Mental Retardation Practice Inventory

The mentally retarded are probably social work's most neglected client population. This article presents the results of a research and training project out of which developed (1) an analysis of the values and practice skills necessary for effective practice with the mentally retarded, (2) an instrument to assess the extent to which a social worker possesses these, and (3) a training program to teach social workers these values and skills.     

Sports in School: Source of Amity or Antipathy?

Objectives . Previous research looks at the impact of school sports on participants' delinquency, but not at the impact on delinquency in schools; further, it does not control for school size or for unobserved school-level variables. This research fills that gap. It uses social capital theory to frame the impact of sports programs on both participants and nonparticipants. Social capital theory predicts that group cohesion will increase cooperative, pro-social behavior among those in the group; however, it can also increase uncooperative, antisocial behavior among those not in the group—particularly when in-group membership is seen as desirable. Social capital theory also predicts that larger schools will have more disturbances, but subgroups in large schools will reduce these adverse effects. Methods . The hypotheses were tested by looking at the relation between disturbances and interscholastic sports programs in Montgomery County, Maryland high schools. Using three years of data on each high school in the county, the study regresses disturbances on sports participation, holding constant demographic variables, school size, and a dummy variable for each school. Results . Larger schools have more disturbances, but bigger interscholastic sports programs mitigate these effects. Conclusions . The policy implications suggest that to foster cooperative behavior in high schools, it might be wise to limit school size, or to foster participation in varsity sports as school size increases.     

Helping ‘Well’ Families to Change: A Pilot Study

This article describes a time limited, inter-generational project which offered ‘well’ families an opportunity to define priorities and needs and practise changed behaviour within a secure group. The program lasted for twelve weeks and emphasized an educational rather than a treatment bias. Experiential learning techniques were used to teach family dynamics and alternative means of conflict resolution to whole families. In this task, the contracting process came to be an increasingly valuable tool for managing conflict within the group and within each family. Some evidence is cited to show that participation in the group enabled families to change disabling patterns of interaction.     

何以为学？何以为教？--墨家教育本体论探究

教育本体论是针对教育存在的根据而不断地发问。“何以为学”和“何以为教”是关涉教育本体的基本问题，墨家就这两个问题进行了富有个性的诠释。基于对“何以为”问题家族的解答范式展开理论探索，通过回答“何以为学”和“何以为教”，墨家实现了对教育本体问题的解答。对墨家教育本体论展开研究，有助于准确、深入地理解墨家哲学。     

能力为本的《小组工作》课程教学初探

能力为本的《小组工作》课程教学,是用小组的方式来讲授《小组工作》。具体做法是把学生分成若干个任务小组,组员在任课教师的示范、支持和督导下,通过调查,自选一个主题,完成一个成长小组的策划、筹备、实施和评估,并在课堂上进行小组模拟。这种体验式的教学方法体现了社会工作“助人自助”的理念,学生在学习中具有多元收获。较之传统的课堂讲授法,能力为本的教学方式更适合《小组工作》课程的要求。     

Academics versus athletics: An examination of the effects of background and socialization on African American male student athletes

It has been stated that popular culture's deluging society with images of African American males as athletes and entertainers is detrimental to the academic and social growth of this group. African American males are over-represented in the sports world, which has recently been attributed to the intentional and intensive socialization of African American into sports. The consequences that have emerged from this phenomena include an over identification with athletic achievement to the detriment of academic achievement. This study addresses the socialization process as an indicator of the overall success or failure of student athletes. This research is a case study of an entire football team at a major Division I University. The research questions were addressed by data collected through a questionnaire designed by the researchers. Several scales, tested for reliability and validity, were utilized to tap the relevant dimensions of the socialization process. Several interesting findings were yielded concerning the parental emphasis on athletics and the effects that emphasis has on academics.     

Development and Application of a Standards-Based Inventory of Foundation Competencies in Social Work with Groups

The International Association for Social Work with Groups Standards for the Practice of Social Work with Groups is an essential document for advancing practice and teaching about social work with groups. However, surveys have reported that many group workers know little about the Standards or about how to teach or apply group work knowledge and skills. This article summarizes the research on the development of a reliable and valid inventory based on the Standards and an effective teaching strategy to improve learning about the Standards. The inventory and teaching method provide tools for advancing evidence-based practice and teaching.     

