The roles of family history of dyslexia, language, speech production and phonological processing in predicting literacy progress

It is well established that speech, language and phonological skills are closely associated with literacy, and that children with a family risk of dyslexia (FRD) tend to show deficits in each of these areas in the preschool years. This paper examines what the relationships are between FRD and these skills, and whether deficits in speech, language and phonological processing fully account for the increased risk of dyslexia in children with FRD. One hundred and fifty-three 4-6-year-old children, 44 of whom had FRD, completed a battery of speech, language, phonology and literacy tasks. Word reading and spelling were retested 6 months later, and text reading accuracy and reading comprehension were tested 3 years later. The children with FRD were at increased risk of developing difficulties in reading accuracy, but not reading comprehension. Four groups were compared: good and poor readers with and without FRD. In most cases good readers outperformed poor readers regardless of family history, but there was an effect of family history on naming and nonword repetition regardless of literacy outcome, suggesting a role for speech production skills as an endophenotype of dyslexia. Phonological processing predicted spelling, while language predicted text reading accuracy and comprehension. FRD was a significant additional predictor of reading and spelling after controlling for speech production, language and phonological processing, suggesting that children with FRD show additional difficulties in literacy that cannot be fully explained in terms of their language and phonological skills. It is well established that speech, language and phonological skills are closely associated with literacy, and that children with a family risk of dyslexia (FRD) tend to show deficits in each of these areas in the preschool years. This paper examines what the relationships are between FRD and these skills, and whether deficits in speech, language and phonological processing fully account for the increased risk of dyslexia in children with FRD. One hundred and fifty-three 4-6-year-old children, 44 of whom had FRD, completed a battery of speech, language, phonology and literacy tasks. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Non-verbal signalling in digital discourse:the case of letter repetition

This study focuses on the interactional functions of non-standard spelling, in particular letter repetition, used in text-based computer-mediated communication as a means of non-verbal signalling. The aim of this paper is to assess the current state of non-verbal cue research in computer-mediated discourse and demonstrate the need for a more comprehensive and methodologically rigorous exploration of written non-verbal signalling. The study proposes a contextual and usage-centered view of written paralanguage. Through illustrative, close linguistic analyses the study proves that previous approaches to non-standard spelling based on their relation to the spoken word might not account for the complexities of this CMC cue, and in order to further our understanding of their interactional functions it is more fruitful to describe the role they play during the contextualisation of the verbal messages. The interactional sociolinguistic approach taken in the analysis demonstrates the range of interactional functions letter repetition can achieve, including contribution to the inscription of socio-emotional information into writing, to the evoking of auditory cues or to a display of informality through using a relaxed writing style.

Discovering knowledge structures in mind maps of mental health risks

This thesis addressed the problem of risk analysis in mental healthcare, with respect to the GRiST project at Aston University. That project provides a risk-screening tool based on the knowledge of 46 experts, captured as mind maps that describe relationships between risks and patterns of behavioural cues. Mind mapping, though, fails to impose control over content, and is not considered to formally represent knowledge. In contrast, this thesis treated GRiSTs mind maps as a rich knowledge base in need of refinement; that process drew on existing techniques for designing databases and knowledge bases. Identifying well-defined mind map concepts, though, was hindered by spelling mistakes, and by ambiguity and lack of coverage in the tools used for researching words. A novel use of the Edit Distance overcame those problems, by assessing similarities between mind map texts, and between spelling mistakes and suggested corrections. That algorithm further identified stems, the shortest text string found in related word-forms. As opposed to existing approaches’ reliance on built-in linguistic knowledge, this thesis devised a novel, more flexible text-based technique. An additional tool, Correspondence Analysis, found patterns in word usage that allowed machines to determine likely intended meanings for ambiguous words. Correspondence Analysis further produced clusters of related concepts, which in turn drove the automatic generation of novel mind maps. Such maps underpinned adjuncts to the mind mapping software used by GRiST; one such new facility generated novel mind maps, to reflect the collected expert knowledge on any specified concept. Mind maps from GRiST are stored as XML, which suggested storing them in an XML database. In fact, the entire approach here is ”XML-centric”, in that all stages rely on XML as far as possible. A XML-based query language allows user to retrieve information from the mind map knowledge base. The approach, it was concluded, will prove valuable to mind mapping in general, and to detecting patterns in any type of digital information.

