Russian students' understanding of and willingness to achieve 'success'

This study investigates the concept of 'success' and the various ways contemporary Russian students are endeavouring to achieve and value success. The findings are set in the context of changes in the understanding and achievement of success among students in Russia over the past 30 years.     

Applying MacKinnon's 4Ps to foster creative thinking and creative behaviours in kindergarten children

The purpose of this study was to identify certain strategies and conditions that should be used by teachers in kindergarten so as to foster creative thinking and creative behaviours to children. We used a quasi-experimental research design for 6 months in a public kindergarten in a suburban area of Greece, and we developed a creative music and movement programme. The programme was based on the 4Ps of MacKinnon (press, product, process and personality). The experimental group participated in the creative programme 2–3 times a week, while the control group participated in the unstructured free-play setting. A total of 16 interventions were applied of 45–60 min each. The intervention was conducted by an external teacher, specialised in music and movement education, who was also the observer of the intervention. Double evaluation was applied in both groups, before and after the intervention, and the results were compared based on MacKinnon's approach. The results of the study showed that following MacKinnon's approach during the design of an educational programme could foster children's creativity.     

Impact of Contact on the Development of Children's Positive Stereotyping about Aging Language Competence

This study examined young children's (M = 38 months) beliefs about the aging of language competence using a modified mutual exclusivity paradigm (cf. Markman, 1990 Markman , E. M. ( 1990 ). Constraints children place on word meanings . Cognitive Science , 14 ( 1 ), 57 – 77 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). Children were shown pairs of objects (familiar and unfamiliar) and were asked by a younger and older experimenter to point to the object in the pair to which a novel non-word referred. Showing reliance on a mutual exclusivity heuristic (a new word must refer to something I do not already know), children selected more unfamiliar objects as the referent. Children who had relatively little contact with older adults showed more reliance on mutual exclusivity when tested by a younger experimenter than an older experimenter. This pattern was reversed for children who had more frequent contact with older adults. These results suggest that with infrequent contact with older adults, children rely on common stereotypes linking old age with diminished competence to judge an older interlocutor's behavior. More frequent contact allows for positive stereotypes associating older age with enhanced language competence to dominate, making an older experimenter the better teacher of new words.     

DEVELOPMENT OF DRAMATIC PLAY IN YOUNG CHILDREN AND ITS EFFECTS ON SELF‐REGULATION: THE VYGOTSKIAN APPROACH

The necessity for parents and teachers to work together collaboratively to optimize children’s learning and development in early childhood education is well recognized. Yet, ways in which initial teacher education programs might prepare teachers for professional relationships with parents are rare in the literature. This paper reports on the use of field experience in family homes that occurred in the 1^st year of a teacher education program. A case study of two student teachers is discussed to illustrate the potential of such an approach to this aspect of teacher preparation. These student teachers experienced the realities of the daily lives of families with young children. Six months later, their experiences appeared likely to have had a positive influence on their understanding of parenting and their attitudes towards establishing and maintaining effective partnerships with parents in their future professional role.     

Diagnóstico y tratamiento de los retrasos en lectoescritura: Descripción psicométrica de un grupo de niños desde la práctica clínica

Mientras los grandes principios sobre el origen de los retrasos en la adquisición de la lengua escrita siguen siendo hoy objeto de múltiples debates entre investigadores de diversas procedencias teóricas, la escuela continúa sin resolver el reto de la alfabetización de la población infantil en un porcentaje de casos relativamente elevado. Esos niños, que sin duda requieren una dedicación altamente individualizada por parte de especialistas, acuden por iniciativa de sus padres o a instancias de la propia escuela a consultas privadas o a servicios de apoyo psicopedagógicos de diversa índole, pero la dinámica de este tipo de consultas (sobrecarga de trabajo, falta de presupuesto, etc.) no permite habitualmente realizar una tarea de caracterización, control y seguimiento de la población tratada. Ese es precisamente el objetivo de este artículo, donde, en base a un respetable numero de expedientes clínicos, se ha realizado una caracterización diagnóstica y evolutiva de un grupo de niños con retraso lector, proponiendo vías de aproximación terapeutica.     

