Cultural literacy: A positive view

88 counselor-trainees were given information about a potential client using either a problem-focused or strength-focused pre-intake form Based on the information provided, counselor-trainees rated the client on the perceived severity of client's problem, difficulty of treatment, attractiveness of case, anticipated duration of treatment, and usefulness of the pre-intake information. This pilot project suggested that the type of information provided to trainees influenced their perceptions of the case, in particular, affording a more positive view of the client.

Download Full-text

Quality Assessment of the Services Delivered by a Court, Based on the Perceptions of Users, Magistrates, and Court Officials

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13020504 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (2) ◽

pp. 504

Author(s):

Patrícia Moura e Sá ◽

Maria João Rosa ◽

Gonçalo Santinha ◽

Cátia Valente

Keyword(s):

Service Quality ◽

Service Providers ◽

Service Performance ◽

Technological Equipment ◽

Perceived Service Quality ◽

Positive View ◽

Depth Interview

This paper aims to measure the quality of the services delivered by a court by assessing the satisfaction of court users and service providers, i.e., magistrates and court officials. For that purpose, a case study was carried out and data were collected by means of a questionnaire based on the SERVPERF instrument, in which perceived service quality is measured, considering court users, magistrates, and court officials’ perceptions of post-service performance. One hundred and fifty-eight questionnaires were successfully returned. An in-depth interview was later conducted to the court administrator to gain a richer understanding of the results achieved and ask follow-up questions. Overall, findings revealed that court users, magistrates, and court officials clearly have a positive view of the services provided, although improvement is needed, particularly in the court’s facilities and technological equipment. The current research sheds some light on the potentialities and difficulties of assessing service quality in the judiciary and contributes to the validation of the SERVPERF instrument in this context.

Download Full-text

Change in Classroom Dialogicity to Promote Cultural Literacy across Educational Levels

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13116410 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (11) ◽

pp. 6410

Author(s):

Merce Garcia-Mila ◽

Andrea Miralda-Banda ◽

Jose Luna ◽

Ana Remesal ◽

Núria Castells ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Professional Development ◽

Children And Adolescents ◽

Development Programme ◽

Cultural Literacy ◽

Educational Levels ◽

Dialogic Teaching ◽

Short Films ◽

Living Together ◽

Diverse World ◽

Professional Development Programme

In a highly diverse world, cultural literacy is an essential tool for living together in harmony, and dialogic teaching may be a way to promote and develop it among children and adolescents. We define cultural literacy as a set of attitudes (inclusion, tolerance, and empathy) and skills (dialogic argumentation) needed to understand others in our everyday lives. This paper focuses on the effect of a professional development programme to promote dialogue and argumentation to help children and adolescents overcome pre-existing stereotypes and prejudices and foster students’ participation in discussions that contrast divergent viewpoints. This was done through debates on social responsibility issues, living together, and belonging as presented in books and short films addressing the following topics: citizenship, the celebration of diversity, democracy, globalisation, human rights, cooperation, sustainable development, and climate change. After the professional development programme was implemented, we video-recorded two of the 15 student–teacher interaction sessions during the project’s implementation (session #3 and session #8). We analysed the data using a validated coding scheme across three educational levels (three preschool, four primary school, and four secondary school classrooms). We observed moderate gains in secondary education and preschool, but statistically significant gains in primary education.

Download Full-text

Understanding Bayesianism: Fundamentals for Process Tracers

Political Analysis ◽

10.1017/pan.2021.23 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-8

Author(s):

Andrew Bennett ◽

Andrew E. Charman ◽

Tasha Fairfield

Keyword(s):

Social Science ◽

Bayesian Analysis ◽

Qualitative Methods ◽

Recent Work ◽

The State ◽

Process Tracing ◽

Bayesian Reasoning ◽

Mutual Exclusivity ◽

Positive View

Abstract Bayesian analysis has emerged as a rapidly expanding frontier in qualitative methods. Recent work in this journal has voiced various doubts regarding how to implement Bayesian process tracing and the costs versus benefits of this approach. In this response, we articulate a very different understanding of the state of the method and a much more positive view of what Bayesian reasoning can do to strengthen qualitative social science. Drawing on forthcoming research as well as our earlier work, we focus on clarifying issues involving mutual exclusivity of hypotheses, evidentiary import, adjudicating among more than two hypotheses, and the logic of iterative research, with the goal of elucidating how Bayesian analysis operates and pushing the field forward.

Download Full-text

Affinity Spaces and Ecologies of Practice: Digital Composing Processes of Pre-service English Teachers

Language and Literacy ◽

10.20360/g2s010 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 16 (1) ◽

pp. 34 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Patrick Howard

Keyword(s):

Communication Systems ◽

New Technologies ◽

Literacy Practices ◽

English Education ◽

Meaning Making ◽

Cultural Literacy ◽

Student Experiences ◽

Traditional Schools ◽

Education Students ◽

Unique Experience

English educators are responsible for preparing pre-service and in-service teachers to consider the ways in which people engage in meaning making by using a variety of representation, interpretive and communication systems. Today new technologies are radically changing the types of texts people create and interpret even as they are influencing the social, political and cultural contexts in which texts are shared. This research project was designed to immerse pre-service English education students in the creation of multimodal, multimedia texts as part of a digital composing workshop. For the purposes of this paper, three student experiences were drawn from a group of twelve pre-service English education students participating in the project. Each student represents a unique experience from which we may draw insight and direction as English educators. Despite the ever present barriers to integrating afterschool (Prensky, 2010) literacy practices into traditional schools and to ensure what we are teaching has the important element of “life validity” ( Mills, 2010) and reflects the evolving socio cultural literacy practices of contemporary society, English educators must provide authentic, engaging opportunities for pre-service teachers to learn about and through multimedia, multimodal digital technologies.

Download Full-text