Web-based language class activities: contexts of uses and background methodologies

Over the past two decades, a growing number of educational researchers have studied the benefits of using information and communication technologies (ICT). Research on Computer- Assisted Language Learning, mostly foreign language learning, shows that the use of ICT is beneficial to the development of learners' competences. This paper presents the preliminary results of an ongoing research on this topic. Building on a brief review of the literature and the analysis of lesson plans of Portuguese language teachers, this study argues that ICT are mainly used to support traditional methodological approaches, contrasting with the learner-centred ones encouraged by recent research on the topic. (C) 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd

Trends and dilemmas facing environmental education in Portugal: from environmental problem assessment to citizenship involvement

Environmental education (EE) emerged in Portugal as an organized field of collective action about 30 years ago. At this time of the return to democracy, major social and environmental changes had begun to occur. Yet, after 30 years of EE, together with significant improvements in the education system and curricula, the real impacts of these mostly voluntary and aggressive efforts aimed at preparing future citizens to deal effectively and sensitively with environmental problem solving are not yet evident. The pathways and social context of these efforts aimed at upgrading EE in Portugal, and their apparent failure to meet their objectives, form the basis of the analysis in this paper. The authors examine the results of a survey questionnaire sent to 15,000 public and private schools all running projects formally associated with both EE and education for sustainable development (ESD). The primary purpose of the analysis was to identify the trends, constraints, and potentials for these EE/ESD projects and initiatives within primary and secondary schools. In addition, perspectives as to the emerging trends in ESD in Portugal are discussed, bearing in mind the shifting educational context

Stent’s Manufacturing Field: Past, Present, and Future Prospects

From the introduction of stents, nobody was able to predict the advances that will occur in stent technology over the upcoming decades. Since their appearances, it became evident that this device had significant limitations, such as vessel occlusion and/or restenosis. Despite that, this medical device is the best clinical solution for cardiovascular vessel occlusions. Stents require a deep analysis, in terms of thrombogenicity, manufacturing process, geometrical aspects, and mechanical performance, among many other characteristics. The surface quality obtained in their manufacture process is crucial to blood compatibility, prevents the activation process of thrombosis, and improves the healing efficiency. The forecast stent market makes necessary continuous studies on this field, which help to solve the medical and engineering problems of this device, which are in constant development. Stents have been the center of many research lines over the last decades. The present chapter aims to summarize the state of the art of this medical device in the last years in the fields of design, manufacturing, and materials

Regulatory Reform Of The Urban Bus System In Recife (Brazil): Stakeholders And The Constituency-Building Process

The integrated metropolitan administration of the bus system in Recife is almost thirty years old and has survived a number of different perils. Even the most recent municipal administration of the city of Recife has dropped its plan to bring back the management of the municipal lines under its roof and has accepted cooperating with the State Government of Pernambuco, provided that a new cooperation contract basis is adopted. This paper begins with an explanation of the administrative and operator structure of the Metropolitan Recife bus system, which has been run by the Metropolitan Urban Transportation Company of Recife (EMTU - Empresa Metropolitana de Transportes Urbanos do Recife), a public corporation owned by the state of Pernambuco, but actually an administrative autarchy. Despite its success in ensuring coordination on the entire metropolitan level, which is still a rare example in Brazil, the EMTU has not been able to ensure a competitive environment in the bus industry under its control and the sector has been following a continuous path in direction of area-based monopolies. This paper describes this process as well as the different attempts by the EMTU to introduce benchmark regulation and the reaction of the operators against such attempts. In spite of these efforts, the legal expiration of the contracts and the organization of the legally required tendering procedure have been subsequently postponed. Different tender studies have been prepared and have been subsequently dropped. When the current municipal administration of the City of Recife came to power, a tender procedure was promised and expected, but the city government only managed to regulate (actually repress and substantially quell) the local informal operators. Most recently, the state attorney has pressed the state and municipal authorities to organize the procedure, but response is still slow. This paper describes these studies and the reactions of different stakeholders (operators, public servants, politicians, consultants, attorneys, press and the population) throughout this long process towards the tender procedure and also outlines the recent negotiations for reforming the EMTU.Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies. Faculty of Economics and Business. The University of Sydne

