Work-based HE pathways for the electrical power engineering industry

Aston University has been working closely with key companies from within the electricity industry for several years, initially in the development and delivery of an employer-led foundation degree programme in electrical power engineering, and more recently, in the development of a progression pathway for foundation degree graduates to achieve a Bachelors-level qualification. The Electrical Power Engineering foundation degree was developed in close consultation with the industry such that the programme is essentially owned by the sector. Programme delivery has required significant shifts away from traditional HE teaching patterns whilst maintaining the quality requirement and without compromise of the academic degree standard. Block teaching (2-week slots), partnership delivery, off-site student support and work-based learning have all presented challenges as we have sought to maximise the student learning experience and to ensure that the graduates are fit-for purpose and "hit the ground running" within a defined career structure for sponsoring companies. This paper will outline the skills challenges facing the sector; describe programme developments and delivery challenges; before articulating some observations and conclusions around programme effectiveness, impact of foundation degree graduates in the workplace and the significance of the close working relationship with key sponsoring companies. Copyright © 2012, September.

Cognitive Approach to e-Learning in Sciences and Technologies

This article describes the approach adopted and the results obtained by the international team developing WBLST (Web Based Learning in Sciences and Technologies) a Web-based application for e-learning, developed for the students of “UVPL: Université Virtuelle des Pays de la Loire”. The developed e-learning system covers three levels of learning activities - content, exercises, and laboratory. The delivery model is designed to operate with domain concepts as relevant providers of semantic links. The aim is to facilitate the overview and to help the establishment of a mental map of the learning material. The implemented system is strongly based on the organization of the instruction in virtual classes. The obtained quality of the system is evaluated on the bases of feedback form students and professors.

Collaborative Learning and Authoring in the Frame of e-Projects

It is presented a research on the application of a collaborative learning and authoring during all delivery phases of e-learning programmes or e-courses offered by educational institutions. The possibilities for modelling of an e-project as a specific management process based on planned, dynamically changing or accidentally arising sequences of learning activities, is discussed. New approaches for project-based and collaborative learning and authoring are presented. Special types of test questions are introduced which allow test generation and authoring based on learners’ answers accumulated in the frame of given e-course. Experiments are carried out in an e-learning environment, named BEST.

Classification-Based Method of Linear Multicriteria Optimization

The paper describes a classification-based learning-oriented interactive method for solving linear multicriteria optimization problems. The method allows the decision makers describe their preferences with greater flexibility, accuracy and reliability. The method is realized in an experimental software system supporting the solution of multicriteria optimization problems.

Educational Games for Learning Programming Languages

A concept of educational game for learning programming languages is presented. The idea of learning programming languages and improving programming skills through programming game characters’ behavior is described. The learning course description rules for using in games are suggested. The concept is implemented in a game for learning C# programming language. A common game architecture is modified for using in the educational game. The game engine is built on the base of the graphical engine Ogre3D and extended with game logic. The game has been developed as an industry level commercial product and is planned for sale to educational institutions.

Facilitating intuitive-guided learning in a serious game through integration with a learning content management system

Increased global uptake of entertainment gaming has the potential to lead to high expectations of engagement and interactivity from users of technology-enhanced learning environments. Blended approaches to implementing game-based learning as part of distance or technology-enhanced education have led to demonstrations of the benefits they might bring, allowing learners to interact with immersive technologies as part of a broader, structured learning experience. In this article, we explore how the integration of a serious game can be extended to a learning content management system (LCMS) to support a blended and holistic approach, described as an 'intuitive-guided' method. Through a case study within the EU-Funded Adaptive Learning via Intuitive/Interactive, Collaborative and Emotional Systems (ALICE) project, a technical integration of a gaming engine with a proprietary LCMS is demonstrated, building upon earlier work and demonstrating how this approach might be realized. In particular, how this method can support an intuitive-guided approach to learning is considered, whereby the learner is given the potential to explore a non-linear environment whilst scaffolding and blending provide guidance ensuring targeted learning objectives are met. Through an evaluation of the developed prototype with 32 students aged 14-16 across two Italian schools, a varied response from learners is observed, coupled with a positive reception from tutors. The study demonstrates that challenges remain in providing high-fidelity content in a classroom environment, particularly as an increasing gap in technology availability between leisure and school times emerges.

