Child care in Kenya     

Diane Adams 《Early Childhood Education Journal》1983,10(3):11-15

Kenya—East African nation of big game, tourism, thorn trees, and white sand beaches—is facing a new challenge in preschool education. With nearly 20 percent of the children under five in some type of child care situation, it is possible that everyday preschool experiences may be leading children either closer to, or away from, the values of their parents. The test for this relatively new nation is to find the proper balance between the goals of the preschool and the values of both traditional and modernized parents. It is a topic of equal importance in any nation where a great many preschoolers are cared for by persons other than their parents.  相似文献   

ICT and educational (dis)advantage: families,computers and contemporary social and educational inequalities     

Lawrence Angus  Wendy Sutherland‐Smith 《British Journal of Sociology of Education》2004,25(1):3-18

Because access to new technologies is unequally distributed, there has been considerable debate about the growing gap between the so‐called information‐rich and information‐poor. Such concerns have led to high‐profile information technology policy initiatives in many countries. In Australia, in an attempt to ‘redress the balance between the information rich and poor’ by providing ‘equal access to the World Wide Web’ (Virtual Communities, 2002 Virtual Communities (2002) About us. Available online at: http://www.virtualcommunities. com.au (accessed 18 August 2002)  [Google Scholar]), the Australian Council of Trade Unions, Virtual Communities (a computer/software distributor) and Primus (an Internet provider) in late 1999 formed an alliance to offer relatively inexpensive computer and Internet access to union members in order to make ‘technology affordable for all Australians’ (Virtual Communities, 2002 Virtual Communities (2002) About us. Available online at: http://www.virtualcommunities. com.au (accessed 18 August 2002)  [Google Scholar]). In this paper, we examine four families, one of which had long‐term Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) access, and three of which took advantage of the Virtual Communities offer to get home computer and Internet access for the first time. We examine their engagement with ICT and suggest that previously disadvantaged family members are not particularly advantaged by their access to ICT.  相似文献   

The inheritance of behavioral wildness in house mice (Mus musculus L.)     

Roy H. Smith  James L. Connor 《Learning & behavior》1974,2(4):249-256

Fourteen behavioral measures were ranked according to their ability to differentiate performances of a wild population of mice from three domestic inbred strains. These “wildness” rankings were then analyzed for their ability to predict genetic and Genotype by Environment interactions. Genetic parameters were derived from analysis of three inbred domestic strains and their three hybrid crosses via the diallel technique of genetic analysis. Genotype by Environment interactions were assessed both as mean differences in stock performances resulting from rearing in a laboratory vs naturalistic environment and as differences in environmental variability within stock genotypes. Behavioral characters ranking high on “wildness” failed to demonstrate any unitary pattern of Genotype by Environment interactions. The diallel genetic analysis revealed many examples of additive variation but relatively few examples of dominant variation. An extremely wide range of interactions occurred between genotype and rearing environments, with “wildness” and “developmental homeostasis” concepts both failing to account for all the observed interactions.  相似文献   

II. GENDER IN LOW- AND MIDDLE-INCOME COUNTRIES: GENERAL METHODS     

Marc H. Bornstein  Diane L. Putnick  Robert H. Bradley  Kirby Deater-Deckard  Jennifer E. Lansford  Yumiko Ota 《Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development》2016,81(1):24-32

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Scaffolding Narrative Skills: A Meta-Analysis of Instruction in Early Childhood Settings     

Diane Pesco  Andréanne Gagné 《Early education and development》2017,28(7):773-793

Research Findings: Children’s ability to tell stories and to understand the stories of others typically emerges in early childhood, supported by primary caregivers and educators. This article reviews instruction designed to foster children’s narrative skills in preschool and kindergarten settings and examines the effects using meta-analysis. The review covers more than 3 decades (1980–2013) of experimental research (k = 15 studies, 28 effects). The findings showed that verbal scaffolding, alone or in combination with other strategies, was the predominant teaching approach. The meta-analysis revealed average effects (weighted for sample size) for narrative expression (.50) and a slightly larger effect for comprehension (.58). These effects were unrelated to the duration of instruction. However, when verbal strategies were combined with nonverbal ones, such as engaging children in enacting stories or in telling stories with props, the effects for expression increased (i.e., children’s storytelling improved more from pretest to posttest). Practice or Policy: The review indicates promising strategies for supporting narrative skills. Furthermore, the studies identified can serve as a resource for practitioners by suggesting diverse kinds of verbal scaffolds, complementary nonverbal approaches, and storybooks that have been used effectively to foster narrative competencies among young children.  相似文献   

Using Family Backpacks as a Tool to Involve Families in Teaching Young Children About Healthy Eating     

Jisoo Hong  Diane W. Bales  Charlotte R. Wallinga 《Early Childhood Education Journal》2018,46(2):209-221

