Karen Pickett, Willeke Rietdijk, Jenny Byrne, Jonathan Shepherd, Paul Roderick and Marcus Grace
The purpose of this paper is to understand early career teachers’ perceptions of the impact of a pre-service health education programme on their health promotion practice in…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to understand early career teachers’ perceptions of the impact of a pre-service health education programme on their health promotion practice in schools and the contextual factors that influence this.
Design/methodology/approach
Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 14 primary and secondary trainee and qualified teachers who had trained at a university in England. Data were analysed using thematic analysis.
Findings
The teachers found the training to be a useful introduction, particularly when it was relevant to their practice. They valued gaining practical skills at university, on placement and in school once qualified. They reported that witnessing pupils’ lives in school had increased their awareness that health education is important. Their personal qualities, life experience, the school’s ethos and competing pressures influenced their practice. Teachers considered that building relationships with colleagues, pupils and parents facilitated health promotion, and that health education needs to be relevant to pupils. Some teachers expressed that teaching about health could be a “minefield”. They also discussed whether schools or parents are responsible for educating pupils about health issues and the place of health promotion within education’s wider purpose.
Originality/value
Few studies have followed-up trainee teachers once they are in teaching posts to explore the longer-term perceived impact of pre-service health education training. The findings suggest that teachers’ development takes place via an interaction between training and practice, suggesting that training could particularly aim to provide teachers with a contextualised understanding of health issues and practical experience.
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Saad Zafir Alshehri, Jenny Byrne and Marcus Grace
The purpose of this paper is to investigate how and why Saudi Arabian students engage in specific health risk behaviours (HRBs), and if there are gender differences.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate how and why Saudi Arabian students engage in specific health risk behaviours (HRBs), and if there are gender differences.
Design/methodology/approach
In order to find out the situation regarding university students in Saudi Arabia, quantitative data were collected by administering questionnaires to 722 respondents, and qualitative data were collected using a series of interviews with 17 students.
Findings
The findings of this mixed methods sequential explanatory study suggest that lifestyle and personal factors, as well as economic, social, policy and other aspects of the environment played a significant role in influencing students’ HRBs. Recommendations for mitigating HRBs among these students and other youth in the Saudi Arabian context are provided.
Originality/value
This paper addresses an important gap in the research on HRBs among university students from the perspectives of students.
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Grace C.-M. Hsu, Peter Clarkson and Annabelle X. Ouyang
The purpose of this study is to investigate whether biotechnology and health-care firms in Australia have poorer continuous disclosure (CD) practices as reflected in Australian…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to investigate whether biotechnology and health-care firms in Australia have poorer continuous disclosure (CD) practices as reflected in Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) queries relative to other firms.
Design/methodology/approach
Univariate tests and multivariate logit regressions are used to examine whether the frequency and nature of ASX queries and firms’ replies to price queries differ between biotechnology/health-care firms and the control firms.
Findings
Results suggest that biotechnology/health-care firms are more likely to receive volume queries and ASX Listing Rule 4.10 queries. They are also more likely to respond to price queries with new information relative to the control firms. However, biotechnology/health-care firms do not otherwise have statistically significantly different CD practice compared to the control firms, as reflected by the frequency and attributes of various types of ASX queries and by the way firms reply to price queries.
Practical implications
Evidence from this study can help evaluate the adequacy and enforcement of CD requirements and the need for further improvement. Investors can also use the evidence to better understand the information risks associated with investment in the biotechnology/health-care industry.
Originality/value
Prior research has not used multivariate methods to examine biotechnology/health-care firms’ CD practice in Australia or to examine accounting determinants of different types of ASX queries and firms’ responses to price queries.
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Marcus Grace, Kathryn Woods‐Townsend, Janice Griffiths, Keith Godfrey, Mark Hanson, Ian Galloway, Marta Cristina Azaola, Kerry Harman, Jenny Byrne and Hazel Inskip
The purpose of this paper is to report the outcome of a city‐wide survey of teenagers’ views on their health, and compare this with the outcomes of a science‐oriented health…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to report the outcome of a city‐wide survey of teenagers’ views on their health, and compare this with the outcomes of a science‐oriented health intervention called LifeLab, a hospital‐based classroom aimed at developing teenagers’ attitudes towards their health and that of their future children.
Design/methodology/approach
A questionnaire survey of 597 14‐year olds across the city of Southampton was conducted to gauge their views and behaviour in relation to their own health. The views of 37 students who took part in innovative, hospital‐based, hands‐on LifeLab activities were compared with those of their peers six months after the intervention to analyse long‐term impacts of the experience. Interviews were carried out with ten LifeLab students to gain further insights.
Findings
The intervention created a wider appreciation among students that food they eat now could affect their long‐term health and the health of their future children. Students became significantly more interested in studying science beyond compulsory schooling, and in considering science and healthcare career options.
Research limitations/implications
Although results were statistically significant, the intervention sample was quite small, and further data collection is ongoing. The city‐wide student response rate of 29 per cent was fairly low.
Social implications
This study has shown that a carefully structured hospital‐based classroom visit, and associated science lessons can have a marked effect on student engagement with health‐related issues, and an impact on their consideration of their career choices.
Originality/value
The hospital‐based classroom is an innovative approach to improving teenagers’ knowledge and attitudes towards their health. The paper's findings should be of interest to a range of educational stakeholders including teachers, local education authorities and local politicians concerned with health education matters.
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To examine how vocabulary instruction can lead toward students connecting the known to the familiar with the unknown.
Abstract
Purpose
To examine how vocabulary instruction can lead toward students connecting the known to the familiar with the unknown.
