Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

Quality of life has been recognized as a key element in the evaluation of the life conditions and student satisfaction by teachers. Through their dimensions, teachers can learn more deeply about the well-being of their students and detect possible deficiencies on a personal, social, family and school level. The purpose of this study is to analyze the perception of the teachers involved in the education of students with intellectual developmental disorders about the way in which school practices are developing in order to improve students’ quality of life. Using a qualitative methodology, a semi-structured interview is conducted with eleven educational agents. The study is contextualized in High School education. The teachers’ perception of their students with intellectual developmental disorders is analyzed, as well as the way in which their expectations, attitudes and actions contribute to their students’ quality of life. Results show the repercussion of the teachers’ expectations on the attitudeof the students, highlighting how low expectations towards the possibilitiesof success for their students with intellectual developmental disorders affect their self-esteem, self-concept, empowerment and, ultimately, their quality of life. Support for improving students’ quality of life is related to a concerned and active teaching attitude, while barriers are associated with conformist, defeatist or elusive attitudes from teachers. The study ends by demanding change, which is still pending, in the current educational model in order to adapt it to the diverse reality of the schools, as well as greater training and educational information to successfully carry out the educational labor.

The aim of this paper is to identify the strengths and weaknesses of highstakes examinations in the view of Primary and Secondary school teachers in Spain. For that purpose, we have analyzed the answers to two open questions from a larger survey designed to determine the teachers’ opinions on these strengths and weaknesses. Out of the total sample, we have selected 1,607 responses corresponding to five Autonomous Communities or regions, distributed as follows: 321 from Andalusia, 445 from Catalonia, 239 from Galicia, 491 from Madrid and 111 from the Basque Country. The questionnaire was applied between November 2013 and May 2014. Its administration began shortly before the new Organic Law for the Improvement of Quality in Education (LOMCE) was passed, although the debate around it had already been taking place for at least a year in the educative community, an important trait of the context in which the survey was carried out. Responses were coded and categorized applying an inductive-deductive process with this sequence: I.Source of information; II. Emerging codes; III. Categories; and IV. Dimensions.The information has been treated according to the following variables:(a) Autonomous Communities; (b) education stage (Primary Educationand Compulsory Secondary Education); and (c) main role undertaken byrespondents at the school (members of the school managing team vs. the rest of the teachers). Results show that by and large there are more references to weaknesses than to strengths. Also, the diagnostic function of tests and their decontextualisation stand out as the most frequent strength and weakness respectively. The analysis reveals significant differences between autonomous communities and also, in some cases, differences depending on the role undertaken by respondents.

Introduction: This study presents the results obtained from the AdvancedTraining Program in Emotional Intelligence (ATPEC) on the planning andmanaging of emotions, and the emotional intelligence experience in Higher Education. Since the beginning of the Bologna process, the objective of a complete education does not only address the teaching of technical abilities, but also of another competences such as team work, effective communication skills, project management, and time and capability to coordinate our emotions. Emotional Intelligence (EI) has been frequently related to the improvement of professional development. In fact, the general competences related to EI have been included in university curricula. Method: The present work aims to design and implement an advanced EI training course for 30 hours. The sample was obtained by 651 higher education students from 3 countries, Spain (n = 193), Moldova (n = 302) and Argentina (n = 156). Results: The results showed a significant improvement in all of the emotional abilities assessed, confirming the efficacy of the intervention program, regardless of the culture/country in which it is developed, and of the undergraduate degrees. Conclusions: the possibility to work in groups to solve study cases, the capability to learn independently or to use an e-learningplatform make this program a unique and efficient tool for the improvement of emotional competences. Implications of these results for the application of EI programs in Higher Education are discussed.

Social networks are a reference model of communication for the Spanishyouth and the preferred digital youth leisure activity. The objectiveof this study was to determine the most important leisure activitiespublished on social networks by Spanish youths, identifying the associatedsociodemographic characteristics. The sample consisted of 1,764 postcompulsory secondary education Spanish students. All territorial areasif the Spanish state were represented by the participants. The mostimportant leisure activities, the number and type of the most importantleisure activities shared on social networks, the sex of the student and theterritorial area of each young person were measured. 64.2% of Spanishpost-compulsory secondary school students share the practice of at leastone of their three main leisure activities on social networks. Festivals andcelebrations were the most shared leisure activity. There were significantdifferences related to the sex and geographical area of residence. Womenshare more on social networks than men. The students who give moreimportance to tourism, festivals and digital activities are those who mostshare their leisure. The conclusions offer keys to educational intervention in social networks as a priority model of communication for post-compulsory secondary education Spanish students. This study is very useful for agents involved in the promotion of Spanish youth leisure.

The growing popularity of the term «post-truth» and the consolidationof the line of thought that is based on it beyond its political context, posessome educational challenges for our times. After having studied the general features of this kind of thought to which we refer when we talk about posttruth (a movement of relativisation that affects not only our knowledge of reality, but reality itself), we focus on the educational aspects involved in this phenomenon, looking into one that is entirely involved in the educational field: a certain neutrality or indifference, that can be characterised as insensitivity to truth, that the subject shows, and that can be interpreted as a lack of will, a decline, fragility or weakness of the desire for knowledge that currently affects Western countries.After reaching this diagnosis, we notice the need for a deliberate fosteringof the desire for truth that goes beyond emotional reactions or purecuriosity, through a critical education of the will. This should be done intwo complementary ways, which correspond to two kinds of will related todifferent human dimensions: will as lack and will as wealth. We highlight the fact that both kinds of will can be learnt and, therefore, should be taught, and we offer, finally, some guidelines in order to do so.