Financial crisis and the change in the practice of applying common charge costs

The global financial crisis has not left the members of the EU untouched. Financial results have significantly dropped, businesses were folded in great numbers, the rate of employment decreased, social tension got fortified, and so did the national deficits in the budget in the majority of the countries. The decisive members of the community reacted fairly quickly to the challenges of the global economic crisis, and among the steps taken there were simultaneously ones to boost the economy and others to lower the expenses of the expenditure. The author examines what role was given to the steps in taxation policy as indirect regulating tools, and that how the decisions brought touch upon the previously issued harmonization strategy.

A számviteli szabályozások eltérésének okairól (Causes of the differences in accounting regulations)

A számviteli szabályozások közötti eltérések oda vezethetnek, hogy ugyanarról a gazdálkodó egység, egyazon időszakáról, akár jelentősen is eltérő, és az adott szabályozási logika alapján helyes pénzügyi kimutatások készülnek. Ezek a sokszor materiális eltérések nehezen magyarázhatók, ha figyelembe vesszük azt a tényt is, hogy a különböző pénzügyi kimutatások mögött azonos gazdasági események húzódnak meg. Az eltérések a számviteli szabályozás különbségeivel magyarázhatók. A cikk feltárja, hogy a számviteli szabályozásnak milyen szintjeit lehet megkülönböztetni, és vizsgálja, hogy milyen tényezők vezettek el oda, hogy az egyes megközelítések akár markánsan eltérő megoldásokat kínálnak egy-egy adott vagyoni elem megjelenítésére és értékelésére, illetve egy tranzakció megjelenítésére. A cikk az egyes eltéréseket indukáló tényezők rendszerezése útján megkísérel deduktív úton becslést adni a számviteli harmonizáció további lehetséges irányaira. ____ Differences among the accounting regulations may lead to material dissimilarities in the financial statements prepared for the same entity and same financial year. These material differences are sometimes hard to explain, given that they shall be based on the same transactions. The differences are explained by the differences in the regulations. The paper explains the possible levels of accounting by-laws and examines – based on the relevant literature – the factors that led to different solutions for the recognition, measurement and disclosure of the same items or transactions. By structuring these factors the article tries to give possible future advances in the harmonization of such systems using a deductive approach.

Effects of phonetic/phonics instruction on reading pronunciation (French level I)

Pronunciation training has been traditionally viewed as of limited importance in a communicatively oriented foreign language curriculum (Pennington & Richards, 1986). Many language instructors seemingly deny the usefulness of phonetic training and rely on a listen-and-repeat method with the use of audiotapes (Bate, 1989; Callamand & Pedoya, 1984; Jones, 1997). Beginners in French classes face the challenge of mastering a complex sound and grapheme-phoneme correspondence system without the benefit of specific instruction. Their pronunciation errors develop mostly from bad habits while decoding from print to sound (Dansereau, 1995). ^ The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of basic phonetic/phonics instruction on reading pronunciation accuracy in a French I language course. ^ The sample consisted of two groups of French I students from Florida International University, who received the same instruction in French language and culture during the fall semester of 1999. Only the experimental group received additional phonetic/phonics training. ^ The instrument consisted of three recorded reading tasks: isolated familiar words, isolated unfamiliar words, and dialogue. Research questions were analyzed using a one-way multivariate analysis of variance. Significant differences were found between the two groups on scores for each of the three sections of the instrument, and on the total scores. These findings support the hypothesis of the study and reveal the effectiveness of phonetic/phonics training for beginners of French. ^ The findings imply that beginning language students should receive the minimum knowledge they need to master the French phoneme-grapheme (sound-spelling) system. ^

The effects of word prediction and text-to-speech technologies on the narrative writing skills of students with specific learning disabilities

This study investigated the effects of word prediction and text-to-speech on the narrative composition writing skills of 6, fifth-grade Hispanic boys with specific learning disabilities (SLD). A multiple baseline design across subjects was used to explore the efficacy of word prediction and text-to-speech alone and in combination on four dependent variables: writing fluency (words per minute), syntax (T-units), spelling accuracy, and overall organization (holistic scoring rubric). Data were collected and analyzed during baseline, assistive technology interventions, and at 2-, 4-, and 6-week maintenance probes. ^ Participants were equally divided into Cohorts A and B, and two separate but related studies were conducted. Throughout all phases of the study, participants wrote narrative compositions for 15-minute sessions. During baseline, participants used word processing only. During the assistive technology intervention condition, Cohort A participants used word prediction followed by word prediction with text-to-speech. Concurrently, Cohort B participants used text-to-speech followed by text-to-speech with word prediction. ^ The results of this study indicate that word prediction alone or in combination with text-to-speech has a positive effect on the narrative writing compositions of students with SLD. Overall, participants in Cohorts A and B wrote more words, more T-units, and spelled more words correctly. A sign test indicated that these perceived effects were not likely due to chance. Additionally, the quality of writing improved as measured by holistic rubric scores. When participants in Cohort B used text-to-speech alone, with the exception of spelling accuracy, inconsequential results were observed on all dependent variables. ^ This study demonstrated that word prediction alone or in combination assists students with SLD to write longer, improved-quality, narrative compositions. These results suggest that word prediction or word prediction with text-to-speech be considered as a writing support to facilitate the production of a first draft of a narrative composition. However, caution should be given to the use of text-to-speech alone as its effectiveness has not been established. Recommendations for future research include investigating the use of these technologies in other phases of the writing process, with other student populations, and with other writing styles. Further, these technologies should be investigated while integrated into classroom composition instruction. ^

