Dr. Maria A. Efstratopoulou is Associate Professor of Special Education  at the United Arab Emirates University.  Before joining UAEU she was Senior Lecturer in  BGUniversity in UK teaching at the Graduate Program in Special Education and Inclusion. She holds a Doctoral Degree in Biomedical Sciences from the Faculty of Kinesiology and Rehabilitation Sciences, Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, and also a European Master in Psychomotor Therapy for Children (KULeuven, Belgium) and a Master in Human Performance and Health for Special Populations (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece). Dr. Efstratopoulou’s research interests are in Motor Behaviour and Assessment and Diagnostical Procedures for children with emotional, behavioural and developmental disorders. She has many years of experience working with children in both educational and clinical settings and she is experienced  in the in-training education of teachers and Special Education professionals. Before starting her Academic career, Dr. Efstratopoulou was a researcher at the University Hospital in KULeuven, Belgium, working with children with autism, ADHD, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorders and children with motor, emotional, behavioural and developmental difficulties. Dr.Efstratopoulou is an active research with International cooperation in Research for more than 15 years in the field of Special Education, Psychomotor and Child Psychology. She is the author of 4 books in Special Education and she has published many research articles in peer review journals. She is a Core Member of the EFP (European Framework in Psychomotor) in Research and she acts as Editorial Board member and Senior reviewer for several per review journals in the field of Education. 

Early identification efforts are particularly critical during the educational years, when students are most amenable to change in behavioural, social, and academic arenas and before students with emotional and/or behavioural disorders (EBD), developmental disorders and a number of mental health conditions, experience negative outcomes within and beyond the school setting. Given the costs associated with these conditions to students themselves, their families, and society as a whole, it is not surprising that a growing area of interest in educational research focuses on assessing children ‘at risk’.The session focusing on the importance of using observations, to identify children ‘at risk’ for emotional/behavioural difficulties and/or developmental delays in school settings and the presentation of the Motor Behaviour Checklist for children ( MBC; Efstratopoulou, Janssen & Simons , 2012) as an assessment instrument for teachers and educational professionals to rate their students and check the effectiveness of their interventions. The MBC for children is a valid and reliable assessment tool, which provides valuable information on motor, emotional, behavioural and overall development of children. It has been translated in seven languages and has been used by professionals around the world, for early diagnosis purposes and for assessing the effectiveness of Interventions. Research aiming to provide the Arabic version of the instrument and new data on the area of early diagnosis in a specific (Arabic) population will assist professionals and multidisciplinary groups working in the field of Special Education, in carrying out more accurate, valid and complete early screening assessments. Ideas for engaging Graduated students and early year researchers from UAEU and Universities overseas in the project will be discussed further during the session.

Ali Shehadeh is Professor of Applied Linguistics and TESOL in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education, UAE University. He has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in Applied Linguistics, Second Language Acquisition and TESOL. He supervised or sat on the panels of over 45 Master’s and Doctoral dissertations in the UK, Syria, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. He published in top-tier research journals in the field including Language Learning, TESOL Quarterly, System, Journal of Applied Linguistics, and Journal of Second language Writing.

Today, publishing research is hitting virtually all universities and research centers around the world. However, high quality publishing continues to be a real challenge for many researchers, in particular research students and novice researchers (i.e., young researchers). The main purpose of this talk is to suggest five instructive and practical ways for nurturing and training young researchers, and providing leadership in publishing research. These are: (1) Providing leadership in the form of holding workshops and seminars; (2) Providing leadership in the form of mentoring young researchers; (3) Providing leadership in the form of editors and reviewers’ guidance; (4) Providing leadership in the form of co-authoring and co-presenting with young researchers; and (5) Providing leadership by creating research groups within and among institutions. The ultimate goal for providing this leadership is to enable young researchers get published, join the publishing community, and contribute to the body of knowledge in their respective disciplines.

Dr. Mona Humaid Aljanahi received her Ph.D. in Curriculum & Instruction from the United Arab Emirates University in 2017. She previously held the position of an English instructor at both federal and private educational institutions in the United Arab Emirates. Her research interests include literacy education, multiliteracies, language learning, ESL/EFL, reading and writing, and language arts. She is currently an active reviewer for peer-reviewed international journals based on research in the field of ESL. Additionally, she presented at numerous national and international conferences on various topics in her field.

New trends in literacy studies shifted their focus from looking at the consequences and gains of literacy to examining its uses by various cultural groups. These new trends try to situate literacy practices in different spheres and contexts as literacy varies across cultural, social, individuals, geographical, and historical timeframes. This study tried to trace the myriad of literacy practices of high school students at home and school spheres in the United Arab Emirates. The study used a convergent concurrent mixed method. Findings revealed that the UAE high school students’ inside-school literacy practices were uniformed in nature, where students felt that in order to do well they had to adhere to rules and guidelines set by the textbook and/or the teachers. Furthermore, the findings showcased the complexity of students’ literacy practices, particularly outside-school literacies, rendering them to fall under the overarching concept of the rhizome as well as the New London Group’s (1996) definition of Multiliteracies. This presentation focuses not only on the study’s content, but sheds light on how this particular project evolved into published articles in Q1 journal.   

Dr Khalifa Alsuwaidi joined the United Arab Emirates University in 1987 and held a number of teaching and administrative positions at the UAE University, including Dean of University College, and Deputy Dean of Faculty of Education. Dr Khalifa is member of the advisory board at the Global Talent Mentoring and member of Steering Committee of Task force on teachers UNESCO.   Dr. Khalifa is the presenter and script writer at Abu Dhabi TV (step). Dr. Khalifa’s specialization is in Curriculum and Instruction. He has also been honored by Sheikh Rashid Bin Saeed award for academic excellence (UAE), Excellence award for University and Community Service (1996-97), and Best UAE national teacher project award (2004) as well as best finalist National IT organizational award (2006) from the UAE educational IT challenge Khalifa Award for education 2008. Besides 15 research papers in leading journals he has authored 5 books. Dr. Khalifa holds a Bachelor Degree (Education/Psychology from United Arab Emirates University), Master Degree (Curriculum & Instruction from George Washington University, USA), and Ph.D. (Curriculum and Instruction from University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA). 

Innovation in education needs reliable foundations as well as international cooperation. Most importantly, it needs incentives and methods to disseminate  best practices. In this lecture, I will first focus on some of these practices, including  the Master of Innovative in Education which is offered by the College of Education at the United Arab Emirates University as a practical model for preparing a generation of creative educators. Second, I will talk about the  platform that has been developed by the International Task Force on Teachers for Education 2030 in order to exchange global experiences within the community of teachers. Then, I will talk about the UNESCO Hamdan Award for Best Practices in Teacher Development in the World as a model for rewarding best practices in teacher development. Finally, I will give an overview of the World Giftedness Center which is an electronic platform that promotes and shares with the world best practices in developing talents and gifts. This innovative platform will be launched in October 2021.