This multiple baseline single-case design study explored the influence that training in observation and interpretation had on teachers’ meaningful conversations with children. Three preschool teachers (1 from public school and 2 from Head Start) were trained using the Cycle of Inquiry System (Broderick & Hong, 2011) that informs of ways to observe and interpret children’s thinking to facilitate developmentally appropriate conversations. Teachers documented and interpreted observations of children engaged in small group play. Teachers were surveyed pre-training and post-training about observation, interpretation, curriculum, the teacher’s role, and the purpose of teacher interactions with children. Teachers were interviewed to clarify researcher questions and videotaped before the training to establish a baseline on their use of productive conversations with children. Videotaped observations after the training showed the effect of training on teachers’ conversations. Field notes from mentoring and videos were collected to provide insight into the influence of the training. A social validity questionnaire was used to determine if participants found value in the process learned. Data were evaluated for the 3 participants using graphs to show evidence for the rate of change. The Cycle of Inquiry Intervention increased teachers’ productive conversations with children. Pre-surveys and post-surveys indicated that teacher’s perceptions were positively affected. Teachers perceived productive conversation as important to documenting and interpreting children’s thinking. Their beliefs about children’s theory development and awareness about the role of conversation in the process changed after the intervention. They value observations and documentation to learn about children’s thinking as a way to engage in conversations. Social validity was used to determine if the goals of training were acceptable, if the training was valued, and if it would influence participants’ teaching. Participants indicated that the Documentation Record (DR) and recording observations was worthwhile and that they would use what was learned during training to increase productive conversations. Two of the 3 participants were concerned about consistency regarding the DR form, indicated it was worthwhile to complete the Interpretation of Children’s Knowledge and Thinking (ICKT) form, but were not sure of their consistency. Curriculum constraints and lack of support could influence their consistency concerns.

This study builds on previous research regarding parent-child religious conversations to explore the elements and bidirectional processes of parent-adolescent religious conversations. It employs qualitative analyses of interviews with highly religious parents and adolescents representing the major Abrahamic faiths (Christianity, Judaism, Islam) from New England and Northern California. Variations in content, structure, conversational processes, and bidirectional influence are summarized in a conceptual model. Findings suggest that the quality of conversations is greater for parents and adolescents when they are youth-centered than when they are parent-centered.

This study describes a series of case studies on topic management patterns of five children (ages 5 to 10 years) with language impairment. The children participated in semi-structured topic tasks that assessed conversational abilities on topics that were verbally introduced and topics that were introduced both verbally and with an object. Although there was considerable variability among participants, the children generally responded to most introductions by acknowledging and maintaining the topic. With the exception of one child, however, the children in this study demonstrated immature topic manipulation patterns that could be expected to have negative social ramifications.

This descriptive study examines principal and teacher perceptions of the shared ideas and agreements that change teachers’ instructional practice. This study was conducted during the school year 2013-2014, drawing on teacher and principal sample representatives selected from 10 high schools, middle schools and elementary schools in one Southern California public school district. The study utilizes qualitative and quantitative methodologies to create survey questionnaires and semi-structured phone interviews to examine the research questions focused on teacher and principal perceptions which were coded and analyzed. The primary data collection was based on the tallies, statistical analysis of the respondents’ survey questionnaire responses, and text analysis of the comments stemming from the phone interviews conducted with teachers and principals. The eight themes arising from the research comprised of social constructs or meanings, expectations, experiences, nature of professional conversations, values, relationships, relevance, and change. The examination of the research results lead to discussion of the similarities and differences in teacher and administrator perceptions of factors believed to build school environments conducive to professional conversations, supportive environments for teachers and creating a culture focused on teachers as learners.

Word retrieval difficulties are experienced by almost all aphasic adults. Consequently, these problems receive a substantial amount of attention in aphasia treatment. Because of the methodological difficulties, few studies have examined WRBs in conversational speech, focusing instead on confrontational naming tasks in which the client is asked to retrieve a specific word. These studies have left unanswered questions about the WRB processes. The purposes of this study were to: (1) develop profiles of WRB for moderately impaired aphasic adult clients and examine these profiles for evidence that reflects the level of breakdown in the word retrieval process, and (2) determine potential treatment applications derived from the study of WRBs of moderately aphasic speakers.

Inter-process communications (IPC) are ubiquitous in today’s software systems, yet they are rarely treated as first-class programming concepts. Implementing crosscutting concerns for message-based IPC are difficult, even using aspect-oriented programming languages (AOPL) such as AspectJ. Many of these challenges are because the context of a communication-related crosscutting concern is often a conversation consisting of message sends and receives. Hence, developers typically have to implement communication protocols manually using primitive operations, such as connect, send, receive, and close. This dissertation describes an extension to AspectJ, called CommJ, with which developers can implement communication-related concerns in cohesive and loosely coupled aspects. It then presents preliminary, but encouraging results from a subsequent study that begin by defining a reuse and maintenance quality model. Subsequently the results show seven different ways in which CommJ can improve the reusability and maintainability of applications requiring network communications.

