Learning objects and learning content management systems in engineering education: implications of new trends

Learning objects and learning content management systems are considered to be ‘the next wave in engineering education’. The results of experiments with these new trends in ICT in engineering education are described in this paper. The prospects were examined and the concepts of reusability of content for teachers and for personalized education using learning objects delivered on demand to students were put to the test. The hurdles that need to be overcome and the benefits of using learning objects and learning content management systems are discussed. This paper is concluded with a discussion of the findings for future developments in engineering education.     

The Collective that Didn't Quite Collect: Reflections on the IALS

The concept and methodology of IALS obviously represent progress for literacy research. Nevertheless, this survey presents serious limitations. It prioritises the handling of data-based information as opposed to experiential and contextualized information, ranking at a higher position those who handle the first kind of information. The survey ignores how people solve problems in their life context. The competence of people cannot be understood merely through outside observation and a questionnaire situation. In the case of Poland, the interpretation of data manifests an ethnocentric Western attitude, tending to reduce cultural differences to a cultural deficit. Two IALS-inspired surveys conducted in Spain and Portugal mixed quantitative and qualitative methods in order to take into account the social relations in their cultural context. This article questions the role of research, which cannot be limited to the objectivation of reality, but should help to transform and improve it. The alternative model proposed is named "investigation action."     

Pre-adolescents’ representations of multiple attachment relationships: the role of perceived teacher interpersonal behaviour

Attachment theory proposes that early parent–child relationships provide the basis for all future close relationships of the individual, through childhood and adolescence into later life. The purpose of the present study was to examine the relationship between parental attachment, peer attachment and students’ perceptions of their teacher’s interpersonal behaviour, in order to shed light on the channels through which these constructs relate. In doing so, we examined three proposed theoretical schemes of pre-adolescents’ representations of multiple relationships. As a side-goal, the psychometric properties of the Greek translations of the Revised Inventory of Parental and Peer Attachment (IPPA-R) and the Questionnaire on Teacher Interaction (QTI-G) were investigated. Two independent samples comprising 270 and 306 pre-adolescents (grades 5–7), respectively participated in the study. Results supported a four-factor structure of the IPPA-R and an elliptical shape for the Interpersonal Teacher Circle measured by the QTI-G. The integrative scheme regarding pre-adolescents’ multiple adult relationships was supported by the data. Parental attachment relationships were found to be an important determinant of students’ perceptions of their teacher interpersonal behaviour, which in turn mediated the relationship between parental and peer attachment relationships. Results are discussed in terms of their theoretical and practical implications.     

Pedagogies of being with: Witnessing,testimonio, and critical love in everyday social movement

This conceptual article explores education and the relational in everyday social movement. I highlight a single, local community event—a Speak Out—and travel with scholarship on public pedagogy, witnessing, and Latina feminist theories of coalition to articulate pedagogies of ‘being with’ in community activism for racial justice. My interpretive vignettes of the Speak Out are part of a larger ethnographic study focusing on a segment of a rural/small city community that moved with intention to teach and learn racial justice. While larger concrete goals were crucial and at the center of the community’s curriculum for justice, the various sites and forms of race-conscious pedagogy in public life—community forums, vigils, celebrations, mural projects—were also enactments of a profound commitment to the relational, to finding common ground in difficult solidarities. With a focus on the testimonios of three women of Color participants in the Speak Out, I show how witnessing and testimonio were at the center of pedagogies of ‘being with.’ In this work of education, the women (1) redefined community, accountability, and ally work, (2) exposed the fissures in social justice organizing across difference, describing commitment to social action with rather than for those most affected by institutional violence, and (3) affirmed the knowledge, histories, and self-determination of people of Color while challenging self-defeating stereotypes. Critical love sustained an ethics of openness to difference and facilitated the intentional work of creating race-conscious learning communities.     

Here,There, and Back Again with the Social Foundations of Education: Tracing Conocimientos In/Toward Coalitional Journeys

This article narrates a parallel personal and professional journey of scholarly engagement with the field of the social foundations of education and its home in the American Educational Studies Association. It draws on Gloria Anzaldúa's (2000 Anzaldúa, G. E. (2000). Interviews/Entrevistas (A. Keating, ed.). New York, NY: Routledge. [Google Scholar]) notion of conocimiento as multileveled and connective knowings, and María Lugones's (2008 Lugones, M. (2008). From within germinative stasis: Creating active subjectivity,resistant agency. In A. Keating (Ed.), Entremundos/Among worlds: New perspectives on Gloria Anzaldúa (pp. 85–99). New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan. [Google Scholar]) idea of coalitional journeys to describe the histories and possibilities for the field.     