The effects of self-monitoring on homework completion and accuracy rates of students with disabilities in an inclusive general education classroom

This study investigated the effects of self-monitoring on the homework completion and accuracy rates of four, fourth-grade students with disabilities in an inclusive general education classroom. A multiple baseline across subjects design was utilized to examine four dependent variables: completion of spelling homework, accuracy of spelling homework, completion of math homework, accuracy of math homework. Data were collected and analyzed during baseline, three phases of intervention, and maintenance. ^ Throughout baseline and all phases, participants followed typical classroom procedures, brought their homework to school each day and gave it to the general education teacher. During Phase I of the intervention, participants self-monitored with a daily sheet at home and on the computer at school in the morning using KidTools (Fitzgerald & Koury, 2003); a student friendly, self-monitoring program. They also participated in brief daily conferences to review their self-monitoring sheets with the investigator, their special education teacher. Phase II followed the same steps except conferencing was reduced to two days a week, which were randomly selected by the researcher and Phase III conferencing was one random day a week. Maintenance data were taken over a two-to-three week period subsequent to the end of the intervention. ^ Results of this study demonstrated self-monitoring substantially improved spelling and math homework completion and accuracy rates of students with disabilities in an inclusive, general education classroom. On average, completion and accuracy rates were highest over baseline in Phase III. Self-monitoring led to higher percentages of completion and accuracy during each phase of the intervention compared to baseline, group percentages also rose slightly during maintenance. Therefore, results suggest self-monitoring leads to short-term maintenance in spelling and math homework completion and accuracy. ^ This study adds to the existing literature by investigating the effects of self-monitoring of homework for students with disabilities included in general education classrooms. Future research should consider selecting participants with other demographic characteristics, using peers for conferencing instead of the teacher, and the use of self-monitoring with other academic subjects (e.g., science, history). Additionally, future research could investigate the effects of each of the two self-monitoring components used alone, with or without the conferencing.^

Universalização do acesso à saúde e regulação dos planos privados de assistência à saúde: a atuação regulatória da ANS como instrumento de harmonia contratual e viabilização do papel suplementar da iniciativa privada na efetivação do direito social à saúde

While essential to human nature, health and life have been protected since ancient times by various areas of knowledge, particularly by the Law, given its dynamics within the regulation of social interactions. In Brazil, health has been granted major importance by the Federal Constitution of 1988, which, disrupting the dictatorial authoritarianism, inaugurating a Social State and focusing on the values of freedom and human dignity, raises health to the condition of a social right, marked predominantly by an obligational bias directed, primarily, to the State, through the enforcement of public policies. Although, given the limitation of the State action to the reserve for contingencies, it turns clear that an universalizing access to public health is impossible, seen that the high cost of medical provisions hinders the State to meet all the health needs of the rightholders. As a result of the inefficiency of the State, the effort of the Constituent Assembly of 1988 in creating a hybrid health system becomes nuclear, which, marked by the possibility of exploration of healthcare by the private initiative, assigns to the private enterprise a key role in supplementing the public health system, especially through the offer of health insurance plans. At this point, however, it becomes clear that health provisions rendered by the private agents are not unlimited, which involves discussions about services and procedures that should be excluded from the contractual coverage, for purposes of sectoral balance, situation which draws the indispensability of deliberations between Fundamental Rights on one hand, related to the protection of health and life, and contractual principles on the other hand, connected to the primacy of private autonomy. At this point, the importance of the regulation undertaken by the ANS, Brazilian National Health Agency, appears primordial, which, by means of its seized broad functions, considerable autonomy and technical discretion, has conditions to implement an effective control towards the harmonization of the regulatory triangle, the stability and development of the supplementary health system and, consequently, towards the universalization of the right to health, within constitutional contours. According to this, the present essay, resorting to a broad legislative, doctrinal and jurisprudential study, concludes that economic regulation over the private healthcare sector, when legitimately undertaken, provides progress and stability to the intervening segment and, besides, turns healthcare universalization feasible, in a way that it can not be replaced efficiently by any other State function.