Web 2.0 and the Global Transformation of Education

Румен В. Николов - Статията анализира необходимостта от институционални промени в училищата и университетите с цел да се адаптират към съвременните изисквания на обществото на знанието. Паралелно се анализират феноменът на електронното обучение, глобалната образователна реформа и необходимостта от разработването и прилагането на нови педагогически модели. В статията е поставен акцент върху Уеб 2.0 технологиите и електронните инфраструктури, както и върху тяхното влияние върху образованието и научните изледвания в училищата и университетите. Професионална квалификация на учителите, която да е проектирана така, че да отговаря на новите предизвикателства, се разглежда като ключов фактор за успешното навлизане на новите технологии в училище. Важно е да се отбележи необходимостта от разработка на стратегия за обучение на учителите през целия живот, която да отчита съвременните научни постижения в технологично- обогатеното обучение и новите теории за ученето. Препоръчва се изграждането на социални умения и компетенции, които са подходящи за работа в една Уеб 2.0 базирана учебна среда и с глобалния социален софтуер, да се включи в учебните планове и програми както на учениците, така и в курсовете за подготовка на учители.

Developing Students’ Mathematical Thinking and Algorithmic Culture in IT Classes

Report published in the Proceedings of the National Conference on "Education in the Information Society", Plovdiv, May, 2012

Advanced ICT based Training Methods

Report published in the Proceedings of the National Conference on "Education in the Information Society", Plovdiv, May, 2013

Achievements and Problems in the In-service Teacher Education in Inquiry Based Style

Report published in the Proceedings of the National Conference on "Education and Research in the Information Society", Plovdiv, May, 2015

Case-based reasoning enabling database mining for cryo-preserving algae applications

Case-based Reasoning's (CBR) origins were stimulated by a desire to understand how people remember information and are in turn reminded of information, and that subsequently it was recognized that people commonly solve problems by remembering how they solved similar problems in the past. Thus CBR became an appropriate way to find out the most suitable solution method for a new problem based on the old methods for the same or even similar problems. The research highlights how to use CBR to aid biologists in finding the best method to cryo preserve algae. The study found CBR could be used successfully to find the similarity percentage between the new algae and old cases in the case base. The prediction result showed approximately 93.75% accuracy, which proves the CBR system can offer appropriate recommendations for most situations. © 2011 IEEE.

Física do meio ambiente como disciplina nas licenciaturas em física: proposta de uma unidade didática para ensinar efeito estufa e aquecimento global

In this dissertation we propose a Teaching Unit of Physics to teach content through environmental discussions of the greenhouse effect and global warming. This teaching unit is based on a problem-methodological intervention from the application of the method of the Arch of Charles Maguerez. The methodological foundations of the thesis are embedded in action research and this is structured in five chapters: the first chapter deals with the Physical Environment (FMA) as a subject in Degree Courses in Physics in Brazil, bringing the concern of how this discipline has been taught. We started the first chapter explaining the reasons behind the inclusion of the discipline of Physical Environment in a Physics Degree Courses. Then we did a search on the websites of Institutions of Higher Education, to know of the existence or not of this discipline on curricular. We then analyzed the menus to see what bibliographies are being adopted and what content of Physics are being worked, and how it has been done. The courses surveyed were those of Federal and Federal Institutes Universities. Thus ended the first chapter. Given the inseparability between studies in Physics Teaching and studies on competencies, skills and significant learning, wrote the second chapter. In this chapter we discuss the challenge of converting information into knowledge. Initially on initial teacher training, because even if this is not our focus, the study is a discipline on the upper reaches, therefore, offered to future teachers. Then we talked about the culture of knowledge, where we emphasize the use of a teaching approach that promotes meanings taught by content and make sense to the student. We finished the third chapter, making some considerations on skills and abilities, in order to identify what skills and competencies were developed and worked during and after the implementation of Curriculum Unit. The third chapter is the result of a literature review and study of the radioactive EarthSun interaction. The subjects researched approach from the generation of energy in the sun to topics stain solar coronal mass ejections, solar wind, black body radiation, Wien displacement law, Stefan-Boltzmann Law, greenhouse effect and global warming. This chapter deals with material support for the teacher of the aforementioned discipline. The fourth chapter talks about the arc method of Charles Maguerez; Here we explain the structure of each of the five steps of the Arc and how to use them in teaching. We also show another version of this method adapted by Bordenave. In the fifth and final chapter brought a description of how the method of Arc was used in physics classes of Environment, with students majoring in Physics IFRN Campus Santa Cruz. Here, in this chapter, a transcript of classes to show how was the application of a problem-based methodology in the teaching of content proposed for Physics Teaching Unit from the environmental discussion about the greenhouse effect and global warming phenomena

Conhecimento da doença renal crônica entre médicos conforme as diretrizes práticas

