Editorial zum Themenheft: ?‘Software-Reengineering“’

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Modellierung und kartographische Visualisierung von Geodaten mit XML-basierten Sprachen

Zusammenfassung Mit den XML-basierten Sprachen GML, XSLT und SVG lassen sich Geodaten nicht nur anwendungsorientiert modellieren, sondern auch karten?hnlich visualisieren. In dieser Fallstudie zeigen wir das, indem wir realistische Geodatenbest?nde der Landesvermessungs?mter zun?chst mit der Geography Markup Language (GML) nachmodellieren. So mit GML strukturierte Daten werden dann mit der Extensible Stylesheet Language for Transformation (XSLT) auf Elemente der Sprache Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) abgebildet. Dabei wird der Prozess der kartografischen Visualisierung durch XSLT-Konstrukte modelliert und auch gleichzeitig implementiert. Als Ergebnis erhalten wir Grafiken, die den entsprechenden Karten der Landes?mter zumindest nicht un?hnlich sind.

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Using the XML-based languages GML, XSLT and SVG, we modeled German geo data and also visualized it in map-like graphics. This case study shows the feasibility of that approach, by modelling the data with the Geography Markup Language (GML). Then, the GML-structured data is mapped with the Extensible Stylesheet Language for Transformation (XSLT) to elements of the language Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG). The process of cartographical visualization is thus modelled through XSLT-constructs and at same time also implemented. The results are graphics, which share close ressemblance to the corresponding maps of the official offices.

CR Subject Classification I.3.3,I.3.5,I.6.5,I.7.2,J.2     

Teaching science skills and knowledge to students with developmental disabilities: A systematic review

A comprehensive review of the literature was conducted to identify current practice on teaching science to students with intellectual disability (ID) and/or Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) in relation to two review questions—students' science outcomes and students' and teachers' experiences of the interventions. Six databases related to education, psychology, and science were systematically searched. A detailed protocol can be viewed on PROSPERO (registration number: CRD42017057323). Thirty studies were identified that reported on science interventions and 20 on student/teacher experiences of the interventions. The majority of the studies targeted science vocabulary and concepts. Other targets included inquiry skills and comprehension skills. The majority of the interventions used components of systematic instruction (n = 23). Five studies focused on self-directed learning and two on comprehension-based instruction. Students and teachers reported positive experiences of the interventions. The findings suggest that components of systematic instruction in particular might be effective in teaching science content to students with ID and/or ASD. Further research is needed to explore the effectiveness of identified interventions on teaching more complex science skills and with students with severe disabilities. Some limitations related to the search strategy are highlighted.     

Understanding and describing mathematical knowledge for teaching: knowledge about proof for engaging students in the activity of proving

This article is situated in the research domain that investigates what mathematical knowledge is useful for, and usable in, mathematics teaching. Specifically, the article contributes to the issue of understanding and describing what knowledge about proof is likely to be important for teachers to have as they engage students in the activity of proving. We explain that existing research informs the knowledge about the logico-linguistic aspects of proof that teachers might need, and we argue that this knowledge should be complemented by what we call knowledge of situations for proving. This form of knowledge is essential as teachers mobilize proving opportunities for their students in mathematics classrooms. We identify two sub-components of the knowledge of situations for proving: knowledge of different kinds of proving tasks and knowledge of the relationship between proving tasks and proving activity. In order to promote understanding of the former type of knowledge, we develop and illustrate a classification of proving tasks based on two mathematical criteria: (1) the number of cases involved in a task (a single case, multiple but finitely many cases, or infinitely many cases), and (2) the purpose of the task (to verify or to refute statements). In order to promote understanding of the latter type of knowledge, we develop a framework for the relationship between different proving tasks and anticipated proving activity when these tasks are implemented in classrooms, and we exemplify the components of the framework using data from third grade. We also discuss possible directions for future research into teachers’ knowledge about proof.

Attachment style and mentoring relationships in adolescence

This study examined the relationship between adolescents’ attachment style and their decision to enter mentoring relationships. The participants were 569 Greek Cypriot high school students. It was found that adolescents who have a mentor are more secure in their attachment than those who do not. Girls with low scores in secure attachment do not enter easily into mentoring relationships. Older adolescents are more anxious in their attachments, probably because they can better appreciate the possible difficulties if something goes wrong; thus, they are more reluctant to take the risk of starting a mentoring relationship than younger students. Furthermore, secure attachment was found to be positively correlated to the perceived impact of the whole experience: the more secure the attachment, the stronger the mentoring bond seems to be.     

