Mastery and exercise play interventions: motor skill development and verbal recall of children with and without disabilities

Background: Fundamental motor skill proficiency is essential for engagement in sports and physical play and in the development of a healthy lifestyle. Children with motor delays (with and without disabilities) lack the motor skills necessary to participate in games and physical activity, and tend to spend more time as onlookers than do their peers. As such, intervention programs are crucial in promoting motor skill development of children with motor delays. While mastery climate (MC) interventions have shown to positively impact children’s motor performance, what is unknown is the impact of cognitive strategies used by children within these climates. Furthermore, although vigorous play seems to be related to the development of gross motor skills, it is still unknown if children with and without disabilities would benefit from exercise play (EP) interventions.

Purpose: This study examined the effects of MC and EP interventions on the motor skill development and verbal recall (VR) of children with motor delays. The sample included children with and without disabilities.

Research designs: One hundred and thirty-eight children from 27 urban public schools were referred to the present study. Children were assessed using the Test of Gross Motor Development second edition (TGMD-2) and a VR checklist. Sixty-four children (18 with disabilities and 46 without) met the inclusion criteria, which was a score less than the fifth percentile on the TGMD-2. Participants were randomly assigned to the MC or EP 14-week interventions emphasizing gross motor skill practice.

Data collection and analysis: Children were assessed at pre- and post-intervention. A 2 (groups)?×?2 (disability) × 2 (time) analyses of variance with repeated measures on the last factor was conducted. Change scores, t-test comparisons on the delta scores and Cohen’s D were also calculated.

Results: The MC group demonstrated significant and positive changes over the intervention period. Further, the MC group showed superior locomotor and object control performance and higher recall of verbal cues (p?≤?.05) at post-intervention compared to the EP group. Children with and without disabilities within the MC showed similar patterns of improvement. The EP intervention did not demonstrate significant improvements.

Conclusion: Children with and without disabilities showed improvements in motor skills and VR when exposed to an MC, incorporating the six TARGET structures. These structures included (a) providing feedback and encouragement, providing opportunities for decision-making and establishing personal goals, (b) including parents in the recognition of children’s achievements, (c) creating opportunities to experience leadership and self-pacing, (d) guiding children to use verbal cues and modeling when practicing gross motor skills, and (e) providing demonstrations and teaching children to self-monitor their performance. Instruction is therefore seen as critical to learning gross motor skills, as demonstrated from the findings. Although there were opportunities for vigorous play within the EP intervention, the children did not show improvements in motor performance or VR. These findings suggest that new trends in teacher education physical education to prioritize physical activity over good motor skill instruction may not be advantageous for children in the early years, and should be reconsidered.     

A physiological,time–motion,and technical comparison of youth water polo and Acquagoal

Abstract

The aims of this study were to provide a profile of young water polo players and to compare technical and tactical aspects, movement patterns, and cardiac loads of youth water polo and Acquagoal codes. Ten young (age 12.3 years, s = 0.6) male water polo players underwent anthropometric (stature, body mass, body mass index, chest circumference, hand breadth, and length), strength, and [Vdot]O_2max evaluations. Friendly youth water polo and Acquagoal matches were arranged to evaluate heart rates and swimming patterns (horizontal and vertical, with and without the ball) of players, and technical and tactical aspects of matches (number of actions, passes, player involved in an action, lost possessions, shots, goals, and the origin and types of shot). Independent of code, matches imposed a high cardiac load on players. Vertical swimming occurred more frequently (P < 0.05) in Acquagoal (71%) than youth water polo (45%). Technical and tactical measures also differed (P < 0.05), with players performing more passes and shots inside the penalty area and showing a higher goal-to-shot ratio during youth water polo than during Acquagoal. These results indicate that youth water polo better resembles the swimming patterns of adult water polo and facilitates the technical and tactical aspects of play better than Acquagoal.     

A survey of talent identification and development processes in the youth academies of professional soccer clubs from around the world

ABSTRACT

Talent identification (TID) and development (TDE) are large fields in professional soccer and in science. However, TID and TDE processes in youth academies have not been assessed in detail. As such, our aim was to survey professional clubs from around the world about their youth academy TID and TDE processes, with 29 clubs responding to the survey. TID and TDE processes changed as a function of player age. TID processes involved finding the best players locally and regionally, but for older players the search widened to nationally and internationally for the needs of the first team. Clubs used a multidisciplinary approach to TID, but more so with older players. Median number of academy players was 80, 100, and 66 players at 8–11 years, 12–16 years, and 17–21 years, respectively. Annual player turnover in the most recent season (selections/de-selections) was 29% across all age groups, with competition from other clubs cited as a limitation to TID. TDE processes involved weekly matches and 3–5 training sessions per week led by experienced, well-qualified coaches, with most clubs providing players with academic education, residency and transportation services. Our findings extend previous research assessing professional soccer youth academy TID and TDE processes by quantifying worldwide practices.     

