Beiträge zum Mathematikunterricht 2015. Vorträge auf der 49. Tagung für Didaktik der Mathematik vom 09.02.2015 bis 13.02.2015 in Basel [Band 1]

Die Jahrestagung der Gesellschaft für Didaktik der Mathematik fand im Jahr 2015 zum dritten Mal in der Schweiz statt. [...] Mit rund 300 Vorträgen, 16 moderierten Sektionen, 15 Arbeitskreistreffen und 21 Posterpräsentationen eröffnete sich ein breites Spektrum an Themen und unterschiedlichen Zugangsweisen zur Erforschung von Fragen rund um das Lernen und Lehren von Mathematik. (DIPF/Orig.)

Reactive Attachment Disorder in infants in foster care and associated mental health and cognitive functioning

Background: Reactive attachment disorder (RAD) has been described as one of the least researched and most poorly understood psychiatric disorders (Chaffin et al., 2006). Despite this, given what is known about maltreatment and attachment, it is likely that RAD has profound consequences for child development. Very little is known about the prevalence and stability of RAD symptoms over time. Until recently it has been difficult to investigate the presence of RAD due to limited measures for informing a diagnosis. However this study utilised a new observational tool Method: A cross sectional study design with a one-year follow-up explored RAD symptoms in maltreated infants in Scotland (n=55, age range= 16-62 months) and associated mental health and cognitive functioning. The study utilised the Rating of Inhibited Attachment Behavior Scale (Corval, et al., unpublished 2014) that has recently been developed by experts in the field along side The Disturbances of Attachment Interview (Smyke & Zeanah, 1999). Children were recruited as part of the BeST trial, whereby all infants who came in to the care of the local authority in Glasgow due to child protection concerns were invited to participate. The study sample was representative of the larger pool of data in terms of age, gender, mental health and cognitive functioning. Results: The sample was found to be representative of the population of maltreated children from which it was derived. Prevalence of RAD was found to be 7.3% (n=3, 95% CI [0.43 – 14.17]) at T1, when children are first placed in to foster care. At T2, following one year in improved care conditions, 4.3% (n=2, 95% CI [below 0 – 10.16]) met a borderline RAD diagnosis. Levels of observed RAD symptoms decreased significantly at T2 in comparison to T1 but carer reported symptoms of RAD did not. Children whose RAD symptoms did not improve were found to be significantly older and showed less prosocial behaviour. RAD was associated with some mental health and cognitive difficulties. Lower Verbal IQ and unexpectedly, prosocial behaviour were found to predict RAD symptoms. Conclusions: The preliminary findings have added to the developing understanding of RAD symptoms and associated difficulties however further exploration of RAD in larger samples would be invaluable.

Emerging Gender Regimes and Policies for Gender Equality in a Wider Europe

This article addresses some implications for gender equality and gender policy at European and national levels of transformations in family, economy and polity, which challenge gender regimes across Europe. Women’s labour market participation in the west and the collapse of communism in the east have undermined the systems and assumptions of western male breadwinner and dual worker models of central and eastern Europe. Political reworking of the work/welfare relationship into active welfare has individualised responsibility. Individualisation is a key trend west − and in some respects east − and challenges the structures that supported care in state and family. The links that joined men to women, cash to care, incomes to carers have all been fractured. The article will argue that care work and unpaid care workers are both casualties of these developments. Social, political and economic changes have not been matched by the development of new gender models at the national level. And while EU gender policy has been admired as the most innovative aspect of its social policy, gender equality is far from achieved: women’s incomes across Europe are well below men’s; policies for supporting unpaid care work have developed modestly compared with labour market activation policies.Enlargement brings new challenges as it draws together gender regimes with contrasting histories and trajectories. The article will map social policies for gender equality across the key elements of gender regimes – paid work, care work, income, time and voice – and discuss the nature of a model of gender equality that would bring gender equality across these. It analyses ideas about a dual earner–dual carer model, in the Dutch combination scenario and ‘universal caregiver’ models, at household and civil society levels. These offer a starting point for a model in which paid and unpaid work are equally valued and equally shared between men and women, but we argue that a citizenship model, in which paid and unpaid work obligations are underpinned by social rights, is more likely to achieve gender equality.

