The Early Literacy Support Programme (ELS) and the blend and clash of national educational policy ideologies in England

In this article we consider the development of key policy issues in England, related to the area of literacy learning and children who are considered to have difficulties in literacy in their early years. We trace the tensions which have arisen since the 1980s between different policies and practices in these areas. These tensions include pressures to raise standards of literacy and to support children with difficulties, and the establishment of a prescribed curriculum for young children. In particular, we focus on the blend and clash of national educational policy ideals in areas related to literacy and children who have been categorised as having ‘special educational needs’, and how these have influenced the development of the Early Literacy Support Programme (ELS) (DfES, 2001 Department for Education and Skills 2001a Early Literacy Support Programme, materials to support teachers working in partnership with teaching assistants London DfES  [Google Scholar]a; 2001 Department for Education and Skills 2001b Early Literacy Support Programme, session materials for teaching assistants London DfES  [Google Scholar]b). This is a programme set up by the Department for Education and Science in England for children in Year 1, aged 5 to 6 years old.     

Predicting Suicide Risks Among Outpatient Adolescents Using the Family Environment Scale: Implications for Practice and Research

This study was designed to identify characteristics of family functioning that relate to suicide potential in an outpatient adolescent population. Participants included 51 adolescents between the ages of 14 and 18 who were involved in outpatient counselling. The Family Environment Scale and the Suicide Probability Scale were used to assess adolescents’ perception of family social climate and degree of suicide risk respectively. Results revealed significant correlations between suicide risk and family systems characterized by heightened conflict and lower levels of cohesion, independence, and organization. A stepwise multiple regression analysis suggested that organization (related to clarity and structure in family activities and responsibilities) was the strongest predictor of suicide risk. Implications for research and practice are considered.     

Investigating relationships between features of learning designs and student learning outcomes

This article reports a study of eLearning in 21 courses in Hong Kong universities that had a blended design of face-to-face classes combined with online learning. The main focus of the study was to examine possible relationships between features of online learning designs and student learning outcomes. Data-collection strategies included expert reviews of the learning designs, student surveys of perceptions of the web environment and their own learning outcomes, and a SOLO (structure of observed learning outcomes) analysis of assessment evidence of student learning outcomes. The findings of this correlational study indicate mild relationships between features of learning design and student perceptions of their learning outcomes. Both the provision of learning resources and the engagement of students in online communication relate to aspects of learning (acquisition of knowledge and skills, and enhancement of learning motivation). Also, the relationship was stronger when eLearning strategies were more extensively used. However, no relationship was found between learning design and the student performance in assessment tasks, possibly because of the limited assessment data that was examined.     

Time With Peers From Middle Childhood to Late Adolescence: Developmental Course and Adjustment Correlates

This study examined the developmental course and adjustment correlates of time with peers from age 8 to 18. On seven occasions over 8 years, the two eldest siblings from 201 European American, working‐ and middle‐class families provided questionnaire and/or phone diary data. Multilevel models revealed that girls' time with mixed‐/opposite‐sex peers increased beginning in middle childhood, but boys' time increased beginning in early adolescence. For both girls and boys, time with same‐sex peers peaked in middle adolescence. At the within‐person level, unsupervised time with mixed‐/opposite‐sex peers longitudinally predicted problem behaviors and depressive symptoms, and supervised time with mixed‐/opposite‐sex peers longitudinally predicted better school performance. Findings highlight the importance of social context in understanding peer involvement and its implications for youth development.     

Elaborating the Concepts of Part and Whole in Variation Theory: The Case of Learning Chinese Characters

The purpose of this paper is to elaborate the concepts of part and whole in Ference Marton's variation theory for dealing with how learners come to understand something of a whole as made up of its parts. Understanding of the parts and the whole is more difficult than expected; as the whole may have an influence on the parts, the nature of the parts of the whole may differ from that of the parts on their own. As such it is not enough for learners just to know the parts in isolation. They also have to recognize the whole to which the parts refer and how the whole influences the parts. To achieve this, teachers have to provide learners with the experience of variation of the parts and the whole. To demonstrate these concepts, I have applied them to the case of children's learning of Chinese characters in this paper.     