A escrita no Ensino Fundamental II: uma análise dos desvios ortográficos e sugestões de estratégias de intervenção

This paper presents a reflection on the written language, a social practice that is increasingly strengthened in everyday life. Unveiling its nature, organization and function must be the first step for teachers to change their posture towards the teaching of this linguistic mode, helping students use it more effectively and securely. Considering these principles, this dissertation seeks to understand on the light of contemporary linguistic theories, the factors that influence the writing deviations were found in the text production of students of the 8th grade of elementary school II, enrolled in a public school in Rio Grande do Norte, whereas those deviations reveal the beginning of learning of this communication tool, representing the first hypotheses raised by students to dominate it. To analyze the data we used the works done by Lemle (1995), Cagliari (2009), Carraher (1985), Zorzi (1998), Guimarães (2005), Miller (2008), Veçossi (2010), among others, starting from of which, the scientific production on reading and writing learning come developing. The results of this analysis showed that the writing deviations present in the texts of the students are motivated not only by lack of knowledge of standard orthographic of the Portuguese language, but, also, stem from phonetic, phonological and grammatical factors. Thus, we seek to present new teaching and learning strategies of writing that might lead students to reflect on the use of the same, developing this ability more critically and creatively. We believe that the activities presented can minimize writing with orthographic deviations or linguistic variation practiced by students. Keywords: Variances writing, spelling, teaching strategies and students

Aplicação do exame da proporcionalidade diante da implantação de empreendimentos eólicos em áreas de preservação permanente

The setting up of wind power enterprises at Permanent Preservation Areas reflects the obvious conflict and necessary convergence between free market and energy security on the one hand, and the promotion of environmental quality on the other. From the perspective of energy sustainability, and in order to achieve development (in its complex meaning, which converges economic, social, environmental and cultural aspects), the harmonization between free market and an ecologically sustainable environment is required. This work aims to identify the link between the protection system of the Permanent Preservation Areas and the current constitutional order, by analyzing the implementation of wind power enterprises in these protected zones focusing on the proportionality aspects. A legal and purposeful research was developed, from a theoretical method, followed by collecting and analyzing both primary and secondary data. From these data, the law, the legal literature and judicial decisions were cross-examined, under the light of the Constitution and guided by the theory of proportionality and related development imperatives. In this context, the present study identified the link between the principles of the economic order, environment and energy law, finding their basis under the Federal Constitution and development. By reproducing this interrelationship and by means of post-crisis institutional reforms, the guiding objectives of the Brazilian electric sector began to corroborate the precepts of development, although issues regarding its sustainability still persist. The appraisal of proportionality indicates that the Permanent Preservation Areas protection system is insufficient to materialize the right to a healthy quality of life upon the implementation of wind projects at Permanent Preservation Areas, albeit seeking the harmonization between free market and environmental protection.

Aplicação do exame da proporcionalidade diante da implantação de empreendimentos eólicos em áreas de preservação permanente

The setting up of wind power enterprises at Permanent Preservation Areas reflects the obvious conflict and necessary convergence between free market and energy security on the one hand, and the promotion of environmental quality on the other. From the perspective of energy sustainability, and in order to achieve development (in its complex meaning, which converges economic, social, environmental and cultural aspects), the harmonization between free market and an ecologically sustainable environment is required. This work aims to identify the link between the protection system of the Permanent Preservation Areas and the current constitutional order, by analyzing the implementation of wind power enterprises in these protected zones focusing on the proportionality aspects. A legal and purposeful research was developed, from a theoretical method, followed by collecting and analyzing both primary and secondary data. From these data, the law, the legal literature and judicial decisions were cross-examined, under the light of the Constitution and guided by the theory of proportionality and related development imperatives. In this context, the present study identified the link between the principles of the economic order, environment and energy law, finding their basis under the Federal Constitution and development. By reproducing this interrelationship and by means of post-crisis institutional reforms, the guiding objectives of the Brazilian electric sector began to corroborate the precepts of development, although issues regarding its sustainability still persist. The appraisal of proportionality indicates that the Permanent Preservation Areas protection system is insufficient to materialize the right to a healthy quality of life upon the implementation of wind projects at Permanent Preservation Areas, albeit seeking the harmonization between free market and environmental protection.