Projekt EDUCARE: Skalendokumentation zur Befragung pädagogischer Fachkräfte in Kindertageseinrichtungen

Die in diesem Dokument aufgeführten Skalen dienen der Erfassung der bildungsbezogenen Vorstellungen und Praktiken von pädagogischen Fachkräften in Kindertageseinrichtungen. Die Skalen wurden im Projekt EDUCARE teils neu entwickelt, teils in Anlehnung an bestehende Instrumente konstruiert und ggf. an die Perspektive von Eltern angepasst. Alle Items wurden mittels eines mehrstufigen Antwortformats erfasst. Ihr Einsatz erfolgte in einer vom Projektteam durchgeführten Datenerhebung mittels Fragebogen. Die Skalenkonstruktion fand auf Basis der erhobenen Primärdaten statt und orientierte sich an den Prinzipien der klassischen Testtheorie. Zu jedem Konstrukt werden deskriptive Kennwerte auf Item- und Skalenebene berichtet. Zur Beurteilung der Güte der Instrumente werden zwei Reliabilitätsmaße sowie die Trennschärfen der Items angegeben. Bei der Auswahl und Konzeption der gemessenen Konstrukte waren habitus- und milieutheoretische sowie kindheitstheoretische Annahmen leitend. Im Projekt ging es darum, ein möglichst breites Bild der im Habitus von Fachkräften verankerten Vorstellungen, Ziele und Sollensvorstellungen in Bezug auf Betreuung, Bildung, Erziehung und Förderung zu erhalten. Zudem wurde die Praxis der Fachkräfte in diesen Handlungsbereichen erfragt, um Rückschlüsse auf eine milieuspezifische Prägung der pädagogischen Arbeit von Fachkräften ziehen zu können. Gerade mit Blick auf gegenwärtige, politisch dominante Leitbilder hinsichtlich der Ausgestaltung von Kindheit war es von Interesse, inwieweit Eltern diese Leitbilder teilen oder ihnen ablehnend gegenüberstehen. … Die Skalendokumentation ist wie folgt aufgebaut: Im Anschluss an (I.) eine einführende Darstellung des Forschungsprojekts werden (II.) das Vorgehen bei der Datenerhebung und die bei der Skalenkonstruktion verwendete Stichprobe beschrieben. Die zur Analyse der Items und zur Konstruktion der Skalen verwendeten Verfahren werden (III.) im nachfolgenden Abschnitt dargestellt. Der Hauptteil des Dokuments ist (IV.) eine thematisch geordnete Zusammenstellung der im Projekt eingesetzten Skalen. Damit wird zugleich ein Einblick in die deskriptiven Ergebnisse der Fachkräftebefragung an Kindertageseinrichtungen gegeben. (DIPF/Orig.)

The experience of family carers of people with dementia who are hospitalised

Hospital admission of a person with dementia can have a significant impact on the family carer, who temporarily relinquishes caring to health professionals. A descriptive qualitative design using in-depth interviews with a conversational approach was used to elicit data. Adjusting to the change in the carer’s role can be challenging and result in feelings of helplessness, loneliness, loss of control and being undervalued. Family support can assist with the transition but family conflict increases anxiety. Good communication between clinicians and the carer is vital. The carer should be included in decision-making as the ‘expert' in the care of the person with dementia. This article discusses findings of a larger study specifically related to the emotional support required for the carers of people with dementia, who are admitted to hospital. The carer and the patient must be considered as a dyad in relation to discharge planning.

