Outcomes and satisfaction of two optional cadaveric dissection courses: A 3‐year prospective study

Teaching time dedicated to anatomy education has been reduced at many medical schools around the world, including Nova Medical School in Lisbon, Portugal. In order to minimize the effects of this reduction, the authors introduced two optional, semester‐long cadaveric dissection courses for the first two years of the medical school curriculum. These courses were named Regional Anatomy I (RAI) and Regional Anatomy II (RAII). In RAI, students focus on dissecting the thorax, abdomen, pelvis, and perineum. In RAII, the focus shifts to the head, neck, back, and upper and lower limbs. This study prospectively analyzes students' academic achievement and perceptions within the context of these two, newly‐introduced, cadaveric dissection courses. Students' satisfaction was assessed anonymously through a questionnaire that included items regarding students' perception of the usefulness of the courses for undergraduate teaching, as well as with regards to future professional activity. For each of the three academic years studied, the final score (1 to 20) in General Anatomy (GA), RAI, and RAII was on average 14.26 ± 1.89; 16.94 ± 1.02; 17.49 ± 1.01, respectively. The mean results were lower in GA than RAI or RAII (P < 0.001). Furthermore, students who undertook these courses ranked them highly with regards to consolidating their knowledge of anatomy, preparing for other undergraduate courses, and training for future clinical practice. These survey data, combined with data on participating students' academic achievement, lend strong support to the adoption of similar courses as complementary and compulsory disciplines in a modern medical curriculum. Anat Sci Educ 10: 127–136. © 2016 American Association of Anatomists.     

Benefits of achieving vigorous as well as moderate physical activity recommendations: evidence from heart rate complexity and cardiac vagal modulation

The aim of this study was to examine differences in traditional heart rate variability measurements and heart rate complexity (sample entropy) in young adults grouped by objectively measured achievement of either moderate or both moderate and vigorous physical activity recommendations. Of 168 young adults tested (86 females, 82 males; age 20.5 ± 1.2 years), 119 achieved only recommendations for moderate physical activity (moderate group) and 49 achieved recommendations for both moderate and vigorous physical activity (vigorous group). Analysis of covariance controlling for sex, weekly minutes of moderate physical activity, and percentage of body fat was used to assess between-group differences in heart rate variability and heart rate complexity. Logistic regression analysis was used to determine the group characteristics that best predicted high heart rate complexity and vagal indices of heart rate variability. The majority of the autonomic measures were higher (P < 0.05) in the vigorous group, and regression analysis showed that vigorous physical activity was the only multivariate predictor of higher heart rate complexity and higher heart rate variability. Young adults engaged in regular vigorous physical activity were more than twice as likely to have high heart rate complexity than those involved in predominantly moderate exercise. These findings suggest that vigorous physical activity is more closely associated with high heart rate complexity than moderate physical activity in young adults.     

头戴百角的奥拉夫

Olav was the most terrible of all the 1)Vikings.With just his bare hands,he could defeat a bull in seconds.To let people know who he was,he adorned his 2)helmet with a hundred 3)horns,and on his 4)cloak were a thousand 5)precious stones,one stone for each enemy he had defeated.     

From Log Files to Assessment Metrics: Measuring Students' Science Inquiry Skills Using Educational Data Mining

We present a method for assessing science inquiry performance, specifically for the inquiry skill of designing and conducting experiments, using educational data mining on students' log data from online microworlds in the Inq-ITS system (Inquiry Intelligent Tutoring System; www.inq-its.org). In our approach, we use a 2-step process: First we use text replay tagging, a type of rapid protocol analysis in which categories are developed and, in turn, used to hand-score students' log data. In the second step, educational data mining is conducted using a combination of the text replay data and machine-distilled features of student interactions in order to produce an automated means of assessing the inquiry skill in question; this is referred to as a detector. Once this detector is appropriately validated, it can be applied to students' log files for auto-assessment and, in the future, to drive scaffolding in real time. Furthermore, we present evidence that this detector developed in 1 scientific domain, phase change, can be used—with no modification or retraining—to effectively detect science inquiry skill in another scientific domain, density.     

