Caring at a distance: Gift Theory, aid chains and social movements

This paper takes as its starting point recent work on caring for distant others which is one expression of renewed interest in moral geographies. It examines relationships in aid chains connecting donors/carers in the First World or North and recipients/cared for in the Third World or South. Assuming predominance of relationships between strangers and of universalism as a basis for moral motivation I draw upon Gift Theory in order to characterize two basic forms of gift relationship. The first is purely altruistic, the other fully reciprocal and obligatory within the framework of institutions, values and social forces within specific relationships of politics and power. This conception problematizes donor-recipient relationships in the context of two modernist models of aid chains-the Resource Transfer and the Beyond Aid Paradigms. In the first, donor domination means low levels of reciprocity despite rhetoric about partnership and participation. The second identifies potential for greater reciprocity on the basis of combination between social movements and non-governmental organizations at both national and trans-national levels, although at the risk of marginalizing competencies of states. Finally, I evaluate post-structural critiques which also problematize aid chain relationships. They do so both in terms of bases-such as universals and difference-upon which it might be constructed and the means-such as forms of positionality and mutuality-by which it might be achieved.

Student projects: plagiarism and assessment

Within the Information Technology degree programme of the University of Reading, the students undertake a major project in their final year. The module is both a hurdle to an honours degree and significant in terms of assessment weighting. The two year history so far has shown that bad citation and plagiarism are issues, and in one case called for the due referral of a project report. In the light of experience to date, we are focusing firstly on plagiarism prevention, giving generic advice on report writing and citation practice, and secondly on detection. In the longer term, I believe we need to reflect on what capabilities we should be creating in our undergraduates and therefore what and how we should be assessing them.

Investigating the practicality of using radio tracking to determine home range and movements of Picathartidae

Radiotelemetry is an important tool used to aid the understanding and conservation of cryptic and rare birds. The two bird species of the family Picathartidae are little-known, secretive, forest-dwelling birds endemic to western and central Africa. In 2005, we conducted a radio-tracking trial of Grey-necked Picathartes Picathartes oreas in the Mbam Minkom Mountain Forest, southern Cameroon, using neck collar (two birds) and tail-mounted (four birds) transmitters to investigate the practicality of radio-tracking Picathartidae. Three birds with tail-mounted transmitters were successfully tracked with the fourth, though not relocated for radio tracking, resighted the following breeding season. Two of these were breeding birds that continued to provision young during radio tracking. One neck-collared bird was found dead three days after transmitter attachment and the other neither relocated nor resighted. As mortality in one bird was potentially caused by the neck collar transmitter we recommend tail-mounted transmitters in future radio-tracking studies of Picathartidae. Home ranges, shown using minimum convex polygon and kernel estimation methods, were generally small (<0.5 km(2)) and centred around breeding sites. A minimum of 60 fixes were found to be sufficient for home range estimation.

Movements, activity patterns and home range of a female brown bear (Ursus arctos, L.) in the Rodopi Mountain Range, Greece

Movements and activity patterns of an adult radio-tagged female brown bear accompanied by her cubs were documented for the first time in Rodopi area (NE Greece) from August 2000 to July 2002. Average daily movements were 2.45 +/- 2.26 SD km, (range 0.15-8.5 km). The longest daily range could be related to human disturbance (hunting activity). The longest seasonal distance (211 km), during Summer 2001 coincided with the dissolution of the family. With cubs, the female was more active during daytime (73 % of all radio-readings) than when solitary (28 %). The female switched to a more crepuscular behaviour, after separation from the yearling (July 2001). According to pooled data from 924 activity - recording sessions, during the whole monitoring period, the female was almost twice as active during day time while rearing cubs (51 % active) than when solitary (23 %). The autumn and early winter home range size of the family was larger (280 km(2)) than after the separation from the cubs (59 km(2)). During the family group phase, home range size varied from 258 km(2) in autumn to 40 km(2) in winter (average denning period lasted 107 days : December 2000-March 2001). The bear hibernated in the Bulgarian part of the Rodopi Range during winters of 2001 and 2002.

Student-teachers' perspectives on positive and negative social processes in schools

In recent years, the Standards for Qualified Teacher Status in England have placed new emphasis on student-teachers' ability to become integrated into the 'corporate life of the school' and to work with other professionals. Little research, however, has been carried out into how student-teachers perceive the social processes and interactions that are central to such integration during their initial teacher education school placements. This study aims to shed light on these perceptions. The data, gathered from 23 student-teachers through interviews and reflective writing, illustrate the extent to which the participants perceived such social processes as supporting or obstructing their development as teachers. Signals of inclusion, the degree of match or mismatch in students' and school colleagues' role expectations, and the social awareness of both school and student-teacher emerged as crucial factors in this respect. The student-teachers' accounts show their social interactions with school staff to be meaningful in developing their 'teacher self' and to be profoundly emotionally charged. The implications for mentor and student-teacher role preparation are discussed in this article.

