Effects of a culturally responsive speech and language intervention for students of Indigenous and non-Indigenous ancestry

This study explored the effectiveness of a speech and language intervention that was designed to be culturally responsive and adapted to provide explicit language instruction. Participants included all 774 kindergarten students from a mid-sized rural school district in British Columbia. Seventy-seven students screened as at risk received the intervention, and the remaining students participated in the regular kindergarten curriculum. Results indicated statistically significant effects of the intervention on language and vocabulary skills. No differential effects were observed between students of Indigenous and non-Indigenous heritage. Results are discussed in terms of culturally responsive and explicit instruction for early language development.Key words: early intervention, language intervention, cultural responsiveness, Aboriginal educationCette étude a examiné l'efficacité d'une intervention orthophonique et linguistique conçue pour être culturellement adaptée et permettre un enseignement explicite des langues. 774 élèves de maternelle d'un district scolaire rural de taille moyenne en Colombie-Britannique ont participé à cette étude. Parmi eux, 77 étudiants, sélectionnés comme étant à risque, ont participé à l'intervention, tandis que les autres étudiants ont participé au programme de maternelle habituel. Les résultats ont montré des effets statistiquement significatifs de l'intervention sur le langage et le vocabulaire. Aucune différence n'a été observée entre les étudiants ayant un patrimoine culturel autochtone ou non autochtone. Ces résultats sont débatus en termes d'enseignement explicite et culturellement adapté pour le développement précoce du langage.Mots clés: intervention précoce, intervention linguistique, sensibilisation à la culturel, éducation des Autochtone

Topological Structure of the Space of Phenotypes: The Case of RNA Neutral Networks

The evolution and adaptation of molecular populations is constrained by the diversity accessible through mutational processes. RNA is a paradigmatic example of biopolymer where genotype (sequence) and phenotype (approximated by the secondary structure fold) are identified in a single molecule. The extreme redundancy of the genotype-phenotype map leads to large ensembles of RNA sequences that fold into the same secondary structure and can be connected through single-point mutations. These ensembles define neutral networks of phenotypes in sequence space. Here we analyze the topological properties of neutral networks formed by 12-nucleotides RNA sequences, obtained through the exhaustive folding of sequence space. A total of 412 sequences fragments into 645 subnetworks that correspond to 57 different secondary structures. The topological analysis reveals that each subnetwork is far from being random: it has a degree distribution with a well-defined average and a small dispersion, a high clustering coefficient, and an average shortest path between nodes close to its minimum possible value, i.e. the Hamming distance between sequences. RNA neutral networks are assortative due to the correlation in the composition of neighboring sequences, a feature that together with the symmetries inherent to the folding process explains the existence of communities. Several topological relationships can be analytically derived attending to structural restrictions and generic properties of the folding process. The average degree of these phenotypic networks grows logarithmically with their size, such that abundant phenotypes have the additional advantage of being more robust to mutations. This property prevents fragmentation of neutral networks and thus enhances the navigability of sequence space. In summary, RNA neutral networks show unique topological properties, unknown to other networks previously described

The role of school personnel perceptions in predicting sustained implementation of school-wide positive behavior support

The current study explored the extent to which implementation of critical features of School-wide Positive Behavior Support (SWPBS) predicted sustained implementation three years later. The respondents included school personnel from 261 schools across the United States who had been implementing SWPBS for at least three years. The PBIS Self-Assessment Survey (PBIS SAS) was administered to assess whether self-reported ratings of school personnel regarding fidelity of implementation in different SWPBS settings (school-wide, non-classroom, classroom, individual) predicted the fidelity of SWPBS practices in schools through an independent evaluation using the Benchmarks of Quality (BoQ) measure. Regression analyses indicated that self-reported fidelity of implementation of Classrooms Systems significantly predicted sustained implementation. Within Classroom Systems, regular acknowledgement of expected behaviors, matching instruction and curriculum materials to student ability, and access to additional support were the strongest predictors of sustained implementation. Results are discussed in terms of critical factors for focusing SWPBS training and professional development to increase the likelihood of sustained implementation.Education, Faculty ofEducational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education (ECPS), Department ofGraduat

Parental Psychopathology and Tourette Syndrome/Chronic Tic Disorder in Offspring : A Nationwide Case-Control Study

Objective: To determine the associations between maternal and paternal psychiatric diagnoses and Tourette syndrome (TS)/chronic tic disorder (CT) in a nationwide study. Method: This nested case-control study linked data derived from three national registers. All singletons born and diagnosed with TS/CT in Finland between January 1991 and December 2010 were identified (n = 1,120) and matched to four controls (n = 4,299). Conditional logistic regression was used to examine the associations between parental psychopathology and TS/CT. Results: Altogether, 24.9% of patients with TS/CT and 12.00/0 of controls had a mother with a psychiatric diagnosis. Similarly, 17.9% and 12.9% had a father with a psychiatric diagnosis. Any maternal and any paternal psychiatric diagnosis was associated with offspring TS/CT (odds ratio [OR] 2.3; 95% CI 1.9-2.7 and OR 1.2; 95% CI 1.01-1.5, respectively). The association between maternal psychiatric diagnosis and TS/CT was stronger than that between paternal psychiatric diagnosis and TS/CT (p Conclusion: Parental psychiatric diagnoses (especially in the mother) are associated with diagnosed offspring TS/CT. Further studies are required before the results can be generalized to all children with TS/CT. The associations between maternal psychiatric disorders and TS may reflect both maternal specific environmental and/or genetic influences.Peer reviewe

Energy policy: Push Renewables to spur carbon pricing

Putting a price on carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to curb emissions must be the centrepiece of any comprehensive climate-change policy. We know it works: pricing carbon creates broad incentives to cut emissions. Yet the current price of carbon remains much too low relative to the hidden environmental, health and societal costs of burning a tonne of coal or a barrel of oil1. The global average price is below zero, once half a trillion dollars of fossil-fuel subsidies are factored in

Complex organic molecules in protoplanetary disks

(Abridged) Protoplanetary disks are vital objects in star and planet formation, possessing all the material which may form a planetary system orbiting the new star. We investigate the synthesis of complex organic molecules (COMs) in disks to constrain the achievable chemical complexity and predict species and transitions which may be observable with ALMA. We have coupled a 2D model of a protoplanetary disk around a T Tauri star with a gas-grain chemical network including COMs. We compare compare synthesised line intensities and calculated column densities with observations and determine those COMs which may be observable in future. COMs are efficiently formed in the disk midplane via grain-surface chemical reactions, reaching peak grain-surface fractional abundances 1e-6 - 1e-4 that of the H nuclei number density. COMs formed on grain surfaces are returned to the gas phase via non-thermal desorption; however, gas-phase species reach lower fractional abundances than their grain-surface equivalents, 1e-12 - 1e-7. Including the irradiation of grain mantle material helps build further complexity in the ice through the replenishment of grain-surface radicals which take part in further grain-surface reactions. There is reasonable agreement with several line transitions of H2CO observed towards several T Tauri star-disk systems. The synthesised line intensities for CH3OH are consistent with upper limits determined towards all sources. Our models suggest CH3OH should be readily observable in nearby protoplanetary disks with ALMA; however, detection of more complex species may prove challenging. Our grain-surface abundances are consistent with those derived from cometary comae observations providing additional evidence for the hypothesis that comets (and other planetesimals) formed via the coagulation of icy grains in the Sun's natal disk.Comment: 34 pages, 12 figures, 7 table