A Training Program to Improve IFSP/IEP Goals and Objectives Through the Routines-Based Interview

WOS:000329323800001 (Nº de Acesso Web of Science)The authors describe a training program designed to improve the knowledge and skills of early childhood interventionists. Within the context of using the Routines-Based Early Intervention approach, this training focused on improving the quality of goals and objectives on individualized plans, through the Routines-Based Interview. We structured the training around five face-to-face sessions and a follow-up 3 months later. Here, we describe the development of the program, its content and methods, and the results on improvement of the goals and objectives with 80 professionals. These participants had completed the training, provided pretraining data, and provided posttraining data. Results showed that the training described here had the desired very large effect: Quality ratings of goals and objectives increased by over three standard deviations

Effects of an in-service training program using the routines-based interview

The focus of this study is an in-service training program rooted in routines-based early intervention and designed to improve the quality of goals and objectives on individualized plans. Participants were local intervention team members and other professionals who worked closely with each team. This training program involved a small number of trainees per group, providing multiple learning experiences across time and various opportunities for self-assessment and monitoring. We investigated (a) the perceptions of the participants about the strengths and weaknesses of the training program, (b) medium-term outcomes of the training with a comparison group, (c) and variables associated with the quality of goals and objectives. This study involved training more than 200 professionals, and results support the effectiveness of the program in improving the quality of goals and objectives, showing the importance of the routines-based interview in producing that improvement.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Measuring professionals’ perceptions about collaborative consultation in early childhood intervention

We investigated the reliability and construct validity of the Professionals’ Perceptions about Collaborative Consultation in Early Childhood Intervention Scale (ProPerCECIS), a rating scale developed to measure collaborative consultation in early childhood intervention (ECI). ProPerCECIS was completed by 427 professionals from 78 ECI teams. The full sample was randomised into sample A, 170 participants, for conducting an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) – and sample B, 257 participants, for performing confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Multiple-group analysis, with the overall sample, was conducted. The EFA final solution comprised three correlated factors, with acceptable to very good internal consistency: Intervention, Context, and Planning. The CFA supported the three-factor structure. Results supported configural invariance and partial metric invariance, but partial scalar invariance did not hold. Results supported the conceptual framework of collaborative consultation in ECI and suggest that ProPerCECIS can be a useful measure of professionals’ perceptions about collaborative consultation practices in ECI. ProPerCECIS seems to be particularly suited to assess collaborative practices within services providing routines-based family-centred interventions. Importantly, because the factor structure for ProPerCECIS holds up for different professional groups, it might be used by transdisciplinary ECI teams.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

FACS-based purification of Arabidopsis microspores, sperm cells and vegetative nuclei

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: The male germline in flowering plants differentiates by asymmetric division of haploid uninucleated microspores, giving rise to a vegetative cell enclosing a smaller generative cell, which eventually undergoes a second mitosis to originate two sperm cells. The vegetative cell and the sperm cells activate distinct genetic and epigenetic mechanisms to control pollen tube growth and germ cell specification, respectively. Therefore, a comprehensive characterization of these processes relies on efficient methods to isolate each of the different cell types throughout male gametogenesis. RESULTS: We developed stable transgenic Arabidopsis lines and reliable purification tools based on Fluorescence-Activated Cell Sorting (FACS) in order to isolate highly pure and viable fractions of each cell/nuclei type before and after pollen mitosis. In the case of mature pollen, this was accomplished by expressing GFP and RFP in the sperm and vegetative nuclei, respectively, resulting in 99% pure sorted populations. Microspores were also purified by FACS taking advantage of their characteristic small size and autofluorescent properties, and were confirmed to be 98% pure. CONCLUSIONS: We provide simple and efficient FACS-based purification protocols for Arabidopsis microspores, vegetative nuclei and sperm cells. This paves the way for subsequent molecular analysis such as transcriptomics, DNA methylation analysis and chromatin immunoprecipitation, in the developmental context of microgametogenesis in Arabidopsis

Diabetes hinders community-acquired pneumonia outcomes in hospitalized patients

This deposit is composed by the main article, and it hasn't any supplementary materials associated.This study aimed to estimate the prevalence of diabetes mellitus (DM) in hospitalized patients with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) and its impact on hospital length of stay and in-hospital mortality.Pfizer Grant; Ernesto Roma Foundation grant: (FER2014/01)

Flavoured searches for type-III seesaw at the LHC

We present a reinterpretation of CMS searches for type-III seesaw lepton triplets at the LHC, both for the normal and the inverse seesaw. We find that, in contrast with previous expectations, these searches in the trilepton final state have a good sensitivity to triplets with predominant coupling to the tau lepton. We also show that the limits resulting from direct searches can be neatly presented for arbitrary masses and general flavour mixings. Thus, it turns out that the common (and often unrealistic) simplifying assumptions about the flavour couplings of the triplets used by experimental collaborations to present their results are unnecessary and should be dropped.This work has been supported by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT, Portugal) and Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (MICINN, Spain) under the bilateral project “Signals of new fermions at colliders” (FCT/1683/27/1/2012/S, AIC-D-2011-0811). F.R.J. and P.M.B. acknowledge support from FCT through the projects CERN/FP/123580/2011, PTDC/FIS/102120/2008 and PEst-OE-FIS-UI0777-2013. J.A.A.S. acknowledges support from MICINN through the projects FPA2006-05294 and FPA2010-17915; from Junta de Andalucía (FQM 101 and FQM 6552) and from FCT (project CERN/ FP/123619/2011)

