Living AnatoME: Teaching and learning musculoskeletal anatomy through yoga and pilates

Living AnatoME, a program designed in 2004 by two medical students in conjunction with the Director of Anatomy, teaches musculoskeletal anatomy through yoga and Pilates. Previously offered as an adjunct to the Gross Anatomy course in 2007, Living AnatoME became an official part of the curriculum. Previous research conducted on the program demonstrated its efficacy in providing relaxation and well-being to students who attended. In 2007, with all 144 gross anatomy students required to participate in a 1.5 hour Living AnatoME session on the upper and lower limbs, the impact of the program on students' comprehension of musculoskeletal anatomy was analyzed through the administration of 25-question pre- and post-tests, gauging knowledge in the following domains: upper limb, lower limb, muscle function, palpation, attachment/location, clinical correlate, and control (i.e., material not emphasized during the intervention). Analysis of postintervention tests revealed significant improvement in total Living AnatoME scores as well as in the domains of upper limb, muscle function, and palpation, indicating the possible efficacy of Living AnatoME in teaching anatomy. Performance on control questions also improved, although not significantly, which may indicate the role of other variables (e.g., additional study time) in increased performance.     

Young Children Give Priority to Ownership When Judging Who Should Use an Object

This study provides evidence that children give priority to ownership when judging who should use an object. Children (N = 269) and adults (N = 154) considered disputes over objects. In disputes between a character using an object and the owner of the object, children, as young as 3 years and as old as 7 years, sided with the owner, and did so more than adults. However, children aged 4 and older disregarded owners' rights in dilemmas where these were pitted against the need to prevent harm. These findings suggest that ownership is central in children's judgments about object use and constrain developmental accounts of how children acquire an appreciation of ownership.     

Community Education and child-care programs

The Community Education Services (CES) division of the Children's Television Workshop (CTW) is CTW's community-outreach arm. This article describes how CES works with parents, children, experts, and local groups to develop special multimedia products, four of which are discussed. Two of the products—a fire-safety kit and a natural-hazards packet—were designed to teach young children how to protect themselves in life-threatening emergencies. Two other products—CES'sSesame Street preschool education materials and its3-2-1 Contact andSquare One TV after-school materials—are attempts by CTW to respond to societal changes that have increasingly shifted the burden of child care onto preschool and after-school programs.     

Amundsen, Nansen, and the question of science: dramatizing historical research on the polar heroic

Recent historical research reveals a much greater role than previously assumed for science in the polar activities of Fridtjof Nansen and Roald Amundsen. Science-based polar exploration was what first linked these two men; Amundsen's subsequent turn to sport and sensation dampened their relationship. These insights and other new perspectives about heroic period of polar exploration are being transformed by the author into a drama for stage that will have its world premier in Norway in December 2011. The play attempts to use imaginatively the art and craft of theatre to diffuse insight from historical scholarship.     

Educating the Next Generation of Public Health Social Work Leaders: Findings from a Summit

This article reports the findings of a 2-day public health social work (PHSW) summit that brought together PHSW educators, practitioners, and administrators to generate ideas for preparing the next generation of PHSW leaders. Data from focus groups revealed four themes: the importance of PHSW in our healthcare delivery system, the need for public health social workers to develop their professional identity, the significance of branding/promoting PHSW, and the favorable consequences of infusing PHSW content into social work curricula. Attendees generated ideas for bringing PHSW forward and provided recommendations to accrediting bodies for highlighting the importance of PHSW.     

COMMUNITY COLLEGE FACULTY ATTITUDES TOWARD CORRECTIONAL INMATES AND TOWARD TEACHING OFF‐CAMPUS COURSES AT CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTIONS

A total of 165 faculty from 8 of the 9 colleges in the Virginia Community College System that offer educational programs to prisoners were tested to investigate attitudes toward correctional inmates and willingness to participate in off‐campus programs at correctional institutions. Attitudes were defined operationally as scores on a 17‐item semantic differential with “correctional inmate” as the concept and a 12‐item Likert rating scale, both developed specifically for use in the study. Via an orientation program designed to provide contact among faculty, inmates, and the correctional environment, the attitudes of a portion of the sample were significantly altered. Generally faculty who consider their prior contact with inmates to be greater than average and those who have had experience teaching in correctional settings express more favorable attitudes. In addition, black faculty members and assistant professors score higher (more positively) on evaluative criteria than white faculty members and those of the other academic ranks. The age, sex, and years teaching experience of faculty were not found to be significant variables in their attitudes toward inmates.     

Preschoolers acquire general knowledge by sharing in pretense

Children acquire general knowledge about many kinds of things, but there are few known means by which this knowledge is acquired. In this article, it is proposed that children acquire generic knowledge by sharing in pretend play. In Experiment 1, twenty-two 3- to 4-year-olds watched pretense in which a puppet represented a "nerp" (an unfamiliar kind of animal). For instance, in one scenario, the nerp ate and disliked a carrot. When subsequently asked generic questions about real nerps, children's responses suggested that they had learned general facts (e.g., nerps dislike carrots). In Experiment 2, thirty-two 4- to 5-year-olds learned from scenarios lacking pretend speech or sound effects. The findings reveal a long overlooked means by which children can acquire generic knowledge.     

Developmental changes in the understanding of implied motion in two-dimensional pictures.

The power of various pictorial movement cues in eliciting a reading of movement was studied to determine the relationship between the ease with which a picture is interpreted and the degree to which the picture retains the structure of reality. Movement was indicated in 2 ways: pictorial conventions indicated movement by lines, blurs, and vibration marks; and pictorial postures indicated movement by figures which were isomorphic with the postures involved in real movement. Preschoolers, first graders, sixth graders, and college students were asked to label and sort pictures of human figures as "moving" or "still". Members of the 2 young groups did not classify pictures with conventional cues as "moving" as often as they did pictures with postural cues. Members of the 2 older groups classified both types of pictures as "moving". Since postural cues for movement are recognized at an earlier age than conventional cues, those that are more similar to reality may be easier to understand.