The Effectiveness of a Program Based on Electronic Interactive Activities in Developing the Tourism Awareness of Kindergarten Children

This study aimed to reveal the effectiveness of a program based on electronic interactive activities in developing the tourism awareness of kindergarten children. To achieve the objectives of the study, the descriptive approach and the quasi-experimental approach were used, on a random sample of (62) boys and girls from the kindergarten stage, they were divided into (32) children for the experimental sample and (30) children for the control sample, all from the Eastern Province in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The researchers designed several tools that included a list of the most important concepts of tourism awareness appropriate for a kindergarten child, prepared a program based on electronic interactive activities, and presented it to the children to develop tourism awareness concepts. An electronic scale was used to measure tourism awareness in children in the study sample before and after the application of the program. After validating the psychometric properties of the tools, the pre-test for tourism awareness was performed, then the program was applied to the experimental sample, and finally the post-test was performed. Data was statistically analyzed using the SPSS program to calculate the significance of the differences between the mean scores of the experimental sample and the control sample (T -test) and measuring the effectiveness of the program by calculating Plaque’s Gain Ratio. The results showed the effectiveness of the program based on electronic interactive activities in developing tourism awareness in kindergarten children .Considering the results of the study, the researchers recommend expanding the integration of electronic interactive programs into the kindergarten curricula to develop the kindergarten child’s tourism awareness and prepare them for the future

Sunflower and climate change: Possibilities of adaptation through breeding and genomic selection

Due to its ability to grow in different agroecological conditions and its moderate drought tolerance, sunflower may become the oil crop of preference in the future, especially in the light of global environmental changes. In the field conditions, sunflower crop is often simultaneously challenged by different biotic and abiotic stresses, and understanding the shared mechanisms contributing to two or more stresses occurring individually or simultaneously is important to improve crop productivity under foreseeable complex stress situations. Exploitation of the available plant genetic resources in combination with the use of modern molecular tools for genome-wide association studies (GWAS) and application of genomic selection (GS) could lead to considerable improvements in sunflower, especially with regard to different stresses and better adaptation to the climate change. In this chapter we present a review of climate-smart (CS) traits and respective genetic resources and tools for their introduction into the cultivated sunflower, thus making it the oil crop resilient to the extreme climatic conditions and well-known and emerging pests and diseases. © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019