Infant Proneness-to-Distress Temperament, Maternal Personality, and Mother-Infant Attachment: Associations and Goodness of Fit

66 mother-infant pairs were examined when the infants were 9 and 13 months. The purpose of this report was to examine relations between infant proneness-to-distress temperament, maternal personality characteristics, and mother-infant attachment. There were no main-effect relations between infant proneness-to-distress temperament as assessed at 9 months and infant attachment classification at 13 months. This was true whether security of attachment (A and C vs. B) or proposed temperament (A1-B2 vs. B3-C2) groupings of attachment classifications were examined. Infant proneness-to-distress temperament, however, was associated with maternal behavior and personality. Furthermore, security of attachment could be predicted by an interaction between maternal personality and infant proneness-to-distress. The importance of considering goodness-of-fit relations in predicting attachment security is discussed.     

Behavioral and neurophysiological effects of morphological awareness training on spelling and reading

Behavioral and neurophysiological effects of a computer-aided morphological training protocol were examined in German-speaking children from Grades 3 to 9. Study 1 compared morphological awareness, reading, and spelling skills of 34 trained children with an untrained control group of 34 children matched for age, sex, and intelligence. All participants in the training group showed increases in morphological awareness, but only students from secondary school improved significantly in reading and spelling competences. In Study 2, a subsample of 8 trained children with poor spelling and reading abilities and 10 untrained children with higher language competencies underwent an electroencephalography testing involving three different language tasks. The training resulted in decreased theta-activity and increased activity in lower (7–10 Hz) and upper alpha (10–13 Hz). These findings reflect more effortful and attention-demanding processing after the training and suggest that children with poor spelling and reading abilities use the acquired morphological knowledge in terms of a compensatory strategy.     

Lower Secondary Students’ Views in Astrobiology

Astrobiology is, on a profound level, about whether life exists outside of the planet Earth. The question of existence of life elsewhere in the universe has been of interest to many societies throughout history. Recently, the research area of astrobiology has grown at a fast rate, mainly due to the development of observational methods, and the media is frequently reporting on new research findings. International surveys show that astrobiology questions are among those that interest young people the most. The popularity of astrobiology and the way it captures much science content makes it an interesting area for science teaching. However, there is very little research directly focused upon students’ views in astrobiology. The study reported in this paper draws from the answers of 186 Swedish lower secondary students (16 years old) to a questionnaire, with closed and open-ended questions regarding their views of issues in astrobiology. The study was guided by the worldview theory (Cobern 1991; Cobern, Science Education 80(5):579–610, 1996; Cobern, Science and Education 9:219–246, 2000). The results show that even though basic reasoning in astrobiology is known by a majority of the students, there is a considerable number of students, for whom this is not the case. Furthermore, it was found that for all questions, there are students answering in different ways when asked to describe their own view and the view they associate with science researchers. The implications of the study for further research and for the teaching of astrobiology in science class are discussed.     

Technical analysis of a Central Asian wall painting detached from a Buddhist cave temple on the northern Silk Road

A great number of Central Asian wall paintings, archeological materials, architectural fragments, and textiles, as well as painting fragments on silk and paper, make up the so called Turfan Collection at the Asian Art Museum in Berlin. The largest part of the collection comes from the Kucha region, a very important cultural center in the third to ninth centuries. Between 1902 and 1914, four German expeditions traveled along the northern Silk Road. During these expeditions, wall paintings were detached from their original settings in Buddhist cave complexes. This paper reports a technical study of a wall painting, existing in eight fragments, from the Buddhist cave no. 40 (Ritterhöhle). Its original painted surface is soot blackened and largely illegible. Grünwedel, leader of the first and third expeditions, described the almost complete destruction of the rediscovered temple complex and evidence of fire damage. The aim of this case study is to identify the materials used for the wall paintings. Furthermore, soot deposits as well as materials from conservation interventions were of interest. Non-invasive analyses were preferred but a limited number of samples were taken to provide more precise information on the painting technique. By employing optical and scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, micro X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction analysis, and Raman spectroscopy, a layer sequence of earthen render, a ground layer made of gypsum, and a paint layer containing a variety of inorganic pigments were identified.