Analysis of 175 newborn babies who died in an orphan age

175 newborns who were admitted to an orphanage in the year 1975–1976 and subsequently died are analysed. Illegitimacy was the major cause for abandoning the babies. 46% of the babies were born in hospitals. 5 babies had congenital anomalies and 11 babies had marks of external injury. 58.8% of the babies abandoned were girls, 82.7% of the babies weighed less than 2.5 kgs. and had some degree of intrauterine growth retardation. The major cause of death was infections which accounted for 79.3% of deaths, of which gastroenteritis (43.4%) was the main killer. Septicemia and bronchopneumonia were the two other major infections that contributed to the deaths. Infections were more common in the low weight babies. Gastroenteritis was probably acquired after introduction of top feeds, due to poor hygiene and occured in all age groups. Majority of babies died of septicemia within 7 days of admission suggesting antenatal and natal infections. Chances of survival increased with increasing weight of the baby.     

Isolation of Gardnerella vaginalis in the diagnosis of sexual abuse in children

INTRODUCTION: The study of sexual transmitted diseases is more and more frequent in patient with suspicion of sexual abuse, and this help to the final medical diagnosis. Organisms like Neisseria gonorrhoeae and Treponema indicate a sure sexual contact. However the role of the rest of organisms in the sexual abuse is more difficult of specifying. OBJECTIVE: To know the role of the Gardnerella vaginalis in the diagnosis of sexual abuse in patient with this possible diagnosis. METHODS: Retrospective study of 135 girls with suspicion of abuse, visited from May of 1997 to February of 1998. Vaginal swabs were taken from 45 of 135 girls evaluated. RESULTS: In five patients the vaginal culture were positive to Gardnerella. The characteristics of these five patients are described (age, aggressor, type and duration of the abuse, physical exploration and final diagnosis). All our patients were the pubertal or prepubertal girls. In these patients the final diagnosis settled with the clinical history and the physical exploration, without keeping in mind the result of the culture. CONCLUSION: It is necessary to discard sexual abuse in all prepubertal girl with a positive culture with Gardnerella vaginalis, being difficult to specify the value of the Gardnerella in the adolescent patients.     

Extending the testing effect to self-regulated learning

In addition to serving summative assessment purposes, testing has turned out to be a powerful learning tool. However, while the beneficial effect of testing on learning performances has been confirmed in a large body of literature, the question of exactly how testing influences cognitive and metacognitive processes remains unclear. We therefore set out to investigate the effect of testing on self-regulated learning (SRL) processes. We hypothesized that by recalibrating metacognitive monitoring, regular practice testing can trigger efficient SRL processes and, in turn, foster learning. To test this hypothesis, we exposed first-year undergraduates to a complex neurology module. Participants were randomly assigned to either the practice testing group or a control group. The testing group underwent multiple practice tests during the neurology module, whereas the control group only underwent the multiple practice tests after the course. To assess the impact of practice testing on SRL processes, we combined a think aloud protocol with a metacognitive monitoring self-report measure. Results showed that, compared with controls, participants in the practice testing group were significantly less overconfident in their ability to recall recently learned information and performed better on a posttest questionnaire. Furthermore, mediation analyses confirmed that enhanced learning performance was explained by the use of efficient SRL processes. Therefore, these results allow us to extend the testing effect to SRL, and empirically underscore the central role of monitoring in SRL. Contributions to the fields of practice testing and SRL are discussed.     

Leading in the eye of a storm: how one team of administrators exercised disaster resilience

Higher Education - Global climate change threatens university campuses around the world. However, prior research suggests that universities around the globe tend to prioritize preventing further...     

Effects of concept and vee mappings under three learning modes on students' cognitive achievement in ecology and genetics

This study verified the efficacy of concept and vee mapping heuristics under cooperative (CP), cooperative–competitive (CP-CM) and individualistic whole (IW) class learning conditions in improving students' achievement in ecology and genetics. A total of 808 tenth-grade students were involved in the study. The results showed that the experimental groups taught with concept and vee mappings under the three learning modes achieved significantly better than the control groups. Students in the CP-CM condition in all groups achieved significantly better than their counterparts in the other two groups, whereas the CP-CM experimental group students achieved significantly best. A significant interaction between treatment and ability suggested that an element of competition, when combined with small group cooperation, favored students of lower ability.     

A sociocultural analysis of mandated curriculum change: the implementation of a new senior physics curriculum in New Zealand schools

We analyse the implementation of a new New Zealand physics curriculum from a socio‐cultural perspective. We explore the development of the curriculum document and examine the obstacles to its implementation. Change was compromised by the lack of any intersubjective linkage between teachers and the curriculum designers. The teachers’ own community of practice was most influential in how implementation occurred.

Curriculum change processes and discourses must be made transparent so that teachers can have a framework for ‘dereification’ of a curriculum document into their classroom practices. Without planning for teachers’ participation in the negotiation of curriculum meanings, curriculum developers themselves become marginalized, and the cultural objects they have developed will be adopted in unanticipated ways.     

Briefly noted

Henry Ward Beecher: An American Portrait, by Paxton Hibben. New York: Doran (now Doubleday, Doran &; Company, Garden City), 1927: pp. 390.

D. L. Moody: A Worker in Souls, by Gamaliel Bradford. New York: Doran, 1927: pp. 320.

Intercollegiate Debates (Volume VIII). Edited by Egbert Ray Nichols. New York: Noble and Noble, 1927: pp. viii, 565.

Debating as an Educator. By John G. Sims, Jr. Published by the author, Box 652, Fort Worth, Texas, 1926: pp. 112.

Four Speeches by Abraham Lincoln Hitherto Unpublished or Unknown. With an introduction by Earl Wellington Wiley, The Ohio State University Press, 1927: pp. 112.

An Introduction to the Drama. Edited by J. B. Hubbell and J. O. Beatty. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1927.

Talking. By J. B. Priestley. New York: Harper &; Bros., 1926.

An Essay on Conversation. By Henry W. Taft. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1927

Conversation. By Olive Heseltine. New York: E. P. Dutton &; Co., 1927.

The Road to Xanadu. By John Livingston Lowes. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1927: pp. xviii, 639.

The Function and Forms of Thought. By Albert E. Avey. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1927: pp. xii, 395.

Demosthenes and His Influence. By Charles Darwin Adams. New York: Longmans, Green and Co., 1927: pp. 184. $1.75.

Les idées politiques d'Isocrate. By Georges Mathieu. Paris: So‐ ciété d'éditions Les Belles Lettres, 1925: pp. 228.

Integrity in Education and Other Papers. By George Norlin. New York: Macmillan, 1926: pp. vi, 231.

Spoken Thought. By Lily C. Whitaker. New York: A. S. Barnes and Company, 1927: pp. x + 596.

Training for Speaking. By Paul Berton. New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1926.

Stammering and Its Treatment. By Samuel D. Bobbins. Boston: Boston Stammerers’ Institute, 1926; 12 mo, Cloth; pp. 121.

Our Times. Volume II, America Finding Herself. By Mark Sullivan. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1927.