Microteaching Lesson Study: Mentor interaction structure and its relation to elementary preservice mathematics teacher knowledge development

This study investigated Microteaching Lesson Study (MLS) and three possible MLS mentor interaction structures during the debriefing sessions in relation to elementary preservice teacher development of knowledge for teaching. One hundred three elementary preservice teachers enrolled in five different sections of a mathematics methods course at a southern urban university were part of the study. This included 72 participants who completed MLS across three different mentor interaction structures as part of their course requirements and 31 elementary preservice teachers who did not complete MLS as part of their methods course and served as a comparison group for a portion of the study. A sequential mixed-methods research design was used to analyze the relationship between MLS mentor interaction structure and growth in preservice teachers' mathematics teacher knowledge. Data sources included pre and post assessments, group developed lesson plans and final reports, a feedback survey with Likert-type and open-ended questions, and transcripts of audio-recorded debriefing sessions. The pre and post assessments were analyzed using Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and descriptive statistics were used to analyze the Likert-type feedback survey questions. Group MLS lesson plans, final reports, and transcripts of debriefing sessions along with the open-ended questions from the feedback survey were coded in a three-step process as described by Miles and Huberman (1994). In alignment with findings from M. Fernandez (2005, 2010), elementary preservice teachers participating in MLS grew in content knowledge related to MLS topics taught by one another. Results from the analysis of pre and post content knowledge assessments revealed that participants grew in their understanding of the mathematics topics taught during MLS irrespective of their mentor interaction structure and when compared to the participants who did not complete MLS in their methods course. Findings from the analysis of lesson plans for growth in pedagogical content knowledge revealed the most growth in this area occurred for participants assigned to the interaction structure in which the MLS mentor participated in the first two debriefing sessions. Analysis of the transcripts of the discourse during the debriefing sessions and the feedback surveys support the finding that the elementary preservice teachers assigned to the interaction structure in which the MLS mentor participated in the first and second debriefing sessions benefited more from the MLS experience when compared to elementary preservice teachers assigned to the other two interaction structures (MLS mentor participated in only the first debriefing session and MLS mentor participated in only the last debriefing session).

Making and Evaluating Strategy: Learning from the Military

Use of military analogy is rampant and considered an acceptable part of business vernacular. However, analogies only illustrate, and bad analogies make bad strategy. There are important lessons to be learned from military strategy, though. This article identifies "the ten principles of strategy" that corporate strategists could utilize in testing their strategic theories, concepts, and plans.

Gas-cushioned droplet impacts with a thin layer of porous media

Peer reviewed

Gas-cushioned droplet impacts with a thin layer of porous media

Peer reviewed

Number comparison and number ordering as predictors of arithmetic performance in adults: Exploring the link between the two skills, and investigating the question of domain-specificity.

Recent evidence has highlighted the important role that number ordering skills play in arithmetic abilities (e.g., Lyons & Beilock, 2011). In fact, Lyons et al. (2014) demonstrated that although at the start of formal mathematics education number comparison skills are the best predictors of arithmetic performance, from around the age of 10, number ordering skills become the strongest numerical predictors of arithmetic abilities. In the current study we demonstrated that number comparison and ordering skills were both significantly related to arithmetic performance in adults, and the effect size was greater in the case of ordering skills. Additionally, we found that the effect of number comparison skills on arithmetic performance was partially mediated by number ordering skills. Moreover, performance on comparison and ordering tasks involving the months of the year was also strongly correlated with arithmetic skills, and participants displayed similar (canonical or reverse) distance effects on the comparison and ordering tasks involving months as when the tasks included numbers. This suggests that the processes responsible for the link between comparison and ordering skills and arithmetic performance are not specific to the domain of numbers. Finally, a factor analysis indicated that performance on comparison and ordering tasks loaded on a factor which included performance on a number line task and self-reported spatial thinking styles. These results substantially extend previous research on the role of order processing abilities in mental arithmetic.

Understanding the Context of L&D

Chapter 2 recognises the important role that context plays in shaping the new directions of L&D professionals. In this chapter, Robin Bell and I discuss how L&D’s role is significantly influenced by contextual factors such as the external environment, organizational life-cycle and size, business/ industry of the organization, organizational goals and senior management’s view of strategy. Irrespective of L&D’s influence on organizational strategy, which varies amongst organizations e.g. whether L&D is a ‘scope maker’ (involved in helping to set direction) or ‘scope taker’ (involved in implementation after the direction has been set), understanding the context they operate within is crucial. This chapter discusses the sources and nature of change, and its impact on industry and organizations’ business model. We also discuss how this has influenced the general nature of work, the workforce, and ultimately, their learning and development.