Social Status as a Predictor of Race and Gender Stereotypes in Late Childhood and Early Adolescence

We examined race and gender stereotypes in fourth‐, sixth‐ and eighth‐grade White and Black children. The participants reported their perceptions of the competence of Black, White, female and male children in academic domains, sports and music. In general, low‐status groups (girls and Black children) did not endorse stereotypes that reflected negatively on their own group but were likely to report stereotypes that favored their social group. High‐status groups (boys and Whites) endorsed most traditional stereotypes, whether negative or positive, for their social group. Where age differences appeared, older children were more likely than younger children to report traditional stereotypes and status effects were more pronounced. The results are discussed in terms of group enhancement and relationships between social stereotypes and self‐views.     

“Her Anger Frightens Me!” Using Group-Work Practice Principles and Feature Films in Teaching Clinical Practice in Mental Health

ABSTRACT

Combining group-work practice principles and the arts (feature films) can contribute to more effective teaching and enhance student clinical practice competency. By treating teaching as a form of group work and introducing a feature film into the classroom group, an instructor can reduce student-learning anxieties, teach core clinical concepts and skills, and enhance the classroom’s socioemotional climate. Vignettes demonstrate how this approach to teaching enriched students’ learning in an introductory clinical social work class on adult mental health.     

Teaching Behaviour Therapy Skills to Social Work Students

Summary Twenty social work students who were in the final term of atwo year non-graduate CQSW course were divided into two groupswhich met weekly for four sessions. The purpose of these sessions was to teach the students, throughexperiential methods, the use of behaviour modification techniquesin the hope that they would transfer this competence to theirwork with clients individually or in groups. Each student selecteda target behaviour for change, and with group supervision, defined,monitored and set goals for the target behaviour and finallyimplemented therapeutic procedures.     

Technocracies,Bureaucracies, or Responsive Polities? Urban School Systems and the Politics of School Violence Prevention*

Objective. Two tacks are implicit in the seminal Chubb and Moe (1990) argument that education bureaucracies tend to be rigidified by democratic conflict. One emphasizes the vulnerability of urban systems to organized interests and community pressures; the other argues that urban systems are unresponsive and ossified bureaucracies. This debate contrasts with traditional assumptions of apolitical “professionalism.” The predictive power of these theses is examined for the case of school violence prevention policy. Methods. Ordinary least squares regression analysis is conducted on the 1995 Council of Urban Boards of Education survey, encompassing 74 urban school districts. Results. Districts with greater levels of racial violence and violence against teachers had more school violence prevention measures. Levels of general school violence and district perceptions of school violence were not statistically significant. Conclusions. Urban systems are quite responsive to interest group pressure as well as to high SES communities. The professionalism thesis is not supported.     

关心教育理论框架下的幼儿教育分析——从幼儿教育者探讨幼儿“关心教育”

学校教育的目的应该是要培养有能力、健康、幸福的孩子。未来需要的并不是成堆的理性知识分子,而是因受过教育而会感觉、会行动也会思考的人。学校不仅要让学生学会竞争,更要让他们学会关心,使他们有能力关心自己的家人并能够主动地为社会做贡献。而基础的关心思想教育需要从最基础的教育做起,即从儿童最初开始正是社会化的教育阶段——幼儿教育开始。本文从幼儿的两方主要关心教育者——家长和老师角度,测量教育者们的关心教育意识、关心教育实践情况、关心教育中遇到的问题等方面,总结幼儿关心教育的现状和可改进之处。     

Benefits of transcultural fostering

Licensed Canadian foster parents residing in a central province where Aboriginal children have been overrepresented in child protection caseloads and Aboriginal adults under‐represented as caregivers were asked about their experiences fostering children from a different culture than their own during telephone interviews. In response to the question ‘What are the benefits of fostering children who have different values, beliefs and traditions than you?’, 48 unique responses were received. These responses were independently grouped together by foster parents and the groupings analysed using multidimensional scaling and cluster analysis. Six concepts emerged. They included learning about a different world view, reflecting on one's own beliefs, an opportunity to share and change, confidence to foster across cultures, humility, and seeing children teach and learn from each other. Similarities and differences between the results and existing research were identified and research implications were described.     