Collaborative care skill training workshop: how Australian carers support a loved one with an eating disorder

This study examined the impact of participating in the CollaborativeCare Skill Training Workshops on carers’ coping strategies, expressedemotion (EE), burden, distress, confidence in their loved one’scapacity to change, as well as the previously unexplored dimensionof accommodating and enabling of their loved one’s eatingdisorder behaviour. A non-experimental research design wasimplemented and 77 carers from Victoria, Australia participated inthe study and completed questionnaires at pre-and postinterventionand an 8-week follow-up. Significant reductionsoccurred in accommodation and enabling of some eating disorderbehaviours, as well as in carers’ maladaptive coping, EE, eatingdisorder-specific burden and psychological distress. Increasedconfidence that their loved one could change was also observed.These changes were maintained at a follow-up. Results suggestthat the workshop can be effective in decreasing carer use ofmaladaptive coping, carer distress and burden. Notably, it targetsand had contributed to reducing factors associated withmaintaining eating disorders such as accommodation and enablingof certain eating behaviours and high levels of EE. Modification tothe content of the workshop may be required to improve carers’adaptive coping and reduce certain behaviours whichaccommodate and enable the eating disorder.

Continuity of care by a primary midwife (caseload midwifery) increases women's satisfaction with antenatal, intrapartum and postpartum care: results from the COSMOS randomised controlled trial

BACKGROUND: Continuity of care by a primary midwife during the antenatal, intrapartum and postpartum periods has been recommended in Australia and many hospitals have introduced a caseload midwifery model of care. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the effect of caseload midwifery on women's satisfaction with care across the maternity continuum.

METHODS: Pregnant women at low risk of complications, booking for care at a tertiary hospital in Melbourne, Australia, were recruited to a randomised controlled trial between September 2007 and June 2010. Women were randomised to caseload midwifery or standard care. The caseload model included antenatal, intrapartum and postpartum care from a primary midwife with back-up provided by another known midwife when necessary. Women allocated to standard care received midwife-led care with varying levels of continuity, junior obstetric care, or community-based general practitioner care. Data for this paper were collected by background questionnaire prior to randomisation and a follow-up questionnaire sent at two months postpartum. The primary analysis was by intention to treat. A secondary analysis explored the effect of intrapartum continuity of carer on overall satisfaction rating.

RESULTS: Two thousand, three hundred fourteen women were randomised: 1,156 to caseload care and 1,158 to standard care. The response rate to the two month survey was 88% in the caseload group and 74% in the standard care group. Compared with standard care, caseload care was associated with higher overall ratings of satisfaction with antenatal care (OR 3.35; 95% CI 2.79, 4.03), intrapartum care (OR 2.14; 95% CI 1.78, 2.57), hospital postpartum care (OR 1.56, 95% CI 1.32, 1.85) and home-based postpartum care (OR 3.19; 95% CI 2.64, 3.85).

CONCLUSION: For women at low risk of medical complications, caseload midwifery increases women's satisfaction with antenatal, intrapartum and postpartum care.

A telephone survey to determine the experiences of children and their parents/carers, following the initiation of a new medicine

Objective: To determine what issues are experienced during the first few weeks of therapy by patients, and their parents/carers, when a child/young person has been prescribed a new medicine. Method: One hundred patients aged ≤18 years of age prescribed a new medicine for ≥6 weeks were recruited from a single UK National Health Service specialist paediatric hospital outpatient pharmacy. Six weeks after the first dispensing of their new medicine the patient or their parent/carer received telephone follow-up by a researcher and verbally completed a questionnaire containing both open and closed questions. Patient or parent/carer experiences were identified and analysed using thematic analysis and descriptive statistics. Results: Eighty-six participants were available for telephone follow-up. Six (7%) had not started their medicine. Paediatric patients and their parents/carers experienced a range of issues during the first few weeks after starting a new medicine. These included additional concerns/questions (24/80, 30%), administration issues (21/80, 26.3%), adverse effects (29/80, 36.3%) and obtaining repeat supplies (12/80, 15%). The Morisky Medication Adherence Scale indicated that 34/78 (43.6%) participants had a high adherence rating, 35/78 (44.9%) medium and 9/78 (11.5%) a low rating. Conclusions: Paediatric patients and their parents/carers experience a range of issues during the first few weeks after starting a new medicine. Further research is required to determine the type of interventions that may further support medicines use in this group of patients.

