Bangladeshi Science Teachers’ Perceived Importance and Perceived Current Practices in Promoting Science Education Through a Context-Based,Socio-scientific Framework

Science & Education - The paper reports a study that seeks to develop an instrument so as to explore Bangladeshi science teachers’ perceived importance and perceived current practices,...     

Zero dynamics and funnel control for linear electrical circuits

We consider electrical circuits containing linear resistances, capacitances and inductances. The circuits can be described by differential-algebraic input–output systems, where the input consists of voltages of voltage sources and currents of current sources and the output consists of currents of voltage sources and voltages of current sources. We generalize a characterization of asymptotic stability of the circuit and give sufficient topological criteria for its invariant zeros being located in the open left half-plane. We show that asymptotic stability of the zero dynamics can be characterized by means of the interconnectivity of the circuit and that it implies that the circuit is high-gain stabilizable with any positive high-gain factor. Thereafter we consider the output regulation problem for electrical circuits by funnel control. We show that for circuits with asymptotically stable zero dynamics, the funnel controller achieves tracking of a class of reference signals within a pre-specified funnel; this means in particular that the transient behavior of the output error can be prescribed and the funnel controller does neither incorporate any internal model for the reference signals nor any identification mechanism, it is simple in its design. The results are illustrated by a simulation of a discretized transmission line.     

Effect of a Hanging Exercise on the Epiphyseal Cartilage of the Humerus of Albino Rats

This study was designed to determine the number of days of pedometer monitoring necessary to achieve reliable and valid estimates of a 1-year average of step counts in adults based on either consecutive days (CD) or random days (RD) of data collection. Twenty-three participants (16 women; M age = 38 years, SD = 9.9) wore a Yamax SW 200 pedometer and recorded their step counts for 365 consecutive days. Nine measurement periods of various lengths were selected (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 14, 21, and 30 days). Each measurement period was randomly selected 10 times each for CD and RD from the larger database. For reliability and validity, two-way intraclass correlation coefficients and mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) were calculated, respectively. The year-round average was considered the criterion measure of the “true” habitual physical activity. Data were analyzed separately by CD and RD. At least 5 CD or 6 RD were necessary to achieve an ICC of .80. A minimum of 30 CD or 14 RD were necessary to achieve an MAPE lower than 10%. These findings provide researchers and practitioners with useful information to determine appropriate measurement length and the method of data selection based on a desired level of reliability and validity.     

Olympic or Sacred? The Controversy over the Flame at the Inaugural 1951 Pan-American Games and Its Aftermath

In 1951, Buenos Aires hosted the inaugural Pan-American Games. On February 25 of that year, a Greek athlete carried a flame flown specially from his country onto the stadium where the event’s opening ceremonies took place and lit the cauldron. The uncertain character of the Greek flame transported to Buenos Aires alarmed many in Olympic circles. Confused and concerned, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) investigated the matter, which led to a rapid succession of policy changes seeking to regulate the use of flames in regional games. The flame flown from Greece to Buenos Aires for the 1951 Pan-American Games sparked an intense debate about the status of the Olympic flame. The IOC’s recognition of the power of the Olympic flame ritual and its preoccupation with protecting it along with other Olympic symbols and terminology reveal the contours of the organization’s ideology in this era and its relations with associated entities. The flame debate also illuminates the push by Pan-American Games’ officials for autonomy. Clearly, Olympic officials recognized early in the 1950s that the globalization of the Olympic flame ritual required regulation if the IOC was to ensure control of this and its other symbolic resources.     

Disciplinary epistemologies,generic attributes and undergraduate academic writing in nursing and midwifery

Generic attributes such as ‘holding a critical stance’, ‘using evidence to support claims’, and ‘projecting an impersonal voice’ are central to disciplinary academic writing in higher education. These attributes, also referred to as ‘skills’, have for a long time been conceptualised as transferable in that once learnt students are able to use them in a variety of contexts and for a range of needs. Over the past few years, however, the conceptualisation of these attributes as transferable has come under close scrutiny as they have been identified to be highly context-sensitive rather than context-flexible as they were once thought to be. Drawing on data from a 2-year study on undergraduate academic writing in nursing and midwifery at a university in the UK, this paper critically examines the role of disciplinary epistemologies in the conceptualisation of these attributes in the two disciplines, and demonstrates how these beliefs help to shape academic writing at undergraduate level, thus contributing to debates on generic skills and attributes and specificity in disciplinary discourses. The paper concludes by highlighting the importance for writers to examine how knowledge is displayed, constructed and communicated in their disciplines, and the significance of analysing the relationship between disciplinary epistemologies, generic attributes and academic writing as a way of gaining access to and producing central discourses in their professional community.     

ICT teacher training: a view of the TPACK model / Formación del profesorado en TIC: una visión del modelo TPACK

This paper presents a study on the TPACK model (Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge), which focuses on the assumption that in order to use ICTs effectively in teaching, the instructor must be trained in technological, content and pedagogical knowledge. In consequence, education, teacher training and professional development programmes should provide learning opportunities so that teachers can develop and put into action the three areas included in the model. To analyse the TPACK model of the teachers included in the study, a translation of an already developed instrument was applied; its reliability resulted in a Cronbach’s alpha of .97. The sample was comprised of 1,368 people who conducted training activities related to education and technologies at universities in Spain, Argentina, Colombia, the Dominican Republic and Venezuela. The results reveal the need to stress not the technological aspects but the pedagogical and content knowledge, which is where the respondents earned the lowest scores.     

Droit International De L’éducation: Une Discipline Nouvelle?

INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION LAW: A NEW DISCIPLINE? – Education is one of the most highly regarded “human rights” and one which has been developed most extensively within the International Human Rights Law, so that its normative corpus already forms a very International Education Law. The right to education means a new right to a new education that, in the Rule of Law, may be qualified as Rightful Education. Such an expression is an operating concept for a human rights-based approach to education; that is, for an education no longer envisaged as a right of man over man. It amounts to a new paradigm. It is therefore high time to systematize the International Education Law in order to promote its study and the introduction of a legal dimension into pedagogic culture.