La metodología “Decoding the Disciplines” navega desde la Universidad de Indiana a las instituciones superiores europeas: Un paradigma para la formación del profesorado en pensamiento científico favorecido por ERASMUS +

Traducción de italiano a castellano de manuscrito original de S. Chistolini por C.G.Madonna

The birth of 'citizenship and constitution' in Italian schools : a new wall of competences or transition to intercultural education?

It seems to be impossible to study education and pedagogy without considering the question of competences and abilities which are the new ID for European and worldwide citizenship. Our discussion starts from an analytical point of view with the aim of examining the conditions of learning in Europe and the future of our systems of higher education. Are we able to communicate the values and traditions of our common historical and cultural heritage or are we facing ungovernable challenges? The era of competences finds fertile ground in a pragmatist mind, while the construction of European citizenship navigates in the waters of the great Mediterranean Sea, cradle of ancient civilisations. Italy could be an interesting example of how Citizenship and Constitution become part of the school curriculum, at all levels, taking the place of Civic Education and Intercultural Education in teaching-training programmes.peer-reviewe

Decoding the Disciplines in higher education institutions

[EN] Decoding the Disciplines is a methodology aimed to support teachers and students of University to tackle obstacles and difficulties in learning process. It is assumed that students come to classroom with different level of secondary school preparation and teachers are generally reinforcing the inequalities in principle deplored as form of injustice in our society. The question of giving tools that students need to succeed in our disciplines requires new strategies intend to make teaching effective in line with the development of the democratic vision of teaching. The methodology represents a dynamic sequence of steps based on the understanding of the content of discipline taught and learned. All disciplines are involved,  humanities as well as sciences. Under the Erasmus Plus Programme some European Universities are collecting relevant evidences  to understand what to teach about an academic discipline. Monitoring students' learning and motivation means to bring out the bottlenecks, which hinder the achievement of knowledge and slow down the learning process leading to failure. Presentation of initial results aims to share the benefits of this methodology able to guide students to master basic mental operations required in university courses. Decoding emerges as challenge and option for policy-makers of higher education.http://ocs.editorial.upv.es/index.php/HEAD/HEAD18Chistolini, S. (2018). Decoding the Disciplines in higher education institutions. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. 1-8. https://doi.org/10.4995/HEAD18.2018.8137OCS110198102

International Survey in Eight Countries about Teachers and Teaching Profession

International Survey in Eight Countries about Teachers and Teaching Profession An international team of experts from Belgium, Italy, Poland, Slovakia, Turkey and the USA employed a questionnaire to identify the deontology of teachers from infant to secondary school in eight countries. The survey was implemented between 2004 and 2007. The socio-cultural concept of Verstehen (understanding) as described in the work of Max Weber, points to the clear significance of being a teacher at this time in history. Qualitative and quantitative analysis allow for an understanding that the teacher is exactly that, in any context. The ideal typology of the teacher is the result of training at a university level and working in the school system. Phenomenal differentiations characterise the various situations and broaden the perspective of the study, including an identification of the shared features of the profession. The strong, common core is the responsibility towards fellow teachers balanced out by a weak, yet common note of regret regarding the scant social prestige of being a teacher. There seems to be a lack of communication between the personal and social aspects involved in shaping the professional identity. The social image of teachers weighs heavily on their professional status due to the inevitable political implications it results in and the considerable effect on institutional behaviour. Teachers listen, but they are not heard; teachers are committed, but remain unrecognised; teachers evaluate, but are evaluated in turn. The issue of the social importance of the profession of teachers in our societies emerges as a crucial point in the perspective of educating young generations

