Adolescent weak decoders writing in a shallow orthography: process and product

It has been hypothesised that students with dyslexia struggle with writing because of a word level focus that reduces attention to higher level textual features (structure, theme development). This may result from difficulties with spelling and/or from difficulties with reading. 26 Norwegian upper secondary students (M = 16.9 years) with weak decoding skills and 26 age-matched controls composed expository texts by keyboard under two conditions: normally and with letters masked to prevent them reading what they were writing. Weak decoders made more spelling errors and produced poorer quality text. Their inter key-press latencies were substantially longer pre-word, at word-end, and within-word. These findings provide some support for the word-level focus hypothesis, although we found that weak decoders were slightly less likely to engage in word-level editing. Masking did not affect differences between weak decoders and controls indicating that reduced fluency was associated with production rather than monitoring what they had produced

Learning from a fool: searching for the 'unmanaged' context for radical learning

Drawing on the existing theorizing of organizational learning from a radical perspective, this article attempts to problematize such notion of learning and position it within the existing organizational contexts informed by divergent types of rationality. The study scrutinizes these frameworks with a view to reflect on the potentiality for radical learning to occur within them. In this vein, the conceptual analysis of non-technical and non-marginal notions, namely, ‘spirituality’, ‘luck’ and ‘wisdom’, in different modes of rationality is conducted. This article demonstrates that since the conceptual inclusiveness is entailed by the specificity of sensemaking mechanisms, which these modes employ, the analysed notions can be approached as their litmus paper. The functionalist rationality types are found to be incommensurate with exigencies of the radical context for learning. In pursue of the conducive area for radical learning, the notions of unmanaged organization and the technology of foolishness provide the theoretical frame for the study, and their joint sensemaking context is discussed using examples. This unmanaged space driven by inclusive foolishness is recognized as one that enables the liminal sensemaking processes conducive for radical learning to occur

Effects of exposure to cigarette smoke prior to pregnancy in diabetic rats

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of cigarette smoke exposure before pregnancy on diabetic rats and their offspring development.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Diabetes was induced by streptozotocin and cigarette smoke exposure was conducted by mainstream smoke generated by a mechanical smoking device and delivered into a chamber. Diabetic female Wistar rats were randomly distributed in four experimental groups (n minimum = 13/group): nondiabetic (ND) and diabetic rats exposed to filtered air (D), diabetic rats exposed to cigarette smoke prior to and into the pregnancy period (DS) and diabetic rats exposed to cigarette smoke prior to pregnancy period (DSPP). At day 21 of pregnancy, rats were killed for maternal biochemical determination and reproductive outcomes.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The association of diabetes and cigarette smoke in DSPP group caused altered glycemia at term, reduced number of implantation and live fetuses, decreased litter and maternal weight, increased pre and postimplantation loss rates, reduced triglyceride and VLDL-c concentrations, increased levels of thiol groups and MDA. Besides, these dams presented increased SOD and GSH-Px activities. However, the increased antioxidant status was not sufficient to prevent the lipid peroxidation observed in these animals.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Despite the benefits stemming from smoking interruption during the pregnancy of diabetic rats, such improvement was insufficient to avoid metabolic alterations and provide an adequate intrauterine environment for embryofetal development. Therefore, these results suggest that it is necessary to cease smoking extensive time before planning pregnancy, since stopping smoking only when pregnancy is detected may not contribute effectively to fully adequate embryofetal development.</p