Teacher confidence in professional training: The predictive roles of engagement and burnout

Teachers' work engagement positively impacts teachers' attitudes towards their job. Nevertheless, teachers may experience burnout during their career, which negatively impacts their professional learning opportunities. In this study we investigated the relationship between teachers' levels of burnout, work engagement, and their confidence in in-service training in a sample of Italian teachers. We expected that burnout mediated the relationship between work engagement and teachers' confidence in training. A total of 481 teachers completed self-report questionnaires about engagement and burnout, with an ad hoc Confidence in Training Index developed to assess their attitudes towards professional development courses. The mediation analysis confirmed that the teachers' levels of burnout mediated the relationship between their work engagement and their confidence in in-service training. Findings suggest that teacher confidence in policies about professional training should be evaluated by taking into account their level of engagement and burnout

L’interculturalismo a scuola. Le credenze di insegnanti di scuola dell’infanzia e primaria

Lo studio analizza le credenze di 33 insegnanti (età media = 46 aa.) di scuola dell’infanzia e primaria sull’interculturalismo a scuola attraverso la somministrazione di un’intervista semi- strutturata. Questa è stata analizzata attraverso il metodo IPA (Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis) associato al conteggio delle clausole linguistiche di ogni tema individuato. I risultati fanno emergere un atteggiamento piuttosto positivo delle insegnanti verso l’interculturalismo a scuola e dei suoi benefici per loro stesse e per gli allievi, accompagnato però dalla percezione di notevoli difficoltà nella gestione delle relazioni interpersonali, soprattutto con i genitori immigrati, e nell’apprendimento degli studenti stranieri a scuola e a casa. I risultati offrono spunti interessanti per la strutturazione di percorsi formativi per le insegnanti con lo scopo di accogliere le loro esigenze e promuovere interventi capaci di rispondere alle difficoltà reali incontrate a scuola

Editorial: Where to Raise Happy and Skilled Children: How Environment Shapes Human Development and Education.

The abstract is not available since this article is an editorial introducing a collection of article

Mathematics self-concept moderates the relation between cognitive functions and mathematical skills in primary school children

In this paper, we investigated the contribution of both cognitive and affective factors to mathematical skills. In particular, we looked at the protective role of self-concept for mathematical learning and performance. In a field study, we tested the relation of math self-concept and short-term visuo-spatial working memory to the mathemati- cal abilities of second- grade primary school children in Italy (N = 105). Measures included the “Test for the evaluation of calculating and problem-solving abilities” (AC-MT 6–11), the backward Corsi blocks test (Battery for Visuo-Spatial Memory), and the mathematics self-concept sub-scale of the Self-Description Questionnaire-I (SDQ-I, Italian version). As expected, correlation and moderated regression analy- ses showed that mathematics self-concept and working memory both positively pre- dict mathematical operations and numeracy, but not accuracy. Simple slope analysis confirmed our moderation hypothesis, with working memory predicting mathemati- cal abilities at low levels of math self-concept, but not at medium and high levels. The theoretical and practical implications are discussed

Contact with Nature and Children’s Wellbeing in Educational Settings

"\"Problem statement: The study explores the role of the spatial-physical features of the. environment for the functioning of educational institutions. Previous research in the field of. environmental psychology showed how physical characteristics of learning environments might be. linked to positive or negative outcomes in terms of learning attitudes and behaviors. In particular, there. is consistent empirical evidence showing that contact with natural settings promotes psychological. restoration, leading to the recovery of direct attention and stress reduction. The present study aims at. investigating the impact of the experience of contact with external green spaces during school time upon. children’s capacity of focusing direct attention on a specific task during structured activity with educators. and upon the quality of children’s social interaction with peers and adult educators. Approach: A total of. 16 children (age range 18-36 months) attending a recently opened childcare center in Rome, Italy. participated in the study. The physical features of the internal and external spaces of the educational. institutions were assessed via on-site observations. Systematic observations of the children were. performed, in different spaces of the educational setting and in different moments of the school day. In. particular, children’s performance in a visual-spatial task requiring direct attention and children social. behavior (using a checklist of social interaction and emotional behavior) were assessed by a paper-andpencil. observation grid on a six-step scale. Results: The research suggests that contact with external. green open spaces during school time is significantly associated with better performances in structured. tasks requiring direct attention and to positive social behaviors. The frequency of educators’ direct. interventions is smaller after the children’s contact with external green open spaces.. Conclusion\\\/Recommendations: These findings can contribute to gaining a better understanding of the. restoration processes occurring in different typologies of educational settings and suggest the importance. of providing these environments, such as childcare centers, with adequate external green spaces, in order. to allow children to have opportunities for systematic psychological restoration during school time.\"

Intercultural practices and inclusive education in Europe: can migration be a resource for individual and societal development?

This is an introductory paper to the special section "Multilingual learning and social inclusion of children: The development of educational programmes to connect school and family"

A Real-Time Medium Access Protocol Supporting Dynamic Spectrum Allocation in Industrial Networks

Abstract. Cognitive radio with spectrum sensing and spectrum reuse has great opportunities for industrial networking. Adapting to the current interference situation and utilising the available frequencies in an effective manner can greatly improve the data delivery capabilities. At the same time, real-time demands must be met. In this paper, we present a medium access control protocol supporting dynamic spectrum allocation as done in cognitive radio networks, providing deterministic medium access for heterogeneous traffic. The possibility of spectrum sensing in the nodes opens up for the possibility of increasing successful data transmissions, and a real-time analysis framework with three formalized constraints to be tested provides support for guaranteed timely treatment of hard real-time traffic. The real-time analysis framework includes a new type of delay check that more exactly bounds the delay compared to earlier work. Simulation experiments and performance comparisons are provided