Maria Montessori e Giuseppina Pizzigoni vestais na renovação pedagógica italiana

This article highlights two women important for pedagogy. María Montessori was a medical doctor who initially carried out research to alleviate the tensions generated by the poor sanitary conditions the children of this society experienced and under which they were educated through traditional strategies that had to be changed. Giuseppina Pizzigoni was a teacher who imagined a new school where children, the offspring of a brutally industrialized society, could be happy while learning. For both women the children’s education, being the task of adults, parents and teachers alike, should be carried out with responsibility and new methodologies they themselves constructed and proposed. For them, the future of humanity lies in the success of this task.El presente artículo destaca dos figuras femeninas de la pedagogía. Maria Montessori es una doctora en medicina que inicialmente realiza investigaciones para aliviar las tensiones generadas por las malas condiciones sanitarias en las que viven los niños de esta misma sociedad, y en las que deben educarse con estrategias tradicionales llamadas a cambiar. Giuseppina Pizzigoni es maestra y piensa en una nueva escuela en la que los niños, hijos de una sociedad brutalmente industrializada, estén felices de aprender. Para ambas, la formación de niños y niñas como labor de adultos, padres y maestros, debe forjarse con responsabilidad y nuevas metodologías que ellas mismas construyen y proponen. En el éxito de esa labor, consideran, se encuentra el futuro de la humanidad.Neste artigo distinguem-se dois ícones femininos da pedagogia. Maria Montessori, doutora em medicina quem inicialmente realizava pesquisa para aliviar as tenções geradas pelas más condições sanitárias nas que vivem as crianças desta mesma sociedade, e nas quais devem se educar com estratégias tradicionais convidadas a mudar. Giuseppina Pizzigoni, mestra que pensa numa nova escola na qual as crianças, filhos duma sociedade brutalmente industrializada, estiverem felizes de aprender.  Para as duas, a formação das crianças como ação dos adultos, padres e mestres, deve se forjar com responsabilidade e novas metodologias que elas mesmas constroem e propõem. No êxito dessa operação, consideram, acha-se o futuro da humanidade

Role of Genetic and Acquired Prothrombotic Risk Factors in Genesis of Sudden Sensorineural Hearing Loss.

The methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase C677T mutation, factor V G1691A (factor V Leiden) mutation, prothrombin G20210A mutation and 8 other laboratory values associated with increased thrombotic risk were analyzed in 40 patients with sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSHL). The results were compared with those obtained from 120 controls not affected by SSHL. We found a statistically significant higher frequency of hyperhomocysteinemia in the SSHL group compared with controls, and that this was also associated with the presence of homozygosity for the MTHFR C677T mutation. The study results suggest that SSHL might be caused, among other factors, by a combination of these 2 variables. We suggest that this analysis of the MTHFR C677T mutation should be further investigated to establish the etiology of SSHL, and that the same analysis should be taken into account in those patients with high levels of homocysteine

Development of systemic autoimmune diseases in healthy subjects persistently positive for antiphospholipid antibodies. long-term follow-up study

We longitudinally followed a single-center cohort of anti-phospholipid (aPL) positive healthy subjects to evaluate the evolution to systemic autoimmune diseases (sAD) and to describe clinical and serological associated features. Since 2010, we have consecutively screened healthy subjects who were positive, in at least two consecutive determinations, for one or more aPL [anti-Cardiolipin (aCL) IgM/IgG, anti-Beta2Glycoprotein I (aB2GPI) IgM/IgG, Lupus Anticoagulant (LA)]. All subjects were evaluated every six months, or in accordance with the patient's clinical course, in order to record the development of clinical and laboratory features suggestive for sAD. Ninety-five subjects [M/F 20/75, median age at first determination 46 years, Interquartile Range (IQR) 19] were enrolled. Thirty-three subjects (34.7%) were positive for only one aPL [15 (15.8%) for aCL, 15 (15.8%) for LA, and 5 (5.3%) for aB2GPI]; 37 (38.9%) had double positivity [32 (33.6%) for aCL and aB2GPI; 5 (5.3%) for aCL and LA], 23 (24.2%) had triple positivity. We prospectively followed up our cohort for a median period of 72 months (IQR 84). During a total follow-up of 7692 person-months, we found an absolute risk for sAD development equal to 1.8%. Specifically, 14 (14.7%) patients developed a sAD: in four patients (4.2%), after developing a thrombotic event, an antiphospholipid syndrome was diagnosed, 7 (7.4%) patients developed an Undifferentiated Connective Tissue Disease after a median period of 76 months (IQR 75.5), and lastly, three (3.1%) patients could be classified as affected by Systemic Lupus Erythematosus according to the ACR/EULAR 2019 criteria. The presence of triple positivity status resulted in being significantly associated with the progression to sAD (p-value = 0.03). In conclusion, we observed the development of sAD in almost 15% of aPL positive subjects. Triple positivity was significantly associated with this progression, suggesting a possible role as biomarker for this condition. Thus, our results could suggest the need for periodic follow-up for such patients to assess early diagnosis and treatment

