Linguaggi, conoscenza e advocacy nella giovane Helen Keller

The article presents, through the analysis of direct sources – some works, letters and speeches by Helen Keller – the development of metacognitive activity in the young years of the writer. It is presented how the lack of functioning of the sense organs, seen and heard, required in her the modification of communication skills and the acquisition of other languages, the manual alphabet, Braille and vocal development obtained with great exercise. These alternative languages have become Helen’s vehicles for thought. At the same time, knowledge has acted as a vector of freedom and social empowerment, particularly for the advocacy of blind people.The article presents, through the analysis of direct sources – some works, letters and speeches by Helen Keller – the development of metacognitive activity in the young years of the writer. It is presented how the lack of functioning of the sense organs, seen and heard, required in her the modification of communication skills and the acquisition of other languages, the manual alphabet, Braille and vocal development obtained with great exercise. These alternative languages have become Helen’s vehicles for thought. At the same time, knowledge has acted as a vector of freedom and social empowerment, particularly for the advocacy of blind people

Teaching to learn reading. Methods and tools

Insegnare ad apprendere a leggere. Metodi e strument

Domotica e disabilità negli ambienti di apprendimento. Esiti di un progetto

In un lavoro sinergico ed interdisciplinare tra ricercatori dell’area pedagogica, dell’area ingegneristica e di quella medica, si è testata la possibilità di adattamento di dispositivi domotici all’ambiente scolastico, ambito non ancora esplorato dalla domotica, ed è stato progettato e realizzato un prototipo di dispositivo innovativo ed originale modellato sulle peculiarità dell’utente nel contesto scolastico. Per quanto riguarda i risultati raggiunti,sono state realizzate tre stazioni domotiche composte da un banco touch-screen collegato ad una LIM. Lo strumento si sta rivelando in grado di facilitare e motivare ad imparare, di trasmettere apprendimenti, di migliorare la qualità della vita del gruppo classe

A general model of focal adhesion orientation dynamics in response to static and cyclic stretch

Understanding cellular response to mechanical forces is immensely important for a plethora of biological processes. Focal adhesions are multi-molecular protein assemblies that connect the cell to the extracellular matrix and play a pivotal role in cell mechanosensing. Under time varying stretches, focal adhesions dynamically reorganize and reorient and as a result, regulate the response of cells in tissues. Here, I present a simple theoretical model based on, to my knowledge, a novel approach in the understanding of stretch sensitive bond association and dissociation processes together with the elasticity of the cell-substrate system to predict the growth, stability and the orientation of focal adhesions in the presence of static as well as cyclically varying stretches. The model agrees well with several experimental observations; most importantly, it explains the puzzling observations of parallel orientation of focal adhesions under static stretch and nearly perpendicular orientation in response to fast varying cyclic stretch

Il ruolo dell'adulto nel gioco del bambino con disabilità

Il contributo presenta brevemente una sistematizzazione da parte della ricerca scientifica dei bisogni di gioco dei bambini con disabilità evidenziando come uno dei maggiori sia quello di un adulto competente. Nella seconda parte viene presentato come possa declinarsi il ruolo dell'adulto nel supporto alle attività ludiche del bambino con disabilità