Search Results (3)

Social skills are essential for fostering healthy relationships and promoting positive social interactions. Supporting students’ development of these skills has become increasingly important in educational contexts and is emphasized within many countries’ national core curricula. However, teachers often lack pedagogical methods for nurturing such skills. This study addresses this gap by investigating how the “Curious About Others” play based on solution-focused and playful pedagogical approaches can support students’ learning of social skills. In the study, we used a qualitative research method involving the qualitative data collected from students’ written documents, learning reflections, discussion recordings, observations, and interviews with students and teachers. The material was analyzed using content analysis. Results indicate that the intervention improved students’ social skills and their abilities in communication, cooperation, empathy, and self-control. These findings highlight the benefits of integrating solution-focused and playful approaches into educational practices. The study underscores the importance of incorporating such interventions into curricula to foster social skills. Practical implications for educators include promoting playful learning activities and strength-based solution-focused approaches to support social–emotional development and create a positive learning environment. Full article

(1) Background: Scopoletin and scoparone, two naturally occurring coumarins, have garnered considerable attention and have been introduced to the market in China due to their high insecticidal efficacy and low toxicity. To investigate the structure–activity relationship of these coumarins, a series of scopoletin derivatives with aryl sulfate at C7 and different substitutes at C3 were designed and synthesized, and their insecticidal activity was studied. (2) Methods: A total of 28 new scopoletin derivatives were designed and synthesized. Most target compounds exhibited moderate insecticidal activity against the phytophagous mite Tetranychus cinnabarinus and the brine shrimp Artemia salina. (3) Results: Among these compounds, compounds 5a and 5j possessed the best insecticidal activities against T. cinnabarinus, with LC₅₀ values of 57.0 and 20.0 μg/mL, respectively, whereas that of the control drug was 15.0 μg/mL. Compound 4j exhibited selective insecticidal activities against A. salina, with an LC₅₀ value of 9.36 μg/mL, whereas its LC₅₀ value against T. cinnabarinus was 93.0 μg/mL. The enzymatic inhibitory activity on acetylcholinesterase (AChE) showed a consistent tendency with the insecticidal activity. Further molecular docking analyses predicted the binding conformations of these compounds, which showed a good correlation between the insecticidal activity and the binding scores. (4) Conclusions: In general, a decreased electron cloud density of the Δ^3,4 olefinic bond is beneficial for improving the insecticidal activity against both T. cinnabarinus and A. salina. In addition, naphthyl or benzene groups with a sulfate ester at the C7 position could further improve the insecticidal activity against A. salina. AChE was implied to be a site of action for potential insecticidal activity. The results provide insight into the rational design of a new generation of effective coumarin insecticides. Full article

A series of novel trifluoromethylcoumarinyl urea derivatives were designed, synthesized, and characterized by ¹H-NMR, ¹³C-NMR, and HR-ESI-MS. The fluorescence spectra of the target compounds were recorded. The spectra show that most of the title compounds glow green with λ_max^em of 500–517 nm, while compounds 5r, 5s, 5u, and 5l (compounds named by authors) glow violet with λ_max^em of 381–443 nm. Moreover, the herbicidal and antifungal activities of the synthesized compounds were evaluated for their potential use as pesticides. The results indicate that compound 5f against the caulis of Amaranthus retroflexus and compounds 5j and 5l against the taproot of Digitaria sanguinalis are equivalent to the commercial herbicide Acetochlor. Nine of the title compounds are more antifungal than commercial fungicide Carbendazim against Botrytis cinerea. Full article