Magic Women on the Margins: Ec-centric Models in Mary Poppins and Ms Wiz

This paper offers a comparative analysis of two characters belonging to the tradition of empowered “spinster” in children’s fiction, namely Mary Poppins and Ms Wiz, from the perspective of gender politics and child/adult interactions. A distinction is made between the figure portrayed in P. L. Travers’ texts and the Disney film starring Julie Andrews, which turned the magic nanny into a cultural icon. These two renderings of the powerful, single woman, in turn, are contrasted with Terence Blacker’s postmodern depiction of the good witch in the “Ms Wiz” series, with a view to tracing the evolution of the ostracised female wizard, a character inherited from folklore that has its origin in the Great Mother archetype. As is demonstrated, each representation of the supernatural woman modifies the manner in which the feminine influences the patriarchal order.     

博物馆,生态博物馆,和反博物馆:解决遗产、社会和发展的思路

此探讨遗产与社会和发展间应当建立起新的关系。认为应当反思，从考虑遗产和其特性的方式上，尤其应当关注遗产地情况。在全球化的今天，化被认为是地区性的，——由地理边界划分。遗产的确定取决于它所处于的社会群体对价值的重要性的认识。因此，我们不能忘记民俗和传统的重要性是自发表现的。 地方遗产面对世界性强势化建立的不正当游戏规则的矛盾现实，所进行的运动是寻找有效的解决方法，世界遗产正在引起人们的重视。这样可能提供一种真正的生存，特别是对于小的社区，他们的社会经济结构和他们的价值观和行为动力相关联——确保可持续地发展他们的经济。地方社区才能对全部遗产的博物馆化作出反应。当我们考虑现在范例的时候，博物馆就可作为一种可持续发展的工具，以更加人性化的行动保护全部遗产。     

… I ever loved thee,lady mine,and yet my love increases: Rhodian Portrait Ceramics and Cultural Dialogue in the Mediterranean

The medieval city of Rhodes kept a secure position as artistic and commercial crossroads, where pottery was the most intensely traded commodity. Here, I focus on a group of fifteenth-century ceramics decorated with profile busts of men and women excavated there, near the Orthodox Church of St. Spyridon. Used in a culturally complex urban centre, these vessels borrowed elements of design, and the concept of portrait-ceramics and love pots from Italy, where spouses and lovers exchanged such objects as ritual gifts. I explore the patronage, production, and function of these ceramics within the specifics of Rhodes, to see how they were suited to serve this cosmopolitan society governed by the Hospitaller Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, while displaying comparable feelings of power and (romantic) character common in Italian portraiture.     

READING MATHEMATICS REPRESENTATIONS: AN EYE-TRACKING STUDY

We use eye tracking as a method to examine how different mathematical representations of the same mathematical object are attended to by students. The results of this study show that there is a meaningful difference in the eye movements between formulas and graphs. This difference can be understood in terms of the cultural and social shaping of human perception, as well as in terms of differences between the symbolic and graphical registers.     

Professional development within the Effective Early Learning Programme: a contribution to a participatory and context-sensitive approach to ECEC evaluation

This paper aims to describe and analyse a case study on professional development that was centred on the Effective Early Learning (EEL) Programme. This process was a part of a larger dissemination project of the EEL programme nationwide, designed to train specialised facilitators at a local level who could, in turn, support the professional development of their peers. From a theoretical stance, it focuses on a democratic and participatory approach to the evaluation and development of quality in ECEC contexts. The study involved the participation of 12 pre-school teachers and a specialised trainer. Results show perceived effects of the process of staff development on professional learning at the level of observation skills, reflection-on-action and critical insertion. Also, the participants recognised that experimentation in practice contexts and shared reflection were the most meaningful and facilitative strategies in their learning.     

e-Cognocracy and the design of public policies

Designing public policies using information technology as a communication support system is one of the most important current issues in the public policy making field. This work presents a methodology for the design and selection of public policies based on the cognitive democratic model known as e-Cognocracy. In addition to facilitating debate between representatives and the represented (deliberative democracy), this model allows for co-decision making between citizens and politicians. Furthermore, and of even greater importance, e-Cognocracy generates a process of continuing education that is concordant to the lifelong process of living systems (cognitive process). The methodology contemplates multiple rounds (usually two) when incorporating the preferences of the actors implicated in decision making and takes advantage of the creative capacity of human beings when solving complex problems. At the same time, the methodology permits the evaluation of both the individual and social learning that is derived from the scientific resolution of the problem and the democratisation of the knowledge that is extracted. This methodology was applied to a real-life experience in the Spanish municipality of Cadrete.