‘What else can I do?’ Radical suggestions to help physical education teachers successfully implement a game based approach to teach games

As with any new relationship when teachers implement a different or unfamiliar pedagogical approach into the classroom it is often accompanied by a period of unaccustomed behaviour; such as a reluctance for teachers to commit or a wariness from learners to invest or reveal. The challenges that teachers and learners face in the initial stages of this new relationship, if overcome, can be the mainstays of a mutually beneficial learning experience. Yet, as many teachers have experienced, the reverse of this is also true. Failure to adequately invest, plan and commit to the introduction of a new pedagogical approach can bring with it long term consequences that include an unwillingness to ever start a new relationship again.

Family control, board independence and earnings management : evidence based on Hong Kong firms

In this study, we document that independent corporate boards of Hong Kong firms provide effective monitoring of earnings management, which suggests that despite differences in institutional environments, corporate board independence is important to ensure high-quality financial reporting. The findings also show that the monitoring effectiveness of corporate boards is moderated in family-controlled firms, either through ownership concentration or the presence of family members on corporate boards. The results based on firms reporting small earnings increases provide additional support for our finding that the monitoring effectiveness of independent corporate boards is moderated in family-controlled firms.

Psychosocial issues in evidence-based guidelines on inflammatory bowel diseases: a review.

AIM: To study statements and recommendations on psychosocial issues as presented in international evidence-based guidelines on the management of inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD). METHODS: MEDLINE, guidelines International Network, National Guideline Clearing House and National Institute for Health and Care Excellence were searched from January 2006 to June 30, 2013 for evidence-based guidelines on the management of IBD. RESULTS: The search yielded 364 hits. Thirteen guidelines were included in the review, of which three were prepared in Asia, eight in Europe and two in the United States. Eleven guidelines made statements and recommendations on psychosocial issues. The guidelines were concordant in that mental health disorders and stress do not contribute to the aetiology of IBD, but that they can influence its course. It was recommended that IBD-patients should be screened for psychological distress. If indicated, psychotherapy and/or psychopharmacological therapy should be recommended. IBD-centres should collaborate with mental health care specialists. Tobacco smoking patients with Crohn's disease should be advised to quit. CONCLUSION: Patients and mental health specialists should be able to participate in future guideline groups to contribute to establishing recommendations on psychosocial issues in IBD. Future guidelines should acknowledge the presence of psychosocial problems in IBD-patients and encourage screening for psychological distress.

An Examination of the merits of a human rights-based approach to higher education teaching and learning, compared with welfare and market-based approaches.

The thesis concludes that a human rights-based approach to higher education will produce better teaching and learning outcomes than welfare state or market-based approaches. It is intended that this research might influence an improvement in policy-making, identify a ‘feasible utopia’ for higher education, and contribute to discussion about the public interest role of higher education.

Evidence-based learning: Interactive, online EBP modules for first year nursing. A case study

Deakin University Library designed a series of six modules to provide interactive, online learning for a first year nursing unit, Understanding Research Evidence. The modules were developed in response to the changing learning requirements of students in the digital age. Delivered using Smart Sparrow software, the modules were designed to assist students in the development and consolidation of their understandings of evidence-based practice (EBP).The development of the modules represents a shift from unilateral communication to interactive content. Previously, online support had largely consisted of static material that was not presented in the context of curriculum. The Library has now developed integrated content that allows for interactivity, but which may also be customised for other purposes or units across all health disciplines.Feedback and data collected from the modules indicate an encouraging degree of engagement with the content. Data also allows the Library to ensure the continuous improvement of the modules. Library staff have also reported on their improved capacity and confidence in creating learning experiences that integrate core information and digital literacy competencies with students' curriculum. Staff also report improvements in their ability to use technologies to create online learning objects.

Integration of process planning and scheduling using mobile-agent based approach in a networked manufacturing environment

Effective and efficient implementation of intelligent and/or recently emerged networked manufacturing systems require an enterprise level integration. The networked manufacturing offers several advantages in the current competitive atmosphere by way to reduce, by shortening manufacturing cycle time and maintaining the production flexibility thereby achieving several feasible process plans. The first step in this direction is to integrate manufacturing functions such as process planning and scheduling for multi-jobs in a network based manufacturing system. It is difficult to determine a proper plan that meets conflicting objectives simultaneously. This paper describes a mobile-agent based negotiation approach to integrate manufacturing functions in a distributed manner; and its fundamental framework and functions are presented. Moreover, ontology has been constructed by using the Protégé software which possesses the flexibility to convert knowledge into Extensible Markup Language (XML) schema of Web Ontology Language (OWL) documents. The generated XML schemas have been used to transfer information throughout the manufacturing network for the intelligent interoperable integration of product data models and manufacturing resources. To validate the feasibility of the proposed approach, an illustrative example along with varied production environments that includes production demand fluctuations is presented and compared the proposed approach performance and its effectiveness with evolutionary algorithm based Hybrid Dynamic-DNA (HD-DNA) algorithm. The results show that the proposed scheme is very effective and reasonably acceptable for integration of manufacturing functions.