Children’s obesity rates have increased substantially over the past several decades, due in part to unhealthy eating habits. About 75% of preschool-aged children consume fewer fruits and vegetables than recommended for health. Because children begin developing eating habits during early childhood, obesity prevention programs are increasingly targeting young children in early childhood education (ECE) settings and are involving their families in teaching about healthy eating. The purpose of this pilot study is to assess the effectiveness of a family involvement activity known as the family backpack in increasing fruit and vegetable consumption among 4- and 5-year-old children and their parents through hands-on activities that encourage them to explore and discuss fruits and vegetables at home. Forty-two families (22 experimental, 20 control) participated in the study. Families received a family backpack from their child’s ECE teacher and completed activities with their child at home during a specific week. Experimental-group backpacks contained a children’s book and three activities to encourage parent–child discussion about fruits and vegetables; control-group backpacks contained an unrelated book and activities. Children’s and parents’ fruit and vegetable consumption and frequency of serving fruits and vegetables at home were assessed using parent self-report surveys before and after completing backpack activities. Parents in the experimental group, but not the control group, reported increases in their own and their children’s fruit and vegetable consumption after completing family backpack activities. Family backpacks show promise as a tool for early childhood educators to help families reinforce and expand children’s learning and encourage healthy eating habits at home.  相似文献   

Strategies for Broadening Participation in Advanced Technological Education Programs: Practice and Perceptions     

Corey Smith  Lori Wingate 《Community College Journal of Research & Practice》2016,40(9):779-796

Expanding and diversifying the STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) workforce is a national priority. The National Science Foundation is investing efforts at post secondary education institutions to engage individuals who have been historically underrepresented in STEM. This paper investigated the use of strategies to broaden participation in STEM by grantees of NSF’s Advanced Technological Education (ATE), who are primarily located at 2-year colleges. The ATE program focuses on developing and improving technician training programs to prepare students for employment in fields that rely on advanced technologiessuch as nanotechnology, photonics, and mechatronics. A survey, conducted annually by the authors of this study, was used to collect data from ATE grantees on their use and perceptions of strategies to broaden participation in STEM. The findings showed that strategies related to motivation and access to enhance recruitment are more widely used then strategies that improve retention. Respondents identified strategies related to providing financial assistance, mentoring, and conducting outreach activities as the most effective for reaching and engaging underrepresented minority students in academic programs. Despite these perceptions, these strategies seem to be underutilized among this group.  相似文献   

Aquatic-Aerobic Exercise as a Means of Stress Reduction during Pregnancy          下载免费PDF全文

Parker KM  Smith SA 《The Journal of perinatal education》2003,12(1):6-17

The goals of this research were to explore the current literature regarding associations between psychological stress and adverse fetal outcome, associations between aerobic exercise and psychological stress reduction, and associations between aerobic exercise and fetal outcome. The published studies that were located provide evidence of the following: 1) Stress reactivity increases physiologically during pregnancy, 2) pregnant women may experience additional stressors that are usually not experienced in a nonpregnant state, 3) psychological stress in pregnancy is associated with adverse fetal outcome, 4) exercise can be a method of stress reduction, 5) exercise in pregnancy is not associated with adverse fetal outcome, and 6) exercise in pregnancy may provide benefit to the fetus. Data were analyzed from an original study and associations were reported between psychological stress-management activities and participation in aquatic aerobic exercise classes. No reports were available investigating an exercise-induced reduction in psychological stress with fetal outcome.  相似文献   

Child abuse potential inventory and parenting behavior: Relationships with high-risk correlates     

Mary E. Haskett  Susan Smith Scott  Kellie D. Fann 《Child abuse & neglect》1995,19(12)

The primary purpose of this research was to examine the construct validity of the Child Abuse Potential Inventory by comparing maltreating and high-risk parents' CAP Inventory abuse scores to their behavior during interactions with their children. A second purpose was to determine the degree to which CAP Inventory scores and parenting behavior were related to several known correlates of abuse, as measured by parent and teacher reports. Participants (n = 41) included abusive and high-risk parents and their children referred to a treatment group. Correlational analyses revealed that CAP Inventory scores and observed parenting style yielded highly related findings, supporting construct validity of the CAP Inventory. However, the CAP Inventory and observed behavior index showed a different pattern of relationships to the risk correlates. Implications for assessment of risk status are discussed and recommendations are provided for continued research.  相似文献   

A review of ontology based query expansion     

J. Bhogal  A. Macfarlane  P. Smith 《Information processing & management》2007

This paper examines the meaning of context in relation to ontology based query expansion and contains a review of query expansion approaches. The various query expansion approaches include relevance feedback, corpus dependent knowledge models and corpus independent knowledge models. Case studies detailing query expansion using domain-specific and domain-independent ontologies are also included. The penultimate section attempts to synthesise the information obtained from the review and provide success factors in using an ontology for query expansion. Finally the area of further research in applying context from an ontology to query expansion within a newswire domain is described.  相似文献