RCAAP Repository

This paper constitutes a summary of the main contributions of a PhD thesis focused on the understanding of the processes of educational influence; that is to say, the practices that allow teachers and other educational agents to help, in an adjusted way, the students. Specifically, this is a study that attempt to define the learning and teaching styles as a decisive aspect in these processes of influence and, therefore, in the evaluation of the students and their performance. Highlighting the necessity to transfer our results to classroom practices and taking as a theoretical reference the cycle of experiential learning, the methodological research procedure is approached from a mixed design and structured according to the CIPP model of evaluative research of an educational geography program. The participants are teachers and students from 10 secondary schools in Murcia (Spain), including a group of 23 students who received the implementation of the defined educational sequence whose evaluation, analysis and discussion have led a series of conclusions that will guide future educational designs, through the learning and assessment activities, according to the learning style of the students.

This study aimed at comparing the performance of an experimental group composed of advanced Portuguese L2 learners and a norm group of native speakers of Portuguese on a reading task. Using the Cloze test as a comparison instrument between both groups, the study was based on the analysis of existing L2 reading research literature and the references provided by the CEFR in order to design a set of seven two hour lessons focusing on deep reading press columns featuring literary, complex and hybrid characteristics. The results showed that the performance of the experimental group were distant not only from those of the norm group but also from the illustrative descriptors of the CEFR for C1 and C2 proficiency levels. Research on the field of language learning methods and strategies was necessary in order to design reading activities that would enable the students to deepen reading comprehension. The second phase of testing leads to the conclusion that, with this group of subjects, the methodological choices implemented throughout the reading lessons that were held between both testing moments led to an improvement in reading processing.

My purpose with this paper will be to offer a view on magic in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by analyzing one of the novel‟s hallows, the Elder Wand. Through an analysis of this wand, which is said to be the most powerful wand ever made in the entire Harry Potter universe, I wish to discuss the many possibilities magic can offer in the world of witches and wizards, but also the limits that exist in the realm of magic. I will argue that, despite its many properties and its enticing realm, magic is not all-powerful, but rather something illusory that simply inspires one‟s imagination. I will further propound that, although it is the main instrument of survival in the Harry Potter universe, even the protagonist‟s actions evince that a balance between imagination and reality must be maintained. By using this novel and J.K. Rowling‟s equally famous book of wizarding tales, The Tales of Beedle the Bard, in which the wand makes an appearance, I will demonstrate that the moral we are being offered through both books is that the endless pursuit of power and the many promises of imagination are things that need to be controlled. As one of the characters of the famous saga, Professor Albus Dumbledore, once said in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone: “It does not do to dwell in dreams and forget to live.”

The number of bilingual and English-Medium-Instruction (EMI) degree programmes has grown significantly in Spanish universities during the last few years, becoming a new trend within the Bologna system. The implementation of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) led to changes in Spanish universities, promoting a shift in the teaching methods and enhancing the improvement in quality and international competitiveness pursuing an increase in mobility opportunities and the employability of the European graduates. The command of the English language in specialized university contexts became thus crucial. Research conducted at university level reveals that university students often have difficulty in performing the cognitive and discursive operations involved in the comprehension and production of written texts. These difficulties aggravate when the written performance has to be conducted in a nonnative language. The present paper analyses the written production of Chemistry students following an EMI approach at the University of Almería (Spain) from a qualitative perspective. Results show the differences in the performance of certain areas of written language competence, which evidences the need to adopt methodologies that solve the problems and difficulties faced by students in order to help them integrate the global features of the writing ability within their own course contents in a second language.

Orthographical errors in French are not merely divided into lexical errors and grammatical errors as other types not directly related to the orthography exist too. Orthographical errors phonetically-based are among the latter which have a specific place in most methods for classifying French orthographical errors. Our aim is to study the distribution of this particular type of errors by reviewing some investigations in FL1 (French as a First Language) and FL2 (French as a Foreign Language). This review found for non-native speakers of French a high frequency of this type of error for which we have discussed eventual causes. As a didactic solution, we have suggested a special focus on phonetics/phonology in teaching orthography in French as a Foreign Language.

The presence of the cultural content is fundamental in what concerns the learning of a foreign language; however, its inclusion tends to raise doubts the moment the teacher has to practice it on a daily basis. Within this framework, the textbook is a guide and a pedagogical tool which transmits, among other aspects, a certain image of the target culture. Therefore, this article aims to offer the results of a study having had into consideration the cultural contents of five works used in the Portuguese formal educational system in order to observe, precisely, the vision they provide of Spain, and its usage intends to supply a genuine assistance to the teacher when dealing with issues regarding the Spanish culture.

