the value orientations of children from wealthy social groups

The paper seeks to understand the trajectories of students who defer entry to university. The study was conducted in Lithuania, a former Soviet Union republic. The phenomenon of a ‘gap year’ is usually associated with young people, who decide not to enter higher education schools immediately after receiving secondary education, instead they choose to spend a year volunteering, working or engaging in other activities. This article analyses the choice of taking a gap year from the perspective of rational choice theory, complemented by human development theory, which was developed by R. Inglehart and his colleagues. The latter theory allows discovering relation between the spreading of the gap year phenomenon in developed European countries and the emergence as well as development of post-materialist values from the macro-level perspective. The theoretical analysis is based on semi-structured interview data collected in Lithuania.     

Research of technical knowledge and creativity development of children in pre-primary education through interactive whiteboard

The introduced study represents methodology and results of research focused on utilization of interactive whiteboard as didactic technology mediating information through multimedia worksheets applied in education process in pre-primary education. Its aim was to determine whether it can significantly increase the level of children’s acquired knowledge in the field of technical skills education and whether it can positively influence the development of children’s creative skills as a sign of their motivation. We observe that this issue in the way it is theoretically and practically established in this study can contribute by proposing education standards and set of multimedia worksheets in the technical field in Slovak pre-primary education.     

Bringing the Author Back Into the Audience Research: A Hermeneutical Perspective on the Audience's Understanding of the Author

In the current media environment the texts available to media audiences are from very diverse sources. This paper deals with a theoretical question of how the audiences' understanding of author co-determines the reader's interpretation of the particular text. Drawing on the tradition of philosophical hermeneutics, a concept of the imagined author is introduced: a result of the text-reader encounter, where the notion of the author suggested by the text is realized by the reader through their prior knowledge and expectations of an author. A multidimensional model of the author is therefore proposed to appreciate different characteristics and values potentially associated by audiences with varying forms of authorial presence. Distinguishing various dimensions of the author allows a matrix of authorial characteristics to be built that positions the author brought into the encounter by the text as a paratextual feature that co-determines the meaning of the text.