Environmental education in the context of the CPLP: an urgent challenge

[Resumo] Os países lusófonos registam diferentes patamares na promoção da Educação Ambiental (EA). Um primeiro levantamento realizado em 2017 mostra que a EA é, em geral, competência dos Ministérios do Ambiente e da Educação, estando reservado um papel específico para o poder local e para as escolas. O apoio público está generalizado na maioria dos países, sendo, no entanto, mais significativo no Brasil e em Portugal. Já o apoio das organizações internacionais verifica-se, sobretudo, nos países de África e em Timor, enquanto as ONG nacionais, fundações e empresas nacionais a atuar no campo da EA estão presentes, ainda que a diferentes níveis, em todos os países e contextos. Em suma, estes primeiros resultados demonstram que a EA já entrou nas agendas pública e política de todos os países, embora de forma desigual e nalguns países ainda seja embrionária. Torna-se, assim, particularmente importante aprofundar o conhecimento e a análise do campo da EA nos países da CPLP, de modo a reforçar a eficácia da sua implementação e a melhorar as políticas públicas nestes territórios, garantindo maior resiliência para enfrentar os desafios que se aproximam[Abstract] Portuguese-speaking countries are at different levels in promoting Environmental Education (EA). A first survey conducted in 2017 shows that EA is mostly the responsibility of the Ministries of Environment and Education, with a role reserved for local administration and schools. While more significant in Brazil and Portugal, public support is widespread in most countries. The support of international organisations is mainly found in African countries and East-Timor while, albeit at different levels, national NGOs, foundations and national companies are present in all countries and contexts. In sum, although unevenly and in some countries still embryonic, these early results demonstrate that EA has already entered the public and political agendas of all Portuguese speaking countries. Therefore, to enhance the effectiveness of implementation, to improve public policies, and to ensure greater resilience to face the coming challenges, it is of particular importance to deepening the analysis and the knowledge of the EE field in the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries

Who’s afraid of Local Agenda 21? Top-down and bottom-up perspectives on local sustainability

Local Agenda 21 is essentially a process of democratic practicing, insofar as it involves sharing political competencies in decision making by the local authorities, and the mobilisation of all citizens and civil society organisations in the process. It is, thus, a course of action in which the willingness and openness of local political leaders is as important as the ability of citizens to take the initiative of learning about and getting involved in local public life. Unfortunately, there are no more than twenty LA21 processes running in Portugal, and most of them do not fulfil all the parameters required. This paper discusses some hypotheses on the lack of success of LA21 in Portugal, which are related to structural political conditions for local governance and public participation. Resorting to some surveys on environmental policy issues (applied to both the municipal leaders and the population), the aim is to characterise the trends of mobilisation on local sustainability in Portuguese society, particularly with regard to the citizenry and local administrations

Mapping and assessing soil protection through an integrative ecosystem service framework.

Recent studies show that introducing the ecosystem service concept into policy and decisionmaking requires spatially explicit information on the state and trends of ecosystems and their services (Maes et al., 2012). Current spatially explicit approaches are often based on land cover assessments (Burkhard et al., 2009; Nelson et al., 2009), assigning values of ecosystem service provision to each land cover class. This approach fails to make a distinction between the actual service provision and the underlying ecosystem potential to provide a specific service. By focusing on actual ecosystem service provision (e.g. tonnes of soil that are fixated by vegetation) the potential of a given ecosystem or community under alternative management options is ignored (e.g. afforestation on a marginal grassland will increase soil fixation when comparing a grassland to a mature forest). The full potential value that the ecosystem service can provide (in this example to mitigate soil erosion) is therefore not taken into account

Avaliação do potencial para a produção de tomate em ambiente protegido em Moçambique

