Integrating Physical Education and Geography in elementary education in the Czech Republic and the Republic of Slovenia

ABSTRACT

This paper addresses the lack of international knowledge and research in interdisciplinary curriculum development and teaching in the subjects of Physical Education and Geography. The authors analysed and compared elementary school curricular documents from two ex-communist countries, the Czech Republic and the Republic of Slovenia (an ex-socialist Yugoslav republic) to reveal how integration of Physical Education and Geography can be embedded at the policy level. A questionnaire survey among teachers examined how the integration is implemented in practice. The authors present some practical examples to show how Physical Education and Geography integration can be achieved. The findings of the study indicate that while interdisciplinarity is an important policy goal of the educational systems of these two countries, integration is not being implemented in practice.     

Digital resource developments for mathematics education involving homework across formal,non-formal and informal settings

The aim of this paper is to explore further an under-developed area – how drivers of curriculum, pedagogy and assessment conceptions and practices shape the creation and uses of technologically based resources to support mathematics learning across informal, non-formal and formal learning environments. The paper considers: the importance of mathematics learning in informal and non-formal as well as formal settings; how curriculum focuses on pedagogy supporting these needs, contrasting this focus in England and Serbia; and in these contexts, the roles of homework, the potential of technologies and the roles of the teacher. Technological developments to support mathematics learning for 11- to 14-year-old pupils in the two countries are explored and contrasted, and ways that recent developments inform our understandings of formal, informal and non-formal learning through learning activities, learning support and settings are modelled. The conception of ‘extended pedagogies’ is introduced; implications are outlined.     

Multimedia and interactivity in distance learning of resuscitation guidelines: a randomised controlled trial

The aim of the study was to conduct a comparative analysis of three forms of knowledge transfer online, taking into account the long-term knowledge growth rate and the satisfaction of students surveyed in respect to distance learning. The cohort of participants for this survey were students of the first degree, studying in the Emergency Medical Services. The authors created three e-learning courses in basic and advanced resuscitation procedures. The level of course participants’ satisfaction was analysed, as well as the knowledge growth rate measured three times: 7, 30 and 90 days, respectively, after finishing the course. The level of satisfaction in all the groups surveyed was comparable. The growth rate for knowledge was the highest in group C in the second and third survey, respectively (30 and 90 days after the end of the course), and a significant difference in favour of course C was demonstrated one month after finishing classes.     

Dialogical PISA: correct answers are all alike,every incorrect answer is incorrect in its own way

Why do students give incorrect answers in PISA? What are the reasons for giving incorrect answers? Do all incorrect answers reflect only the lack of competence or might even a competent child make a mistake? The aim of this article is to contribute to a better understanding of these issues. In the current investigation, we selected six students who responded incorrectly to one PISA question in mathematics or science when they solved it individually. Then, we analyzed their understanding of the PISA task and their reasoning about it through a dialogical problem solving in triads to identify why they made an incorrect answer. Moreover, we tried to determine how the shared peer interaction might change the understanding and reasoning of the child and enable her/him to solve the task. The results of this study illustrate the differences between incorrect answers reflecting lack of competence and those incorrect answers, which appear for some other reasons. Based on the dialogical problem solving approach, we analyzed these two types of incorrect answers and the reasoning trajectories behind them.     

Educational counseling of workers in Czechoslovakia

Conclusion Theoretical work regarding counseling in the enterprise sphere (in contrast to the school sphere) is currently sporadic and still quite specialized.In cooperation with the European Centre for Leisure and Education, Prague     

Probing into Pupils’ Moral Judgement in Environmental Dilemmas: a basis for ‘teaching values‘

In the frame of the international project ‘Environment and School Initiatives’ (ESIP), a pilot study has been carried out with the aim to elucidate existing levels of moral reasoning in environmental dilemmas (in analogy to Kohlberg) in a group of 11‐ and 15‐year‐old students. Beside the age‐related differences, also indications for differences between boys and girls were found. The content analysis of students’ justifications show different images about the relationship humans‐nature (humans as users, preservers, admirers, respecters). The main aim was to give teachers a better insight into pupils’ moral reasoning in environmental dilemmas and thus a basis for guiding discussions in the sense of moral discourse. These discussions, embedded in other experientially based activities, can hopefully contribute to the clarification and development of environmental values.     

由隋嘎的族谱看西盟佤族进入父系社会的时间

从前佤族人只背自己一姓的家谱，而不能背出整个家族的族谱。隋嘎能背100代族谱，由此推断西盟佤族走出司岗里进入父系社会的时间，至少应在2500年以前，比以往学界所说的1000年整整提前了1500年。     

Exclusion Expected? Cardiac Slowing Upon Peer Exclusion Links Preschool Parent Representations to School-Age Peer Relationships

Attachment theory proposes that children’s representations of interactions with caregivers guide information-processing about others, bridging interpersonal domains. In a longitudinal study (N = 165), preschoolers (M_age = 5.19 years) completed the MacArthur Story Stem Battery to assess parent representations. At school-age (M_age = 8.42 years), children played a virtual ballgame with peers who eventually excluded them to track event-related cardiac slowing, a physiological correlate of rejection, especially when unexpected. At both ages, parents and teachers reported on peer and emotional problems. During exclusion versus inclusion-related events, cardiac slowing was associated with greater positive parent representations and fewer emerging peer problems. Cardiac slowing served as a mediator between positive parent representations and peer problems, supporting a potential psychophysiological mechanism underlying the generalization of attachment-related representations to peer relationships.     

Inclusive education in the Slovak Republic two decades after the dissolution of Czechoslovakia

The fall of Communist regime in 1989 and the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1993 significantly affected the educational system of today's Slovakia. As a sovereign state, Slovakia has ratified the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities obliging its signatories to practise ‘inclusive education’. This article explores the current educational policies of the Slovak Republic in light of this obligation. Using the official statistical data the article argues that the current state educational policies have not succeeded in meeting the objective of practising inclusive education, as the proportion of students educated in segregated special educational provisions has been consistently rising over the last decade. This article attempts to identify particular aspects of the current educational policies which might have contributed to this phenomenon.     

The connotations of botho philosophy and its potential contribution towards environmental conservation: the case of Tlokoeng community in Lesotho

This paper explores innovative environmental education strategies to conserve biodiversity in a rural-based context, in Lesotho. A case study approach was employed to investigate the community’s conception of botho philosophy and how it might promote nature conservation. Focus Group Interviews were conducted with 105 participants. The responses were analyzed to determine the community’s emerging definition and conception of botho. The findings indicate features of botho that parallel the ones that are found in the literature. In addition, botho was described metaphysically as a holistic spiritualised worldview that is concerned with a harmonious co-existence with others, nature and the Creator and empirically, in terms of moral attributes that foster co-existence within the socio-economic and natural systems. It is illustrated that botho can contribute towards environmental education discourse and nature conservation and thus diversify the pre-dominantly Euro-centric knowledge landscape in Lesotho.