Curriculum Integration: A Trial

Curriculum integration and working in teams are two key characteristics of middle schooling in Australia today. As part of a new primary/middle teacher education program an interdisciplinary team of academics has developed a course that aims to teach pre service teachers how to plan for and teach an integrated curriculum unit in an authentic context: their 6 week school placement. This paper will describe the first cycle of an action research project detailing the issues for the third year pre service teachers and for the staff involved in teaching the course as they come to grips with new ways of working. This is an action research project and the data includes course materials, staff notes and journals and student assignments. A number of key issues have emerged from this trial including pre services teachers’ knowledge of how curriculum is constructed at this stage of their career and the difficulties of modeling this approach

The importance of understanding attachment and resilience in residential child care : an argument against risk-averse practice

The intent of this paper is to explore the importance of relationships within Scottish residential child care settings. Whilst making reference to research, theoretical and legislative material, consideration will be given to the ethical and developmental issues surrounding the risk-averse approach to practice believed to be increasingly evident in relation to care provision within contemporary social work in Scotland (Scottish Executive, 2005). With reference to this, I will provide a critical analysis of the way in which riskaverse practice has infiltrated into residential child care practice in relation to meeting the attachment needs and promoting resilience of the looked after and accommodated children and young people to whom they provide a service

The Reflective Dispositional Coaching Process: An Action Research Project

The authors implemented an action research project to help teacher education candidates to reflect upon, assess, and ultimately strengthen teacher candidate dispositions through the Reflective Dispositional Coaching Model.  The teacher education faculty agreed that candidate dispositions should address four areas: (a) professionalism, (b) commitment to lifelong learning, (c) reflective and critical thinker, and (d) commitment to diversity.  Coaching the candidates through the reflective practitioner model not only allowed the candidates to operationally define and assess their dispositions, but also assisted them in a plan for empowerment and professional growth

Barriers to the Uptake of Cataract Surgery and Eye Care After Community Outreach Screening in Takeo Province, Cambodia

Purpose: To assess the barriers influencing eye healthcare seeking be-havior after community outreach screening. Design: A concurrent mixed methods study. Methods: A total of 469 patients screened during the previous 12 months were followed up, of which 354 (75%) from 5 districts were in-terviewed in person, using a semi-structured questionnaire, in-depth in-terviews (n = 11), and 16 focus groups (n = 71). SPSS and NVivo were used to analyze response frequency and identify themes. Results: Of the respondents, 98% (350/354) reported they were told they had an eye problem, with 295 individuals (83%) told to attend CARITAS Takeo Eye Hospital (CTEH) and 55 to have their eyes checked at Kiri Vong Vision Centre. Of those 68.9% (244/354) who reported seeking treatment, only 7.4% (18/244) reported they attended CTEH, 54% (n = 132) attended a “local pharmacy,” 31.6% (n = 77) “self-treated at home,” 11% (n = 27) reported “using steam from boiling rice,” and 10.7% (n = 26) attended a “traditional healer.” Of those who reported reasons for “not attending,” responses included “no time” (47.8%, 86/180), “no one to accompany” (21.7%, n = 39), “fear of losing sight” (17.8%, n = 32), “cannot afford to travel” (16.1%, n = 29), and “eye problem is not serious enough” (15.6%, n = 28). Follow-up of patient records identified that 128 individuals (79 females) attended eye care services. Conclusions: Socioeconomic factors, personal concerns, and the use of local cultural remedies were reasons for not seeking eye hospital treatment. An integrated community approach to improve awareness and uptake of appropriate treatment is recommended

