A suggested approach to a library building program

The preliminary building program suggested in this paper makes use of outlines, graphs, charts, and lists, rather than long-winded paragraphs, to describe the needs, objectives, and philosophy of the library. It is hoped that a short, concise, but detailed, report using these methods will save time and make the report more attractive to read, thereby encouraging the many people who will need to assist in the building planning to use the report.     

Public Library Services for Veterans: Selected Brief Case Studies

Public libraries across the country design and deliver programs for military veterans and their families, often collaborating with other organizations and agencies. The examples were assembled from both general and specialized interviews with librarians, and literature and Internet searches, with summaries of programs assembled and written by multiple researchers. The specific limitations on the listing in this article are clearly outlined in the first section. Overall, however, the article provides a good introductory overview of what’s going on in veteran’s programs and services in America’s public libraries in over seventy libraries in forty states. We hope this list of what public libraries have organized or are doing will supply other public librarians with ideas on how to provide new services or enhance their existing ones.     

Effects of tapering on physical match activities in professional soccer players

ABSTRACT

This study aimed to examine: (i) the effect of decreasing training load (TL) during taper weeks on physical match activities in professional soccer players, and (ii) to disclose the relationship between weekly TL and physical match activities. Rating of perceived exertion was collected after each training session and match to quantify the TL in 19 professional players over 17 standard and 7 taper weeks during the season. Physical match activities were quantified by a computerised match analysis system and compared between standard training and taper weeks. Compared to standard weeks, the duration and frequency of training sessions during the taper weeks decreased (?21.7% and ?18.8%, respectively; P < 0.01) with no change in intensity (?4.8%; P = 0.09). Consequently, the weekly TL decreased during the taper weeks (?25.5%; P < 0.01). Increases in distance covered by intense running (+15.1%; P < 0.05), high-intensity running (HIR) (+15.7%; P < 0.01), number of sprints (+17.8%; P < 0.05) and number of high-speed runs (+15.7%; P < 0.05) were observed during the seven matches played after the taper weeks. High relationships were observed between TL and HIR distance covered, number of HIR and number of sprints (r = ?0.53; r = ?0.55; r = ?0.65, respectively; P < 0.01). Decreasing TL during taper weeks by reducing training duration and frequency but maintaining intensity was associated with an increase in physical activities during matches. However, it needs to be determined whether tapering or other match factors led to the changes in match activity.     

Managing physical education lessons: an interactional approach

Physical education (PE) lessons involve complex and dynamic interactive sequences between students, equipment and teacher. The potential for unexpected and/or unintended events is relatively large, a point reflected in an increasing amount of scholarship dealing with classroom management (CM). This scholarship further suggests that unexpected and disruptive events negatively impact on learning and can have deleterious effects on teacher health. Despite considerable potential for these kinds of events, many PE lessons occur in structured, organized ways. The broad purpose of this paper is to consider how classroom action becomes ordered in PE contexts. To this end, an interactional approach is put forward including the specific analytic concepts of directives, epistemic authority and deontic authority. To exemplify the approach, the micro-dynamics of a situation in which a group of students are building a human pyramid is examined. The examination draws attention to: how the teacher engages in a series of interactions with the students to move the sequence forward; how the students themselves achieve order through their interactions with one another; and how the characteristics of the activity help to organize the students' behaviors and limit possibilities for action. The discussion is located against a backdrop of current CM scholarship. Reference is also made to two aspects of social context: the increasing prominence of managerial discourse in educational arenas and the significance of student-centeredness in pedagogical theory. Both aspects appear to influence how order can be achieved in PE today. The analysis raises issues related to pedagogy, management and authority which are addressed in the final two sections of the paper.     

Problems Associated with Multi-Media Data Bases

Education is intimately associated with communication, and so may utilize any technology that is able to support a process that enables information to be transferred from one location to another. This paper describes the meaning of the term multi-media data base and presents a model of its potential role in aiding message creation for the purposes of communicating educational material using many parallel channels. Some of the problems associated with the implementation of such systems are outlined.     

Choosing schools,choosing selves: exploring the influence of parental identity and biography on the school choice process in Delhi,India

Drawing on qualitative interview data from a group of lower income parents in Delhi, India, this paper focuses on the dynamic relationship between parental choice of a particular school and parents’ own identity construction. The data indicate that choice of school is for some parents a symbolic expression of identity, influenced by family dynamics and parents’ educational biographies. The paper outlines the concept of ‘forging solidarities’ and proposes it as an alternative way of understanding school enrolment decisions that recognises the social significance of such choices for the wider family unit. More generally, as school choice mechanisms in various forms become an increasingly important part of the educational landscape in many countries, the findings draw attention to the sociocultural nature of choice in real-world market settings and the contribution of schooling choices to processes of social and educational segregation.     

Educational inequality in Tasmania: evidence and explanations

In this article, we map the extent of educational inequality within Tasmania, and between Tasmania and the rest of Australia, using National Assessment Program—Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) and senior secondary attainment data. This analysis yields some surprising findings, showing the success of Tasmanian primary and high schools and that Tasmanian educational inequality is most strongly expressed at the senior secondary level. We conclude that using such publicly available data to identify differential achievement within and between jurisdictions would strengthen public policy and practitioner interventions aimed at achieving more equal educational outcomes for students in all schools. Our findings also have implications for research directions in this field, suggesting that by analysis of NAPLAN and My School data across individual schools and jurisdictions academic researchers could assist practitioners gain a deeper understanding of inequalities reproduced by the systems they are working within, while finding examples of schools and systems which show a greater level of success in ameliorating disadvantage.     

The Many Faces of Human-Machine Interaction

Interactive processes are fundamental to all forms of training and learning activity. Within educational technology increasing use is being made of both simple and sophisticated machines as instructional aids. Because of their growing applicability in all areas of educational practice it is important to understand the basic nature of the interactive processes involved in using such machines. This paper provides an overview of the techniques and mechanisms of human-machine interaction and outlines the status of some ongoing research trends in this area.     

A Methylome‐Wide Association Study of Trajectories of Oppositional Defiant Behaviors and Biological Overlap With Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

In 671 mother–child (49% male) pairs from an epidemiological birth cohort, we investigated (a) prospective associations between DNA methylation (at birth) and trajectories (ages 7–13) of oppositional defiant disorder (ODD), and the ODD subdimensions of irritable and headstrong; (b) common biological pathways, indexed by DNA methylation, between ODD trajectories and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); (c) genetic influence on DNA methylation; and (d) prenatal risk exposure associations. Methylome‐wide significant associations were identified for the ODD and headstrong, but not for irritable. Overlap analysis indicated biological correlates between ODD, headstrong, and ADHD. DNA methylation in ODD and headstrong was (to a degree) genetically influenced. DNA methylation associated with prenatal risk exposures of maternal anxiety (headstrong) and cigarette smoking (ODD and headstrong).