When does a nation-level analysis make sense? ESD and educational governance in Brazil,South Africa,and the USA

International policy analysis tends to simplify the nation state, portraying countries as coherent units that can be described by one statistic or placed into one category. As scholars from Brazil, South Africa, and the USA, we find the nation-centric research perspective particularly challenging. In each of our home countries, the effective influence of the national government on education is quite limited, particularly in fringe and emerging areas of education such as Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and Climate Change Education (CCE). This essay explores how nation-level comparisons are and are not useful for international research on ESD and CCE. We consider several layers of decentralized governance, but ultimately come to the conclusion that ESD governance in our respective countries is polycentric rather than decentralized. We discuss the implications of this idea for cross-national policy research on ESD and CCE.     

STRUCTURE OF PRIMARY MATHEMATICS TEACHER EDUCATION PROGRAMS IN SPAIN

Spain was 1 of the 17 countries that participated in the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement’s Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics (TEDS-M 2008). In this paper, we explore and describe the structure of Spanish primary mathematics teacher education programs. We analyzed the documents collected from the 48 sampled Spanish institutions that participated in TEDS-M. Our approach to the syllabus analysis focused on the established content dimension of curriculum in educators’ syllabi. These contents are structured into 4 knowledge domains—school mathematics, advanced mathematics, general pedagogy, and mathematics pedagogy—and categorized into subjects and topics. The results show that Spanish teacher education programs are diverse across institutions, but follow a basic structure that emphasizes the teaching of general pedagogy subjects.     

Disinfection by-products effect on swimmers oxidative stress and respiratory damage

Disinfection by-products (DBPs) are generated through the reaction of chlorine with organic and inorganic matter in indoor swimming pools. Different DBPs are present in indoor swimming pools. This study evaluated the effects of different chlorinated formations in oxidative stress and lung damage in 20 swimmers after 40?min of aerobic swimming in 3 indoor pools with different characteristics. Biological samples were collected to measure lung damage (serum-surfactant-associated proteins A and B), oxidative stress parameters (plasma protein carbonylation and malondialdehyde, and whole-blood glutathione oxidation), and swimming exertion values (blood lactate) before and after exercise. Free chlorine and combined chlorine in water, and chlorine in air samples were determined in all the swimming pools. Chlorination as disinfection treatment led to the formation of chloramines in water samples, mainly mono- and dichloramine. However, free chlorine was the predominate species in ultraviolet-treated swimming pool. Levels of total chlorine increased as a function of the swimming activity in chlorinated swimming pools. The lower quality of the installation resulted in a higher content of total chlorine, especially in air samples, and therefore a higher exposure of the swimmer to DBPs. However, the concentration level of chlorinated DBPs did not result in significant variation in serum-surfactant-associated proteins A and oxidative stress parameters in swimmers. In conclusion, the quality of the installation affected the DBPs concentration; however, it did not lead to lung epithelial damage and oxidative stress parameters in swimmers.     

Syllable frequency in lexical decision and naming of English words

The importance of phonological syllables in recognition and pronunciation of visual words has been demonstrated in languages with a high degree of spelling-sound correspondence. In Spanish, multisyllabic words with frequent first syllables are named more quickly than those with less frequent first syllables, but receive slower lexical decisions. The latter effect is attributed to lexical competition from other words beginning with the same syllable. We examined syllable frequency effects on naming and lexical decision for 3029 visually presented words in English, a language with a high degree of irregularity in spelling/sound relationships, and in which phonological syllables are less clearly marked in printed words. The results showed facilitative effects of syllable frequency in both tasks, and these were stronger when syllables were defined orthographically than phonologically. The results suggest that activation of lexical candidates based on a syllabic code does not occur rapidly enough to interfere with lexical decision in English.