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A edição da obra Emblematum Liber (1531) de Andrea Alciato (1492-1550), de enorme sucesso editorial e ampla divulgação europeia, teve uma marcada influência na mentalidade cultural da Europa, nomeadamente nas formas de comunicação social e cultural e na expressão artística e literária dos séculos XVI e XVII. Em Portugal, apesar de não se conhecerem edições traduzidas integrais da obra de Alciato a sua influência fez-se sentir em múltiplos aspectos, nomeadamente através de livros de emblemas e nas representações decorativas e de arquitetura efémera, mas também na forma de construção de um discurso literário dominado pela imagem. Este trabalho propõe-se analisar a forma como a literatura emblemática nas suas diferentes vertentes de expressão temática e formal, desenvolvidas ao longo do século XVI, influenciou as novelas pastoris maneiristas portuguesas de princípios do século XVII, herdeiras tardias do género bucólico, levando-as a adotar um discurso logo-icónico com características inovadoras e com aspectos singulares e originais, tanto em termos de forma como de conteúdo adaptados à expressão bucólica portuguesa.

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André Dias Laudes are very important for the medieval spiritual literature in Portugal and no less remarkable are its implications within the ‘parateatralidad’. We refer here, in particular, the Livro dos Milagres do Bom Jesus de S. Domingos de Lisboa, their interesting and juicy introduction, the reason for its inclusion and its role within the work Laudes e Cantigas. We also discuss the use and content of miracles included there

This study aims to draw attention to some letters written by Father João Cardim (S.J.), especially those that were addressed to his mother, Catarina de Andrada, and his sister, Mother Isabel de São Francisco (O.S.H), as they allow to listen up spiritual ascending, held, in this case, through advice and spiritual guidance, by this religious, despite his youth. Thus, these letters show us some interesting vectors of the guidance of the spiritual life and consciousness direction in the XVIIth century in Portugal: recommended readings, modes of prayer or ascetic and devotional practices.

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This paper presents an analysis of occurrences of evaluation within the subsystem of Attitude in the Appraisal System, taken from narrative sections of police reports (PRs) about language crimes against honor. The study was based on the principles of Systemic Functional Grammar (Halliday e Hasan, 1989; Halliday e Matthiessen, 2004) and the System of Appraisal (Martin e White, 2005). The narrative sections of six Police Reports (PRs) about crimes against honor were analyzed, two concerning calumny, two defamation and two injury. These extracts were randomly chosen from a corpus of 2,343 PRs which had been filed by the Civil Police, in September, 2011, across the whole of the State of Rio Grande do Sul. The quali-quantitative analysis using the three subsystems of Attitude identified explicit negative attitudinal evaluation in all the samples, with a predominance of judgment of social sanction in the PRs concerned with calumny and judgment of social esteem and social sanction in PRs concerned with defamation and injury. In crimes of calumny and defamation, the derogatory evaluation of victims is realized in reported projected clauses, which describe the facts with the offensive content, whereas in crimes of injury, the attitudinal pejorative evaluation is not described in facts, but is realized by epithets functioning as Attributes in projected relational clauses and as Verbiage in projected verbal clauses.

The spreading of letter-writing and its social implication during the Modern Age resulted in the appearance of books in vernacular languages to learn how to write a letter correctly from the mid-Sixteenth century in Spain, as well as the rest of Europe. Among the varied examples offered to the readers to adapt their correspondence to the customs and conventions of this time, it’s possible to find some letters directed to the Pope, who certainly had to be one of the most demanding addressees. In these treatises the Pontiff not only appears as the absent to whom the missives are written, but he also sometimes takes the quill. This collection of model letters makes up a imaginary correspondence that must be studied from the perspective of the epistolary theory, analyzing the typologies of letters proposed, the epistolary topics and themes allowed – the matters that could be discussed directly with the Pope, and those other ones that required intermediaries –, the authorized senders and their self-representative strategies on the paper.

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A noção de pertença geográfica refere-se aos laços afectivos que o indivíduo estabelece com o território. A construção da noção de topofilia baseia-se por isso em concepções pessoais e colectivas, na relação com o território. Em caso de experiências de mobilidade, a dinâmica migratória implicará a (re)construção da identidade numa lógica de resiliência. Então onde é de facto a nossa casa? Como é que a capacidade de resiliência dos sujeitos determina a escolha e permanência em determinados locais e em contexto migratório? Estas e outras questões serão abordadas a partir da discussão de duas obras fílmicas. A primeira – A Gaiola Dourada, de Ruben Alves (2013); a segunda – O Caminho das Nuvens, de Vicente Amorim (2003). Ambas as histórias se cruzam, apresentando dilemas familiares relativamente ao território de pertença e à busca de lugar entre a casa que deixaram e a nova casa.