Carers in the welfare state : on informal care and support for carers in Sweden

  The general aim of this dissertation is to describe and analyse patterns of informal care and support for carers in Sweden. One specific aim is to study patterns of informal care from a broad population perspective in terms of types of care and types of carer. A typology of four different care categories based on what carers do revealed that women were much more likely than men to be involved at the ‘heavy end’ of caring, i.e. providing personal care in combination with a variety of other caring tasks. Men were more likely than women to provide some kind of practical help (Study I). Another aim is to investigate which support services are received by which types of informal caregiver. Relatively few informal caregivers in any care category were found to be receiving any kind of support from municipalities or voluntary organizations, for example training or financial assistance (Study II). The same study also examines which kinds of help care recipients receive in addition to that provided by informal carers. It appears that people in receipt of personal care from an informal caregiver quite often also receive help from the public care system, in this case mostly municipal services. However, the majority of those receiving personal, informal care did not receive any help from the public care system or from voluntary organizations or for-profit agencies (Study II). The empirical material in studies I and II comprises survey data from telephone interviews with a random sample of residents in the County of Stockholm aged between 18 and 84. In a number of countries there is a growing interest among social scientists and social policymakers in examining the types of support services that might be needed by people who provide informal care for older people and others. A further aim of the present dissertation is therefore to describe and analyse the carer support that is provided by municipalities and voluntary organizations in Sweden. The dissertation examines whether this support is aimed directly or indirectly at caregivers and discusses whether the Swedish government’s special financial investment in help for carers actually led to any changes in the support provided by municipalities and voluntary organisations. The main types of carer support offered by the municipalities were payment for care-giving, relief services and day care. The chief forms of carer support provided by the voluntary organizations were support groups, training groups, and a number of services aimed primarily at the elderly care recipients (Study III). Patterns of change in municipal carer support could be discerned fairly soon. The Swedish government’s special allocation to municipalities and voluntary organisations appears to have led to an increase in the number of municipalities providing direct support for carers, such as training, information material and professional caregiver consultants. On the other hand, only minor changes could be discerned in the pattern of carer support services provided by the voluntary organizations. This demonstrates stability and the relatively low impact that policy initiatives seem to have on voluntary organizations as providers (Study IV). In studies III and IV the empirical material consists of survey data from mail questionnaires sent to municipalities and voluntary organizations in the County of Stockholm. In the fields of social planning and social work there appears to be a need to clarify the aims of support services for informal carers. Should the support be direct or indirect? Should it be used to supplement or substitute caregivers? In this process of reappraisal it will be important to take the needs of both caregivers and care recipients into account when developing existing and new forms of support. How informal caregivers and care recipients interact with the care system as a whole is undeniably a fertile field for further research.

The return of the traditional birth attendant

The World Health Organization has noted much progress towards the realisation of Millennium Development Goals related to maternal and child health. Eighty percent of women in many developing economies now receive at least one visit during pregnancy by a skilled birth attendant (although only 52% had the recommended four visits), and 68% of women across developing regions receive skilled health attendant care (up from 56% in 1990). However, disparities follow regional and urban-rural gaps. Sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia lag behind other regions in the provision of antenatal care and skilled attendance at birth (although typically attended by a family member or villager) and over 32 million of the 40 million births not attended by skilled health personnel in 2012 occurred in rural areas. Overall, one-quarter of women in developing nations still birth alone or with a relative to assist them. While increased numbers of medically-trained midwives and health workers or midwife assistants would increase coverage by up to 40%, these are longer-term solutions. In the short term, gross disparities in services in some resource-poor areas have been alleviated by recruiting Traditional Birth Attendants (TBAs) re-trained in emergency obstetric skills to deal with emergency situations and to refer women onto health facilities when necessary. Samoa and Bangladesh are examples. For many women for a range of reasons TBAs are preferable to hospital care. It therefore makes sense to recognise their place within maternity care, to offer basic and ongoing training and to set up registration procedures thus better ensuring the monitoring of outcomes. Incorporating TBAs into the formal healthcare system would meet both physiological and relational components of birth. In terms of the latter, TBAs would act as cultural brokers between Western and traditional cosmologies and provide women with continuity of care from a known carer; in the West a demonstrably simple but effective intervention promoting physiological safety and reducing the need for higher level medical interventions.