This thesis explores the process of an annual appraisal strategy, ‘clinical conversation’, from the perspective of seven nurses who were assessed using this technique. The findings demonstrate that clinical conversation is a strategy which facilitates reflection, both as a solitary exercise and with others, to ensure that learning from experience is optimized. The research used a qualitative interpretive approach informed by the model of Grounded Theory espoused by Strauss and Corbin. All eight nurses who were assessed using the clinical conversation strategy were advanced practitioners working within the scope of sexual and reproductive health. Two of the actual appraisals were observed and seven of the nurses were interviewed within eight weeks of being assessed. The outcome of the clinical conversation was primarily one of learning; the acquisition of new insights into self as practitioner. The learning was facilitated through the process of narration; telling the story of clinical practice. Three distinct narrative cycles were identified, each an experiential learning episode. The experience of undertaking a variety of assessment activities created a narrative with self and triggered an internal reflective thinking process; the experience of working with a peer created an additional narrative, a mutual dialogue reflecting back on practice; the experience of sharing practice with an assessor created a further and final narrative, a learning conversation. Each narrative can be seen as a catalyst for change. Primarily, the nurses felt differently about themselves in practice, the way they saw themselves had shifted. Such a change can be described as an alteration in perspective. These alterations in perspective led all nurses to identify ways in which they would change their actual clinical practice. In this way the nurses attempted to align their espoused beliefs about practice with their actual practice. My study shows that each nurse responded differently to each narrative learning cycle: for some the conversation with the assessor was more of a catalyst for change than for others. In this way clinical conversation may be flexible enough to respond to a variety of differing learning styles. Learning was person specific which is an imperative for the continued professional development of already highly skilled clinicians. The implication of the research is that whilst clinical conversation was designed as a tool for appraising clinical competence, its intrinsic value lies in supporting the professional development of nurses.

Politeness Phenomena and Mild Conflict in Japanese Casual Conversation

<p>Personer med afasi får sin språkförmåga nedsatt på flera olika sätt vilket kan försvåra för dem att delta i samtal. De kan då använda sig av olika strategier för att hantera dessa problem. En sådan strategi är skratt. Denna uppsats syftar till att studera hur personer med afasi använder sig av skratt vid vardaglig interaktion. Föreliggande studie har utgått från videofilmer där en kvinna med afasi interagerar med olika personer i olika miljöer. Samtalen har transkriberats och analyserats enligt principer från Conversation Analysis. Studien har identifierat tre typer av situationer då kvinnan använder sig av skratt: skratt vid anomi, skratt vid genans samt skratt vid skämt. Det har visat sig att hon skrattar dels för att kompensera svårigheter med tal men även vid helt vanliga humoristiska situationer som vilken person som helst. Många av de tillfällen där Maja skrattar ignoreras eller får inte ett skratt som respons.</p>

<p>Syftet med studien var att undersöka interaktion vid logopedisk intervention för personer med afasi. Interaktionen utspelade sig i en institutionell kontext där undersökningen syftade till att påvisa om interaktionen skiljer sig åt beroende på interventionens form. Bakom studien finns antagandet att afasi påverkar förmågan att kommunicera. Språkliga svårigheter, såsom ordmobiliseringsproblem samt språkförståelseproblem, kan leda till pragmatiska svårigheter, och intervention syftar ofta till att öka förmågan att använda språket i olika vardagliga aktiviteter. Metoden för analysen i studien är inspirerad av Conversation Analysis (CA) då det är en metod för att systematiskt analysera interaktion. Sex interventionssamtal mellan logopeder och personer med afasi spelades in och analyserades med hjälp av CA. Fem logopeder och sex patienter med afasi medverkade i studien. Analysen resulterade i identifikation av fyra, för syftet, relevanta fenomen: riktning i samtalet, gemensamt mål, avslut av samtalsämne samt avdramatiserande uttryck. Efter analysen kunde följande tendenser konstateras: Logopeden tar ansvaret för samtalet, men det framkom en antydan till att patienten tar mer initiativ att påverka riktningen i samtalet vid friare delar, såsom icke-uppgiftsinriktade delar av interventionen. Oftast satte logopeden målet i samtalet och tog därmed ansvar för att ett gemensamt mål skapades. I interventionssamtalen var det logopeden som oftast stod för ämnesbyten och avslut. Det framkom i analysen att patienten oftare avslutade samtalsämnet i icke-uppgiftsinriktade än i uppgiftsinriktade delar av interventionen. Avdramatiserande uttryck i samtalet användes ofta för att undvika att hota patientens ansikte, oavsett vem som avdramatiserade situationen.</p>