Empowering Learning: Using Student Exemplars in Teaching

Using student work as exemplars is a powerful component of a balanced pedagogy.     

Correlation analysis-based image segmentation approach for automatic agriculture vehicle

INTRODUCTION In recent years,harvesting crop by combine has become more and more popular in China.In2003,combines were used to harvest23%of rice and71%of wheat.The work described here is part of a pro-ject aimed at researching automatic combines who follow the cut-uncut edge of the crops automatically to reduce the driver’s fatigue from the intensive work.Much attention has been focused on vision-bas-ed automatic agriculture vehicle.Image segmenta-tion is the key to extracting the guida…     

一类2×2拟线性双曲守恒律组的奇性形成

本文在文[3]的基础上,进一步给出了包含均熵气体动力学方程组在内的一类2×2拟线性双曲守恒律组的奇性形成结果,证明了在“真正大初值”条件下,Lax定理仍然成立。     

Do Users Experience Real Sociability Through Social TV? Analyzing Parasocial Behavior in Relation to Social TV

The purpose of this study is to explore the ways in which users build parasocial relationships via social TV, and the implications for sociability and usability in future media. Focusing on parasocial behavior, this study examines how sociability and usability influence the attitudes and intentions of social TV (STV) users. The findings from experiments and a user survey indicate mediating and moderating roles of parasociability in the effect of performance on intention. The results showed that STV viewing and interaction were positively associated with parasocial experience. Parasocial relationships and interaction, in turn, were positively associated with the viewers’ perception of usability and sociability, and intentions. This study reveals the links among an emerging media experience, social TV, and users’ interaction with mediated realities.     

Special education and general education preservice teachers’ co-teaching experiences: a comparative synthesis of qualitative research

Co-teaching is commonly used to support students with disabilities in inclusive educational settings. However, there is often a gap between the potential effectiveness of co-teaching and actual classroom practice. This study examined preservice teachers’ co-teaching experiences to better understand this gap to identify potential practices for improving teacher training and service delivery. A review of 11 studies revealed that both special education and general education preservice teachers believed that co-teaching practices provided them opportunities to communicate and work collaboratively. Both groups agreed on the significant impact of personality in co-teaching as well as challenges in implementing co-teaching. Furthermore, special education preservice teachers noted that they lacked content knowledge, whereas general education preservice teachers thought they needed more training in the provision of accommodations and modifications. Study limitations, areas for future research, and implications for preservice teacher preparation are discussed.     

The Effectiveness of Cooperative and Individualistic Approaches in Teaching Mathematics and English

This paper reports an experimental study into the effects of cooperative and individualistic approaches in teaching Mathematics and English. The study was conducted at a Vacation Learning Camp (VLC) which was held for two weeks in one of the secondary schools in Singapore. This VLC was targeted at Secondary One pupils who were classified as below average based on general ability streaming.

The individualistic teaching approach was assumed to contribute to individual efforts while the cooperative teaching approach was expected to produce cooperativeness among the subjects. The results indicated that there were no significant differences in performances in the main effects classified as the treatment groups and the sex groups in both Mathematics and English; in Mathematics, the individualistic teaching approach was more effective for the male pupils whereas the cooperative teaching approach was more effective with females. However, in English, the results were reversed.

The female pupils in the cooperative group seemed to have improved in their attitude towards learning Mathematics whereas the male pupils in the individualistic group seemed to have a more positive attitude towards learning English.     

Structure and Agency in Adolescents’ Expectations of Pursuing Post-secondary Education

Research in Higher Education - Past studies have supported the view that parent background and family socioeconomic status determine the post-secondary educational expectations of adolescents. They...     

Revamping the funding formula for special education programs in Taiwan

The purpose of this study was to determine the services required by students in special education programs and to estimate the cost of adequately funding special education in Taiwan. Questionnaires were administered to 300 special education teachers at the elementary school level to identify the services required. Thereafter, two focus group interviews were organized to determine the service categories and their cost. The results show that the costs for special education programs vary significantly according to severity of disability, and the weighting for mildly, moderately, and severely disabled students was found to be 3.7, 4.5, and 5.2, respectively. The costs also vary significantly according to the category of disability, and the weighting was found to range from 3.6 for emotionally disabled students and to 5.9 for hearing impaired students. These findings suggest that the current special education funding formula in Taiwan, which ignores these cost differences, should be revamped.