Building inclusion and resilience in students with and without SEN through the implementation of narrative speech,role play and creative writing in the mainstream classroom of primary education

ABSTRACT

Based on the theory of inclusion, the present 3-year pilot program (2013–2016) deals with narrative speech, role play and creative writing as a useful tool to build resilience in primary school students with and without Special Educational Needs (SEN) in the mainstream classroom. The specific aim of the program was to help students develop a series of fundamental psychosocial skills, such as a positive sense of inner self and the ability to cooperate and relate to others by familiarising with them in recognising and expressing the basic emotions of joy, sadness, fear and anger. Under the systematic cooperation among the general education teacher, the special education teacher and the rest of the teaching staff, the concept was to involve the maximum of the school teachers in order to create a Community of Practice, Collaboration, Sharing Learning and Action. Using an action-based research approach, the data from the present work allowed the participating students to demonstrate a range of socio-emotional skills, including those necessary for self-awareness. Similarly, the teachers involved in the project in each class built positive relations with their students and the rest of the teachers as well, whom they encouraged to participate in various collaborative tasks through similar programs.     

Critical thinking as the ability to sort and qualify the information available,to form one's own judgement

In an era marked by an excessive exposure to information and disinformation, this article explores how the public in France engages with critical thinking on the topics of scientific information and knowledge, as well as associated debates. First, a panel survey was carried out in 2022 by the science education centre Universcience in Paris in collaboration with the survey institute GECE. A total of 3,218 respondents participated in the survey in France. The survey questions focused on three themes: (1) the substantial relationship between respondents' scientific reasoning and critical thinking; (2) sources that respondents used for information, particularly on scientific subjects, to form an understanding of current events; (3) respondent relationships to discourses in the sciences and otherness in reasoning. In this study, critical thinking was defined as the ability to sort and make sense of available information and to question one's opinions. Also, the ability to discern trustworthy sources and information. In this approach, critical thinking is a condition for correctly assessing information on science topics. This is understood to include knowledge about science, its processes of knowledge production, and quality sources of information in the natural sciences. In this study, a Barometer of Critical Thinking was developed, and a survey was carried out. Survey results and the development of the barometer are described. Finally, we discuss how developing scientific literacy (knowledge about scientific facts, methods, practices and sources) is crucial in order to foster critical thinking on scientific information, knowledge, debates, and beyond.     

Mathematical modeling for theory-oriented research in educational technology

Educational technology research and development - Mathematical modeling describes how events, concepts, and systems of interest behave in the world using mathematical concepts. This research...     

Adult intervention levels in young children’s free play: an observational study on how Pikler educators combine the instrumental and relational dimensions of their educational activity

European Journal of Psychology of Education - Studies about child development emphasize the importance of play in children’s early years. However, there is an existing controversy about the...     

Motion analysis of front crawl swimming applying CAST technique by means of automatic tracking

Abstract

Kinematic analysis of swimming is of interest to improve swimming performances. Although the video recordings of underwater swimmers are commonly used, the available methodologies are rarely precise enough to adequately estimate the three dimensional (3D) joint kinematics. This is mainly due to difficulties in obtaining the required kinematic parameters (anatomical landmarks, joint centres and reference frames) in the swimming environment. In this paper we propose a procedure to investigate the right upper limb’s 3D kinematics during front crawl swimming in terms of all elbow and shoulder degrees of freedom (three rotations of the shoulder, two of the elbow). The method is based upon the Calibrated Anatomical Systems Technique (CAST), a technique widely used in clinics, which allows estimation of anatomical landmarks of interest even when they are not directly visible. An automatic tracking technique was adopted. The intra-operator repeatability of the manual tracking was also assessed. The root mean squared difference of three anatomical landmarks, processed five times, is always lower than 8 mm. The mean of the root mean squared difference between trajectories obtained with the different methodologies was found to be lower than 20 mm. Results showed that complete 3D kinematics of at least twice as many frames than without CAST can be reconstructed faster and more precisely.