Design/methodology/approach
Theoretical advances in vocabulary acquisition and utility are discussed in relation to word reading and knowledge formation. Extending theory requires pedagogical planning and reinforcement to promote skill learning first toward preparing students to have the capacity to acquire vocabulary across the content areas and in turn, understand and apply that knowledge toward problem solving.
Findings
Students must be scaffolded toward connecting what they know with that which is familiar and eventually with the unknown; only then can we extend learning beyond our guidance and supervision. Students must be taught how and when to use vocabulary acquisition strategies so they are prepared to overcome difficulties associated with word meanings in independent reading.
Practical implications
It is timely for rich, varied, and complete vocabulary instruction to serve as the basis for learning across the curriculum. Words are the predecessors of tomorrow’s learning and we must consider how to best provide instruction for students who overuse sight words, text shorthand more than they write formally, and even substitute inappropriate language based upon a lack of vocabulary knowledge and ability to articulate their feelings.
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Fabiano Colombini and Simone Ceccarelli
This paper discusses dynamic financial approaches to solvency analysis in non‐life insurance companies by explaining cash flow simulation models which are based on the planning of…
Abstract
This paper discusses dynamic financial approaches to solvency analysis in non‐life insurance companies by explaining cash flow simulation models which are based on the planning of their typical cash inflows and outflows. Posits that these models take into account patterns of loss reserve run‐offs and asset cash flows by implementing several hypotheses that also include expectations about external economic conditions such as inflation rates and interest rates. Acknowledges the cash inflows and outflows have been planned over a period of time to evaluate how positive net cash flow (liquidity) leads to the increase in assets over liabilities (solvency).
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Martin Upchurch, Phoebe Moore and Aylin Kunter
This chapter reviews the ongoing processes of marketisation in secondary school teaching and its further embedment through commodification of teachers’ performance. We track…
Abstract
This chapter reviews the ongoing processes of marketisation in secondary school teaching and its further embedment through commodification of teachers’ performance. We track developments through documentary evidence from Government statements and other agency reports and unstructured interviews with teachers’ union representatives in the South West of England. Following Carter and Stevenson (2012) we begin by introducing the labour process debate concerning teachers’ productive labour to provide the backdrop for the argument that teachers’ work is increasingly commodified and judged along neoliberalised requirements. Commodification has taken place through measurement of abstract standards constructed by associating individual teachers with their pupils’ achievements, as well as subjective assessment of teacher behaviour judged against newly introduced ‘Teacher Standards’. We argue that this attempted quantification of teacher output is constructed, in Marxist terms, to accommodate to the ‘socially necessary labour time’ and to indirectly maximise work ‘output’ for individual teachers through a process of standardisation of processes involved in task completion. We attempt to define new ways of measuring teachers’ work through the lens of abstract labour and link such processes to workplace alienation. In such fashion, teachers are subject to work intensification, increased monitoring and surveillance, further standardisation of work and weakening of creative autonomy leading to intensified alienation from the professional nature of the job.
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Cynthia Szymanski Sunal and Julianne M. Coleman
An investigation of very young children’s perceptions of a natural disaster, a tornado, used a stratified random sample of 40 children, aged 4-5 years, from a population of 108 in…
Abstract
An investigation of very young children’s perceptions of a natural disaster, a tornado, used a stratified random sample of 40 children, aged 4-5 years, from a population of 108 in ten classes. The study also investigated a research protocol for ascertaining prior knowledge through children’s responses: physical representation, drawing responses, and retelling of personal stories through dictating captions for drawings. Two data sets were taken soon after the tornado. The children physically represented what happens in a tornado and how one takes shelter. Drawings increased in complexity by the second data set. Children’s stories included personal experiences: houses lost or damaged, being scared, friends missing, and wanting a significant other. Researchers can use a variety of methods to investigate very young children’s prior knowledge. An implication is that disaster education has a role in early social studies education promoting meaningful understanding by children of dangers posed, protecting oneself, and coping with the aftermath. Such a role is increasingly important as recent major U.S. disasters have impacted large numbers of citizens including our very young students. Further research especially with very young children in the area of disaster and hazards education is warranted in the field of social studies education.
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Sirpa Kärkkäinen, Jari Kukkonen, Sirpa Kontturi and Tuula Keinonen
Health literacy is the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health…
Abstract
Purpose
Health literacy is the degree to which individuals have the capacity to obtain, process and understand basic health information and services needed to make appropriate health decisions. The purpose of this paper is to focus on sixth graders’ (N=21, aged 13–14) health literacy, particularly in relation to the rational use of medicines and the role of pharmacies.
Design/methodology/approach
The socio-scientific issues (SSI) approach by way of the three-stage model, the stages being scenario, inquiry and decision making, was adopted in this intervention study. The study was a qualitative case study and data consisted of cartoons, audio recordings of group discussions and group interviews. Qualitative data were analyzed using content analysis.
Findings
At the beginning of the intervention, pupils possessed detailed information about the rational use of medicines; however, they did not refer to the role of pharmacy as a source of medicine information which they did after the intervention. They were also more aware particularly how to store and dispose of unnecessary medicines. Their theoretical and practical knowledge related to pharmacy careers and production of medicines was enhanced.
Practical implications
The SSI approach by way of the three-stage model provides an excellent opportunity to schools for local co-operation with the community and familiarization with the careers. Moreover, it offers the possibility to enhance pupils’ health literacy.
Originality/value
The SSI approach is so far less implemented in the context of medicine education and to improve health literacy.