The Toronto International Film Festival Group (tiff.) is the latest addition to an existing array of spectacles offered in Entertainment District of Toronto. Spectacles remove us from reality, surprise us, connect us with others, and allow us to participate as a part of a community. However, their extraordinary nature can be so enticing that they put us into a trance that can leave us vulnerable to political and economic influences. This thesis uses Michel Foucault’s concept of heterotopias, or ‘other places’, to shed light on the values, characteristics and functions of spaces dedicated to these spectacles. These spaces exist in the grey zone between the political-public domain and the economic-private property. They are sanctuaries for events, activities and illusions that deviate from those of the commonplace. The Entertainment District is a heterotopia that reflects and fosters Toronto’s enjoyment and fascination with spectacles. This thesis looks at how the district can further its role as a heterotopia of spectacle by juxtaposing the existing experiences with a variety of contemporary experiences such as free play and film-related events introduced through John Street’s use of the concept of shared space and the introduction of a new home for tiff. Portions of John Street are transformed into continuous ground surfaces that encourage pedestrian circulation within the district, as well as the introduction of new spectacles. The new tiff. building situates itself along this continuous ground surface and extends up to the building’s edge and through laneways to an internal courtyard. The building reads as an incompatible cluster of skewed volumes with their own distinct function stacked on top of one another. The agitated and fragmented geometry of the building is developed through a series of governing lines and curves which sets themselves within the Cartesian grid of the city at irregular angles. These volumes are wrapped in a variety of opaque, transparent and translucent materials that frame views of events on the street, in the neighbourhood, and in the city. This thesis of discourse and design will be of interest to all those wishing to understand heterotopias or ‘other places’ dedicated to spectacles.

The Toronto International Film Festival Group (tiff.) is the latest addition to an existing array of spectacles offered in Entertainment District of Toronto. Spectacles remove us from reality, surprise us, connect us with others, and allow us to participate as a part of a community. However, their extraordinary nature can be so enticing that they put us into a trance that can leave us vulnerable to political and economic influences. This thesis uses Michel Foucault’s concept of heterotopias, or ‘other places’, to shed light on the values, characteristics and functions of spaces dedicated to these spectacles. These spaces exist in the grey zone between the political-public domain and the economic-private property. They are sanctuaries for events, activities and illusions that deviate from those of the commonplace. The Entertainment District is a heterotopia that reflects and fosters Toronto’s enjoyment and fascination with spectacles. This thesis looks at how the district can further its role as a heterotopia of spectacle by juxtaposing the existing experiences with a variety of contemporary experiences such as free play and film-related events introduced through John Street’s use of the concept of shared space and the introduction of a new home for tiff. Portions of John Street are transformed into continuous ground surfaces that encourage pedestrian circulation within the district, as well as the introduction of new spectacles. The new tiff. building situates itself along this continuous ground surface and extends up to the building’s edge and through laneways to an internal courtyard. The building reads as an incompatible cluster of skewed volumes with their own distinct function stacked on top of one another. The agitated and fragmented geometry of the building is developed through a series of governing lines and curves which sets themselves within the Cartesian grid of the city at irregular angles. These volumes are wrapped in a variety of opaque, transparent and translucent materials that frame views of events on the street, in the neighbourhood, and in the city. This thesis of discourse and design will be of interest to all those wishing to understand heterotopias or ‘other places’ dedicated to spectacles.

Studiens syfte har varit att undersöka hur lek används i undervisningen. Genom en standardiserad enkät har 21 pedagoger från fem olika skolor tillfrågats. Pedagogerna har varit verksamma inom förskoleklass till årskurs tre. Studiens resultat visar att leken i undervisningen förekommer i olika mängd i både förskoleklassen och de olika skolorna. Pedagogerna menar att det är svårt att uttala sig om vad lek betyder men framhåller att leken utvecklar olika förmågor såsom fantasi, socialt samspel och lärande. De framhåller också att det både finns fördelar och nackdelar med att använda lek i undervisningen.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 172-183). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Universität Zürich, 1947. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 146-151).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 292-305). Available also in a digital version from Dissertation Abstracts.