VitisNet: ‘‘Omics’’ Integration through Grapevine Molecular Networks

Background: Genomic data release for the grapevine has increased exponentially in the last five years. The Vitis vinifera genome has been sequenced and Vitis EST, transcriptomic, proteomic, and metabolomic tools and data sets continue to be developed. The next critical challenge is to provide biological meaning to this tremendous amount of data by annotating genes and integrating them within their biological context. We have developed and validated a system of Grapevine Molecular Networks (VitisNet). Methodology/Principal Findings: The sequences from the Vitis vinifera (cv. Pinot Noir PN40024) genome sequencing project and ESTs from the Vitis genus have been paired and the 39,424 resulting unique sequences have been manually annotated. Among these, 13,145 genes have been assigned to 219 networks. The pathway sets include 88 ‘‘Metabolic’’, 15 ‘‘Genetic Information Processing’’, 12 ‘‘Environmental Information Processing’’, 3 ‘‘Cellular Processes’’, 21 ‘‘Transport’’, and 80 ‘‘Transcription Factors’’. The quantitative data is loaded onto molecular networks, allowing the simultaneous visualization of changes in the transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome for a given experiment. Conclusions/Significance: VitisNet uses manually annotated networks in SBML or XML format, enabling the integration of large datasets, streamlining biological functional processing, and improving the understanding of dynamic processes in systems biology experiments. VitisNet is grounded in the Vitis vinifera genome (currently at 8x coverage) and can be readily updated with subsequent updates of the genome or biochemical discoveries. The molecular network files can be dynamically searched by pathway name or individual genes, proteins, or metabolites through the MetNet Pathway database and web-portal at http://metnet3.vrac.iastate.edu/. All VitisNet files including the manual annotation of the grape genome encompassing pathway names, individual genes, their genome identifier, and chromosome location can be accessed and downloaded from the VitisNet tab at http://vitis-dormancy.sdstate.org

VitisNet: ‘‘Omics’’ Integration through Grapevine Molecular Networks

Background: Genomic data release for the grapevine has increased exponentially in the last five years. The Vitis vinifera genome has been sequenced and Vitis EST, transcriptomic, proteomic, and metabolomic tools and data sets continue to be developed. The next critical challenge is to provide biological meaning to this tremendous amount of data by annotating genes and integrating them within their biological context. We have developed and validated a system of Grapevine Molecular Networks (VitisNet). Methodology/Principal Findings: The sequences from the Vitis vinifera (cv. Pinot Noir PN40024) genome sequencing project and ESTs from the Vitis genus have been paired and the 39,424 resulting unique sequences have been manually annotated. Among these, 13,145 genes have been assigned to 219 networks. The pathway sets include 88 ‘‘Metabolic’’, 15 ‘‘Genetic Information Processing’’, 12 ‘‘Environmental Information Processing’’, 3 ‘‘Cellular Processes’’, 21 ‘‘Transport’’, and 80 ‘‘Transcription Factors’’. The quantitative data is loaded onto molecular networks, allowing the simultaneous visualization of changes in the transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome for a given experiment. Conclusions/Significance: VitisNet uses manually annotated networks in SBML or XML format, enabling the integration of large datasets, streamlining biological functional processing, and improving the understanding of dynamic processes in systems biology experiments. VitisNet is grounded in the Vitis vinifera genome (currently at 8x coverage) and can be readily updated with subsequent updates of the genome or biochemical discoveries. The molecular network files can be dynamically searched by pathway name or individual genes, proteins, or metabolites through the MetNet Pathway database and web-portal at http://metnet3.vrac.iastate.edu

Enhanced immunogenicity of a functional enzyme by T cell epitope modification

BACKGROUND: T helper epitopes are necessary for the induction of high titers of antigen-specific IgG antibodies. We are interested in the epitope modification of intact proteins as a method to enhance their immunogenicity for the generation of recombinant protein-based vaccines. RESULTS: Hartley strain guinea pig T cell epitopes were mapped for two related bacterial proteases. Two T cell epitopes were found in one of the proteases, while a comparatively reduced immunogenicity protease had no detectable T cell epitopes. A T cell epitope sequence homologous to the immunogenic protease was created in the less immunogenic protease by changing a single amino acid. Proliferative responses to the whole protein parent enzyme were two-fold higher in splenocyte cultures from variant-immunized animals. We found that the single amino acid change in the variant resulted in a protein immunogen that induced higher titers of antigen-specific IgG antibody at low doses and at early time points during the immunization protocol. The serum from parent- and variant-immunized guinea pigs cross-reacted at both the protein and the peptide level. Finally, animals primed to the variant but boosted with the parent enzyme had higher levels of antigen-specific IgG than animals immunized with the parent enzyme alone. CONCLUSIONS: With a single amino acid change we have introduced a T cell epitope into a comparatively low-immunogenic enzyme and have increased its immunogenicity while retaining the enzyme's original proteolytic function. The ability to immunomodulate proteins while leaving their function intact has important implication for the development of recombinant vaccines and protein-based therapeutics