INTRODUCTION: Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a global health problem, with increasing prevalence in its terminal stage and one of the factors that can contribute is the failure to recognize the disease and its risk factors. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the knowledge of medical residents (MR) and medical preceptors (MP) in hospitals in the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte in Natal-RN - Brazil, on the DRC, based on the policy of the Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO ). METHODS: Cross-sectional study where 64 MR (R1 = 32; R2 = 15; R3 = 17) and 63 MP answered a questionnaire divided into seven sessions that addressed aspects of the DRC since the setting up referral to a nephrologist. RESULTS: Only 20 participants (15.7%) reported using any guidelines for the management of CKD. The scores obtained by session were: Definition and classification (46.1 ± 47.8); Risk factors (70.5 ± 27.9); Laboratory evaluation (58.2 ± 8.8); Clinical action plan (57.6 ± 19.9); Reduction in proteinuria (68.3 ± 15.0); Complications (64.8 ± 19.9); Referral to a nephrologist (73.0 ± 44.6). There was a statistically significant difference between the knowledge of MR and MP in the sessions: Laboratory evaluation (MR 61.5 ± 8.4 vs 54.8 ± 7.9 MP; p <0.001); Reduction in proteinuria (73.1 ± 11.4 vs MR MP 63.5 ± 16.7; p <0.001) and Referral to a nephrologist (MR 81.2 ± 39.3 vs 64.5 ± 48.2 MP; p = 0.035). Among the MR, the R2 obtained the best score (63.9 ± 22.6 vs R1 R2 R3 71.9 ± 17.2 vs 63.5 ± 22.5, p = 0.445). It identified a low percentage of success of the doctors on the definition of CKD (MP = 46%; R1 = 40.6%; R2 = 60%; R3 = 52.9%; p = 0.623) and classification (MP = 34.9%; R1 = 53.1%, R2 = 60%; R3 = 52.9%; p = 0.158). CONCLUSION: The study showed that most doctors do not use any guidelines for clinical management of CKD and that there are gaps in knowledge on the subject, even among physicians who work in the university environment. In this sense, we propose the realization of mini-workshops for participants and students from boarding UFRN, using Case-Based Learning Strategy (CBL), with small group discussion, to strengthen the incorporation of CKD guidelines in undergraduate teaching and in clinical medical practice in general.

Conhecimento da doença renal crônica entre médicos conforme as diretrizes práticas

INTRODUCTION: Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a global health problem, with increasing prevalence in its terminal stage and one of the factors that can contribute is the failure to recognize the disease and its risk factors. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the knowledge of medical residents (MR) and medical preceptors (MP) in hospitals in the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte in Natal-RN - Brazil, on the DRC, based on the policy of the Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO ). METHODS: Cross-sectional study where 64 MR (R1 = 32; R2 = 15; R3 = 17) and 63 MP answered a questionnaire divided into seven sessions that addressed aspects of the DRC since the setting up referral to a nephrologist. RESULTS: Only 20 participants (15.7%) reported using any guidelines for the management of CKD. The scores obtained by session were: Definition and classification (46.1 ± 47.8); Risk factors (70.5 ± 27.9); Laboratory evaluation (58.2 ± 8.8); Clinical action plan (57.6 ± 19.9); Reduction in proteinuria (68.3 ± 15.0); Complications (64.8 ± 19.9); Referral to a nephrologist (73.0 ± 44.6). There was a statistically significant difference between the knowledge of MR and MP in the sessions: Laboratory evaluation (MR 61.5 ± 8.4 vs 54.8 ± 7.9 MP; p <0.001); Reduction in proteinuria (73.1 ± 11.4 vs MR MP 63.5 ± 16.7; p <0.001) and Referral to a nephrologist (MR 81.2 ± 39.3 vs 64.5 ± 48.2 MP; p = 0.035). Among the MR, the R2 obtained the best score (63.9 ± 22.6 vs R1 R2 R3 71.9 ± 17.2 vs 63.5 ± 22.5, p = 0.445). It identified a low percentage of success of the doctors on the definition of CKD (MP = 46%; R1 = 40.6%; R2 = 60%; R3 = 52.9%; p = 0.623) and classification (MP = 34.9%; R1 = 53.1%, R2 = 60%; R3 = 52.9%; p = 0.158). CONCLUSION: The study showed that most doctors do not use any guidelines for clinical management of CKD and that there are gaps in knowledge on the subject, even among physicians who work in the university environment. In this sense, we propose the realization of mini-workshops for participants and students from boarding UFRN, using Case-Based Learning Strategy (CBL), with small group discussion, to strengthen the incorporation of CKD guidelines in undergraduate teaching and in clinical medical practice in general.

Stimulus Integration and Parsing in the Primate Auditory Midbrain

Integrating information from multiple sources is a crucial function of the brain. Examples of such integration include multiple stimuli of different modalties, such as visual and auditory, multiple stimuli of the same modality, such as auditory and auditory, and integrating stimuli from the sensory organs (i.e. ears) with stimuli delivered from brain-machine interfaces.

