The need for support: Young people living through a family health crisis

Young people living with a family health crisis are found to experience high levels of distress, anxiety, low mood and depressive symptoms and are at risk of becoming disengaged with education, socially isolated and uncertain regarding what the future will hold for them. A body of research indicates that practical intervention, including youth work, engagement with other young people and targeted support can have a significant impact upon a young person’s capacity to cope with a complex family health crisis and develop self-reliant behaviours. Despite the plethora of evidence to indicate the need for systems of support for children and young people experiencing a family health crisis, current provision across the UK is inconsistent, inequitable and not clearly underpinned by policy intervention. This study sets out to indicate the extent and nature of need of children and young people who are living with a family health crisis in Britain, the type of support they require and the ways in which Hope Support meets those needs

“Where I’m From”: Utilizing Place-Based Pedagogy and Multimodal Literacy in a Graduate Children’s Literature Class

In this study, I examined integrating place-based education pedagogy and multimodal literacies into a graduate level children’s literature class. The findings suggest including place-based education pedagogy allows middle level graduate students to connect to geographically-based children’s literature. The findings also propose that incorporating multimodal texts into classroom assignments expands graduate students perceptions of text. Implications for implementing the assignment into 4-8 grade classes is discussed

The Benefits of Exposure to Animals for Persons with Dementia: A Literature Review

This literature review was performed to assess the current standing of the use of animals as a therapeutic agent for individuals suffering from dementia. This area of study is currently broad; therefore the intent of reviewing the current literature was to establish what has been studied at this point in time and to recommend future research directions in the field. The literature search was performed on three academic search sites (PsycINFO, PubMed, and AgeLine) using four search terms (“Pet therapy Alzheimer’s,” “Pet therapy dementia,” “Animal therapy Alzheimer’s,” “Animal therapy dementia”); search results were verified by having a second researcher independently conduct the literature search using the same criteria used by the author. A total of 26 studies meeting inclusion criteria were reviewed. The general findings of this review show that individuals suffering from dementia who are exposed to animals tend to show improvements in measured outcomes (including behavioral, social, and physiological measures). Based on these findings, it is recommended that future studies examining the impact of interactions between persons with dementia and animals are warranted. However it is recommended that future studies should be done with a more focused intent, should include larger numbers of participants, and should make use of more standardized assessments instruments so the benefits of exposure to animals can be more definitively established

The Assessment Of In-Bed Mobility Using Pressure Sensitive Mats

Clinical mobility tools have been shown to predict adverse outcomes in elderly patients, yet aren’t used often enough to inform hospital staff on patient health. Integrated computing has therefore become increasingly important and is predicted to improve traditional healthcare. This thesis details the design of an algorithmic system to partially automate a mobility tool. Three pressure sensitive mats were set-up on a hospital bed frame, underneath a mattress. Thirty volunteers enacted five movements on the hospital bed; each movement representative of a different mobility score. These movements generated pressure data, and a system of algorithms was constructed in a decision tree to automatically classify data. The overall system yielded 96% accuracy, where the misclassifications were due largely to inconsistencies in volunteer performance. These results suggest that this algorithmic system is effective in distinguishing between the mobility enactments examined here, and emphasizes the potential for integrated computing to improve traditional healthcare

