Dificultades en el aprendizaje de las Matemáticas : una propuesta para Psicopedagogía.

Esta comunicación se centra en una propuesta para la elección de contenidos matemáticos que sirvan de ejemplo para el tratamiento de dificultades de los procesos de enseñanza-aprendizaje. Hay que tener en cuenta que una de las funciones del licenciado en Psicopedagogía es realizar intervenciones psicodidácticas en un proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje; sin embargo, sus acciones no van a operar en el vacío, tendrá que intervenir y ofrecer alternativas para alguna situación concreta dentro de una determinada área curricular. Debido al carácter instrumental y formativo de las Matemáticas, su enseñanza y aprendizaje es imprescindible en cualquier ámbito de la sociedad. Los cambios que se están produciendo en el sistema educativo hacen necesaria una aportación curricular a la formación de estos especialistas desde el área de Didáctica de las Matemáticas.

Perfil del maestro especialista en Educación Física en centros públicos de la Región de Murcia.

Analizar en profundidad la situación de la enseñanza de la educación física en la Región de Murcia que se encuentra con buenas perspectivas de difusión desde la creación de la especialidad en la Escuela de Magisterio en 1990, pero cuya realidad resulta desconcertante ante la falta de cualificación y especialización del profesorado que imparte esta asignatura en la actualidad. Coincide con el universo ya que está constituida por el conjunto de maestros y maestras que imparten la asignatura de educación física en los centros públicos de la Región de Murcia. 291 profesores elegidos por diseño muestral aleatorio simple por cuotas de género y edad de los 458 totales. De la muestra 183 son hombres y 108 mujeres. El proceso central de la investigación lo constituye la elaboración del instrumento (cuestionario) de recogida de información. Se recopiló información mediante la consulta de documentación y de expertos y recogida de información adicional mediante técnicas exploratorias (grupos de discusión y entrevistas en profundidad) Una segunda fase consistió en la celebración de reuniones de trabajo con grupos de maestros realizándose una distribución por zonas geográficas de la región (14 grupos con un total de 132 maestros) En la tercera fase se establece un cuestionario definitivo y se realiza un pretest cognitivo aplicándolo a una pequeña muestra piloto de 60 sujetos para verificar el nivel de comprensión. Correcciones, envío postal a los participantes y análisis de los resultados. Cuestionario de elaboración propia de 37 ítems divididos en seis bloques: variables socio-demográficas de los maestros de educación física de la Región de Murcia, licencias por enfermedad, formación docente, opinión sobre medios e instalaciones, aplicación de contenidos de la LOGSE, actitudes hacia su profesión y especialidad. Insvestigación descriptiva y metodología cuantitativa. De los maestros que imparten EF en la Región de Murcia sólo el 15, 1 por ciento han cursado la especialidad, aunque el 55 por ciento aprobó las oposiciones de la especialidad, oposiciones que se convocaron cuando no existían especialistas. Más del 60 por ciento no han participado nunca en actividades de formación permanente de la especialidad. La mayoría de los maestros opina que la asignatura debe ser impartida por especialistas. Muchos de los maestros que imparten EF piensan que no están suficientemente formados en algunos de los contenidos de la LOGSE: expresión y comunicación y salud corporal. La mayoría de maestros que imparte la asignatura están dispuestos a cambiar de especialidad (casi el 60 por ciento). El perfil de maestro que imparte la asignatura de EF en la Región de Murcia es un varón de mediana edad, funcionario, que no ha estudiado la especialidad, que ha accedido aprovechando situaciones de mejora personal y laboral, que reconoce poseer una escasa formación específica en la materia y no estar preocupado por su formación permanente. Que ocupa un cargo directivo en el centro y que le preocupa escasamente la práctica de la actividad físico-deportiva.

Is participation prevention? A blurring of discourses in children's preventative initiatives in the UK

This article explores the relationships between two key concepts that have defined recent social policy initiatives for children in the UK: participation and prevention from social exclusion. Drawing on the Children's Fund initiative as an example, the article traces the diverse and sometimes contradictory discourses of childhood and social inclusion/ exclusion in stakeholders' differing rationales for supporting children's participation and prevention. The authors argue that the blurring of the rationales for participation and prevention has implications for the strategies and practices that agencies adopt and raises questions about which groups benefit and whose agendas are served by participation and prevention activities.

Adjoint goal-based error norms for adaptive mesh ocean modelling

Flow in the world's oceans occurs at a wide range of spatial scales, from a fraction of a metre up to many thousands of kilometers. In particular, regions of intense flow are often highly localised, for example, western boundary currents, equatorial jets, overflows and convective plumes. Conventional numerical ocean models generally use static meshes. The use of dynamically-adaptive meshes has many potential advantages but needs to be guided by an error measure reflecting the underlying physics. A method of defining an error measure to guide an adaptive meshing algorithm for unstructured tetrahedral finite elements, utilizing an adjoint or goal-based method, is described here. This method is based upon a functional, encompassing important features of the flow structure. The sensitivity of this functional, with respect to the solution variables, is used as the basis from which an error measure is derived. This error measure acts to predict those areas of the domain where resolution should be changed. A barotropic wind driven gyre problem is used to demonstrate the capabilities of the method. The overall objective of this work is to develop robust error measures for use in an oceanographic context which will ensure areas of fine mesh resolution are used only where and when they are required. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Force constants and dipole moment derivatives of molecules from perturbed Hartree-Fock calculations II. Applications to limited basis set SCF-MO wavefunctions

