Phenomenological Aspects of Ecosystemics

This paper outlines key ideas in phenomenology and phenomenological psychology in order to clarify some of the processes which are used in ecosystemics. Occasionally writers take the view that a phenomenological approach indicates simply that we are concerned with an individual's experiences or that we are dealing with subjective perspectives. This paper shows that the important theoretical perspectives and specific techniques of phenomenological psychology provide the basis for important aspects of the ecosystemic approach.     

The Benefits of Parent Intervention in Children's Disputes: An Examnation of Concurrent Changes in Children's Fighting Styles

The impact of parental intervention on the quality of children's conflict behavior was examined using observational data from 40 English-speaking Canadian families with 2-and 4-year-old children. Children's behavior in the portions of fights that preceded their parents, interventions was compared to their behavior in fights in which there was no intervention. Also, children's behavior before parental intervention was contrasted with their behavior after intervention. It was found that parents intervened in the most intense fights between their children, fights in which the children displayed few de-escalating strategies. Parental intervention was associated with their children using fewer power strategies coupled with an increase in the use of more sophisticated negotiation moves. It was concluded that parental intervention in sibling conflict has beneficial effects in terms of the immediate quality of the children's fighting. Results were interpreted in light of contemporary models of socialization.     

Intentional Communication and Graphic Symbol Use by Students with Severe Intellectual Disability

Communicative intent is an important construct in pragmatic theory that is based, in part, on the study of language acquisition among normally developing children. This article discusses communicative intent in persons with severe intellectual disability in the context of intervention studies reporting the acquisition of graphic symbol use.     

谈写生色彩

成人高校开设各种实用美术类专业,教学中发觉学生对写生色彩入门颇感困难,究其原因,除学生实践少以外,理论知识也处于模糊状态。一般初学者观察色彩的习惯是从物体的固有色角度出发。掌握写生色彩规律,除了有理论知识,更重要的是不断实践、逐渐积累自己的经验。文章就如何学好理论知识,加强教学实践环节,进行了探讨。     

Problem Solving, Contention, and Struggle: How Siblings Resolve a Conflict of Interests

In a laboratory setting, 48 sibling dyads age 4 and 6 or 6 and 8 years negotiated the division of six toys. Findings revealed that, in general, children reached divisions while using a preponderance of constructive problem-solving strategies, rather than contentious tactics. The degree of conflict of interests and the quality of sibling relationships predicted the children's use of problem-solving and contentious negotiation strategies, and was related to the types of resolutions achieved. Dyads experiencing low conflict of interests resolved their differences quickly. High conflict of interests coupled with positive relationships and constructive negotiation resulted in longer negotiations and creative, agreeable resolutions. High conflict of interests coupled with more negative relationships and destructive negotiations resulted in children's failures to reach agreement. Developmental differences indicated that older siblings within the pairs took the lead in negotiation, and benefited slightly more from the divisions. Furthermore, children in older dyads were more sophisticated and other oriented in their negotiations.     

Expressed Readiness of Australian Schoolchildren to Act as Bystanders in Support of Children who are Being Bullied

Promoting interventive action on the part of student bystanders witnessing peer victimisation is currently seen as a promising way of reducing bullying in schools. A video depicting bullying in the presence of bystanders was viewed by late primary (n = 200) and early secondary school students (n = 200). Some 43% of the students indicated that they were likely to help the victim. Questionnaires were employed to assess student attitudes towards victims, beliefs about the expectations of parents, friends, and teachers, perceived self‐efficacy, and social desirability response set. Multiple regression analysis identified as significant predictors of expressed intention to intervene: attending primary school, having rarely or never bullied others, having (reportedly) previously intervened, positive attitude to victims, and believing that parents and friends (but not teachers) expected them to act to support victims. Implications for action to reduce bullying in schools are discussed.     

Discipline knowledge and confidence to teach science: self-perceptions of primary teacher education students

There has been renewed debate in recent years about the relatively poor science discipline background knowledge of primary and preschool teachers, and their lack of confidence to teach science stemming from this. A reaction from teacher educators, such as recommended by theDiscipline Review of Teacher Education in Mathematics and Science Report, has been to provide more explicit science discipline units in pre-service teacher education courses. However, a few studies have cast some doubt on the notion that more science discipline studies (Skamp, 1989; Stepans & McCormack, 1985). This paper reports on pre-service students' perceptions of their cofidence to teach science before and after a science education unit adapted from the PECSTEP work (Kirkwood, Bearlin & Hardy, 1989), which included only a small amount of physical science, and took an explicit gender approach emphasising the students as learners. Specializations: primary teacher education, teaching strategies in science.     

Attempted and completed incidents of stranger-perpetrated child sexual abuse and abduction

OBJECTIVE: To establish the prevalence, typology and nature of attempted or completed incidents of stranger-perpetrated sexual abuse or abduction of children "away from home". METHODS: A questionnaire was completed by 2,420 children (83% response rate) aged 9-16 years in 26 elementary and high schools in North-West England. RESULTS: Of these children, 19.0% (n=461) reported that they had been the victims of any attempted or completed sexual abuse or abduction incident away from home at some point in their lives. Of these children, 161 (6.7% of the original sample) reported that the "last" incident had been perpetrated by a stranger. Based upon these last incidents, four main types of attempted or completed CSA or abduction incident were identified: indecent exposure (40.8% of victims), touching (25.8%), and abduction (23.1%), each occurring on their own; and incidents involving multiple types of act (10.2%). The majority of these abductions (91.1%) and touching incidents (50.9%) were attempted as opposed to completed. Rates of victimization were generally higher among girls than boys (10.4% vs. 4.2%, p<.001). A sizeable minority of victims had experienced sexual abuse or abduction previously (28.8%). The large majority of incidents were carried out by males (88.2%). Most incidents occurred when children were accompanied by their peers (67.9%). Many victims were frightened by their experience (46.9% very frightened) and the large majority made a disclosure (79.9%). Only a minority of incidents were reported to the police (33.3%). CONCLUSIONS: Incidents of attempted and completed stranger CSA and abduction are distinct from CSA and abduction by known persons, go against stereotypes, are complex, and give rise to a number of key issues that may have implications for prevention and intervention. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Professionals involved in child protection should undertake work to reduce the risk of existing victims of CSA or abduction becoming victims of stranger CSA or abduction, and the risk of attempted incidents becoming completed ones. They also need to encourage the disclosure and reporting of attempted and completed stranger CSA and abduction incidents.     

The Effect of a Mentoring Model for Elementary Science Professional Development

This study describes an elementary science model of professional development through mentoring by university science education professors working with teachers at a private elementary school in a regional city in Queensland, Australia. A cross-cultural collaboration involving professors from the United States and Australia resulted in the socially constructed image of the science education mentor. While there is no generic model for elementary science mentoring, results of data collection reveal that (a) one-to-one mentoring has short-term implications for implementing constructivist science teaching practices; (b) successful mentoring models include facilitating the understanding of science content, exploring elementary science pedagogical content knowledge through modeling, and off-site professional development workshops; and (c) understanding and working from the predispositions of the teachers is an essential component of effective professional development.