Foreign language learning difficulties in Italian children: are they associated with other learning difficulties?

A group of seventh- and eighth-grade Italian students with low achievement (LA) in learning English as a foreign language (FL) was selected and compared to a group with high achievement (HA) in FL learning. The two groups were matched for age and nonverbal intelligence. Two experiments were conducted to examine the participants' verbal and nonverbal learning skills, such as native language reading accuracy, speed and comprehension, calculation, and attention and self-regulation. Both experiments showed that the LA group seemed at risk for reading comprehension difficulties, but its reading speed and accuracy were within the average range according to Italian norms. The results also excluded the possibility that FL learning difficulties of LA participants could be associated with a deficit in calculation. Furthermore, according to teachers' ratings, children with LA appeared at risk for attention-deficit disorder (ADD). The pattern of learning difficulties of seventh- and eighth-grade participants with LA appeared to be not completely comparable with that of high school students at risk of FL learning difficulties as described in the literature.     

Cross-linguistic analysis of vocabulary in young children: spanish, dutch, French, hebrew, italian, korean, and american english

The composition of young children's vocabularies in 7 contrasting linguistic communities was investigated. Mothers of 269 twenty-month-olds in Argentina, Belgium, France, Israel, Italy, the Republic of Korea, and the United States completed comparable vocabulary checklists for their children. In each language and vocabulary size grouping (except for children just learning to talk), children's vocabularies contained relatively greater proportions of nouns than other word classes. Each word class was consistently positively correlated with every other class in each language and for children with smaller and larger vocabularies. Noun prevalence in the vocabularies of young children and the merits of several theories that may account for this pattern are discussed.     

Patterns for reform in American teacher education

Public accountability in America has led to the reform of teacher preparation. A competency-based fieldcentered approach is emerging. The two major processes for achieving reform are the development of alternative teacher education institutions and the conversion of existing ones. The political and educational aspects of each process are considered.

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Résumé La réforme de la formation des maîtres aux Etats-Unis a été amenée par le développement de l'idee de responsabilité publique. On remarque l'élaboration d'une approche fondée sur la compétence pratique. Les deux principaux facteurs de cette réforme sont le développement d'un nouveau genre d'établissements pour la formation des maîtres et la transformation de ceux qui existent actuellement. Cet article fait l'exposé des aspects politique et éducationnel de chacun de ces facteurs.

     

Is sports science answering the call for interdisciplinary research? A systematic review

Sports science research is traditionally monodisciplinary despite calls for an interdisciplinary focus. The primary purpose of this systematic review was to identify studies on talent identification, talent selection and competition performance to determine whether interdisciplinary research is being conducted. Thirty-six studies met the selection criteria. These studies were critiqued relative to sport, skill level, sport science sub-disciplines included, and whether the research was multidisciplinary or interdisciplinary. The secondary purpose of the review was to critique the level of analysis and level of representative task design in performance tests used in the studies. Twenty-five studies were categorised as interdisciplinary, with 11 categorised as multidisciplinary. Thirteen sports were represented with soccer the most frequent followed by field hockey, Australian Rules football, handball and rugby league. Thirty-two studies completed their analysis at a group level and four at an individual level. A total of 337 performance tests were rated for representative task design with 64 categorised as low, 123 as medium and 150 as high. The results pertaining to interdisciplinary studies and individual analyses are discussed in relation to constraints theory, which predicts that interacting variables can explain sport performance. Sports science research is beginning to fulfil the call for interdisciplinary research. Future research, however, needs to consider individual analyses and representative task design of tests to progress sports science knowledge.     

Reading and writing: what is the relationship with anxiety and depression?