published_or_final_version / Social Work and Social Administration / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

This thesis investigated the application of enactive principles to the design of classroom technolo- gies for young children’s learning through play. This study identified the attributes of an enactive pedagogy, in order to develop a design framework to accommodate enactive learning processes. From an enactive perspective, the learner is defined as an autonomous agent, capable of adapta- tion via the recursive consumption of self generated meaning within the constraints of a social and material world. Adaptation is the parallel development of mind and body that occurs through inter- action, which renders knowledge contingent on the environment from which it emerged. Parallel development means that action and perception in learning are as critical as thinking. An enactive approach to design therefore aspires to make the physical and social interaction with technology meaningful to the learning objective, rather than an aside to cognitive tasks. The design framework considered in detail the necessary affordances in terms of interaction, activity and context. In a further interpretation of enactive principles, this thesis recognised play and pretence as vehicles for designing and evaluating enactive learning and the embodied use of technology. In answering the research question, the interpreted framework was applied as a novel approach to designing and analysing children’s engagement with technology for learning, and worked towards a paradigm where interaction is part of the learning experience. The aspiration for the framework was to inform the design of interaction modalities to allow users’ to exercise the inherent mechanisms they have for making sense of the world. However, before making the claim to support enactive learning processes, there was a question as to whether technologically mediated realities were suitable environments to apply this framework. Given the emphasis on the physical world and action, it was the intention of the research and design activities to explore whether digital artefacts and spaces were an impoverished reality for enactive learning; or if digital objects and spaces could afford sufficient ’reality’ to be referents in social play behaviours. The project embedded in this research was tasked with creating deployable technologies that could be used in the classroom. Consequently, this framework was applied in practice, whereby the design practice and deployed technologies served as pragmatic tools to investigate the potential for interactive technologies in children’s physical, social and cognitive learning. To understand the context, underpin the design framework, and evaluate the impact of any techno- logical interventions in school life, the design practice was informed by ethnographic methodologies. The design process responded to cascading findings from phased research activities. The initial fieldwork located meaning making activities within the classroom, with a view to to re-appropriating situated and familiar practices. In the next stage of the design practice, this formative analysis determined the objectives of the participatory sessions, which in turn contributed to the creation of technologies suitable for an inquiry of enactive learning. The final technologies used standard school equipment with bespoke software, enabling children to engage with real time compositing and tracking applications installed in the classrooms’ role play spaces. The evaluation of the play space technologies in the wild revealed under certain conditions, there was evidence of embodied presence in the children’s social, physical and affective behaviour - illustrating how mediated realities can extend physical spaces. These findings suggest that the attention to meaningful interaction, a presence in the environment as a result of an active role, and a social presence - as outlined in the design framework - can lead to the emergence of observable enactive learning processes. As the design framework was applied, these principles could be examined and revised. Two notable examples of revisions to the design framework, in light of the applied practice, related to: (1) a key affordance for meaningful action to emerge required opportunities for direct and immediate engagement; and (2) a situated awareness of the self and other inhabitants in the mediated space required support across the spectrum of social interaction. The application of the design framework enabled this investigation to move beyond a theoretical discourse.

No description available.

Background: For most children, being hospitalized is a whole new experience. The care should be safe and meet the children’s needs. In hospital care, children are a large group of patients. It’s important for them to be involved in decisions regarding their care and to get proper information. Working as a nurse, there’s a high possibility to meet with children being ill. In order to get more knowledge about how children experience their hospital stay this study was conducted.Aim: The aim of the study was to describe children’s experiences of being a patient in hospital.Method: The method used was a literature study, based on qualitative research. Eight articles from the databases Cinahl and PsycInfo read, reviewed and analyzed according to the model for analysis of qualitative studies made by Friberg.Results: Four themes and eleven sub themes were found. Children’s experiences of hospital care revolved around the hospital environment, their emotions, not being in control and the nursing staff.Conclusion: The result shows that children’s different experiences related to their hospital stay often is affected by the ability to have their parents close, to have the opportunity to play and to get the proper information from caring health professionals. Children describe both positive and negative experiences.