Non-medical skills and competencies needed by paraprofessional caregivers

This research effort was intended to identify the non-medical job skills projected to be needed by in-home paraprofessional caregivers of today and beyond as indicated by a Delphi panel of caregiving experts from public and private business areas as well as academia. Thirty Delphi participants were selected based on a qualifying questionnaire. Actual respondents, however, numbered 29 for Round 1, 24 for Round 2 and 23 for Round 3. Each round asked participants to respond to a survey as prompted by an open ended statement. Within the Round 1 process, participants indicated which non-medical skills from the prepared list they considered important to current and future paraprofessional in-home caregivers. They also added any other skills they believed to be worthy of consideration. Round 1 presented a prepared list of 68 skills in 7 categories. Round 2 presented 128 skills in 8 categories for which panelists provided ratings from a Likerttype scale. Round 3 presented 130 skills of which individually identified revisions were solicited toward consensus. This round produced 3 new skills which were not rated. Overall the final round achieved consensus ranging from 71% to 100% on all 130 rated items. Over the three rounds, 133 skills were identified and 130 acknowledged as having some level of importance to the effectiveness and efficiency of the paraprofessional inhome caregiver. All skills/competencies receiving rating consideration by the Delphi panelists were considered to possess some degree of importance. Importance ratings assigned by participants considered 29 as Extremely Important, 56 Very Important, 35 Important, 10 Somewhat Important while none were considered Not Important

Provision For The Retarded Pupils In The Regular Instructional Program Of Reading In The Snook Negro School

If freedom Is to endure, our schools must produce real citizens who know how to face and think through their own problems, not merely to follow a dictator; but who have faith In such democratic procedures as free discussion, expression of conviction through ballot; who recognize the responsibilities to their fellowmen; who will strive to bring to every nan freedom from fear and want, and freedom of speech and worship. Such individuals will possess the essential tools which enable men to function as producing members of American society. Statement of the Problem Our rich social heritage and the opportunities of our modern civilization must be made available to all children. Since every child is entitled to be educated to his fullest capacity, the problem of what can be done to the instructional program arose to give every boy and girl a chance, An attempt will be made to handle the following questions: Why are some children retarded? How can the retarded child be helped through the regular Instructions! program? What are the different levels of those children? What teaching materials should be Included In the program for these pupils? How can they be encouraged to stay In school? What procedures in teaching can be used to help these pupils to become better adjusted socially, emotionally, economically, spiritually, and Intellectually

Why bad ideas are a good idea

What would happen if we wrote an Abstract that was the exact opposite of what the paper described? This is a bad idea, but it makes us think more carefully than usual about properties of Abstracts. This paper describes BadIdeas, a collection of techniques that uses ???bad??? or ???silly??? ideas to inspire creativity, explore design domains and teach critical thinking in interaction design. We describe the approach, some evidence, how it is performed in practice and experience in its use.published or submitted for publicationis peer reviewe

Breaking the prejudice habit: Mechanisms, timecourse, and longevity

The prejudice habit-breaking intervention (Devine et al., 2012) and its offshoots (e.g., Carnes et al., 2012) have shown promise in effecting long-term change in key outcomes related to intergroup bias, including increases in awareness, concern about discrimination, and, in one study, long-term decreases in implicit bias. This intervention is based on the premise that unintentional bias is like a habit that can be broken with sufficient motivation, awareness, and effort. We conducted replication of the original habit-breaking intervention experiment in a sample more than three times the size of the original (N = 292). We also measured all outcomes every other day for 14 days and measured potential mechanisms for the intervention’s effects. Consistent with previous results, the habit-breaking intervention produced a change in concern that endured two weeks post-intervention. These effects were associated with increased sensitivity to the biases of others and an increased tendency to label biases as wrong. Contrasting with the original work, both control and intervention participants decreased in implicit bias, and the effects of the habit-breaking intervention on awareness declined in the second week of the study. In a subsample recruited two years later, intervention participants were more likely than control participants to object on a public online forum to an essay endorsing racial stereotyping. Our results suggest that the habit-breaking intervention produces enduring changes in peoples’ knowledge of and beliefs about race-related issues, and we argue that these changes are even more important for promoting long-term behavioral change than are changes in implicit bias

Strain analysis of multiferroic BiFeO3-CoFe2O4 nanostructures by Raman scattering

We report a Raman scattering investigation of columnar BiFeO3-CoFe2O4 (BFO-CFO) epitaxial thin film nanostructures, where BFO pillars are embedded in a CFO matrix. The feasibility of a strain analysis is illustrated through an investigation of two nanostructures with different BFO-CFO ratios. We show that the CFO matrix presents the same strain state in both nanostructures, while the strain state of the BFO pillars depends on the BFO/CFO ratio with an increasing tensile strain along the out-of-plane direction with decreasing BFO content. Our results demonstrate that Raman scattering allows monitoring strain states in complex 3D multiferroic pillar/matrix composites.Comment: revised version submitted to Appl. Phys. Let

Destination Online Communication: Why Less is Sometimes More. A Study of Online Communications of English Destinations

This research investigates the relationship between Web site design and the Web site end-user experience of a vast number of English tourism destinations, both local and regional ones. Following recent research in the field, this paper evaluates destinations' online communication based on the implemented Web site features and on the effectiveness of the communication itself, borrowing its research methodology from different domains. After content and functionality analysis, a user-experience, scenario-based investigation has been carried out, which demonstrated that complex Web sites do not always serve end-users' needs properly; in other words, Web site complexity is not directly related with good user experience. This research may help destination managers to foster their online communication if they have fewer content and functionalities but are better focused and clearly user-oriented. © 2014 Taylor & Francis

Time-series analysis of intraindividual performances of a complex serial gross motor task

Four case studies of time-series motor performances were designed to examine relationships among serial recall, visual and kinesthetic perceptual attributes, and spatial complexity. The task included four nine-element serial sequences and two tossing sequences. Subjects performed a series of movement patterns that included walking, simple hand motions, ducking under or stepping over obstacles, stacking blocks of differing colors, and walking in geometrically shaped floor patterns. Selected perceptual demand characteristics were structured into the four serial sequences, i. e., high-visual (HV) versus low-visual (LV) attributes and a four- versus nine-destination spatial environment. Subjects first completed two perceptual tests, The Rod-and-Frame Test and the Space relations subtest of the Differential Aptitude Test. Fifteen trials were conducted over three weeks. Performances were timed and coded by trained observers. Timed data included total time for each trial and partial times for each element within the trial. Two interventions changed element order within sequences and sequence order within task