<p>In this study I will find out which thoughts and alternative conceptions pupils have about photosynthesis, decomposing and breeding. The method used was qualitative semi-structured interviews with pupils in preschool class and in the third grade. They were interviewed about what a flower needs in order to live, die and to propagate themselves. The result shows that the students have alternative conceptions about these issues. There are no big differences in the notions of the average classes. There is a relation between the children’s way of living and their notions.</p><p>The result shows that all 17 pupils know that the flowers need water and soil. Half of them know that it also needs sun. But only 2 pupils know that the flowers need sugar to live.</p>

Objective: The current study examined conceptions of adulthood, close personal relationships, and health behaviors (dietary intake, substance use, sexual behaviors) of emerging adults aged 18-30 with horizontally-infected HIV. Emerging adults were expected to differ in levels of achievement of adulthood tasks. The quality of close relationships, and perceptions of close friends’ behaviors were hypothesized to be associated with health behaviors. Method: Utilizing a cross-sectional design, 48 emerging adults with HIV (64.6% female; M age = 22.59, SD = 3.17) from a youth-based clinic serving most of Miami-Dade County were recruited. Participants completed measures on markers of adulthood, close friend and romantic partner qualities, health behaviors, and perceptions of close peers’ health behaviors using Filemaker technology on laptops; audio computer-assisted self-interview options were available. Results: The domains of individualism and family capacities received the highest mean ratings of importance for marking adulthood. Participants rated the acceptance of responsibility for one’s actions and making independent choices as being most important for being considered an adult; other items rated highly were related to emotional control and adopting new family roles. In the domain of peer relationships, participants who had a close friend or romantic partner generally reported high levels of positive qualities in the friendship that were comparable to national samples; however, most individuals had not disclosed their HIV status to their best friend or romantic partner. A number of emerging adults (12.5%) reported having no friends, which is a higher percentage of friendless individuals than national samples. Most emerging adults with HIV reported consumption of fewer fruits and vegetables than national recommendations. In addition, comparable to rates found among adolescents and emerging adults without HIV, participants were engaged in substance use and risky sexual practices such as having multiple sexual partners. Conclusions: There was considerable variability in development among emerging adults. Conceptions of adulthood and peer relationships may be a particularly important aspect of development to examine among emerging adults with HIV. In addition, many of these individuals continue to engage in health risk behaviors that may require intervention efforts geared specifically to their developmental stage. Implications for care providers are discussed.

The study aim at describing and analysing the practices of and conditions for senior managers in public administration, as well as which similarities and differences are in existence both within and between authorities in this respect. The practices of senior managers are studied in the light of two dimensions, one explicit that comprises the values, ideologies, interests, knowledge and feelings that senior managers express, as well as an executed dimension that encompasses physical activities, what managers do, how the work is executed, where work is done and with whom they work. These dimensions of managerial practices are studied with a special focus on leadership. The aim of this study can also be understood as to describe and analyse pedagogical processes (influence processes as well as learning and development processes) in a senior manager's work. The study has a multiple case study design comprising eight different authorities. Two sub-studies have been performed, one interview study consisting of 31 senior managers and one observation study comprised of six of these managers. The results show that leadership is a well-known concept, that great value is ascribed to it, that there is unanimity on the meaning of leadership as well as this meaning having changed over time. The results in the form of descriptions of managers' work show that there are many similarities between the managers in the study. For example, the work to a great extent is a question of interplay with other individuals and that in this social dimension the prerequisites for learning and developing processes exist. The study shows too that managers have a certain amount of room for action and that in their work managers take into consideration several different dimensions of contexts in the performance of their work. The managerial work is finally described in terms of an explicit and an implicit context with regard to the public character of the work involved. One conclusion is that there are differences between managers' conceptions of leadership that is executed. These differences can be understood by considering the background consisting of the simultaneous existence of normative respective experiential patterns of practice described in the study as the non-uniform work. Furthermore, the results indicate differences among the authorities but that these are small in relation to differences within the authorities. Thus the results can be interpreted as the immediate context in the form of a number of personal/local preconditions to a greater extent being formed for managerial work in relation to a more peripheral context. In this light, leadership is defined as a social, influence, learning and developmental process, which is executed as implicit and explicit work within the framework for a structural, an institutional and a subjective fields.

In this study I will find out which thoughts and alternative conceptions pupils have about photosynthesis, decomposing and breeding. The method used was qualitative semi-structured interviews with pupils in preschool class and in the third grade. They were interviewed about what a flower needs in order to live, die and to propagate themselves. The result shows that the students have alternative conceptions about these issues. There are no big differences in the notions of the average classes. There is a relation between the children’s way of living and their notions. The result shows that all 17 pupils know that the flowers need water and soil. Half of them know that it also needs sun. But only 2 pupils know that the flowers need sugar to live.

