The Arts (Music, Arts&Crafts and Drama) as a procedure for learning pre-school content: Grupo Edebé Project

There is nothing as amazing and fascinating as children learning process. Between 0 and 6 years old, a child brain develops in a waythat will never be repeated. At this age, children are eager to discover and they have great potential of active and affective life.Because of this, their learning capacity in this period is incalculable. (Jordan-Decarbo y Nelson, 2002; Wild, 1999).Pre-school Education is a unique and special stage, with self identity, which aims are:attending children as a whole,motivate them to learn,give them an affective and stable environment in which they can grow up and get to be balanced and confident people and inwhich they can relate to others, learn, enjoy and be happy.Arts, Music, Visual Arts and Drama (Gardner, 1994) can provide a framework of special, even unique, personal expression.With the aim of introducing qualitative improvements in the education of children and to ensure their emotional wellbeing, and havingnoticed that teachers had important needs and concerns as regards to diversity in their student groups, we developed a programbased on the detection of needs and concerns explained by professionals in education.This program of Grupo edebé, object of our research, is a multicultural, interdisciplinary and globalizing project the aims of which are:developing children's talent and personality,keeping their imagination and creativity and using these as a learning resource,promoting reasoning, favouring expression and communication,providing children with the tools to manage their emotions,and especially, introducing Arts as a procedure to increase learning.We wanted to start the research by studying the impact (Brice, 2003) that this last point had on the learning of five-year-old childrenschooled in multicultural environments.Therefore, the main goal of the research was the assessment of the implementation of a child education programme attending todiversity in a population of five-year-old children, specifically in the practice of procedures based on the use of Arts (music, arts andcrafts and theatre) as a vehicle or procedure for learning contents in Pre-school stage.Because children emotional welfare was a subject of our concern, and bearing in mind that the affective aspects are of vitalimportance for learning and child development (Parke and Gauvain, 2009), Grupo Edebé has also evaluated the starting, evolving andfinal impact in five-year-old children given that they finish Pre-school education at that age.

Evaluating fear of falling among community-dwelling older people: A qualitative pattern model based on the experience of falls

This research was conducted in the context of the project IRIS 8A Health and Society (2002-2008) and financially supported by the University of Lausanne. It was aomed at developping a model based on the elder people's experience and allowed us to develop a "Portrait evaluation" of fear of falling using their examples and words. It is a very simple evaluation, which can be used by professionals, but by the elder people themselves. The "Portrait evaluation" and the user's guide are on free access, but we would very much approciate to know whether other people or scientists have used it and collect their comments. (contact: Chantal.Piot-Ziegler@unil.ch)The purpose of this study is to create a model grounded in the elderly people's experience allowing the development of an original instrument to evaluate FOF.In a previous study, 58 semi-structured interviews were conducted with community-dwelling elderly people. The qualitative thematic analysis showed that fear of falling was defined through the functional, social and psychological long-term consequences of falls (Piot-Ziegler et al., 2007).In order to reveal patterns in the expression of fear of falling, an original qualitative thematic pattern analysis (QUAlitative Pattern Analysis - QUAPA) is developed and applied on these interviews.The results of this analysis show an internal coherence across the three dimensions (functional, social and psychological). Four different patterns are found, corresponding to four degrees of fear of falling. They are formalized in a fear of falling intensity model.This model leads to a portrait-evaluation for fallers and non-fallers. The evaluation must be confronted to large samples of elderly people, living in different environments. It presents an original alternative to the concept of self-efficacy to evaluate fear of falling in older people.The model of FOF presented in this article is grounded on elderly people's experience. It gives an experiential description of the three dimensions constitutive of FOF and of their evolution as fear increases, and defines an evaluation tool using situations and wordings based on the elderly people's discourse.

Nouveaux aspects de la prise en charge de l'hypertension artérielle chez le patient insuffisant rénal chronique [New aspects of hypertension management in patients with chronic kidney disease].

Hypertension is a frequent finding in patients with chronic kidney disease. Whether primary or secondary to renal disease, hypertension remains an important risk factory for the progression of chronic kidney disease and the occurrence of cardiovascular events. The objective of this paper is to review different treatment strategies in hypertensive CKD patients, with the exclusion of patients with renal replacement therapy such as dialysis or renal transplantation.