Uma abordagem evolucionária e espacial para o jogo da autorregulação de processos de trocas sociais em sistemas multiagentes

Interações sociais são frequentemente descritas como trocas sociais. Na literatura, trocas sociais em Sistemas Multiagentes são objeto de estudo em diversos contextos, nos quais as relações sociais são interpretadas como trocas sociais. Dentre os problemas estudados, um problema fundamental discutido na literatura e a regulação¸ ao de trocas sociais, por exemplo, a emergência de trocas equilibradas ao longo do tempo levando ao equilíbrio social e/ou comportamento de equilíbrio/justiça. Em particular, o problema da regulação de trocas sociais e difícil quando os agentes tem informação incompleta sobre as estratégias de troca dos outros agentes, especificamente se os agentes tem diferentes estratégias de troca. Esta dissertação de mestrado propõe uma abordagem para a autorregulacao de trocas sociais em sistemas multiagentes, baseada na Teoria dos Jogos. Propõe o modelo de Jogo de Autorregulacão ao de Processos de Trocas Sociais (JAPTS), em uma versão evolutiva e espacial, onde os agentes organizados em uma rede complexa, podem evoluir suas diferentes estratégias de troca social. As estratégias de troca são definidas através dos parâmetros de uma função de fitness. Analisa-se a possibilidade do surgimento do comportamento de equilíbrio quando os agentes, tentando maximizar sua adaptação através da função de fitness, procuram aumentar o numero de interações bem sucedidas. Considera-se um jogo de informação incompleta, uma vez que os agentes não tem informações sobre as estratégias de outros agentes. Para o processo de aprendizado de estratégias, utiliza-se um algoritmo evolutivo, no qual os agentes visando maximizar a sua função de fitness, atuam como autorregulares dos processos de trocas possibilitadas pelo jogo, contribuindo para o aumento do numero de interações bem sucedidas. São analisados 5 diferentes casos de composição da sociedade. Para alguns casos, analisa-se também um segundo tipo de cenário, onde a topologia de rede é modificada, representando algum tipo de mobilidade, a fim de analisar se os resultados são dependentes da vizinhança. Alem disso, um terceiro cenário é estudado, no qual é se determinada uma política de influencia, quando as medias dos parâmetros que definem as estratégias adotadas pelos agentes tornam-se publicas em alguns momentos da simulação, e os agentes que adotam a mesma estratégia de troca, influenciados por isso, imitam esses valores. O modelo foi implementado em NetLogo.

Patterns of Play in the Fast attack of F. C. Barcelona, Manchester United and F. C. Internazionale Milano: a Mixed Method Approach

This study aimed to detect and analyse regular patterns of play in fast attack of football teams, through the combination of the sequential analysis technique and semi-structured interviews to experienced first League Portuguese coaches. The sample included 36 games (12 games of the respective national leagues per team) of the F.C. Barcelona, Inter Milan, and Manchester United teams that were coded with the observational instrument tool developed by Sarmento et al. (2010) and the data analysed through sequential analysis with the software SDIS-GSEQ 5.0. Based on the detected patterns, semi-structured interviews were carried out to 8 expert high-performance football coaches and data were analysed through the content analysis technique using the software NVivo 10. The detected patterns of play revealed specific characteristics of the teams under study. The combination of the results of sequential analysis with the qualitative interviews to the professional coaches proved to be very fruitful in this game the analysis of scope, allowing reconcile scientific knowledge with practical interpretation of coaches who develop their tasks in the field.

“Am i really all the things that are outside of me?” - Estudo correlacional sobre persistência pessoal e vinculação

Dissertação de Mestrado apresentada ao Instituto Superior de Psicologia Aplicada para obtenção de grau de Mestre na especialidade de Psicologia Clínica.

Nonlinear development of matrix-converter instabilities

Matrix converters convert a three-phase alternating-current power supply to a power supply of a different peak voltage and frequency, and are an emerging technology in a wide variety of applications. However, they are susceptible to an instability, whose behaviour is examined herein. The desired “steady-state” mode of operation of the matrix converter becomes unstable in a Hopf bifurcation as the output/input voltage transfer ratio, q, is increased through some threshold value, qc. Through weakly nonlinear analysis and direct numerical simulation of an averaged model, we show that this bifurcation is subcritical for typical parameter values, leading to hysteresis in the transition to the oscillatory state: there may thus be undesirable large-amplitude oscillations in the output voltages even when q is below the linear stability threshold value qc.

Gestão sustentável de resíduos sólidos em grandes eventos : Rio+20 e jogos olímpicos de Londres

Dissertação (mestrado)—Universidade de Brasília, Centro de Desenvolvimento Sustentável, 2015

Steps to success : family-friendly guide for third grade : mathematics

This document is designed to: provide examples of the standards, skills, and knowledge your child will learn in mathematics and should be able to do upon exiting third grade ; suggest activities on how you can help your child at home ; offer additional resources for information and help.

One-dimensional Model for Fluids of Third-grade in Tubes with Constant Radius

Our goal in this paper is to extend previous results obtained for Newtonian and secondgrade fluids to third-grade fluids in the case of an axisymmetric, straight, rigid and impermeable tube with constant cross-section using a one-dimensional hierarchical model based on the Cosserat theory related to fluid dynamics. In this way we can reduce the full threedimensional system of equations for the axisymmetric unsteady motion of a non-Newtonian incompressible third-grade fluid to a system of equations depending on time and on a single spatial variable. Some numerical simulations for the volume flow rate and the the wall shear stress are presented.

Mathematics and fiber arts

Mathematics can be found all over the world, even in what could be considered an unrelated area, like fiber arts. In knitting, crochet, and counted-thread embroidery, we can find concepts of algebra, graph theory, number theory, geometry of transformations, and symmetry, as well as computer science. For example, many fiber art pieces embody notions related with groups of symmetry. In this work, we focus on two areas of Mathematics associated with knitting, crochet, and cross-stitch works – number theory and geometry of transformations.