Community‐Based Educational Planning for Severely Handicapped Students: An Expanding Role for Teachers∗

The emphasis on deinstitutionalization in recent years has resulted in a substantial increase in the use of small community-based residential facilities for disabled students; concomitantry there has been a shift towards a developmental or functional model for instructing these students. These initiatives have resulted in changes in the educational system and in the roles of teachers. Instructional planning for disabled students can no longer be viewed simply within the constraints of the classroom; rather a functional curriculum must be developed which provides for the learning and practising of skills across environments, including residences. Educators must fully participate with parents and residential staff to ensure the coordination of children's habilitation programs; without this involvement, crucial elements may be overlooked. In this paper a model is presented which describes how educators can participate in the planning of programs for severely disabled students in community-based residences. Steps in the process involve assessment of current skills and deficits, evaluation of the type and quality of services children are currently receiving, development of goals, identification and analysis of community resources, specification of individual objectives, monitoring of progress, and evaluation of overall service provision.

     

Dynamical Patterns in the Development of Clapping

The development of a complex rhythmical behavior—clapping—is modeled using a formal, explicit model of coupled oscillator dynamics. Even though this behavior manifests a good deal of nonstationarity and high variability within and across subjects, results indicate that these properties may be dynamically modeled quantitatively as well as qualitatively. Results suggest that clapping goes through a less stable period of relative coordination between 3 and 7 years before more stable absolute coordination is achieved. Nevertheless, in that the clapping behavior is affected in highly predictable ways by inertial loading of the limbs, the same underlying dynamic seems responsible for the coordination of both the younger and older children. Developmentally, the behavior of the coordination variable (relative phase) changes from a nonconstant magnitude in younger clappers to a constant magnitude in older clappers. These results suggest that development of proficiency in rhythmic motor skills displays developmental changes that can be understood well in dynamical terms.     

The relationship between teachers’ emotional intelligence and classroom discipline management

One of the fundamental problems of educational systems in many countries is related to classroom discipline. This reflects one of the worst problems faced by teachers. Classroom discipline management strategies play an effective role in creating positive teacher‐student relationships. One of the factors that influence behavior management in a classroom is emotional intelligence. Therefore, this study analyzing how teachers emotional intelligence influences the management of discipline in a classroom and the relationship between gender, academic formation, and service time of teachers with their emotional intelligence. Its sample comprises 559 basic and secondary school teachers. An Emotional Competence Questionnaire, a Scale of Teacher Efficacy in Classroom Management, and a personal and professional data inquiry have been used as instruments. Results show that teachers who have more capacity to deal with emotion demonstrate a greater management of discipline in the classroom. Most of the relationships in the model are statistically significant.     

Toronto multiagency child abuse research project: The abused and the abuser

Information from 422 cases of child mistreatment in Toronto was gathered from the files of a child welfare agency and a children's hospital. These data were compared to patterns reported in previous studies and clinical writings on child mistreatment to investigate similarities and differences in families whose children have been abused in Canada, England, and the United States. Findings from the present study were similar to others in many respects. The differences were primarily in the area of lower incidences of such problems as perinatal difficulties in the children and intellectual limitations and social isolation in the parents; however, there was a higher incidence of single-parent families. The results suggest that clinicians should bear in mind that child mistreatment cannot be ruled out on the grounds that no serious problems have been noted for the child or the family.     

The social stratification of the German VET system

Germany is widely known for its vocational education and training (VET) system and its dual apprenticeship system in particular. What is often overlooked, however, is the vertical stratification within the German VET system. This is the focus of this study. Our analysis shows that the VET system, like the German school system, is highly stratified, resulting in large differences in labour market opportunities. We elaborate on three dimensions of vertical stratification: VET system vs. higher education, fully qualifying vs. prevocational VET programmes and segmentation of the fully qualifying VET programmes by educational attainment and career prospects. All three stratification dimensions are closely linked to school attainment and thereby to social origin.     

Students’ conscious unknowns about artefacts and natural objects

This study attempts to characterise what 7th- and 12th-grade students believe they do not know about artefacts and natural objects, as well as the dependence of what is unknown on a knowledge of these objects. The students were asked to make explicit through questioning what they did not know about a sample of objects. The unknowns generated were categorised according to a scheme based on lexical semantics theory. Two of the categories focused specifically on imprecise unknowns expressed through What is X? questions, and on unknowns concerning functions. The results showed, firstly, that a lower grade level and lower knowledge of a certain class of objects was associated with more imprecise unknowns. Secondly, unknowns about the functions of artefacts were significantly more frequent than unknowns about the functions of natural objects at any of the grade levels. Overall, the results were consistent with the hypothesis of a correspondence between knowledge and unknowns.     

默顿对科学社会学的贡献

这篇文章是关于默顿及其科学社会学工作的回忆与评论.作者自1960年起先后作过默顿的学生、助手和同事,前后达15年之久,可以说对默顿非常熟悉.文中主要讨论了默顿关于清教与科学的博士论文、关于科学规范的论述、以及关于"马太效应"的文章.作者评论道,默顿一方面未能赋予其清教论题以更一般化的陈述,另一方面又未能对经验资料给予足够的关注,从而导致人们怀疑其马太效应理论的正确性.