Em Moçambique a maioria das culturas hortícolas, e em particular a cultura do tomate, apresentam baixos níveis de produtividade. Existe escassez deste produto no mercado principalmente nos meses de verão, em particular em dezembro na quadra festiva do natal, quando a procura é grande. A produção de tomate apresenta uma sazonalidade muito marcada, caracterizada por maior produção em períodos de clima favorável, ou seja, na estação fria em que as temperaturas são amenas. O objetivo deste trabalho consistiu em avaliar o potencial de produção da cultura de tomate em Moçambique em 4 regiões: Maputo, Beira, Nampula e Chimoio. Os resultados obtidos mediante recurso a modelos de balanço de energia, balanço de massa e modelos de previsão da produção mostraram que a produção de tomate em ambiente protegido tem elevado potencial em Moçambique. Com o sistema de produção sob coberto, usando rede de sombra, o nível de radiação solar dentro da construção é menor e estimou-se uma redução na temperatura do ar e aumento da humidade relativa. A produção estimada indica um potencial de alta produtividade da cultura de tomate, usando este recurso simples de controlo ambiental. Os indicadores económicos mostram que a produção da cultura de tomate sob coberto é economicamente viável nas regiões selecionadas; ABSTRACT: “Evaluation of the potential for producing vegetables in protected cultivation in Mozambique” In Mozambique most horticultural crops, and in particular the tomato crop, have low levels of productivity. There is a shortage of this product on the market especially in the summer, particularly in December when demand is high during Christmas and New Year celebrations. Tomato production is characterised by a very marked seasonality, with the production concentrate in the favourable climate period, that is, during the “cold” season when air temperature is mild. The objective of this work was to evaluate the potential of tomato crop production in Mozambique in 4 regions: Maputo, Beira, Nampula and Chimoio. The results obtained using energy and mass balance models and production models showed that tomato production in protected environment has high potential in Mozambique. Tomato cultivation in protected environment, using shading screens, allows to reduce solar radiation within the building and it was estimated a reduction in air temperature and an increase of relative humidity. Estimated yield indicates a high yield potential of tomato crop using this simple environmental control technique. Economic indicators showed that protected tomato crop cultivation is economically viable in the selected regions

Structural changes in employment in the economy: 1996 and 2002 compared

With the implementation, in 1994, of the Real plan in the Brazilian economy, and the consequent price stabilization, the analysis of structural aspects of the economy has gained importance. Among these aspects, considering the needs for labor absorption in the economy, one of the main concerns relates to the question of employment. This paper deals with it by making an analysis of the changes in the employ distribution relating to modifications of productive structure in the Brazilian economy, between 1996 and 2002. The analytical method used input-output matrices and its correspondent theory. The efforts concentrated on input-output matrix construction for the year 2002 and comparative analysis, applying several techniques and parameters. A series of indicators were estimated, this allowed to make an analysis about the structural aspects of the Brazilian economy and to relate it with the employment changes occurred in the period being considered.Productive Structure, Employment, Input-Output

Interplay between MexAB-OprM and MexEF-OprN in clinical isolates of Pseudomonas aeruginosa

MexAB-OprM and MexEF-OprN are Pseudomonas aeruginosa efflux pumps involved in the development of antibiotic resistance. Several studies developed with laboratory strains or using a few clinical isolates have reported that the regulation system of MexEF-OprN is involved in the final levels of MexAB-OprM expression. Therefore, this study was aimed to determine the interplay between MexAB-OprM and MexEF-OprN in 90 out of 190 P. aeruginosa clinical isolates with an efflux pump overexpression phenotype. Regarding oprD, 33% (30/90) of isolates displayed relevant modifications (RM) defined as frameshift or premature stop, both related to carbapenem resistance. On the other hand, 33% of the isolates displayed RM in nalC, nalD or mexR, which were significantly associated with multidrug resistance (MDR), non-susceptibility to carbapenems, OprD alterations and strong biofilm production. Meanwhile, the RM in MexS were associated with presence of pigment (p = 0.004). Otherwise, when all the regulators were analysed together, the association between RM in MexAB-OprM regulators and MDR was only significant (p = 0.039) when mexS was the wild type. These data show the modulatory effect of MexEF-OprN on MexAB-OprM in a clinical population of P. aeruginosa. Further studies may contribute to design of novel molecules acting on this interplay to fight against antimicrobial resistance