THE DEVELOPMENT OF PERSONALITY,ABILITIES AND SOCIAL RELATIONS IN A SPECIAL CLASS

Two years have passed since our first report on the project with primary school children at Törökszentmiklós. New results indicate that participation in the project has accelerated the development of abilities, has led to mainly favourable personality changes and has promoted the formation of advantageous social structures in the classroom. In the future, in addition to increasing support for the children's personal wellbeing (for instance, provision of more free time, promotion of communication skills), the work of four terms will be completed in three.     

DEVELOPING TALENTED CHILDREN: PROBLEMS AND EXPERIENCES

A project in the 7th and 8th grades aimed at providing the best possible school conditions to promote development of the abilities of children aged 13–14. The children's activity was founded on two main psychological and pedagogical principles: adequate motivation, and individual differentiation. The children's development was monitored by means of intelligence and personality tests. The main results were as follows: there was a pronounced improvement in the performance tasks, but no significant development in verbal tasks; the role of inner motives had greatly increased but the pupils had become more tense and impatient by the end of the school year. Necessary alterations in the project are outlined.     

Academic music: music instruction to engage third-grade students in learning basic fraction concepts

This study examined the effects of an academic music intervention on conceptual understanding of music notation, fraction symbols, fraction size, and equivalency of third graders from a multicultural, mixed socio-economic public school setting. Students (N?=?67) were assigned by class to their general education mathematics program or to receive academic music instruction two times/week, 45?min/session, for 6?weeks. Academic music students used their conceptual understanding of music and fraction concepts to inform their solutions to fraction computation problems. Linear regression and t tests revealed statistically significant differences between experimental and comparison students?? music and fraction concepts, and fraction computation at posttest with large effect sizes. Students who came to instruction with less fraction knowledge responded well to instruction and produced posttest scores similar to their higher achieving peers.     

In the forests of the night: an inquiry into the relevance of social dreaming for action research

This paper explores the potential for using dream material and social dreaming in action research. Access to emotional dimensions of experience is increasingly recognised as an issue for action researchers, raising questions about how to enable such inquiry and how material from the imaginative sphere may be brought into socially constituted spaces to generate new insights. Dreams provide entry into the world of image as opposed to concept. But until recently, meanings derived from dream analysis have been restricted to the private, individual sphere. Social dreaming, on the other hand, is a new technique where meanings from dreams are created by and for a socially constituted group. Drawing on a wide range of oneirological literature, studies in social dreaming and dream-sharing, and the author’s own dreams, two working assumptions are articulated to guide inquiry into how dreaming may be used in action research, one relating to the nature of dream experience and the other about practices for bringing dream material into social spaces. These assumptions guided two group-based inquiries to explore the significance of dreaming for action-based research, at meetings of action researchers and practice developers. Material from these inquiries contained a similar dream image, a house in a forest, and the image’s significance to participants and to the author is explored. Participants found that relating their dreams to their work as action researchers and practice developers was fruitful. Questions and insights were uncovered for the practice of action research, and for the practice of social dreaming for social benefit through action research.     

Knowledge of general practitioners on dementia and mild cognitive impairment: a cross-sectional,questionnaire study from Hungary

General practitioners (GPs) play a pivotal role in dementia recognition, yet research suggests that dementia often remains undetected in primary care. Lack of knowledge might be a major contributing factor to low recognition rates. Our objective was to address a gap in the scientific literature by exploring GPs’ knowledge on dementia and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) for the first time in Hungary by conducting a cross-sectional, questionnaire study among practicing GPs. Recruitment of the participants (n = 402) took place at mandatory postgraduate training courses and at national GP-conferences; the applied questionnaire was self-administered and contained both open-ended and fixed-response questions.

Results showed that GPs highlighted vascular and metabolic factors (38.3% of the answer items) and unhealthy lifestyle (29.1% of the answer items) as dementia risk factors. They perceived vascular dementia as the most common dementia form, followed by Alzheimer’s disease. Almost half of the respondents (44.9%) were not familiar with MCI. Most GPs identified memory problems (98.4%) and personality change (83.2%) as the leading symptoms of dementia.

In summary, GPs demonstrated adequate knowledge on areas more relevant to their practices and scope of duties (risk and preventive factors, main types and symptoms of dementia); however, uncertainties were uncovered regarding epidemiology, MCI, and pharmacological therapy. As only one-fifth (19.4%) of the GPs could participate recently in dementia-focused trainings, continued education might be beneficial to improve dementia detection rates in primary care.