Given the complexity of teaching, continuing teacher professional development (CPD) is essential for maintaining and enhancing teaching effectiveness, and bridging the gap between ever-evolving theory and practice. Technological advancements have opened new opportunities for digital tools to support CPD. However, the successful integration of such digital tools into practice poses challenges. It requires adherence to CPD prerequisites and acknowledgment of the complexity of the professional development process. This study explored the applicability of the developed digital PE teacher professional development TARGET-tool in a secondary school PE context. We examined the perceived usability of this tool and gained insights into the process of teachers’ professional development as a result of using the tool. Ten PE teachers from different schools implemented the TARGET- tool within their PE context for a period of 4 to 6 weeks. Individual semi-structured inter- views and the System Usability Scale provided insights into the perceived usability and the process of teacher professional development. The TARGET-tool demonstrated its potential as an effective tool for supporting teachers’ professional development. Future tool improve- ments were identified to further optimize the perceived usability, such as simplifying com- plex features, providing additional support and resources, and improving (data) presenta- tions. Using the Interconnected Model of Professional Growth as a theoretical basis, it was demonstrated how the use of the TARGET-tool engages teachers as active and reflective participants in their professional development and induces changes within the external domain, the domain of practice, the domain of consequences, and the personal domain.
Enjoyment in primary physical education (PE) is a key factor in increasing children's physical activity engagement in PE and leisure time. While existing PE research has largely focused on a motivational PE climate and meaningful experiences in PE, research on children's perceptions of enjoyable teaching practices (TPs) in PE is limited. Therefore, this study aimed to explore primary school children's perspectives on TPs that foster PE enjoyment. In addition, we observed to what extent these TPs were applied in daily PE practice. Four focus groups with 10- to 12-year-old children (12 boys, 12 girls) from four primary schools were formed and inductive analysis resulted in 32 child-identified TPs categorized into 10 dimensions. Thirty-one PE lessons taught by 19 different PE teachers (11 generalists, 8 PE specialists) were recorded and coded using the child-identified TPs. Teachers regularly performed a substantial number of these TPs during their PE lessons. However, TPs such as the use of cooperative learning, instructional methods to promote children's (social) learning process, an emphasis on children's individual improvements, and consciously grouping were rarely observed. Moreover, PE specialists showed TPs supporting exploratory learning and children's individual learning processes more frequently than generalists. In addition, PE specialists provided challenging, differentiated tasks with a creative use of equipment more often than generalists. Including children's perspectives contributes to a comprehensive understanding of PE enjoyment and TPs that can promote enjoyable PE experiences. Children's voices need to be heard continuously by PE teachers to ensure enjoyable PE experiences for all children.
The quality of teaching has a clear impact on student success, but how can good teaching be defined? The European QualiTePE research project, funded by the Erasmus+ programme and involving ten European countries, seeks to adress this question specifically for Physical Education (PE). The QualiTePE instrument was designed for use in teacher training and further training to enable criteria-based observation and assessment of the quality of Physical Education lessons. The instrument is designed for diverse PE teaching and learning scenarios, alongside teacher resources, facilitating the practical assessment of teaching quality in PE. The QualiTePE instrument quantifies teaching quality by assessing specific, observable teaching characteristics via questionnaire items. Each assessment is conducted by three different population groups: 1) the students 2) the PE teacher 3) an observer. The comparative analysis of the data collected from these three perspectives enables systematic and criteria‐based feedback for (prospective) teachers, identifies areas of improvement, and informs content development for PE across Europe. The QualiTePE digital web-based evaluation tool for assessing the “Quality of Teaching in Physical Education” is now available in English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Slovenian, Czech and Greek.
Designing cities that are socially sustainable has been a significant challenge until today. Lately, European Commission’s research agenda of Industy 5.0 has prioritised a sustainable, human-centric and resilient development over merely pursuing efficiency and productivity in societal transitions. The focus has been on searching for sustainable solutions to societal challenges, engaging part of the design industry. In architecture and urban design, whose common goal is to create a condition for human life, much effort was put into elevating the engineering process of physical space, making it more efficient. However, the natural process of social evolution has not been given priority in urban and architectural research on sustainable design. STEPS stems from the common interest of the project partners in accessible, diverse, and progressive public spaces, which is vital to socially sustainable urban development. The primary challenge lies in how to synthesise the standardised sustainable design techniques with unique social values of public space, propelling a transition from technical sustainability to social sustainability. Although a large number of social-oriented studies in urban design have been published in the academic domain, principles and guidelines that can be applied to practice are large missing. How can we generate operative principles guiding public space analysis and design to explore and achieve the social condition of sustainability, developing transferable ways of utilising research knowledge in design? STEPS will develop a design catalogue with operative principles guiding public space analysis and design. This will help designers apply cross-domain knowledge of social sustainability in practice.
Aanleiding: De belangstelling voor gezonde en veilige voeding is groot. Bij de gezondheidseffecten van voeding spelen de darmen een cruciale rol. Verschillende soorten bedrijven hebben behoefte aan natuurgetrouwe testmodellen om de effecten van voeding op de darmen te bestuderen. Ze zijn vooral op zoek naar modellen waarvan de uitkomsten direct vertaalbaar zijn naar het doelorganisme (de mens of bijvoorbeeld het varken) en die niet gebruikmaken van kostbare en maatschappelijke beladen dierproeven. Doelstelling Het project 2-REAL-GUTS heeft als doel om twee innovatieve dierproefvrije darmmodellen geschikt te maken voor onderzoek naar voedingsconcepten en -ingrediënten. De twee darmmodellen die worden toegepast zijn darmorganoïden, minidarmorgaantjes bestaande uit stamcellen, en darmexplants bestaande uit hele stukjes darm verkregen uit relevante organismen. Beide modellen hebben potentieel heel uitgebreide toepassingsmogelijkheden en hebben ook grote voordelen ten opzichte van de huidige veelgebruikte cellijnen, omdat ze meerdere in de darm aanwezige celtypen bevatten en uit verschillende specifieke darmregio's te verkrijgen zijn. Gezamenlijk gaan de partners werken aan: 1) het aanpassen van de kweekomstandigheden zodat darmmodellen geschikt worden om de vragen van partners te beantwoorden; 2) het vaststellen van de toepassingsmogelijkheden van de darmmodellen door verschillende stoffen en producten te testen. Beoogde resultaten Kennisconferenties, publicaties en exploitatie van de modellen zullen zorgen voor het verspreiden van de opgedane kennis. Omdat het project gebruikmaakt van moderne, op de toekomst gerichte laboratoriumtechnieken (kweekmethoden met stamcellen en vitaal weefsel, moleculaire analyses en microscopie), leent het zich uitstekend om geïmplementeerd te worden in het hbo-onderwijs. Als spin-off zal het project dan ook voorzien in een specifieke, voor Nederland unieke hbo-minor op het gebied van stamcel- en aanverwante technologie (zoals organ-on-a-chiptechnologie).