Student perceptions of their IEP targets

The 2001 Code of Practice for Special Educational Needs (DfES, 2001) explicitly states that students with IEPs should have an active role in the writing and implementing of them. A research project was conducted in which 19 Year 8 students in three schools were interviewed, with the findings cross-referenced against an examination of their individual education plans (IEPs) and interviews with the SENCos. Very few students were able to communicate a clear understanding of IEPs. Students' stated targets mostly reflected mainstream target-setting: very few stated targets matched with those in their IEPs. Consistent with these findings is literature which argues that meaningfully involving students in the IEP process takes considerable time and effort, which would appear to imply that the number of students with IEPs in any one school must be limited. Against this are pressures, particularly from OFSTED but also from examination boards, to have IEPs available as evidence that students' needs are being met. The article concludes by suggesting that SENCos look to limit the number of IEPs issued, alongside a robust defence of the school's special educational needs policy within the school evaluation form to ensure that students' needs are met and also are seen to be met.

Problems in the coupling of eye and hand in the sequential movements of children with developmental coordination disorder

Background: Shifting gaze and attention ahead of the hand is a natural component in the performance of skilled manual actions. Very few studies have examined the precise co-ordination between the eye and hand in children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD). Methods This study directly assessed the maturity of eye-hand co-ordination in children with DCD. A double-step pointing task was used to investigate the coupling of the eye and hand in 7-year-old children with and without DCD. Sequential targets were presented on a computer screen, and eye and hand movements were recorded simultaneously. Results There were no differences between typically developing (TD) and DCD groups when completing fast single-target tasks. There were very few differences in the completion of the first movement in the double-step tasks, but differences did occur during the second sequential movement. One factor appeared to be the propensity for the DCD children to delay their hand movement until some period after the eye had landed on the target. This resulted in a marked increase in eye-hand lead during the second movement, disrupting the close coupling and leading to a slower and less accurate hand movement among children with DCD. Conclusions In contrast to skilled adults, both groups of children preferred to foveate the target prior to initiating a hand movement if time allowed. The TD children, however, were more able to reduce this foveation period and shift towards a feedforward mode of control for hand movements. The children with DCD persevered with a look-then-move strategy, which led to an increase in error. For the group of DCD children in this study, there was no evidence of a problem in speed or accuracy of simple movements, but there was a difficulty in concatenating the sequential shifts of gaze and hand required for the completion of everyday tasks or typical assessment items.

How active gaze informs the hand in sequential pointing movements

Visual information is vital for fast and accurate hand movements. It has been demonstrated that allowing free eye movements results in greater accuracy than when the eyes maintain centrally fixed. Three explanations as to why free gaze improves accuracy are: shifting gaze to a target allows visual feedback in guiding the hand to the target (feedback loop), shifting gaze generates ocular-proprioception which can be used to update a movement (feedback-feedforward), or efference copy could be used to direct hand movements (feedforward). In this experiment we used a double-step task and manipulated the utility of ocular-proprioceptive feedback from eye to head position by removing the second target during the saccade. We confirm the advantage of free gaze for sequential movements with a double-step pointing task and document eye-hand lead times of approximately 200 ms for both initial movements and secondary movements. The observation that participants move gaze well ahead of the current hand target dismisses foveal feedback as a major contribution. We argue for a feedforward model based on eye movement efference as the major factor in enabling accurate hand movements. The results with the double-step target task also suggest the need for some buffering of efference and ocular-proprioceptive signals to cope with the situation where the eye has moved to a location ahead of the current target for the hand movement. We estimate that this buffer period may range between 120 and 200 ms without significant impact on hand movement accuracy.

Eye-movements aid the control of locomotion

Eye-movements have long been considered a problem when trying to understand the visual control of locomotion. They transform the retinal image from a simple expanding pattern of moving texture elements (pure optic flow), into a complex combination of translation and rotation components (retinal flow). In this article we investigate whether there are measurable advantages to having an active free gaze, over a static gaze or tracking gaze, when steering along a winding path. We also examine patterns of free gaze behavior to determine preferred gaze strategies during active locomotion. Participants were asked to steer along a computer-simulated textured roadway with free gaze, fixed gaze, or gaze tracking the center of the roadway. Deviation of position from the center of the road was recorded along with their point of gaze. It was found that visually tracking the middle of the road produced smaller steering errors than for fixed gaze. Participants performed best at the steering task when allowed to sample naturally from the road ahead with free gaze. There was some variation in the gaze strategies used, but sampling was predominantly of areas proximal to the center of the road. These results diverge from traditional models of flow analysis.