The author of this degree thesis has interviewed students in there first year of the upper secondary school about (among others) how they express conception about Adolph Hitler. The thesis shows that the students are interested in modern history but they have some lack in knowledge in nineteen- and the twentieth century general history. The students connect Hitler with the Holocaust and they had no conceptions that aren’t known in Hitler research. The students wanted to understand “why” the Holocaust happened and why Hitler did what he did and what his beliefs and thoughts was. In general the students had good knowledge about Hitler and they often saw him as intelligent but also as mentally ill. The students often placed too much in there explanations to Hitler’s own person and did idealistic interpretations, but they didn’t see Hitler as a superhuman or a demon. The students also were good at critical thinking, analysis ability and reflection. The thesis also shows that the interviewed students were influenced by media andespecially movies about Hitler, and the schoolbooks were of subordinate importance. The thesis finally concludes that discussion and orientation in school about historical movies is of importance and new ways to teach about the Second World War, Hitler and the Holocaust can be necessary regarding things as education about movie influence and a social psychology way of looking at things as human evil and the Second World War.

<p> </p><p>The author of this degree thesis has interviewed students in there first year of the upper secondary school about (among others) how they express conception about Adolph Hitler. The thesis shows that the students are interested in modern history but they have some lack in knowledge in nineteen- and the twentieth century general history. The students connect Hitler with the Holocaust and they had no conceptions that aren’t known in Hitler research. The students wanted to understand “why” the Holocaust happened and why Hitler did what he did and what his beliefs and thoughts was. In general the students had good knowledge about Hitler and they often saw him as intelligent but also as mentally ill. The students often placed too much in there explanations to Hitler’s own person and did idealistic interpretations, but they didn’t see Hitler as a superhuman or a demon. The students also were good at critical thinking, analysis ability and reflection. The thesis also shows that the interviewed students were influenced by media andespecially movies about Hitler, and the schoolbooks were of subordinate importance. The thesis finally concludes that discussion and orientation in school about historical movies is of importance and new ways to teach about the Second World War, Hitler and the Holocaust can be necessary regarding things as education about movie influence and a social psychology way of looking at things as human evil and the Second World War.</p><p> </p>

No description available.

Whereas conceptions of giftedness, assessment tools, and models espoused in contemporary psychology are all grounded in the West, there are different ways to look at giftedness. This study investigated Shona culture of Zimbabwe’s conceptions of giftedness with a view to generate theoretical ideas that inform gifted programming from an African cultural perspective. The study was conducted at two levels using different research designs: a) a cultural level seeking to highlight Shona culture’s implicit theories of giftedness and b) an individual level seeking to understand Shona artists’ talent attributions. At the first level, Shona culture’s implicit theories of giftedness were explored by a questionnaire completed by 16 Zimbabwean academics of Shona cultural background. Data were analyzed in thematic frames, using frequency tables to gauge a consensus of responses among the respondents. The second study adopted a grounded theory study approach to generate a mid-range theory of Shona stone sculptors’ talent attributions focusing on how they propel a field of art. Participants in the study were 20 top talented Shona stone sculptors (icons of creative works in Zimbabwe). The Shona model of giftedness that emerged is spiritual, participatory and community focused. The grounded theory generated in the study suggested a dynamic interactive process model (DIPM) which explains how artists’ talent attributions help to propel a field of art. The DIPM posits that creativity emerges from dynamic and interactive processes activated or reactivated (by some trigger stimulus) in interactions evoking one’s unique experiences, cultural consciousness and domain specific consciousness and realized through practice and experience. In the DIPM model, creative vision and inspiration in art evolve from the interplay of six major factors which are not necessarily discrete: a) inherent/inborn potential, b) cultural consciousness, c) individual’s unique experiences, d) activation/reactivation stimulus, e) domain specific consciousness, and f) practice and experience. The DIPM model is based on beliefs systems as the magic carpets by which the artists ascend into the unknown to unleash their creativity. The study suggests that belief systems could become an interesting focus for future studies to understand creativity. The study makes a case for diversity sensitivity in gifted programming.