Using an evidence-based online module to improve parents’ ability to manage their child with Developmental Coordination Disorder

Background : Developmental coordination disorder (DCD) is a prevalent neurodevelopmental disorder. Best practices include raising parents’ awareness and building capacity but few interventions incorporating these best practices are documented. Objective : To examine whether an evidence-based online module can increase the perceived knowledge and skills of parents of children with DCD, and lead to behavioural changes when managing their child’s health condition. Methods : A mixed-methods, before-after-follow-up design guided by the theory of planned behaviour was employed. Data about the knowledge, skills and behaviours of parents of children with DCD were collected using questionnaires prior to completing the module, immediately after, and three months later. One-way repeated measures ANOVAs and thematic analyses were performed on data as appropriate. Results : Fifty-eight participants completed all questionnaires. There was a significant effect of time on self-reported knowledge [F(2.00,114.00)=16.37, p=0.00] and skills [F(1.81,103.03)=51.37, p=0.00] with higher post- and follow-up scores than pre-intervention scores. Thirty-seven (65%) participants reported an intention to change behaviour postintervention; 29 (50%) participants had tried recommended strategies at follow-up. Three themes emerged to describe parents’ behavioural change: sharing information, trialing strategies and changing attitudes. Factors influencing parents’ ability to implement these behavioural changes included clear recommendations, time, and ‘right’ attitude. Perceived outcomes associated with the parental behavioural changes involved improvement in well-being for the children at school, at home, and for the family as a whole. Conclusions : The online module increased parents’ self-reported knowledge and skills in DCD management. Future research should explore its impacts on children’s outcomes long-term.

Using an evidence-based online module to improve parents’ ability to manage their child with Developmental Coordination Disorder

Background : Developmental coordination disorder (DCD) is a prevalent neurodevelopmental disorder. Best practices include raising parents’ awareness and building capacity but few interventions incorporating these best practices are documented. Objective : To examine whether an evidence-based online module can increase the perceived knowledge and skills of parents of children with DCD, and lead to behavioral changes when managing their child’s health condition. Methods : A mixed-methods, before-after design guided by the theory of planned behavior was employed. Data about the knowledge, skills and behaviors of parents of children with DCD were collected using questionnaires prior to completing the module, immediately after, and three months later. Paired T-tests, sensitivity analyses and thematic analyses were performed on data as appropriate. Results: One hundred-sixteen, 81 and 58 participants respectively completed the three questionnaires. For knowledge and skills, post- and follow-up scores were significantly higher than baseline scores (p<0.01). Fifty-two (64%) participants reported an intention to change behavior post-intervention and 29 (50%) participants had tried recommended strategies at follow-up. Three themes emerged to describe parents’ behavioral change: sharing information, trialing strategies and changing attitudes. Factors influencing parents’ ability to implement these behavioral changes included clear recommendations, time, and ‘right’ attitude. Perceived outcomes associated with the parental behavioral changes involved improvement in well-being for the children at school, at home, and for the family as a whole. Conclusions : The online module increased parents’ self-reported knowledge and skills in DCD management. Future research should explore its impacts on children’s long-term outcomes.

A Case-Based Approach to Nosocomial Infection Detection

The nosocomial infections are a growing concern because they affect a large number of people and they increase the admission time in healthcare facilities. Additionally, its diagnosis is very tricky, requiring multiple medical exams. So, this work is focused on the development of a clinical decision support system to prevent these events from happening. The proposed solution is unique once it caters for the explicit treatment of incomplete, unknown, or even contradictory information under a logic programming basis, that to our knowledge is something that happens for the first time.