Um estudo sobre o erro ortográfico no 1º e 2º CEB – da identificação às estratégias de intervenção

Relatório de estágio apresentado à Escola Superior de Educação de Santarém do Instituto Politécnico de Santarém para obtenção do grau de Mestre em ensino do 1.º e do 2.º ciclo do ensino básico

A new stepwise carbon cycle data assimilation system using multiple data streams to constrain the simulated land surface carbon cycle

Acknowledgements. This work was mainly funded by the EU FP7 CARBONES project (contracts FP7-SPACE-2009-1-242316), with also a small contribution from GEOCARBON project (ENV.2011.4.1.1-1-283080). This work used eddy covariance data acquired by the FLUXNET community and in particular by the following networks: AmeriFlux (U.S. Department of Energy, Biological and Environmental Research, Terrestrial Carbon Program; DE-FG02-04ER63917 and DE-FG02-04ER63911), AfriFlux, AsiaFlux, CarboAfrica, CarboEuropeIP, CarboItaly, CarboMont, ChinaFlux, Fluxnet-Canada (supported by CFCAS, NSERC, BIOCAP, Environment Canada, and NRCan), GreenGrass, KoFlux, LBA, NECC, OzFlux, TCOS-Siberia, USCCC. We acknowledge the financial support to the eddy covariance data harmonization provided by CarboEuropeIP, FAO-GTOS-TCO, iLEAPS, Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, National Science Foundation, University of Tuscia, Université Laval and Environment Canada and US Department of Energy and the database development and technical support from Berkeley Water Center, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Microsoft Research eScience, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, University of California-Berkeley, University of Virginia. Philippe Ciais acknowledges support from the European Research Council through Synergy grant ERC-2013-SyG-610028 “IMBALANCE-P”. The authors wish to thank M. Jung for providing access to the GPP MTE data, which were downloaded from the GEOCARBON data portal (https://www.bgc-jena.mpg.de/geodb/projects/Data.php). The authors are also grateful to computing support and resources provided at LSCE and to the overall ORCHIDEE project that coordinate the development of the code (http://labex.ipsl.fr/orchidee/index.php/about-the-team).

Medicines reconciliation at the point of hospital discharge for children

Objectives: Hospital discharge is a transition of care, where medication discrepancies are likely to occur and potentially cause patient harm. The purpose of our study was to assess the prescribing accuracy of hospital discharge medication orders at a London, UK teaching hospital. The timeliness of the discharge summary reaching the general practitioner (GP, family physician) was also assessed based on the 72 h target referenced in the Care Quality Commission report.1 Method: 501 consecutive discharge medication orders from 142 patients were examined and the following records were compared (1) the final inpatient drug chart at the point of discharge, (2) printed signed copy of the initial to take away (TTA) discharge summary produced electronically by the physician, (3) the pharmacist's amendments on the initial TTA that were hand written, (4) the final electronic patient discharge summary record, (5) the patients final take home medication from the hospital. Discrepancies between the physician's order (6) and pharmacist's change(s) (7) were compared with two types of failures – ‘failure to make a required change’ and ‘change where none was required’. Once the patient was discharged, the patient's GP, was contacted 72 h after discharge to see if the patient discharge summary, sent by post or via email, was received. Results: Over half the patients seen (73 out of 142) patients had at least one discrepancy that was made on the initial TTA by the doctor and amended by the pharmacist. Out of the 501 drugs, there were 140 discrepancies, 108 were ‘failures to make a required change’ (77%) and 32 were ‘changes where none were required’ (23%). The types of ‘failures to make required changes’ discrepancies that were found between the initial TTA and pharmacist's amendments were paracetamol and ibuprofen changes (dose banding) 38 (27%), directions of use 34 (24%), incorrect formulation of medication 28 (20%) and incorrect strength 8 (6%). The types of ‘changes where none were required discrepancies’ were omitted medication 15 (11%), unnecessary drug 14 (10%) and incorrect medicine including spelling mistakes 3 (2%). After contacting the GPs of the discharged patients 72 h postdischarge; 49% had received the discharge summary and 45% had not, the remaining 6% were patients who were discharged without a GP. Conclusion: This study shows that doctor prescribing at discharge is often not accurate, and interventions made by pharmacist to reconcile are important at this point of care. It was also found that half the discharge summaries had not reached the patient's family physician (according to the GP) within 72 h.