In this thesis, I will discuss subject conceptions among social studies teachers who work in upper secondary schools. The aim of this study is to investigate and analyse subject conceptions among social studies teachers and their relationship to the teachers’ personal background. Subject conceptions can be expressed in both planned and realized teaching, which are analysed in this study. The questions posed are: What subject conceptions are expressed in the social studies teachers’ descriptions of their teaching? Are there any relationships between the teachers’ personal background and the subject conceptions they express? Which subject conceptions are manifested in written tests and exercises? This study consists of three empirical sub-studies. The first sub-study is based on a questionnaire with 60 social studies teachers in upper secondary schools in two counties in Sweden. The second sub-study is based on in-depth interviews with eight social studies teachers who expressed different subject conceptions in the questionnaire. The last sub-study is based on a document analysis of 28 written tests and examinations that were collected from the interviewed teachers. The theoretical framework of this study consists of structuration, class, gender and didactic theories. Some conclusions can be drawn from this study. There are different subject conceptions among the social studies teachers. I have found four typical subject conceptions, which I have called the fact-and-concept–focused, value-focused, analysis-focused and citizenship-focused subject conceptions. The study also shows that the teachers’ personal background has a relationship with their subject conceptions, to a certain degree. Gender and the combination of subjects in the teachers’ academic exams are related to the subject conceptions that the teachers express. Also, internal framing factors, like social background, political views and years in the profession, and external frame factors, like steering documents, textbooks, current news events and the students’ interests and needs, influence the teachers’ subject understanding to different extents. The study also shows that there are differences between the subject conceptions, which are shown in the teachers’ descriptions of their teachings and their assessment materials. The majority of the teachers in the study expressed the citizenship-focused subject conception in the questionnaire, while the written tests and examinations are dominated by fact-and-concept–focused and analysis-focused questions. One conclusion drawn from the empirical results is that code, classification and framing vary among the different conceptions of the subject social studies.

The General Medical Council now requires that all new medical graduates in the United Kingdom should be able to ‘function effectively as a teacher’. This thesis explores multiple perspectives on what this means, and the implications for medical student learning in relation to teaching. There is a lack of existing literature exploring how those involved in the undergraduate medical curriculum conceptualise teaching or what it means to function effectively as a teacher. There is also a lack of literature on what teaching recent medical graduates undertake, and what, if any, learning outcomes in teaching they and other key stakeholders think should be core for the undergraduate medical curriculum. To address these gaps in the literature, original data were gathered using 1) a Delphi study with eighteen experts in medical education, 2) semi-structured interviews with nineteen recent medical graduates, and 3) focus group interviews with twelve final year medical students. The three data sets were analysed individually, compared, then synthesised with the existing literature. All three participant groups articulated a wide range of conceptions of teaching, with considerable variation both within and between groups. The great majority thought that all medical students should learn about teaching as part of the undergraduate medical curriculum. Almost all of the recent graduates and medical students viewed teaching as part of the role of junior doctors working in the UK, although only two thirds of the recent graduates said they saw themselves as teachers. The recent graduates reported having delivered a wide range of teaching in their first year of work as junior doctors, and this correlated well with the range of teaching medical students reported having received from junior doctors. Teaching undertaken by recent medical graduates could be grouped into three broad categories: informal opportunistic teaching, semi-formal pre-arranged teaching, and formal organised teaching. A total of 153 learning outcomes in teaching were suggested and rated by the expert Delphi panel in terms of how appropriate they were for UK undergraduate medical curricula. Many of the graduates and students also suggested some learning outcomes in teaching before rating the 153 learning outcomes arising from the Delphi. All three groups indicated that they thought most of the 153 learning outcomes in teaching should be core for all UK undergraduate medical curricula, although there was some variation within and between groups. The majority of these learning outcomes have not been previously suggested in the literature for UK undergraduate medical curricula, but are consistent with literature on teaching competencies expected of more senior doctors. This thesis offers new insights on what teaching means to experts in medical education, recent medical graduates and current students, comparing these between groups and with the educational literature. It also offers multiple perspectives on core learning outcomes in teaching for UK undergraduate medical curricula, and greater understanding of the teaching undertaken by UK medical graduates. This thesis could help those responsible for undergraduate medical curricula to prioritise, refine and exemplify detailed learning outcomes in teaching, ensuring their graduates are more prepared for practice. It will also be of interest to policy-makers, programme directors, teachers, students, junior doctors, administrators and academics involved in medical and allied healthcare education. It is hoped that this thesis will encourage stakeholders to reflect on what teaching means to them, the role of junior doctors as teachers and the implications of learning about teaching as part of the undergraduate medical curriculum, leading to greater engagement, scholarly debate and research in this area. This in turn may lead to doctors delivering better quality teaching, to students and trainees in medicine and other disciplines receiving better teaching, and consequently to patients experiencing better healthcare.