The overall aim of this body of work is to empirically examine stimulus integration in these three domains to inform our broader understanding of how and when the brain combines information from multiple sources.

First, I examine visually-guided auditory, a problem with implications for the general problem in learning of how the brain determines what lesson to learn (and what lessons not to learn). For example, sound localization is a behavior that is partially learned with the aid of vision. This process requires correctly matching a visual location to that of a sound. This is an intrinsically circular problem when sound location is itself uncertain and the visual scene is rife with possible visual matches. Here, we develop a simple paradigm using visual guidance of sound localization to gain insight into how the brain confronts this type of circularity. We tested two competing hypotheses. 1: The brain guides sound location learning based on the synchrony or simultaneity of auditory-visual stimuli, potentially involving a Hebbian associative mechanism. 2: The brain uses a ‘guess and check’ heuristic in which visual feedback that is obtained after an eye movement to a sound alters future performance, perhaps by recruiting the brain’s reward-related circuitry. We assessed the effects of exposure to visual stimuli spatially mismatched from sounds on performance of an interleaved auditory-only saccade task. We found that when humans and monkeys were provided the visual stimulus asynchronously with the sound but as feedback to an auditory-guided saccade, they shifted their subsequent auditory-only performance toward the direction of the visual cue by 1.3-1.7 degrees, or 22-28% of the original 6 degree visual-auditory mismatch. In contrast when the visual stimulus was presented synchronously with the sound but extinguished too quickly to provide this feedback, there was little change in subsequent auditory-only performance. Our results suggest that the outcome of our own actions is vital to localizing sounds correctly. Contrary to previous expectations, visual calibration of auditory space does not appear to require visual-auditory associations based on synchrony/simultaneity.

My next line of research examines how electrical stimulation of the inferior colliculus influences perception of sounds in a nonhuman primate. The central nucleus of the inferior colliculus is the major ascending relay of auditory information before it reaches the forebrain, and thus an ideal target for understanding low-level information processing prior to the forebrain, as almost all auditory signals pass through the central nucleus of the inferior colliculus before reaching the forebrain. Thus, the inferior colliculus is the ideal structure to examine to understand the format of the inputs into the forebrain and, by extension, the processing of auditory scenes that occurs in the brainstem. Therefore, the inferior colliculus was an attractive target for understanding stimulus integration in the ascending auditory pathway.

Moreover, understanding the relationship between the auditory selectivity of neurons and their contribution to perception is critical to the design of effective auditory brain prosthetics. These prosthetics seek to mimic natural activity patterns to achieve desired perceptual outcomes. We measured the contribution of inferior colliculus (IC) sites to perception using combined recording and electrical stimulation. Monkeys performed a frequency-based discrimination task, reporting whether a probe sound was higher or lower in frequency than a reference sound. Stimulation pulses were paired with the probe sound on 50% of trials (0.5-80 µA, 100-300 Hz, n=172 IC locations in 3 rhesus monkeys). Electrical stimulation tended to bias the animals’ judgments in a fashion that was coarsely but significantly correlated with the best frequency of the stimulation site in comparison to the reference frequency employed in the task. Although there was considerable variability in the effects of stimulation (including impairments in performance and shifts in performance away from the direction predicted based on the site’s response properties), the results indicate that stimulation of the IC can evoke percepts correlated with the frequency tuning properties of the IC. Consistent with the implications of recent human studies, the main avenue for improvement for the auditory midbrain implant suggested by our findings is to increase the number and spatial extent of electrodes, to increase the size of the region that can be electrically activated and provide a greater range of evoked percepts.

My next line of research employs a frequency-tagging approach to examine the extent to which multiple sound sources are combined (or segregated) in the nonhuman primate inferior colliculus. In the single-sound case, most inferior colliculus neurons respond and entrain to sounds in a very broad region of space, and many are entirely spatially insensitive, so it is unknown how the neurons will respond to a situation with more than one sound. I use multiple AM stimuli of different frequencies, which the inferior colliculus represents using a spike timing code. This allows me to measure spike timing in the inferior colliculus to determine which sound source is responsible for neural activity in an auditory scene containing multiple sounds. Using this approach, I find that the same neurons that are tuned to broad regions of space in the single sound condition become dramatically more selective in the dual sound condition, preferentially entraining spikes to stimuli from a smaller region of space. I will examine the possibility that there may be a conceptual linkage between this finding and the finding of receptive field shifts in the visual system.

In chapter 5, I will comment on these findings more generally, compare them to existing theoretical models, and discuss what these results tell us about processing in the central nervous system in a multi-stimulus situation. My results suggest that the brain is flexible in its processing and can adapt its integration schema to fit the available cues and the demands of the task.