Learning can be considered a function of synthesis in which both cognitive functioning and the domain of affectivity convey. The aim of the present study was to investigate how specific literacy skills, i.e., reading and writing, relate to two main dimensions of negative affectivity, i.e., anxiety and depression. Study 1 was conducted on third grade children (72), while Study 2 focused on first grade children (43). Two groups of participants selected because they had been deemed ‘at risk’ for the development of anxiety or depression and a control group were compared in reading and writing tasks, which included both word and non-word lists. The assessment included also the evaluation of Verbal, Nonverbal and Composite IQs. Results indicated that children ‘at risk’ for depression made more spelling errors in dictation of words in comparison to the control group. No differences emerged in reading tasks or with reference to the group of children ‘at risk’ for anxiety.

From Supporting to Co-Parenting: The New Roles of Fathers

SYNOPSIS

To develop a secure attachment, the quality of the mother’s relationship is fundamental, but now there is evidence that fathers equally play early and integrated roles in the development of the child, particularly in social and communicative skills. Hiraoka and colleagues emphasize father support in regulating maternal distress while listening to the infant’s cry. We also emphasize the father’s role in supporting the mother and in improving social and communicative competences in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.     

Municipal consultants’ participation in building networks to support science teachers’ work

This paper focuses particularly on the role of municipal science consultants in developing and maintaining network activities and connections among primary school science teachers. The hypothesis is that consultants play a crucial role in supporting strategic planning, and sustaining contacts and activities within professional learning networks. The research is framed by a project that involved 80 primary science teachers in 20 schools. The aim of the project was to develop network activities that facilitate sustainable change of the participating schools’ collective culture and practice of science teaching. The authors were involved as researchers and evaluators in the project. Data consist of reports from the consultants about their participation in various network activities, school assessment reports and a longitudinal survey. Three distinct cases are analysed through the use of a framework of professional learning networks to assess the consultants’ opportunities and constraints in terms of participating in network development. The results indicate that the consultants’ roles in successful network formation is characterized by personal stable contacts within the science teacher community in the municipality, availability of municipal resources to support network activities, participation in strategic planning of municipal network support, and facilitation of the development of new teaching activities within schools or in collaboration between schools. These four distinctive features of municipal science consultants’ participation in supporting network activities enable the participants to share and develop teaching activities.     

Factors affecting willingness to mentor

The paper presents a survey among 300 employees in Northern Italy to assess the willingness to mentor and identify the factors that affect it. Men and respondents with previous mentoring experience indicate a higher willingness to be a mentor. Willingness is affected by personal characteristics that are perceived as necessary for a mentor and the perceived benefits and drawbacks of mentoring.     

Does it matter where patent citations come from? Inventor vs. examiner citations in European patents

This paper addresses the question of whether patent citations are useful indicators of technology flows. We exploit the distinction between citations added by inventors and patent examiners. We use information from the search reports of European Patent Office patent examiners to construct our dataset of patenting activity in Europe and the US, and apply various econometric models to investigate what determines the probability that a citation is added by the inventor rather than the examiner. Contrary to previous work which uses US Patent and Trademark Office data, we find that geographical distance is a factor that strongly diminishes the probability of knowledge flows. We find other significant effects of such factors as cognitive distance, time and strategic factors on citing behaviour.     

Parental satisfaction with disabled children’s school inclusion in Italy

The principal aim of the present study is to examine the level of parental satisfaction with inclusive education for their children with disability attending Italian schools of any grade level. The survey involved 285 parents of pupils randomly selected from the population of students with disability certificates. On average, parents expressed a high level of satisfaction. Four principal components of parental satisfaction were extracted from the item scores of the questionnaire: inclusive educational practices; environment and special equipment; classmates’ and families’ acceptance; integration between education and rehabilitation activities. Various correlations were found between these aspects and both child-related and context-related variables. In particular, children’s emotional regulation abilities evaluated by teachers are involved in various dimensions of the parents’ satisfaction. On the other hand, satisfaction with the integration between the educational and rehabilitation activities showed a significant negative correlation with the fathers’ and mothers’ educational level. Lastly, parental satisfaction towards classmates’ and families’ acceptance appears to be the most critical aspect and tends to decrease in relation to school level, while it is positively linked with the number of hours the support teacher spends in class. Taken together, these results stimulate useful considerations to promote better practices in inclusive education.