Questionnaire on Perceived Competency-based Learning for primary school students (#ICOMpri1) / Cuestionario del Aprendizaje Percibido basado en Competencias para el Alumnado de Educación Primaria (#ICOMPri1)

The purpose of this study was to design and validate an assessment tool to find out how primary school students perceive their competency-based learning. By examining the content validity (n = 35 experts), comprehension (n = 173 students) and construct (n = 523 students) of the instrument, the results showed correct psychometric quality, internal consistency, reliability and adequacy of the structural model: χ²/df = 2.08, TLI = 0.88, CFI = 0.90, GFI = 0.90, RMSEA = 0.04, and SRMR = 0.04. The final version of the Questionnaire on Perceived Competency-based Learning of primary school students (#ICOMpri1) includes eight dimensions and 27 items. The results showed a high perceived competency-based learning of primary school students. This is therefore a valid and reliable instrument that provides a more subjective and real vision of primary students’ academic performance. Nevertheless, future studies should analyse the criterion-related validity by comparing perception results with those of international academic achievement.     

Promoting Gypsy children's behavioural engagement and school success: Evidence from a four‐wave longitudinal study

Low schooling, high non‐attendance and school dropout rates are critical phenomena within disadvantaged groups, especially among the Gypsy community. For example, in the UK, 10%–25% of Gypsy children do not attend school regularly and have significantly higher levels of overall absence from school (percentage of half‐day sessions missed) than pupils from other ethnic groups. In Portugal, available data on Gypsy children is sparse, yet data from one geographic region of the country reports high school failure (45%) and dropout rates (15%) among this population. The present study assessed the efficacy of a four‐year intervention to promote Gypsy children's behavioural engagement and school success. Gypsy communities were contacted and 30 children participating in the four waves were randomly distributed into control and experimental groups. Every school day throughout four years, 16 children in the experimental group were called at home and invited to go to school. The effectiveness of the intervention was evaluated in four waves (at the end of each of the four school years), assessing behavioural engagement (i.e. school non‐attendance, classroom behaviour) and school achievement (i.e. mathematics achievement, student progression). Findings show the efficacy of the intervention on promoting behaviour engagement and academic success without devaluing Gypsy people's culture.     

Relationship Between Flow and Athletic Identity: The Case of Three Elite Sportsmen

This study analyzes the personal narrative of flow experiences across three elite sportsmen within their particular sport autobiographical contexts. Using a holistic formal structure analysis to examine the participants’ self-narratives, five major themes emerged: (a) early socialization as the basis of a strong athletic identity, (b) withdrawal from sports as a threat to athletic identity, (c) the dramatic weight of the narrative plots within which the experiences of flow are inserted, (d) biographical sporting flow accounts, and (e) silences and devaluations in flow narrative. The results of the narrative analyses show a close relationship between the flow experiences and athletic identity. This study concludes that, in this case, the narratives of flow experiences have had an ontological role as they served to assert the participants’ threatened athletic identity. Hence, studying narratives as practices is a useful way to better understand not only the internal coherence of the narrative fragments into which flow experiences are inserted, but also the role that they play regarding the autobiographical narrative into which these are inserted.     

Nothing in the History of Spanish <Emphasis Type="Italic">Anís</Emphasis> Makes Sense,Except in the Light of Evolution

We describe, discuss and illustrate a metaphoric parallel between the history of the most famous Spanish liqueur, “Anís del Mono” (Anís of the Monkey), and the evolution of living organisms in the light of Darwinian theory and other biological hypotheses published subsequent to Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species. Also, we report the use of a caricature of a simian Darwin with a positive connotation, perhaps the only one ever produced. We conclude that, like some species in the natural world, Anís of the Monkey has evolved, adapted, survived and become the fittest and most successful anís in the Spanish market and possibly the world. We hope this paper will contribute a new useful metaphor for the teaching of biological evolution.     

Correlation Between Organizational Culture and Compensation Strategies Using Charles Handy's Typology

Alignment between management strategies, policies, and practices with organizational cultures holds great potential to meet the challenges of retaining professionals and maintaining their commitment. In this article, authors consider that when it is aligned with company strategy, compensation acts as an incentive for developing common visions within organizational culture.     