Non-Contact Bed-Based Monitoring of Vital Signs

Vital signs are a set of commonly measured signals used internationally as a baseline in medicine and surgery and are one of the most accurate predictors of clinical and physiological deterioration. Despite the clear clinical importance of vital sign measurements, there is often missed or inadequate documentation of patient vital sign measurements. The development of unobtrusive, automated and continuous monitoring offers the potential to enhance the safety and quality of patient care.This thesis details a system that uses multiple modalities to capture data and data processing techniques to extract vital signal measurements and vital signal measurement abnormalities related to subject morbidities. This thesis focuses on the examination, testing and improvement upon a current visible light video processing technique intended to extract vital signal measurements, and expand it's use to thermal infrared video vital signal extraction.Three modalities were used to gather data from healthy adult subjects and older adult in-hospital patients: thermal infrared cameras, visible light cameras and pressure sensitive mats. Subjects participated in several experimental procedures including video data capture of faces, hands and feet as well as in-bed pressure mat data capture. This data was subjected to several stages of data processing to extract vital signal measurements, which include pulse, respiration temperature and mobility measurements. Data segmentation using binary masks, level set method, and watershed method were used to identify regions of interest. An adaptive spatio-temporal video processing algorithm, the main thesis contribution, was used to extract vital signal measurements. The developed algorithm was assessed for its performance in vital signal estimation, as well its robustness with respect to noise. The whole system was assessed for its ability to extract vital signal measurements, and vital signal measurement abnormalities associated with possible subject morbidities.The whole system demonstrated accurate vital signal measurement extraction, and the ability to detect signal abnormalities associated with subject morbidities. The developed algorithm was able to improve upon previous versions. Furthermore, several patterns associated with system failure were identified. This work demonstrated the potential for multiple sensor systems in conjunction with data processing to improve current methods of extracting vital signal data

The Development of Vocational Interests and Abilities in Secondary School Aged Children

This body of work has focussed on the measurement, structure and stability of vocational interests and abilities in mainstream, mixed-ability secondary school aged children. This set of studies investigated how a large group of children’s vocational interests developed over a two year period, and how their interests for activities/occupations were related to selected abilities (Mechanical, Spatial Rotation and Logical Reasoning). Published research has consistently demonstrated that for adults, vocational interests are stable over time, and that interests typically fall into six main categories; Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising and Conventional (Holland, 1959). Furthermore, there is a wealth of evidence to suggest that the relationships between these six categories broadly approximate a hexagonal framework once individuals reach adulthood (e.g. Holland et al., 1969). Data analysis revealed that similar to adults, children’s interests overall were remarkably stable over time, and that this was particularly the case for Realistic and Social interests. The findings were also suggestive of a pathway of interest development in children aged 11-17. The youngest children who participated in this research had interests that were often gender stereotyped, though the structure of their interests was not consistent with the hexagonal structure commonly seen in adults. However, as children got older, their interests became more aligned to a hexagonal format, particularly for the female group. Furthermore, there were clear gender differences with females typically having more distinctive and more consistent interest profiles over time. There were a few weak associations between ability and interest, with the clearest link suggesting that early Realistic interests are predictive (in part) of later Mechanical ability. These findings consequently have practical implications for the timing and delivery of careers counselling in school. Theoretical implications and future directions have also been identified and discussed.E.S.R.C. & Learning and Skill Counci

Workforce composition, qualifications and professional development in Montessori early childhood education and care settings in England.

In England, the early childhood education and care (ECEC) workforce is largely characterised by a high proportion of young, female employees with lower than average qualification levels to comparable sectors, high staff turnover, poor pay, and restricted professional development opportunities, while carrying out demanding and responsible work. Within this context, the research reported here examined the workforce, professional development and qualifications of Montessori settings within the Montessori Schools Association (MSA) in England compared to the general ECEC sector in England. An online survey with a mix of closed and open text questions using the Qualtrics survey tool was administered through MSA from February - Summer 2020. A response rate of 22% was achieved with 77 responding settings. Key messages from findings were: Montessori settings reported well qualified, experienced staff and higher Ofsted ratings; nonetheless there were threats to maintaining qualification levels, difficulties in professional development and poor external recognition of Montessori qualifications; the future supply of trained Montessori workforce was insecure and currently has limited diversity; Montessori provision was more likely to be in areas of lower disadvantage and, within settings, higher qualified staff were most likely to be deployed with older children

The vicious circle and infection intensity: The case of Trypanosoma microti in field vole populations

