The relevance of this research is due to the problem of modern society informatization, the need to form a single information space, the emergence of new competencies, which the modern teacher should master, increase in requirements for the qualifications and professional activity of the teacher; the need to set a strategic goal of transforming the country into a world intellectual State with the predominant development of discarnate intellectual and knowledge-based material industries. The purpose of this research is to identify the specificity of formation of future university school teachers' ICT competence. Research methods. The leading method to investigate this problem is the pedagogical experiment (ascertaining, forming and control), and the method of statistical processing of quantitative results of research. 146 future university school teachers took part in the experiment. During the process of formation of ICT competence of future university school teachers, the phenomena of society informatization, the need to improve the information culture, and computer literacy were taken into account. Educational quest-technologies, tasks, exercises which form a unified system for the formation of ICT competence of future university school teachers were developed. Specificity of the author's method of formation of ICT competence of future university school teachers is that this process is based on the simultaneous formation of media literacy and informational culture. Relevance of the research. The research proved the effectiveness of the proposed methodology for the formation of ICT competence of future university school teachers, the results of implementation of which mainly identified a sufficient level of the ICT competence formation of future university school teachers. The materials of the article can be useful for university school teachers, parents, teachers of higher education institutions while using this method of formation of ICT competence.

The small-scale survey methodology for assessing KD elimination at township level was feasible. KD among the people living in Yuanbao township has not been eliminated.

BackgroundNo spatial analysis of hair selenium and Keshan disease (KD) on a nationwide county-level has been performed. Selenium deficiency is a recognized environmental risk factor for KD. Hair selenium is one of the recognized biomarkers of selenium nutrition. This study aimed to perform a geographically precise and visualized assessment of the achievement of KD prevention and control at the level of selenium nutrition in terms of etiology.MethodsA spatial ecological study was conducted. The hair selenium content of the residents was assayed using an atomic fluorescence spectrometer. The spatial analysis was performed using ArcGIS.ResultsThe median of the hair selenium levels of the 3,028 participants in the 1,174 counties was 0.38 mg/kg, and the content of inhabitants in KD endemic counties was significantly lower than that in KD non-endemic counties (0.34 vs. 0.39 mg/kg, z = −10.03, P < 0.0001). The proportion of Se-deficient and Se-marginal counties in KD endemic counties was significantly higher than that in KD non-endemic counties (59.4 vs. 29.0%, z = −7.45, P < 0.0001). The global autocorrelation analysis was not statistically significant (Moran's I = 0.0005, P = 0.68). Local autocorrelation analysis identified 174 low-low clusters of hair selenium levels, 83 (47.7%) of which are KD endemic counties located in KD endemic provinces of Henan, Gansu, Shaanxi, Inner Mongolia, Jilin, and Heilongjiang. The hair selenium featured a positive correlation with per capita GDP (rs = 0.20, P < 0.0001).ConclusionThe median of the hair selenium levels of inhabitants living in KD endemic counties was significantly lower than that in KD non-endemic counties. All the 83 KD endemic counties with low-low clusters of hair selenium levels should be prioritized in KD precision prevention and control. These findings are geographically precise and visualized evidence of the assessment of the effectiveness of KD prevention and control at the level of selenium nutrition in terms of etiology.

Previous studies in genre-based pedagogy mainly concerned with its teaching effects, few studies involved with students’ perceptions and attitudes which is actually playing a role in teaching and learning activities. The present study intends to make some explorations in this aspect. A quasi-experimental study to designed to answer the research question “What are students’ perceptions and attitudes towards the genre-based pedagogy developed in Chinese university students’ persuasive writings?” Thirty-four students participated in the study and a four-point Likert scale questionnaire and an interview were applied to collect the data. After the quantitative and qualitative analysis, the study find that most participants hold positive attitudes towards every item of the questionnaire and think highly of the genre-based teaching pedagogy from the following six aspects: the mastery of textual features, the genre-awareness of persuasion, confidence in writing an effective persuasion, attitudes towards group writing in the teaching instruction, interests in the application of the curriculum cycle to other genres and other program instruction related comments such as being difficult to master certain required language features and following the teaching patterns involved in the textual construction of persuasion. However, the general indication is that the curriculum cycle can help and enhance students’ understandings of each of the textual features of persuasion. Finally, the study provides implications for future teaching: the genre-based approach could be effectively and widely applied in Chinese university students’ genre writing as the apprenticeship involved allows the students to be more creative as their writing skills develop.

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