Mathematics teaching life histories in the study of teachers' perceptions of change

The aim of this paper is to discuss teachers' perceptions of change in their thought and/or practice over time and their perceptions of what kind of experiences or challenges might have influenced those changes. Two mathematics teaching life histories of Brazilian teachers are examined, considering a context of curriculum development in the state of São Paulo, Brazil. Reflection on teachers' thought and practice and interest in their own development, including interest in their own learning of mathematics, seemed to be the most important internal aspects influencing change and development. Close support seemed to be the most important external aspect. The retrospective analysis put a good face on personal change and development. (C) 2000 Elsevier B.V. Ltd. All rights reserved.

On the determination of epsilon during discriminative GMM training

Discriminative training of Gaussian Mixture Models (GMMs) for speech or speaker recognition purposes is usually based on the gradient descent method, in which the iteration step-size, ε, uses to be defined experimentally. In this letter, we derive an equation to adaptively determine ε, by showing that the second-order Newton-Raphson iterative method to find roots of equations is equivalent to the gradient descent algorithm. © 2010 IEEE.

Spirituality: Do teachers and students hold the same opinion?

Background:  Few studies have investigated potential differences between the opinions of educators and undergraduates regarding spirituality in patient care. Understanding these differences, could lead to better strategies for educational proposes. Purpose:  To compare the opinions of medical teachers (MTs) and medical students (MSs) regarding spirituality training in a Brazilian medical school. Methods:  A cross-sectional study was conducted. MTs and MSs filled out a questionnaire containing the Duke Religion Index, and questions regarding spirituality in clinical practice and at medical school. A comparison between early-curriculum MSs, late curriculum MSs and MTs was carried out. Chi-square (categorical) and Mann-Whitney (continuous/ordinal) tests were used. Results:  A total of 475 MSs and 44 MTs were evaluated. Results showed that MSs did not address spirituality as frequently as MTs (p<0.001), and that most participants did not feel prepared to address this issue, and believe that Brazilian medical schools are not giving all the required information in this field. Nevertheless, they believe MSs should be prepared to discuss these issues. Late-curriculum MSs believed that spirituality plays a more positive role in patient health (p=0.027), and were more prone to address this issue than early-curriculum MSs (p=0.023). Conclusion:  These findings revealed some of the challenges faced by spirituality medical training in Brazil, and differences between MTs and MSs regarding this issue. Further studies are needed to replicate these findings in other countries. © Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2013.

The Acting in Group of Teachers as Possibility of Resignification of the Interpretation about the Writing Language

Front of the possibility of acting with the teachers who teach in schools of Early Childhood Education for children aged six years, about the re-siginification of the understanding of writing language and of the importance of the child in this age group establish a positive relationship with this mode of language, was developed in 2011, a project linked to the Teaching of UNESP titled “Depathologization learning of the writing and inclusive education: reflections and actions of the teacher of Early Childhood Education”. This project aims to identification of the actions, in the classroom, of the patologization and subsequent implementation of actions depathologization writing by teachers’ actions, considering the increasingly early systematization of formal education of this kind of language in kindergarten. To this end, procedures that characterize the collaborative methodology are adopted. Throughout the methodological course, the engagement of the teachers, of the coordination and of the direction was valued, which seemed to favor both the formation, as the maintenance of the group, were very important aspects to ensure the interaction between its members and the common interest in the reflection about the topic in question. This paper focuses attention on whether thematic axes highlight during the initial survey of the expectations of teachers subsequently addressed in theoretical and reflective meetings leading up to identification of actions the patologization and/or of the proposition of the actions despatologizadoras of the learning of the writing, and in what refers to the way they are addressed.

Formação continuada em educação física e inclusão do deficiente no ensino regular sob a ótica de professores =: The ongoing graduation in physical education studies and the inclusion of disable people in regular schools under the teacher's perception

Pós-graduação em Ciências da Motricidade - IBRC

Impact of patient training patterns on peritonitis rates in a large national cohort study

Background. Ideal training methods that could ensure best peritoneal dialysis (PD) outcome have not been defined in previous reports. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the impact of training characteristics on peritonitis rates in a large Brazilian cohort.Methods. Incident patients with valid data on training recruited in the Brazilian Peritoneal Dialysis Multicenter Study (BRAZPD II) from January 2008 to January 2011 were included. Peritonitis was diagnosed according to International Society for Peritoneal Dialysis guidelines; incidence rate of peritonitis (episodes/patient-months) and time to the first peritonitis were used as end points.Results. Two thousand two hundred and forty-three adult patients were included in the analysis: 59 +/- 16 years old, 51.8% female, 64.7% with <= 4 years of education. The median training time was 15 h (IQI 10-20 h). Patients were followed for a median of 11.2 months (range 3-36.5). The overall peritonitis rate was 0.29 per year at risk (1 episode/41 patient-months). The mean number of hours of training per day was 1.8 +/- 2.4. Less than 1 h of training/day was associated with higher incidence rate when compared with the intervals of 1-2 h/day (P = 0.03) and > 2 h/day (P = 0.02). Patients who received a cumulative training of > 15 h had significantly lower incidence of peritonitis compared with < 15 h (0.26 per year at risk versus 0.32 per year at risk, P = 0.01). The presence of a caregiver and the number of people trained were not significantly associated with peritonitis incidence rate. Training in the immediate 10 days after implantation of the catheter was associated with the highest peritonitis rate (0.32 per year), compared with training prior to catheter implantation (0.28 per year) or > 10 days after implantation (0.23 per year). More experienced centers had a lower risk for the first peritonitis (P = 0.003).Conclusions. This is the first study to analyze the association between training characteristics and outcomes in a large cohort of PD patients. Low training time (particularly < 15 h), smaller center size and the timing of training in relation to catheter implantation were associated with a higher incidence of peritonitis. These results support the recommendation of a minimum amount of training hours to reduce peritonitis incidence regardless of the number of hours trained per day.

Future Brazilian teachers imaginaries about physics teaching in adults education

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Minha terra tem palmeiras onde canta o sabiá...: sobre o Projeto Inajá e a formação de professores no médio Araguaia

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)