Objectives and motivations of small-scale forest owners : theoretical modelling and qualitative assessment

Abstract

Teràpia aquàtica en pacients afectats d' AVC

La teràpia aquàtica o hidroteràpia és una de les tècniques de fisioteràpia poc valorades pels beneficis que aporten. En aquest estudi analitzem com aquest tractament en el medi aquàtic pot beneficiar als pacients afectats de un accident vascular cerebral (AVC). Els participants d’aquest estudi son pacients els quals han patit un AVC en els últims dos anys. Aquest estudi serà dut a terme ha l’Hospital Sant Joan de Déu de Palma de Mallorca. La investigació consisteix en una combinació entre el mètode qualitatiu i el mètode quantitatiu, cada mètode aporta diferents visions de l’estudi amb la finalitat d’obtenir resultats més complets, arribant als objectius marcats. Per una banda, l’aspecte bio-psico-social serà avaluat utilitzant el mètode qualitatiu, realitzant entrevistes semi-estructures abans i després del tractament amb la finalitat d’obtenir la sensació que percep el pacient en cada moment. Per l’altre banda, l’espasticitat la valorarem mitjançant l’escala de Ashworth amb el mètode quantitatiu abans i després del tractament. Tenint en compte que poden sorgir varis limitacions com el temps de durada de l’estudi, la planificació o limitacions entre els participants, és un estudi interessant per valorar els canvis en la qualitat de vida d’aquestes persones.

Diabetes care: opinions, needs and proposed solutions of Swiss patients and healthcare professionals: a qualitative study.

AIMS: To explore, both among patients with diabetes and healthcare professionals, opinions on current diabetes care and the development of the "Regional Diabetes Program". METHODS: We employed qualitative methods (focus groups - FG) and used purposive sampling strategy to recruit patients with diabetes and healthcare professionals. We conducted one diabetic and one professional FG in each of the four health regions of the canton of Vaud/Switzerland. The eight FGs were audio-taped and transcribed verbatim. Thematic analysis was then undertaken. RESULTS: Results showed variability in the perception of the quality of diabetes care, pointed to insufficient information regarding diabetes, and lack of collaboration. Participants also evoked patients' difficulties for self-management, as well as professionals' and patients' financial concerns. Proposed solutions included reinforcing existing structures, developing self-management education, and focusing on comprehensive and coordinated care, communication and teamwork. Patients and professionals were in favour of a "Regional Diabetes Program" tailored to the actors' needs, and viewed it as a means to reinforce existing care delivery. CONCLUSIONS: Patients and professionals pointed out similar problems and solutions but explored them differently. Combined with coming quantitative data, these results should help to further develop, adapt and implement the "Regional Diabetes Program".

Anàlisi de l'atenció a la diversitat a les tres escoles rurals de la Zer Tramuntana

L’objectiu d’aquest estudi, de caire interpretatiu - qualitatiu, consisteix en l’anàlisi de l’Atenció a la Diversitat a les tres escoles rurals de la ZER Tramuntana. Una recerca que pretén descriure, analitzar i interpretar els principals aspectes d’inclusió de l’alumnat en el grup - classe, la resposta educativa que donen els docents a la diversitat en les aules i els documents normatius que recullen aquests dos aspectes. Professors, alumnes i grup - classe són els actors que nosaltres hem estudiat detalladament, a partir d’entrevistes, tests sociomètrics i l’anàlisi dels documents vigents de les tres escoles de referència d’aquesta ZER que tenen present l’Atenció a la Diversitat. A partir de l’estudi dels tres casos reals, l’escola Puig Segalar de Viladamat, l’escola de Ventalló i l’escola Els Valentins de Vilamacolum, ens centrem en la perspectiva curricular i model inclusiu, per poder donar resposta a la nostra hipòtesi plantejada inicialment: El model d’escola rural afavoreix les estratègies d’Atenció a la Diversitat.

Materials and supplementary materials used to teach vocabulary in the English class

This study is based on the analysis of the use of supplementary materials to teach vocabulary by second language teachers in Primary Education. The study consists of two analyses: the first one is a quantitative analysis based on 33 questionnaires answered by different second language teachers of Primary Education. The other, is a qualitative analysis in which the teacher’s subjective opinion on vocabulary learning techniques is presented. The study covers these main aspects: material use, effectiveness, children’s motivation, main criteria to teach vocabulary and the children’s role in their vocabulary learning.