Materiales para hacer música en las primeras edades: Ejes del triángulo formación, innovación e Investigación

Esta investigación emerge de un programa de formación del profesorado realizado en siete centros de educación infantil (0-3 años) de una ciudad de la provincia de Barcelona, con el objetivo de conseguir que los ambientes escolares en los que se desarrolla la vida de los niños de las primeras edades, sean ricos en comunicación musical y en vivencias. Haciendo balance del primer año de aplicación, se observa que la introducción y el uso de materiales para hacer música en las aulas ha sido el aspecto más impactante de la formación. Se diseña y valida un cuestionario que tiene por objetivo evaluar siete materiales representativos del programa de formación aplicado en estos centros. Las valoraciones obtenidas son muy positivas, especialmente en los ítems relacionados con la comunicación musical.This research emerged from a teacher-training programme implemented in seven early learning centres (0-3 years old) in a town in the province of Barcelona, Spain. Its goal was to make the school environment where young children’s lives develop richer in musical experiences and communication. On taking stock of the progress made after one year it may be observed that the introduction and use of materials for making music in the classroom is the aspect of the programme that has made the most impact. A questionnaire was designed and validated; its purpose was to evaluate seven sets of materials that are representative of the training programme implemented in these centres. The results were very positive, especially as regards the items related to musical communication.

Free Form of the Foldy-Wouthuysen Transformation in External Electromagnetic Fields

We derive the exact Foldy-Wouthuysen transformation for Dirac fermions in a time independent external electromagnetic field in the basis of the Ritus eigenfunctions, namely the eigenfunctions of the operator $(\gamma \cdot \Pi)^2$, with $\Pi^\mu = p^\mu - e A^\mu$. In this basis, the transformation acquires a free form involving the dynamical quantum numbers induced by the field.Comment: 8 pages. Accepted in J. Phys. A: Math. and Theo. (Fast Track Communication

New estimates for the maximal singular integral

In this paper we pursue the study of the problem of controlling the maximal singular integral $T^{*}f$ by the singular integral $Tf$. Here $T$ is a smooth homogeneous Calder\'on-Zygmund singular integral of convolution type. We consider two forms of control, namely, in the L^2(\Rn) norm and via pointwise estimates of $T^{*}f$ by $M(Tf)$ or $M^2(Tf)$, where $M$ is the Hardy-Littlewood maximal operator and $M^2=M \circ M$ its iteration. It is known that the parity of the kernel plays an essential role in this question. In a previous article we considered the case of even kernels and here we deal with the odd case. Along the way, the question of estimating composition operators of the type $T^\star \circ T$ arises. It turns out that, again, there is a remarkable difference between even and odd kernels. For even kernels we obtain, quite unexpectedly, weak $(1,1)$ estimates, which are no longer true for odd kernels. For odd kernels we obtain sharp weaker inequalities involving a weak $L^1$ estimate for functions in $L LogL$.Comment: v2: 56 pages, with small changes made after acceptance by International Math. Research Notice

Effects of variable and constant temperatures on the embryonic development and survival of a new grape pest, xylotrechus arvicola (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae)

Xylotrechus arvicola Olivier (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae) has become a new expanding pest in grape (Vitis spp.) crops. To better improve control tactics, the consequences of 11 constant (12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30, 32, 34, 35 and 36°) and nine variable temperatures (with equal mean temperatures at each of the nine constant rates ranging from 15 to 35°) on survival and embryonic development were studied. The eggs were able to complete development at constant temperatures between 15 and 35°, with mortality rates at the extremes of the range of two and 81.5%, respectively. Using variable temperatures a mortality rate of 38.9% at a mean temperature of 15° and 99% at 35° was observed. The range of time for embryonic development was 29.5 d at 15° to 6 d at 32° at constant temperatures, and from 29.6 d at 15° to 7.2 d at 32° at variable temperatures. The goodness-of-fit of different development models was evaluated for the relationship between the development rate and temperature. The models that gave the best fit were the Logan type III for constant temperatures and The Briare for variable temperatures. Optimum temperatures were estimated to be from 31.7 to 32.9°. The models that best described embryo development under natural field conditions were the Logan type III model for constant temperatures (98.7% adjustment) and The Lactin model for variable temperatures (99.2% adjustment). Nonlinear models predicted faster development at constant temperatures and slower development at variable ones when compared with real field development, whereas the linear model always predicted faster development than what actually took place. © 2011 Entomological Society of America.The Spanish Institute for Food and Agricultural Sciences and Technologies (INIA) funded this research, project no. RTA04-117-C2.Peer Reviewe

Social Benefits in Brics and Spain

The object of this paper is to collect and discuss examples of social benefits in emerging markets. The main approach is to identify a number of the current policies being applied in BRICS compared to those in Spain and the OECD. Emerging markets are countries that will become a reference for their industry, economy and social management in upcoming years. These countries should not disregard the role the workforce holds as being essential for their mutual benefit (both as employers and employees). For this reason, it is crucial to review the social benefits applied in these states and their companies. According to various studies, governments are implementing polices to increase maternity and paternity leave, the development of personal and work skills or other social benefits like discounts for personal fitness or transport vouchers

Applying Recommendations to Align Competences, Methodology, and Assessment in Telematics, Computing, and Electronic Engineering Courses

The alignment between competences, teachinglearning methodologies, and assessment is a key element of European higher education. This paper presents the efforts carried out by six telematics, computer science and electronic engineering education teachers toward achieving this alignment in their subjects. In a joint work with pedagogues, a set of recommended actions are identified. A selection of these actions are applied and evaluated in the six subjects. The cross analysis of the results indicates that the actions allow students to better understand the methodologies and assessments planned for the subjects, facilitate (self-) regulation, and increase students’ involvement in the subjects

Tau Phosphorylation, Aggregation, and Cell Toxicity

Protein aggregation takes place in many neurodegenerative disorders. However, there is a controversy about the possible toxicity of these protein aggregates. In this review, this controversy is discussed, focussing on the tau aggregation that takes place in those disorders known as tauopathies

Sharpening the species boundaries in the Cladonia mediterranea complex (Cladoniaceae, Ascomycota)

The complex Cladonia mediterranea belongs to the section Impexae and is formed by C. azorica, C. macaronesica and C. mediterranea. These species are basically distributed in the Mediterranean and Macaronesian Regions. In the present work the limits between the species of this complex are re-examined. To this end, the morphological characters were studied along with the secondary metabolites and the DNA sequences from three loci (ITS rDNA, IGS rDNA and rpb2). The morphological data were studied by principal component analysis (PCA), while the DNA sequences were analyzed using several approaches available to delimit species: genealogical concordance phylogenetic species recognition, species tree (BEAST* and spedeSTEM) and cohesion species recognition. In addition, the genealogical sorting index was used in order to assess the monophyly of the species. The different procedures used in our study turned out to be highly congruent with respect to the limits they establish, but these limits are not the ones separating the prior species. Either the morphological analysis or the different approaches to species delimitation indicate that C. mediterranea is a different species from C. macaronesica, while C. azorica and C. macaronesica, which are reduced to synonyms of C. portentosa, constitute a separate lineage