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It has been argued that successful professional development efforts, especially in assessment-literacy, need to address emotional components and the existence of implicit conceptions in order to raise consciousness and ultimately transform practice (Xu and Brown, 2016: p. 156). Experiential approaches have been shown to be highly effective for adult learning, especially in bringing about and sustaining changes in beliefs and practices. In this paper, I explore the use of an experiential approach in an online language assessment course, describing in depth two formative assessment (FA) activities and the technology tools that were employed. These activities served to (1) develop participants' AL in formative assessment, including online formative assessment; (2) evoke emotions, raise consciousness about conceptions, and prompt a desire for transformation; and (3) bridge the theory-practice gap. This paper offers insights into approaches to FA and teacher development in online settings and seeks to contribute to the growing body of knowledge in the field of assessment education.

Background: Rare diseases, also referred to as orphan diseases, are characterised by their low prevalence with majority of them are chronically debilitating and life threatening. Given the low prevalence and the widely dispersed but very small patient base for each disease, there may often be a disproportion in the availability of treatments and resources to manage patients, spur research and train experts. This is especially true in Southeast Asian countries that are currently in the process of implementing or revising their universal health coverage schemes. This paper aims to examine the status of rare disease management in Southeast Asian countries. It will serve as the basis for a more active discussion on how countries in the region can address an under-recognised rare disease burden and enhance national and regional capacities.Methods: The study consists of literature reviews and key stakeholders interviews in six focus countries, including the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand and five countries as best practice, comprising of France, Canada, Australia, Taiwan, and South Korea. Rare disease management initiatives across each country were examined based on the World Health Organization's framework for action in strengthening health systems.Results: The results suggest rare disease management remains challenging across Southeast Asia, as many of the focus countries face fundamental issues from basic healthcare systems to funding. Nonetheless, there are substantial improvement opportunities, including leveraging best practices from around the world and organising a multi-stakeholder and regional approach and strategy.Conclusions: Southeast Asian countries have made significant progress in the management of rare disease, but there remain key areas for substantial development opportunities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on designing a comprehensibility test and a questionnaire for spoken world Englishes in Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore, and utilizing the test to investigate the comprehension of Burmese, Cambodians, Indonesians, Laotians, Thais and Vietnamese. We reviewed the demarcation of users of English based on Kachru's (1984, 1985) three concentric models within the bloc's context where two circles--Outer Circle and Expanding Circle are present. The findings established a moderate comprehensibility level of Expanding Circle listeners toward the speakers of the Outer Circle. The variations of comprehensibility scores paved way for the exploration of the comprehension scores' possible relationships with language proficiencies, attitudes toward speakers, familiarity of spoken variety, historical origins of languages, and political ambiance between and among ASEAN nations. (Contains 8 tables and 1 figure.) [Work on this paper was partly supported by Prince of Songkla University's Graduate School Grant.]

The predicted widespread use of English as a lingua franca following ASEAN's 2015 integration mushroomed intelligibility studies between and among Asean nationals including Bruneians, Burmese, Cambodians, Filipinos, Indonesians, Laotians, Malaysians, Singaporeans, Thais and Vietnamese. Previous studies regarding ASEAN nationals' intelligibility and/or comprehensibility were reviewed. This paper presents a study of five exposures that relate to the intelligibility and/or comprehensibility within world Englishes speaker-listener paradigm. They are exposures to English through education, work experiences, outside the classroom (non-educational settings), social media, and travel and stay abroad. The Comprehensibility Testing Flowchart was used as the main framework of the study and data analysis. The findings show that there are positive correlations and significances between the five variables and the comprehensibility levels Aseans gained in the comprehensibility test. Questionnaire is appended. (Contains 1 note, 1 figure, and 6 tables.) [Work on this paper was partly supported by Prince of Songkla University's Graduate School Grant.]