The perturbed Hartree–Fock theory developed in the preceding paper is applied to LiH, BH, and HF, using limited basis‐set SCF–MO wavefunctions derived by previous workers. The calculated values for the force constant ke and the dipole‐moment derivative μ(1) are (experimental values in parentheses): LiH, ke  =  1.618(1.026)mdyn/Å,μ(1)  =  −18.77(−2.0±0.3)D/ÅBH,ke  =  5.199(3.032)mdyn/Å,μ(1)  =  −1.03(−)D/Å;HF,ke  =  12.90(9.651)mdyn/Å,μ(1)  =  −2.15(+1.50)D/Å. The values of the force on the proton were calculated exactly and according to the Hellmann–Feynman theorem in each case, and the discrepancies show that none of the wavefunctions used are close to the Hartree–Fock limit, so that the large errors in ke and μ(1) are not surprising. However no difficulties arose in the perturbed Hartree–Fock calculation, so that the application of the theory to more accurate wavefunctions appears quite feasible.

The use of life cycle assessment to compare the environmental impact of production and feeding of conventional and genetically modified maize for broiler production in Argentina

The paper presents the methods and results of a life-cycle assessment (LCA) applied to the production of maize grain from a conventional variety compared with maize grain from a variety genetically modified to be herbicide tolerant and insect protected and to contain an enhanced oil and lysine content, and its impact when fed to broiler chickens. The findings show that there are both environmental and human health benefits of growing GM maize including lower impacts on global warming, ozone depletion, freshwater ecotoxicity and human toxicity. However, when considered in terms of the use of maize as a feed input to broiler chicken production, the benefits of the GM alternative become negligible compared to the use of conventional maize.

Reproduction recovery of the crustacean Daphnia magna after chronic exposure to ibuprofen

In mammals, the pharmaceutical ibuprofen (IB), a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug, primarily functions by reversibly inhibiting the cyclooxygenase (COX) pathway in the synthesis of eicosanoids (e.g. prostaglandins). Previous studies suggest that IB may act in a similar manner to interrupt production of eicosanoids reducing reproduction in the model crustacean Daphnia magna. On this basis withdrawal of IB should lead to the recovery of D. magna reproduction. Here we test whether the effect of IB is reversible in D. magna, as it is in mammals, by observing reproduction recovery following chronic exposure. D. magna (5-days old) were exposed to a range of IB concentrations (0, 20, 40 and 80 mg l(-1)) for 10 days followed by a 10 day recovery period in uncontaminated water. During the exposure period, individuals exposed to higher concentrations produced significantly fewer offspring. Thereafter, IB-stressed individuals produced offspring faster during recovery, having similar average population growth rates (PGR) (1.15-1.28) to controls by the end of the test. It appears that maternal daphnids are susceptible to IB during egg maturation. This is the first recorded recovery of reproduction in aquatic invertebrates that suffered reproductive inhibition during chronic exposure to a chemical stressor. Our results suggest a possible theory behind the compensatory fecundity that we referred to as 'catch-up reproduction'.

Morpholinone mediated oxazolone-free C-terminus amide coupling permitting a convergent strategy for peptide synthesis

3-Substituted-5-phenylmorpholinones have been demonstrated to act as N-protected C-terminus activated alpha-amino acids capable of undergoing solution phase N-terminus peptide extension following standard coupling procedures. The N-acylated morpholinones do not undergo epimerisation of the stereocentre of the C-terminus amino acid residue as oxazolone formation is sterically prevented, although C-terminus peptide coupling is still possible. This convergent approach to peptide synthesis is exemplified by the preparation of L-ala-L-ala-L-ala and L-ala-D-ala-L-ala. Copyright (c) 2008 European Peptide Society and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Novel lanthanide luminescent materials based on complexes of 3-hydroxypicolinic acid and silica nanoparticles

New lanthanide complexes of 3-hydroxypicolinic acid (HpicOH) were prepared: [Ln(H2O)(picOH)(2)(mu-HpicO)].3H(2)O (Ln = Eu, Tb, Er). The complexes were characterized using photoluminescence, infrared, Raman, and H-1 NMR spectroscopy, and elemental analysis. The crystal structure of [Eu(H2O)(picOH)(2)(mu-HpicO)] . 3H(2)O 1 was determined by X-ray diffraction. Compound 1 crystallizes in a monoclinic system with space group P2(1)/c and cell parameters a = 9.105(13) Angstrom, b = 18.796(25) Angstrom, and c = 13.531(17) Angstrom, and beta = 104.86(1) deg. The 3-hydroxypicolinate ligands coordinate through both N,O- or O,O- chelation to the lanthanide ions, as shown by X-ray and spectroscopic results. Photoluminescence measurements were performed for the Eu(III) and Tb(III) complexes; the Eu(III) complex was investigated in more detail. The Eu(III) compound is highly luminescent and acts as a photoactive center in nanocomposite materials whose host matrixes are silica nanoparticles.