“Spanish as a foreign language” teachers’ profiles: inclusive beliefs, teachers’ perceptions of student outcomes in the TCLA program, burnout, and experience

The present study focuses on the Temporary Classroom of Linguistic Adaptation program (TCLA program) in which specialist teachers (Spanish as a foreign language teachers—SFL teachers) teach Spanish to immigrants who are not proficient in the language. We suggest that support for immigrant students in Spanish schools should adopt a new inclusive educational approach. The present investigation is a preliminary attempt at characterizing the profiles of SFL teachers by assessing, simultaneously, five relevant variables (through cluster analysis): inclusive beliefs, teachers’ perceptions of student outcomes in TCLA program, general burnout, diversity-related teacher burnout, and years of teaching experience. Eighty-one SFL teachers from 132 schools in Spain (EU) were asked to complete a self-report questionnaire. Cluster analysis found two clearly differentiated groups: the larger one, Innovative SFL Teachers and the smaller, Traditional SFL Teachers. The Traditional SFL Teachers are characterized by more years of experience, lower inclusive beliefs scores, lower teachers’ perception of student outcomes in the TCLA program scores, and higher burnout scores as compared with the Innovative SFL Teachers. Moreover, Traditional SFL Teachers conceptualize their teaching role as a "teacher of Spanish" whereas Innovative SFL Teachers see themselves much more as playing a supportive role.     

社会主义和哲学(二)

在一定意义上,历史唯物主义就是马克思主义。历史唯物主义可以作为三种理论:作为对人生和宇宙最一般理解的一种哲学方法;作为一种由于其展现一种特定的历史阶段而可以归结为某些法则的政治经济学评论;作为一种关于所有劳动阶级向社会主义迈进的必需的和能用的政治活动的解释和说明。马克思主义现在和将来都不是拘泥于马克思和恩格斯的著作之内的。马克思主义这个名称即便是现在也是一个有多向旨趣而且内容复杂的理论的象征和纲要。     

The importance of having a flexible scope ISO 15189 accreditation and quality specifications based on biological variation – the case of validation of the biochemistry analyzer Dimension Vista

Introduction

Technological innovation requires the laboratories to ensure that modifications or incorporations of new techniques do not alter the quality of their results. In an ISO 15189 accredited laboratory, flexible scope accreditation facilitates the inclusion of these changes prior to accreditation body evaluation. A strategy to perform the validation of a biochemistry analyzer in an accredited laboratory having a flexible scope is shown.

Materials and methods:

A validation procedure including the evaluation of imprecision and bias of two Dimension Vista analysers 1500 was conducted. Comparability of patient results between one of them and the lately replaced Dimension RxL Max was evaluated. All studies followed the respective Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) protocols. 30 chemistry assays were studied. Coefficients of variation, percent bias and total error were calculated for all tests and biological variation was considered as acceptance criteria. Quality control material and patient samples were used as test materials. Interchangeability of the results was established by processing forty patients’ samples in both devices.

Results:

27 of the 30 studied parameters met allowable performance criteria. Sodium, chloride and magnesium did not fulfil acceptance criteria. Evidence of interchangeability of patient results was obtained for all parameters except magnesium, NT-proBNP, cTroponin I and C-reactive protein.

Conclusions:

A laboratory having a well structured and documented validation procedure can opt to get a flexible scope of accreditation. In addition, performing these activities prior to use on patient samples may evidence technical issues which must be corrected to minimize their impact on patient results.     

A narrative review of Greek myths as interpretative metaphors in educational research and evaluation

This paper reviews a series of Greek myths put forward as cultural narratives that could be used as metaphors or interpretative similes for explanatory and evaluative purposes in educational research and evaluation. These myths have been used in educational research literature, and most of them were found by carrying out an exhaustive search of that literature. In particular, the paper discusses Procrustes, referring to the use of arbitrary evaluative standards; the myth of Mentor, the embodiment of the researcher as facilitator/improver for new, inexperienced researchers; Prometheus, or the archetype of the self-sacrificing researcher; Periphetes, representing the evaluator who is cruel through incompetence; Sisyphus, symbolising the researcher’s anxiousness to achieve his goals; and Ulysses, an archetype for qualitative research.These myths are still absolutely relevant today, after more than 20 centuries, and can be used as powerful explicative frameworks of phenomena in the field of educational research and evaluation. By using myths to interpret educational phenomena, one reconnects contemporary qualitative educational enquiry with its ancient predecessor forms of meaning making.     

Mind,Brain, and Education in the Digital Era

Computers are everywhere, and they are transforming the human world. The technology of computers and the Internet is radically changing the ways that people learn and communicate. In the midst of this technology‐driven revolution people need to examine the changes to analyze how they are altering interaction and human culture. The changes have already permeated societies around the world, altering learning, teaching, communication, politics, and most aspects of human interaction. The possibilities for improving educational effectiveness seem powerful, as a result of an information revolution with online access to infinite information and numerous teaching and learning activities of adults and children at school, at home, and in public places. An urgent need is for systematic longitudinal studies of what happens with learning and teaching as people use computers and play with the Internet. Perhaps the new technologies make possible a new kind of constructive dialogue, with intertwining of teaching and learning in a dynamic double helix of questions and answers, of modeling and experimentation. This special section will deal with (1) uses of new technologies to help people teach and learn more effectively, (2) uses of individual laptops to help children learn, (3) creation of new tools for learning and assessment, and (4) techniques that image brain structure and activity.