防污损涂料添加剂Irgarol-1051降解产物对H4IIE鼠肝癌细胞的基因影响(英文)

为研究海洋防污损涂料添加剂Irogarol-1051的降解产物M2的基因毒性,应用微阵列技术,选取Affymetrix公司鼠基因组230 2.0基因芯片检测30μmol/L M2暴露下的鼠肝癌细胞基因表达变化.实验结果显示,96 h的M2暴露导致了38个基因在全部4组可能的对照/暴露中均发生显著变化(p0.002 5),其中只有Accn5基因研究较为透彻,该基因表达的抑制可能影响上皮钠通道的功能.此外,分别有10和82个功能注释基因在至少一组对照/暴露组中上调和下调.M2诱导的基因主要和细胞核(细胞成分)相关.M2抑制的基因则主要影响生物过程中的G蛋白偶联信号通路功能和细胞成分中的细胞膜内整合功能.     

U.S.-Produced Entertainment Media and Attitude Toward Americans

This study examines the relationship between Singaporean college students'attitude toward Americans and their exposure to U.S. exported entertainment media.

The 328 Singaporean college student participants expressed relatively neutral attitudes toward Americans and reported high consumption of U.S. entertainment media (movies, television shows, magazines, music). Exposure to American media was found to correlate positively with student attitudes toward Americans.

In contrast to some media critics' contention that exposure to U.S. media fosters negative attitudes among citizens of other countries, this study suggests that U.S. entertainment may influence attitude toward Americans in a positive direction.     

ICT's impact on family solidarity and upward mobility in translocal China

Information communication technologies (ICTs) create new channels and repertoires for mediated communication among parents and their children in mobile locations, thus playing a special role in reinvigorating intergenerational family solidarity in contemporary translocal China. For China's rapid, uneven economic development since 1978, social mobility has been fast growing and many family members are separated into different locations for seeking upward mobility as reciprocal aspirations. Some cases of translocal Chinese, studying, working, and living apart from their elderly parents were studied to investigate ICT's impact on family solidarity within the new dynamics of more symbolic and symmetrical family obligations and interactions. Their demonstrations of redefined sociability and intergenerational relationships via connected presence provide a promising new direction for social support and knowledge exchanges in translocal China with a special attention to the multifacets of mobilities and localities in the lives of the contemporary Chinese. A new model of family solidarity is proposed by the proper use of ICTs as new channels for intergenerational communication to supplement but not to replace the traditional ways of ‘togetherness’ by face-to-face interaction among the elderly Chinese parents and their adult children in remote locations. And this is deployed to reinvigorate parent–child relationships of the ‘relational families’ characterized by ‘autonomy of the generations’ in a balance of individualism and collectivism for seeking upward mobility and social cohesion in order to partly solve the social pressure of aging population and rural–urban divide, especially under the special conditions of China's one-child policy and jumping scale of economic development.     

Panel 2: The Implications of Digital Scholarship for Research Libraries: Challenges of Access and Preservation

ABSTRACT

The panelists present observations on the impact of digital scholarship for library goals related to information access and preservation based on their experiences in a variety of Web-influenced environments. The advent of digital forms of publishing and information retrieval signal significant changes in our understanding of library business models, user services, and the role of special collections.     

Balancing Act for the Future: How the Academic Library Engages in Collection Development at the Local and Consortial Levels

ABSTRACT

Collection development remains a major focus and concern of current interest for all types of libraries. Consortia began as a means of sharing resources and of leveraging purchasing power for its members. How does a library balance its individual collection needs, both present and future, when it is a member of a consortium? Do the expectations of the consortium outweigh the needs of the individual library member? This article will address how an academic library engages in collection development at the local and consortia levels, addresses the benefits and challenges of consortia memberships, and responds to its local patrons in light of its obligations and commitment to a consortium.