The development of children with down syndrome: the influence of maternal adaptation,mother-child interaction and early forms of support

In this paper, we present a longitudinal case study involving four dyads with babies with Down syndrome from birth until the age of 7 years – the moment at which the children were observed for the last time before they began compulsory schooling. At each data collection point, the mother was given a semi-directive interview and we filmed a free interaction situation. The objective of our study was to carry out an indepth analysis of the ways in which mothers adapt to the birth of a ‘different baby’, the evolution of their expectations in relation to the child's development, mother–child interaction and early support for both the child and the family, and the way in which these aspects of the overall situation relate to the children's development. The data of our longitudinal study show that there is an interaction between children's development and family characteristics and patterns, particularly mother–child interaction and the way in which the mother deals with the stress factors associated with the fact that she has a disabled child. We found that the four dyads experienced different models of early support, which to some extent reflect what really does happen in Portugal in cases involving children with disabilities, and that the programmes' impact was not identical in every situation. The most successful was the one which best suited the family's wishes, and involved both the mother and later on the kindergarten teacher.     

Sexualities,teenage pregnancy and educational life histories in Portugal: experiencing sexual citizenship?

This article focuses on Portuguese working-class teenage girls’ voices and experiences concerning sexuality and pregnancy. Within a sociological, feminist and educational framework, it explores the girls’ perspective on sexual and intimate citizenship as evidence of fairer forms of regulation of teenage sexualities. Through building life histories of three pregnant and teenage mothers, this article aims to understand how girls rehearse and live out their sexualities and pregnancies as well as listen to their voices and recognise their demand for inclusion and respect. Gender power relations emerge as central in configuring girls’ pathways and shed light on youth pregnancy.     

Noises in the attic: The legacy of expectations in the academy

This process-video on the topic of graduate students and junior faculty of color in higher education represents musings around the issues that are involved in racism and the assumptions that are a part of that ideology. Using the lens of Critical Race Theory as described by Bell (1987), the conversations that took place in a video-recording studio were analyzed for themes that represent the experience of being "the fly in the milk," at a White academic institution. "How do we talk to whiteness?" is the central theme that organizes this discussion of the videotape "Noises in the Attic: Conversations with Ourselves. "The participants talk about alienation, as described in sections called "Noises," "The White Man's Scrapbook," "Between and Betwixt," and "Filling in the?" A realization that there is a need to understand that White people operate from a different perspective than nonwhite people rounds off the discussion of being a noise in the attic of the White academic environment.     

What Predicts Older Adults’ Adjustment to Aging in Later Life? The Impact of Sense of Coherence,Subjective Well-Being,and Sociodemographic,Lifestyle, and Health-Related Factors

The aim of this study was to build a structural model to explore the predictors of adjustment to aging (AtA) in a community-dwelling older population. A community-dwelling sample of 1,270 older adults aged between 75 and 102 years answered a questionnaire to determine sociodemographic (sex, age, professional and marital status, education, household, adult children, family's annual income, living setting, and self-reported spirituality), lifestyle, and health-related characteristics (perceived health, recent disease, medication, and leisure). Several instruments were used to assert psychological variables, namely AtA, sense of coherence, and subjective well-being. Structural equation modeling was used to explore a structural model of the self-reported AtA, encompassing all variables. Significant predictors are self-reported spirituality (β = .816, p < .001); perceived health (β = .455, p < .001); leisure (β = .322, p < .001); professional status (β = .283, p < .001); income (β = .230, p = .035); household (β = –.208, p = .007); sense of coherence (β = ?.202, p = .004); and adult children (β = .164, p = .011). The variables explain, respectively, 60.6% of the variability of AtA. Self-reported spirituality is the strongest predictor of AtA. Other predictors are perceived health, leisure, professional status, income, household, sense of coherence, and adult children. This study emphasizes the need for deepening the variables that influence older adults’ AtA—in particular, perceived health and further lifestyle-related characteristics—as being relevant for promoting aging well in later life, within a salutogenic context for health care.     

The reform process of Portuguese higher education institutions: from collegial to managerial governance

Tertiary Education and Management - Portuguese public higher education institutions have been undergoing a major reform process since 2007. The most noticeable changes were introduced by Law...