Background: The rate of international migration for the primary purpose of employment has increased exponentially in recent decades. A significant proportion of this global movement takes place across East and Southeast Asia as workers move on a temporary basis from lower-middle-income home countries such as Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam to high-income host destinations including Hong Kong and Singapore. Relatively little is known about the unique and long-term health needs of this heterogeneous group of people. This systematic review presents an analysis of recent research into the experiences and perceptions of health of temporary migrant workers in the East and Southeast Asian regions. Methods: Five electronic databases CINAHL Complete (via EbscoHost), EMBASE (including Medline), PsycINFO (via ProQuest), PubMed and Web of Science, were systematically searched for qualitative or mixed methods, peer-reviewed literature published in print or online between January 2010 and December 2020. Quality of the studies was assessed using the Critical Appraisal Checklist for Qualitative Research published by the Joanna Briggs Institute. Findings from the included articles were extracted and synthesised using qualitative thematic analysis. Results: Eight articles were included in the review. Findings from this review indicate that multiple dimensions of workers' health is impacted by the processes of temporary migration. In addition, the research reviewed indicated that migrant workers used various strategies and mechanisms to attempt to address their health-related issues and to take better care of themselves. Such agentic practices could help them manage and maintain their health and wellbeing across physical, psychological and spiritual dimensions within the structural constraints of their employment. Conclusions: Limited published research has focused on the health perceptions and needs of temporary migrant workers in East and Southeast Asia. The studies included in this review focused on female migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong, Singapore, and the Philippines. These studies provide valuable insights but do not reflect the heterogeneity of migrants moving within these regions. The findings of this systematic review highlight that temporary migrant workers experience high and sustained levels of stress and are exposed to certain health risks which may compromise long-term health outcomes. These workers demonstrate knowledge and skills in managing their own health. This suggests that strength-based approaches to health promotion interventions may be effective in optimising their health over time. These findings are relevant to policy makers and non-government organisations supporting migrant workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a context of rapid economic growth, skills development systems have become increasingly important to countries in Southeast Asia in response to skills gaps generated by changing labour-market conditions. Countries in the region have no alternative but to invest in the development and maintenance of these systems. This paper asserts that in doing so they should recognise the importance of adopting a definition of skills that encompasses cognitive and soft skills as well as technical skills, they should regard as being essential to the development of effective labour market information systems, and they should adopt and institutional frameworks that are adequate to the task of managing complex and effective national skills development systems.

Contamination status, potential emission sources, environmental fate, and human exposure risk of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are reviewed for indoor and outdoor dust from Southeast Asian countries, under an international comparison point of view. PBDEs have been widely detected in house, workplace, car, and road dust samples collected from Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. The highest PBDE levels up to hundreds of μg/g were found in settled dust from some e-waste processing areas in Thailand and Vietnam. Concentrations of PBDEs in house, car, and road dust from this region were generally lower than those reported in China and Western developed countries. BDE-209 was the most predominant congener in almost all analyzed samples, reflecting the widespread application of materials and products treated with commercial deca-BDE mixtures in this region. The market demand and application rate of commercial PBDE mixtures in Southeast Asia were lower than those documented for other regions in the world. As a result, PBDE contamination levels in the environments (e.g., indoor and outdoor dust) and associated risks in these countries were not significantly high. However, more attention should be paid to informal processing activities and management strategies for modern wastes such as e-waste, plastics, and end-of-life vehicles. There exist several knowledge gaps about spatiotemporal trends, potential sources, risk assessment, inventory, management, and legislation regarding PBDEs in dust from this region, which should be filled by additional comprehensive, detailed studies with relevant inter-country/regional monitoring schemes., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Little attention has been paid to the impacts of institutional-human-environment dimensions on the outcome of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) abatement. Through the diagnostic social-ecological system (SES) framework, this review paper aimed to investigate what and how the multifaceted social, physical, and governance factors affected the success level of seven selected Asia-Pacific countries (namely, South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, Indonesia, and New Zealand) in combatting COVID-19. Drawing on statistical data from the Our World In Data website, we measured the COVID-19 severity or abatement success level of the countries on the basis of cumulative positive cases, average daily cases, and mortality rates for the period of 1 February 2020 to 30 June 2020. A qualitative content analysis using three codes, i.e., present (P), partially present (PP), and absent (A) for each SES attribute, as well as score calculation and rank ordering for government response effectiveness and the abatement success level across the countries, was undertaken. Not only did the standard coding process ensure data comparability but the data were deemed substantially reliable with Cohen's kappa of 0.76. Among 13 attributes of the SES factors, high facility adequacy, comprehensive COVID-19 testing policies, strict lockdown measures, imposition of penalty, and the high trust level towards the government seemed to be significant in determining the COVID-19 severity in a country. The results show that Vietnam (ranked first) and New Zealand (ranked second), with a high presence of attributes/design principles contributing to high-level government stringency and health and containment indices, successfully controlled the virus, while Indonesia (ranked seventh) and Japan (ranked sixth), associated with the low presence of design principles, were deemed least successful. Two lessons can be drawn: (i) having high number of P for SES attributes does not always mean a panacea for the pandemic; however, it would be detrimental to a country if it lacked them severely, and (ii) some attributes (mostly from the governance factor) may carry higher weightage towards explaining the success level. This comparative study providing an overview of critical SES attributes in relation to COVID-19 offers novel policy insights, thus helping policymakers devise more strategic, coordinated measures, particularly for effective country preparedness and response in addressing the current and the future health crisis., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of interest.