Views and Experience of People with Diabetes, Informal Carers, and Healthcare Professionals in Portugal

INTRODUCTION: The increasing burden of diabetes poses a great challenge to healthcare systems and economy worldwide. Although modern therapeutic strategies for diabetes are widely available, most patients still fail to achieve optimal clinical targets and well-being. The primary objective of this study was to assess and explore potential drivers and successful management of diabetes among people with diabetes, family members and healthcare professionals in Portugal, by applying the protocol of the multinational study "Diabetes, Attitudes, Wishes and Needs (DAWN2)". MATERIAL AND METHODS: A total of 767 adults, including 417 people with diabetes, 123 family members and 227 healthcare professionals, participated in the study. Surveys assessed health-related quality of life, self-management, attitudes/beliefs, social support and priorities for improvement areas in diabetes care. RESULTS: Diabetes has a negative impact on the physical health and emotional well-being of patients in Portugal and is also a psychological burden for family members. Earlier diagnosis and treatment of diabetes were mentioned as a major area of improvement. Healthcare professionals indicated the need for diabetes self-management education. CONCLUSION: We have used for the first time in Portugal the DAWN2 protocol to address the wishes, needs, and attitudes of Portuguese diabetes patients, their relatives, and healthcare professionals regarding the disease.publishersversionepub_ahead_of_prin

Conceptions of basic education teachers about math proof: influence of professional experience

A prova é uma atividade que desempenha um papel fundamental na construção do conhecimento matemático, razão pela qual adquire relevância nos programas escolares de Matemática. Admitindo que as conceções dos professores sobre a prova afetam a forma como ela é tratada em sala de aula, procuramos averiguar as conceções de professores portugueses de Matemática do 3.º ciclo do Ensino Básico (do 7.º ao 9.º ano) sobre diferentes aspetos da prova matemática e a influência que a experiência profissional tem nessas conceções. Adotando uma abordagem metodológica mista, recolhemos os dados através de um questionário, respondido por 72 professores, e de uma entrevista a duas professoras com experiências profissionais diferentes. Os resultados revelam que os professores, sobretudo os que têm menos tempo de docência, consideram que a prova matemática tem uma natureza distinta da de outras disciplinas, é uma atividade essencial para a construção do conhecimento matemático, tem como função verificar e explicar a veracidade de uma afirmação e permite desenvolver o raciocínio e a comunicação matemática. No que respeita à participação dos alunos na atividade de provar, são os professores com mais tempo de docência que mais o destacam, o que permite aos alunos perceberem a natureza desta atividade. Em termos curriculares, são os professores com menos experiência docente que mais concordam com a presença da prova logo nos primeiros anos, embora salientem que esta atividade só faz sentido em alguns tópicos programáticos.Proof is an activity that plays a key role in the construction of mathematical knowledge, which is why it acquires relevance in mathematics programs. Admitting that teachers' conceptions about proof influence how it is handled in the classroom, we tried to investigate the conceptions of Portuguese mathematics teachers from the 3rd cycle of basic education (grade 7 to 9) on different aspects of mathematical proof and the relationship that the teachers’ experience has in these conceptions. Adopting a mixed methodological approach, we collected data through a questionnaire answered by 72 teachers, and an interview with two teachers with different professional experience. The results show that teachers, especially those with less experience, consider that mathematical proof has a distinct nature from other disciplines, it is an essential activity for the construction of mathematical knowledge and its function is to verify and explain the truth of a statement by developing reasoning and mathematical communication. With respect to student participation in the activity of proving, teachers with more teaching experience are the ones that most highlight it, which allows students to realize the nature of this activity. In curriculum terms, teachers with less experience are the ones that most agree with the presence of proof in early grades, while emphasizing that this activity only makes sense in some program topics.Este trabalho contou com o apoio de Fundos Nacionais através da FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia no âmbito do projeto PEst-OE/CED/UI1661/2014, do CIEdUM e do projeto UID/Multi/04016/2016info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Seasonal water level fluctuations: Implications for reservoir limnology and management

With the purpose of finding out whether seasonal water level fluctuations could affect water quality in a reservoir subjected to those changes, trends in environmental variables and in phytoplankton and zooplankton assemblages were analysed. The reservoir’s hydrological cycle was characterized by three regimes. The maximum level phase lasted from January to the beginning of June, the emptying phase existed between mid-June to the beginning of September and the minimum level phase lasted from mid-September to the beginning of the first autumn/winter rain events. The highest values of total phosphorus, soluble reactive phosphorus, nitrate, water colour and chlorophyll a were found during the minimum level phase. The phytoplankton assemblage was dominated by taxa typical of meso-eutrophic environments during the emptying and minimum level phases. However, during the maximum level phase, taxa generally found in more oligotrophic systems were observed here also. Similar to other disturbed systems, the zooplankton assemblage was dominated by Rotifera, except in summer and autumn when the cladoceran Ceriodaphnia quadrangula and/or the copepod Tropocyclops prasinus became dominant. Although those shifts seem to be related to water level variations, further research is needed to evaluate to what extent they might also be induced by other seasonal factors acting independently of water fluctuations. Based upon the obtained data, suggestions for reservoir management are proposed