Assessing small area estimates via artificial populations from KBAABB: a kNN-based approximation to ABB

Comparing and evaluating small area estimation (SAE) models for a given application is inherently difficult. Typically, we do not have enough data in many areas to check unit-level modeling assumptions or to assess unit-level predictions empirically; and there is no ground truth available for checking area-level estimates. Design-based simulation from artificial populations can help with each of these issues, but only if the artificial populations (a) realistically represent the application at hand and (b) are not built using assumptions that could inherently favor one SAE model over another. In this paper, we borrow ideas from random hot deck, approximate Bayesian bootstrap (ABB), and k nearest neighbor (kNN) imputation methods, which are often used for multiple imputation of missing data. We propose a kNN-based approximation to ABB (KBAABB) for a different purpose: generating an artificial population when rich unit-level auxiliary data is available. We introduce diagnostic checks on the process of building the artificial population itself, and we demonstrate how to use such an artificial population for design-based simulation studies to compare and evaluate SAE models, using real data from the Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) program of the US Forest Service. We illustrate how such simulation studies may be disseminated and explored interactively through an online R Shiny application

A quantum-classical co-processing protocol towards simulating nuclear reactions on contemporary quantum hardware

Quantum computers hold great promise for arriving at exact simulations of nuclear dynamical processes (e.g., scattering and reactions) that are paramount to the study of nuclear matter at the limit of stability and to explaining the formation of chemical elements in stars. However, quantum simulations of the unitary (real) time dynamics of fermionic many-body systems require a currently prohibitive number of reliable and long-lived qubits. We propose a co-processing algorithm for the simulation of real-time dynamics in which the time evolution of the spatial coordinates is carried out on a classical processor, while the evolution of the spin degrees of freedom is carried out on a quantum processor. This hybrid algorithm is demonstrated by a quantum simulation of the scattering of two neutrons performed at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's Advanced Quantum Testbed. We show that, after implementation of error mitigation strategies to improve the accuracy of the algorithm in addition to the use of either circuit compression techniques or tomography as methods to elucidate the onset of decoherence, this initial demonstration validates the principle of the proposed co-processing scheme. We anticipate that a generalization of this present scheme will open the way for (real-time) path integral simulations of nuclear scattering.Comment: 12 pages, 10 figure

Broadband CPW-based impedance-transformed Josephson parametric amplifier

Quantum-limited Josephson parametric amplifiers play a pivotal role in advancing the field of circuit quantum electrodynamics by enabling the fast and high-fidelity measurement of weak microwave signals. Therefore, it is necessary to develop robust parametric amplifiers with low noise, broad bandwidth, and reduced design complexity for microwave detection. However, current broadband parametric amplifiers either have degraded noise performance or rely on complex designs. Here, we present a device based on the broadband impedance-transformed Josephson parametric amplifier (IMPA) that integrates a horn-like coplanar waveguide (CPW) transmission line, which significantly decreases the design and fabrication complexity, while keeping comparable performance. The device shows an instantaneous bandwidth of 700(200) MHz for 15(20) dB gain with an average saturation power of -110 dBm and near quantum-limited added noise. The operating frequency can be tuned over 1.4 GHz using an external flux bias. We further demonstrate the negligible back-action from our device on a transmon qubit. The amplification performance and simplicity of our device promise its wide adaptation in quantum metrology, quantum communication, and quantum information processing.Comment: 11 pages, 8 figure