Objective: In natural populations, infection and condition may act synergistically to trigger a vicious circle: poor condition predisposes to host infections, which further reduce condition, and so on. If this vicious circle originates from a reduced resistance to infection, it will not only result in greater proneness to becoming infected of those that are in poorer condition, but it may also cause infections of higher intensity. Here, we investigate the temporal relationship between host condition and intensity of infection by a specific pathogen using as a system the dynamics of the protozoan Trypanosoma microti in field vole (Microtus agrestis) populations. Methods and results: With two years of longitudinal data from three monthly-sampled populations, we evaluated if individuals acquiring a high intensity of infection previously had lower haematological indicators of condition (red blood cells [RBCs] and lymphocyte counts) than those that acquired lower infection intensities. Also, the association of these indicators with past and present trypanosome blood levels was investigated. The individuals that developed high levels of parasitaemia were those that previously had low lymphocyte counts. Greater intensity of infection corresponded with lower RBCs only in low to moderate weight females, and no effect of intensity of infection on lymphocyte counts was observed. However, delayed effects of high trypanosome intensity were seen on both RBCs and lymphocytes. Conclusions: The vicious circle may also result in high infection intensity: individuals in poor condition are not only more likely to become infected by one pathogen; they may also be the most important source of infection for that and for other pathogens, and thus key protagonists for parasite dynamics.Fil: Beldomenico, Pablo Martín. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Santa Fe. Instituto de Ciencias Veterinarias del Litoral. Universidad Nacional del Litoral. Facultad de Ciencias Veterinarias. Instituto de Ciencias Veterinarias del Litoral; ArgentinaFil: Telfer, Sandra. University of Liverpool; Reino UnidoFil: Gebert, Stephanie. University of Liverpool; Reino UnidoFil: Lukomski, Lukasz. University of Liverpool; Reino UnidoFil: Bennett, Malcolm. University of Liverpool; Reino UnidoFil: Begon, Michael. University of Liverpool; Reino Unid

Addressing the ‘Shift’: Preparing Preservice Secondary Teachers for the Common Core

Common Core represents a shift in content-area literacy instruction, broadening from a narrow focus on generalizable skills to also include a disciplinary perspective of literacies specific to the specialized language and habits of thinking within particular subjects. This requires teachers to be knowledgeable in their content and possess competence in pedagogical practices that allow them to scaffold their students’ literacy development within these disciplines. We examined how the implementation of a Disciplinary Literacy Project into a content-area literacy course influenced preservice secondary teachers’ disciplinary literacy practice. The findings suggest structured inquiry into disciplinary communities enhances preservice teachers’ understanding of disciplinary literacy, but this knowledge is not easily transferred into classroom instruction. Implications for future research on disciplinary literacy models and preservice teacher preparation are discussed

Co-funding as a risk-sharing mechanism in grant financed LED programmes : a case study of the Gijima KwaZulu-Natal Local Competitiveness Fund Implementation (LCFI) programme.

Thesis (M.Dev.Studies)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2012.The promotion of Local Economic Development (LED) increasingly involves the allocation of grant finance for project implementation. This finance is often provided on condition that the grant recipient commits a certain level of co-funding to the project. These co-funding requirements are essentially a risk-sharing mechanism used to avert the agency problems, namely adverse selection and moral hazard, which occur in the relationship between the funding programme and the grant beneficiaries. The purpose of this study is to examine whether these requirements are effective at achieving this aim and to determine their impact on the LED outcomes of various types of projects. This is undertaken through the comparative analysis of projects funded through the Gijima KwaZulu-Natal Local Competitiveness Fund Implementation Programme (LCFI), which provided grant funding for projects implemented by the private sector, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and local government. The findings indicate that co-funding has a positive impact on internally co-funded private sector projects and in this scenario is necessary to achieve optimal outcomes. Inversely, co-funding has a detrimental impact on projects implemented by non-profit groups in that it requires the attraction of funding from additional organisations whose finance conditions may not align to those of the principal donor. Finally, co-funding is ineffective when provided by government for the implementation of community projects due to the lack of risk it assumes. These findings have implications for the design of LED grant programmes and support the assertion that grant programme should be designed to efficiently reflect the objectives and risk preferences of the institutions they support