Variables involved in personal, social and school adjustment in a sample of preschool-aged children from different cultural backgrounds

The continuing incorporation of immigrant populations into the Spanish educational system poses an important challenge in that all participants must cooperate toward creating the best possible adaptation process at the academic level as well as on the personal and social levels. A number of different factors appear to influence children’s adjustment during the preschool stage, and these factors are especially relevant since many studies have shown that this is a key period for the prevention of future difficulties. The present study examines the variables involved in the adaptation of a group of preschool-aged children from different cultural backgrounds in Spain. The results indicate that preschoolers, regardless of their background, have similar performance and learning potential, with language proficiency being the factor that most clearly affects the other variables investigated. It was also found that children’s attitudes toward learning were related to the presence of behavioral difficulties and with the quality and type of parental child-rearing practices. These practices appear to be related to a number of difficulties immigrant children may experience on personal and social levels.     

Children´s play and affective development: affect,school adjustment and learning in preschoolers / El juego infantil y el desarrollo afectivo: afecto,ajuste escolar y aprendizaje en la etapa preescolar

Preschool education is a privileged setting where social development and the progressive achievement of emotional adjustment occur. During this stage, affect plays an important role in social interaction. Furthermore, children’s play has been described as an activity with a great potential for promoting development. This article reports results from the systematic observation of 38 five- to six-year-old children in four different school activities on two separate occasions. A total number of 304 registries, totalling 1,520 minutes, were made during the observations, which were conducted with the objective of comparing affective expression in different activities and inquiring into its relationship to school adjustment and performance in preschoolers. It was found that affect’s intensity and quality is higher during play. Results are discussed taking into account positive relationships between affect and school adjustment and performance, concluding that children’s play is a privileged activity for affective development and should be promoted in preschool education.     

Collaborative action research between schools,a continuing professional development centre for teachers and the university: a case study in Spain

This article describes a collaborative action research project developed over the course of the 2011/12 academic year in the Faculty of Education at Cordoba University (Spain). The RIECU school–continuing professional development centre for teachers–university learning network is part of this research process. The aim is to create and consolidate a community of practice made up of continuing professional development advisers to teachers, infant education teachers, university students who are training to become infant education teachers and university teaching staff. The most relevant findings, which respond to the questions raised, are: the action research conducted indicates that teamwork between teacher, adviser, researcher and university student is an effective strategy to facilitate the acquisition of professional competences among student teachers; and student-teachers involved in the case study have evolved in their conception and approach to childhood and have had the opportunity to learn by modelling the professional conduct of their mentor teachers.     

Assessment of prosocial–altruistic behavior of members and non-members of the scout movement

The aim of this study is to evaluate the differences in prosocial altruistic behavior between children and young students who belong to the scout movement and those who do not belong to this or any other similar movement. The prosocial altruistic behavior has been assessed with questionnaires for the school: self-evaluation, teacher, classmate, and parents. By means of a prospective design of case–control, every scout has been compared with another non-scout matched in variables like age; number of siblings; whether he/she is the oldest, the youngest, etc.; sex; the order between the siblings; if the mother works inside or outside the home; and if he/she lives with his/her two parents. The results show that significant differences exist between one group and another in the questionnaires of self-evaluation, for the teacher and for the classmate. It seems that children and young people who are scout members are better assessed than the non-scouts in prosocial altruistic behavior.     

Intelligence assessment: Gardner multiple intelligence theory as an alternative

In the multiple intelligence framework, newer and more contextualized cognitive tasks are suggested as alternative to more traditional psychometric tests. The purpose of this article is to examine whether or not these two types of instruments converge into a general factor of cognitive performance. Thus, the Battery of General and Differential Aptitudes (BADyG: reasoning, memory, verbal aptitude, numerical aptitude and spatial aptitude) and a set of Gardner's multiple intelligence assessment tasks (linguistic, logical, visual/spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, naturalistic and musical intelligences) were administered to 294 children aged 5 to 7. The confirmatory factor analysis points out the absence of a common general factor considering both batteries, indicating instead the existence of two general factors, which gather the tests that encompass them. Also, these two general factors correspond to traditional and multiple intelligence assessments and show a statistically moderate correlation between them. These results challenge Gardner's original position on refusing a general factor of intelligence, especially when considering the cognitive dimensions measured which do not coincide with the more traditional tests of intelligence.