Trajectories of team and individual sports participation in childhood and links with internalizing problems

The purpose of this 5-year longitudinal study is to identify trajectories of team and individual sports participation in childhood, and to compare these trajectories on different types of internalizing problems. Parents reported their children's annual sports participation from the ages of 6–10 (n = 785) and teachers reported internalizing problems (depression, anxiety, social withdrawal) at the beginning and at the end of this period. The study used latent class growth analyses to identify two trajectories of team sports and two trajectories of individual sports participation were identified: (1) high participation, and (2) low participation. Considering baseline level of internalizing problems and gender, children in the high participation team sports trajectory show significantly fewer depression, anxiety, and social withdrawal behaviors at age 10 than those in the low participation team sports trajectory. No differences between individual sports trajectories were observed. Comparison with joint trajectory groups partially confirmed these results but also showed that sustained participation in multiple individual sports could also be linked to decreased anxiety. Our findings suggest that participation in team sports should be encouraged to promote certain aspects of children's mental health.     

运动休闲的渊源及其激励效应

对休闲时间,大部分人都处于放任随性的状态,缺乏理性的规划。爱因斯坦说过：人的差异在于业余时间。随着休闲时代的到来,提高人们休闲生活的质量是现代生活方式的重要内容。研究运动休闲,从价值观和价值取向上,引导人们积极进行运动休闲,有助于养成个体健康的生活方式,培养休闲性的创新意识,并将休闲运动作为人力资本投资的形式,以鼓励社会网络支持运动休闲,有利于促进和谐社区的建设。     

Support for Parents of Children with Cancer

Self-help and mutual support groups play an important role in the spectrum of resources useful to parents of children with cancer. These groups can provide parents with opportunities to share their experiences with other parents in similar situations, to learn from and teach others, and to create a new social network. While much has been written about such groups, very little attention has focused on factors related to parents evaluation of their group experience. This paper examines factors related to parents' perceptions of the value of self-help groups.     

Who's Calling the Shots? Women Coaches in Division I Women's Sports*

Objective. During the past 30 years, women have become an increasingly small proportion of coaches of women's sports. We test several explanations for why some institutions have women coaches and others do not. Methods. Taking the 329 NCAA Division I institutions with women's sports programs as the cases in point, we explore possible explanations for the dearth of women coaches: the resources and prestige of an institution or sport; the gender of the athletic director; and institutional traditionalism. Results. Within Division I schools, women coaches are more frequently found in more prestigious, resource‐richer institutions and those that devote more resources to women's sports. Conclusions. Although the analysis is confined to Division I schools, it appears that more institutional and organizational efforts need to be made to increase the number of women in the eligible pools for head coaching jobs.     

Parenting Black children in White spaces: Skilled African migrants reflect on their parenting experiences in Australia

This paper employs a critical race theory (CRT) perspective to probe the experiences of skilled African migrants parenting Black children in Australia, a predominantly White country. Two key themes emerged from this study: (1) the need to explicitly teach children about race and racism and to foster positive racial identities and (2) the complexities of navigating tensions between ‘African’ and ‘Western’ cultural values. Participants demonstrated high levels of awareness of intercultural parenting approaches and a desire to blend the best aspects of African and Australian cultural values in their own parenting practice. A significant paradox was also apparent in the tension between parental desires to inculcate pride in African ancestry and culture, while simultaneously encouraging children to ‘curate’ their blackness to minimize experiences of racialization. Social workers in Australia often play a critical role in the lives of migrant families as they support them to negotiate transitions in parenting contexts. Although this paper only offers a perspective on the parenting experiences of skilled African migrants and how they creatively manage the tensions and change emerging from this process, we suggest that this understanding helps to expand knowledge on the complexity of parenting in multicultural, transcultural and intercultural contexts.     

Longitudinal associations among adolescents’ organized activity involvement and sociopolitical values

Organized activities represent a potentially important context for the development of adolescent sociopolitical values, but few studies have examined longitudinal associations between youths’ sociopolitical values and activity involvement. Adolescents (N = 299, Time 1 M_age = 15.49, SD = .93, 62% female) reported on their organized activity involvement (volunteering, church, sports, arts/music, school and community clubs) and sociopolitical values (materialism, social dominance, authoritarianism, patriotism, spirituality) at baseline and one year later. Greater involvement in arts/music predicted lower spirituality and patriotism one year later and greater involvement in church predicted higher levels of spirituality and lower levels of social dominance one year later. Higher levels of materialism predicted less involvement in arts/music one year later and higher social dominance values predicted less involvement in volunteering one year later. Findings support the importance of organized activities in sociopolitical development, and suggest that sociopolitical values may guide decisions concerning future organized activity involvement.