Crowds on Hessle Road

A Strange Sight Strangers to Hessle Road in Hull,East Yorkshire,on a Saturday in July might be surprised to see lots of brightly dressed people running along the road,pushing prams as fast as they can.They might be more surprised to see that inside each pram isn’t a baby,but an adult who is jumping out regularly and quickly drinking a pint of beer at a pub before jumping into the pram again to continue.     

Integrating Cognition and Emotion: Yirat Shamayim and the Taxonomies

Following Bennett Solomon's suggestion of the “integrating individual”—one who possesses the skill and interest to incorporate new knowledge into a larger and unified life-picture—this article explores how recognizing the coupling of the affective and cognitive can influence Jewish education. Emotions help construct our daily perceptions and our moral and spiritual awareness. Jewish sources acknowledge the tandem nature of cognition and emotion in spiritual life by placing yirat shamayim (fear or awe of Heaven) as a paramount goal that is tightly bound to Torah learning. Education can nurture complex spiritual qualities by working with simpler emotions and qualities within the context of rigorous cognitive learning.     

How Do the Different Components of Episodic Memory Develop? Role of Executive Functions and Short‐Term Feature‐Binding Abilities

This study investigated the development of all 3 components of episodic memory (EM), as defined by Tulving, namely, core factual content, spatial context, and temporal context. To this end, a novel, ecologically valid test was administered to 109 participants aged 4-16 years. Results showed that each EM component develops at a different rate. Ability to memorize factual content emerges early, whereas context retrieval abilities continue to improve until adolescence, due to persistent encoding difficulties (isolated by comparing results on free recall and recognition tasks). Exploration of links with other cognitive functions revealed that short-term feature-binding abilities contribute to all EM components, and executive functions to temporal and spatial context, although ability to memorize temporal context is predicted mainly by age.     

Optimal Test Characteristics for Maximal Anaerobic Work on the Bicycle Ergometer

Abstract

Two separate experiments were conducted to ascertain the optimum protocol for a maximum anaerobic work output test on the bicycle ergometer. Data from 58 subjects indicated that the test duration needs to be approximately 40 sec and the optimal frictional resistance, 5.0 to 6.0 kp (30 to 36 kpm/rev). The desirability of using performance tests to represent biophysiologic data is discussed.     

Students’ Perception of Risk About Nanotechnology After an SAQ Teaching Strategy

We experimented with teaching nanotechnology in high school within the perspective of citizenship education in science by involving experts in nanotechnology, education, ethics and philosophy. After training, the students debated a Socially Acute Question (SAQ) that they elaborated during the various phases of instruction. The field of SAQs represents a French orientation for the teaching of SocioScientific Issues. We analyzed the interactions of students in the debate to determine their risk perception on nanotechnology. We compared and put their arguments into perspective using various analytical frameworks. We observed two contrasting argumentative tendencies: one reflecting a positivist view that involved an individualistic use of nanotechnology and science and one carrying a critical and humanistic vision of the use of nanotechnology and science.     

Can we Evaluate the Impact of a Critical Detail? The Role of a Type of Diagram in Understanding Optical Imaging

This paper describes an attempt at evaluating a potentially critical “detail” of teaching practice; that is, using a particular diagram to illustrate the imaging role of a converging lens. This “basic” diagram has been designed to contribute to help students overcome the well‐known “travelling image” syndrome. We conducted a comparative study with 125 students in all, at three academic levels: end of secondary school, degree students, and teacher training. The groups compared had previously been taught elementary optical imaging in a classical, uncontrolled manner, and were presented with two classical questions, commonly used to demonstrate students’ difficulties. In each group, one‐half of the students had a classic introductory diagram and the other half had the “basic” one. A positive reaction of students to the evaluated diagram was observed at a relatively high academic level (trainee physics teachers and degree students), in contrast with an apparent lack of effect at the end of secondary school. The paper ends with a discussion of the evaluation of a detail of practice in isolation, with respect to the distance between students’ actual and targeted levels of comprehension.     

The Moment of No Return: The University of Paris and the Death of Aristotelianism

Aristotelianism remained the dominant influence on the course of natural philosophy taught at the University of Paris until the 1690s, when it was swiftly replaced by Cartesianism. The change was not one wanted by church or state and can only be understood by developments within the wider University. On the one hand, the opening of a new college, the Collège de Mazarin, provided an environment in which the mechanical philosophy could flourish. On the other, divisions within the French Catholic Church between Augustinians and Molinists led to Cartesianism finding support within an important section of the faculty of theology, which was the traditional guardian of philosophical orthodoxy. The conversion of the University of Paris to Cartesianism had important consequences. It encouraged similar changes to the natural philosophical curriculum throughout France and affected the structure and raison d’être of the Académie des Sciences.