The effectiveness of a project day to introduce sixth grade students to science competitions

Background: Science Olympiads and science fairs are effective instruments to foster interested and talented students. However, at most schools competitions are not systematically integrated into the school mission statement so that students are unaware of these opportunities. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of a newly designed competition day in terms of willingness to participate in a science competition and to learn more about students’ reasons for a prospective participation. Programme description: A project day (called ‘competition day’) for students in sixth grade was designed to encourage and motivate more students to participate in science competitions. The theoretical foundations for the design are self-determination theory and an adapted version of Holland’s RIASEC-model. Sample: The sample consisted of 474 German sixth grade students from six secondary schools. Design and methods: A pre-post-follow up-study was conducted with two intervention groups; both groups participated in the competition day and either entered a fictive competition or worked on the same tasks in school lessons. One control group not participating in the competition day was also investigated. Results: The results provide information regarding students’ interests, as well as reasons for and against participating in competitions. Furthermore, the effectiveness of the competition day is shown. Conclusions: The competition day is an effective way to introduce students to competitions and raise their willingness to participate in science contests. Combining the competition day with science competitions showed even better results. This supports the call for continuous fostering strategies

EC92-2308 Principles and Practices for Food Sanitation Programs

Food plant sanitation programs will vary depending on the type of product produced. All sanitation programs begin wtih a commitment to construct, upgrade, and maintain the food processing system. Follow federal, state and local regulations. This publication will concentrate on your food plant sanitation program and will cover the following areas: plant and grounds, plant construction, equipment, receiving and storage, processing and packaging, warehousing and shipping, cleaning and sanitizing, personal hygiene and food handling

EC92-2308 Principles and Practices for Food Sanitation Programs

Food plant sanitation programs will vary depending on the type of product produced. All sanitation programs begin wtih a commitment to construct, upgrade, and maintain the food processing system. Follow federal, state and local regulations. This publication will concentrate on your food plant sanitation program and will cover the following areas: plant and grounds, plant construction, equipment, receiving and storage, processing and packaging, warehousing and shipping, cleaning and sanitizing, personal hygiene and food handling

Practice nurses experiences of mentoring undergraduate nursing students in Australian general practice

Internationally, the delivery of health services has shifted from secondary to primary care, necessitating an exponential growth of the nursing workforce and expansion of the nursing role in general practice. This growth, and the subsequent need to develop this workforce, has created a need to expose undergraduate nurses to general practice nursing as a viable career option. Concurrently, universities are struggling to find sufficient clinical places for their undergraduate students to gain clinical experience. It is logical, therefore, to increase the number of undergraduate nursing student placements in general practice. Through qualitative research methods, this paper seeks to explore the experiences of practice nurses mentoring undergraduate students on clinical placements within the general practice setting. Findings are presented in the following three themes: (1) Promoting Practice Nursing: We really need to get students in, (2) Mentoring future co-workers: Patience and reassurance, and (3) Reciprocity in learning: It\u27s a bit of a two way street, which show the benefits of such placements. Clinical placements in general practice settings can be mutually beneficial in terms of providing quality teaching and learning experiences for students. Conversely, the experience provides an impetus for practice nurses to maintain currency of their clinical skills and knowledge through mentoring student nurses

Approach to Inclusive Education for all children and youth in the South: an input-process-outcome-context framework

La Educación Inclusiva abarca todas las variantes producidas por estos diferentes objetivos, niveles, sistemas y motivos. La confusión surge cuando la Educación Inclusiva se toma como un estado fijo en lugar de un proceso dinámico, como se señaló en el informe de la UNESCO sobre la Situación Actual de la Educación Especial (Hegarty, 1998). Un nivel más de complejidad implica la definición de la necesidad de educación especial. Los países pueden incluir una amplia gama de individuos en la categoría de necesidades educativas especiales, por ejemplo, niños y jóvenes refugiados, talentosos, discapacitados, y aquellos con diversas dificultades de aprendizaje y características que se traducen en bajo rendimiento educativo. A los efectos de este artículo, la definición de Educación Inclusiva deriva de la Declaración de Salamanca de 1994, ya que su desarrollo implicó un alto nivel de participación global, ofreciendo quizás la mejor definición intercultural de la educación inclusiva en acción. El principio fundamental de la Educación Inclusiva es “que todos los niños [y jóvenes] deben aprender juntos, siempre que sea posible, haciendo caso omiso de sus dificultades y diferencias”. Las escuelas que demuestren la Educación Inclusiva “deben reconocer las diferentes necesidades de sus alumnos y responder a ellas, adaptarse a los diferentes estilos y ritmos de aprendizaje de los niños [y jóvenes] y garantizar una enseñanza de calidad por medio de un programa de estudios apropiado, una buena organización escolar, una utilización atinada de los recursos y una asociación con sus comunidades. Debería ser, de hecho, una continua prestación de servicios y ayuda para satisfacer las continuas necesidades especiales que aparecen en la escuela.”Dossier: Nuevas juventudes, socialización y escolarización: perspectivas de la investigación socioeducativaDepartamento de Ciencias de la Educació

Neural reward-related reactions to monetary gains for self and charity

The aim of the present study was to examine the neural signatures of gaining money for self and charity. Young adults (N = 31, 21–24 years of age) underwent fMRI scanning while they performed a task in which they could earn money for themselves and for a self-chosen charity by selecting one of two options with unknown outcomes. The results showed elevated activity in the ventral striatum when gaining for the self only and for self and charity, but not when gaining for charity only. However, increased ventral striatal activity when gaining for charity only was correlated with participants’ self-reported empathic concern and enjoyment when winning for charity. Empathic concern was also related to donating a larger proportion of earnings to charity after the MRI session. In short, these results reveal robust ventral striatal activity when gaining for oneself, but empathydependent individual differences in ventral striatal activity when gaining for charit

Neural reward related-reactions to monetar gains for self and charity are associated with donating behavior in adolescence

The aim of the current study was to examine neural signatures of gaining money for self and charity in adolescence. Participants (N = 160, aged 11–21) underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging-scanning while performing a zero-sum vicarious reward task in which they could either earn money for themselves at the expense of charity, for a self-chosen charity at the expense of themselves, or for both parties. Afterwards, they could donate money to charity, which we used as a behavioral index of giving. Gaining for self and for both parties resulted in activity in the ventral striatum (specifically in the NAcc), but not gaining for charity. Interestingly, striatal activity when gaining for charity was positively related to individual differences in donation behavior and perspective taking. Dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, insula and precentral gyrus were active when gaining only for self, and temporal-parietal junction when gaining only for charity, relative to gaining for both parties (i.e. under equity deviation). Taken together, these findings show that striatal activity during vicarious gaining for charity depends on levels of perspective taking and predicts future acts of giving to charity. These findings provide insight in the individual differences in the subjective value of prosocial outcome