Subjects lectured during the 4th year of the Bachelor’s degree in Communication, at the Catholic University of Murcia have a large practical part, which raises their permeability to innovation, especially concerning learning and evaluative methodologies. In this context and throughout the years in which different media subjects were taught, some problems related to the students’ lack of involvement and the low quality of the resulting projects, alongside the limited synergy between the University and the labor market, have been detected.This research follows the hypothesis that working with a real client with whom students interact and develop visual communication projects increases students’ participation, the quality of their projects, and bridges the gap with the labor market. For that purpose, an experiment was conducted during the practical lectures of several visual communication subjects taught during the 2013-2014, 2014-2015 and 2015-2016 academic years, at the Communication Faculty at the Catholic University of Murcia. A sample size of n = 375 with a margin of error of e = 0.05 was calculated according to the total number of students enrolled in communication studies at a national level (N = 17, 213) according to data published by the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports.Among the main conclusions, we found, after the client-based experiment through design thinking and visual storytelling, a notable improvement of the students’ implication in projects, a rise in formal and content quality of those projects, and an increase in the synergy among the university and the labor market. This successful experiment has provoked its implementation in similar subjects the forthcoming academic years.

This article analyzes an expanded learning experience, expanded in the sense that this experience is mediated by public digital space, in which a very active collective of educators that work with young children strive to improve their professional practice incorporating the pedagogical approaches of Emmi Pikler. Although, initially, the format of this seminar was based on discussion and analysis meetings, a few years back the author and researcher joined to suggest open and connected activities, promoting the use of standard tools of the social web that enable participants to create knowledge before, during and after the sessions; as well as disseminate, debate and recover it afterwards. The interpretation and analysis of this experience showcase the diversity and evolution of the trajectories of participation that take place within this community of practice, and the design of its functional elements and protocols intend to inspire an expanded approach in other learning scenarios.

The phenomenon of “brokering”—or connecting youth to present or future opportunities—is now well known in the field of learning and youth development as an integral part of how and why youth pursue and remain in particular interest-related learning opportunities. More recently, the related term sponsorship refers to the multiple ways in which youth experience brokering-like moments related to their interests. This article aims to better understand how sponsorship functions in the everyday conduct of youths’ lives, as well as if and how sponsorship mediates young people’s sustained participation and planned future in relation to their interest(s). We leverage a longitudinal data set collected over three years of youth participation in interest-related activities to retrospectively understand sponsorship within the existing conditions of young people’s lives, including youth interest and access to program resources. Findings suggest that interest was often not the initial driver for youth entering an activity, but that youth joined activities based on other perceived benefits. Once involved, however, they found themselves developing skills, making friends, and seeing a possible future in the activity. We conclude with design principles intended to support young people in joining an activity, sustaining their participation, and seeing new possibilities for their futures.  

Latino families in the U.S. are an under-served population, and are adopting digital technologies rapidly. This article shares case studies from in-depth research with Latino immigrant families and their use of technology, focusing on family technology practices that were interest-driven, cross-setting, and in some cases also collaborative among family members. Three cases illustrate ways that families, all of whom had elementary school-age children, were innovative in their use of technology to learn, as well as how digital content and devices served to help children and parents explore content across settings. In addition to documenting families’ existing practices, the study examined what happened when each family received a tablet device with curated language- and literacy-related content. The analysis highlights how introducing these tools made new practices possible among families, while building on parents’ and children’s existing expertise. We focus on three types of connections that technology facilitated: 1) aligning access to rich content at home and school leading to more exploration of academically relevant material; 2) expanding parents’ roles as collaborative learners of English as a second language among other topics; and 3) Digital production that connects civic, STEM, and language practices. We highlight ways in which families used innovative approaches to get the most out of the devices and content they had access to. We also explore how other factors including technology infrastructure, opacity of the app marketplace, and cost can constrain families’ opportunities to learn with technology.

Unprecedented changes to family life in the new millennium have left many parents feeling unable to effectively participate in their child’s school-based learning. This article presents research which explored enablers and impediments when using social media as part of an inquiry curriculum to promote parent engagement in student learning in one Australian school. Using collaborative inquiry research, various data were collected from two early-years teachers, their students, and the students’ parents using surveys, a full-day meeting, online weekly meetings, interviews, and the social media digital platform of Seesaw. Rogoff’s three interrelated planes of sociocultural analysis – personal, interpersonal, and community – were used to examine participant interactions and their effects. The agency|structure dialectic provided a conceptual lens to further explain how the social media apparatus of Seesaw enabled learning and teaching. The findings showed that access to forms of language needed to contribute to online social media spaces drew attention to the importance of teachers having at the ready a substantive knowledge of inquiry. Implications for future research are discussed.