A Case Based approach to assess Waiting Time Prediction at an Intensive Care Unity

Waiting time at an intensive care unity stands for a key feature in the assessment of healthcare quality. Nevertheless, its estimation is a difficult task, not only due to the different factors with intricate relations among them, but also with respect to the available data, which may be incomplete, self-contradictory or even unknown. However, its prediction not only improves the patients’ satisfaction but also enhance the quality of the healthcare being provided. To fulfill this goal, this work aims at the development of a decision support system that allows one to predict how long a patient should remain at an emergency unit, having into consideration all the remarks that were just stated above. It is built on top of a Logic Programming approach to knowledge representation and reasoning, complemented with a Case Base approach to computing.

Age Prediction through Pelvis X-Ray Images - A Case Based approach to Problem Solving

It is well known that the dimensions of the pelvic bones depend on the gender and vary with the age of the individual. Indeed, and as a matter of fact, this work will focus on the development of an intelligent decision support system to predict individual’s age based on pelvis’ dimensions criteria. On the one hand, some basic image processing technics were applied in order to extract the relevant features from pelvic X-rays. On the other hand, the computational framework presented here was built on top of a Logic Programming approach to knowledge representation and reasoning, that caters for the handling of incomplete, unknown, or even self-contradictory information, complemented with a Case Base approach to computing.

Assessing the role of Mediterranean evergreen oaks canopy cover in land surface albedo and temperature using a remote sensing-based approach

Modifications in vegetation cover can have an impact on the climate through changes in biogeochemical and biogeophysical processes. In this paper, the tree canopy cover percentage of a savannah-like ecosystem (montado/dehesa) was estimated at Landsat pixel level for 2011, and the role of different canopy cover percentages on land surface albedo (LSA) and land surface temperature (LST) were analysed. A modelling procedure using a SGB machine-learning algorithm and Landsat 5-TM spectral bands and derived vegetation indices as explanatory variables, showed that the estimation of montado canopy cover was obtained with good agreement (R2 = 78.4%). Overall, montado canopy cover estimations showed that low canopy cover class (MT_1) is the most representative with 50.63% of total montado area. MODIS LSA and LST products were used to investigate the magnitude of differences in mean annual LSA and LST values between contrasting montado canopy cover percentages. As a result, it was found a significant statistical relationship between montado canopy cover percentage and mean annual surface albedo (R2 = 0.866, p < 0.001) and surface temperature (R2 = 0.942, p < 0.001). The comparisons between the four contrasting montado canopy cover classes showed marked differences in LSA (χ2 = 192.17, df = 3, p < 0.001) and LST (χ2 = 318.18, df = 3, p < 0.001). The highest montado canopy cover percentage (MT_4) generally had lower albedo than lowest canopy cover class, presenting a difference of −11.2% in mean annual albedo values. It was also showed that MT_4 and MT_3 are the cooler canopy cover classes, and MT_2 and MT_1 the warmer, where MT_1 class had a difference of 3.42 °C compared with MT_4 class. Overall, this research highlighted the role that potential changes in montado canopy cover may play in local land surface albedo and temperature variations, as an increase in these two biogeophysical parameters may potentially bring about, in the long term, local/regional climatic changes moving towards greater aridity.

Expenditure pattern analysis of cultural tourists at World Heritage Sites: an empirical evidence based on CHAID analysis

Nowadays, World Heritage Sites (WHS) have been facing new challenges, partially due to a different tourism consumption patterns. As it is highlighted in a considerable amount of studies, visits to these sites are almost justified by this prestigious classification and motivations are closely associated with their cultural aspects and quality of the overall environment (among others, Marujo et al, 2012). However, a diversity of tourists’ profiles have been underlined in the literature. Starting from the results obtained in a previous study about cultural tourists’ profile, conducted during the year 2009 in the city of Évora, Portugal, it is our intend to compare the results with a recent survey applied to the visitors of the same city. Recognition of Évora by UNESCO in 1986 as “World Heritage” has fostered not only the preservation of heritage but also the tourist promotion of the town. This study compares and examined tourists’ profile, regarding from the tourists’ expenditure patterns in Évora. A total of 450 surveys were distributed in 2009, and recently, in 2015, the same numbers of surveys were collected. Chi-squared Automatic Interaction Detection (CHAID) was applied to model consumer patterns of domestic and international visitors, based on socio demographic, trip characteristics, length of stay and the degree of satisfaction of pull factors. CHAID allowed find a population classification in groups that able to describe the dependent variable, average daily tourist expenditure. Results revealed different patterns of daily average expenditure amongst the years, 2009 and 2015, even if primarily results not revealed significant variations in socio-demographic and trip characteristics among the visitors’ core profile. Local authorities should be aware of this changing expensive behavior of cultural visitors and should formulate strategies accordingly. Policy and managerial recommendations are discussed.

Expenditure pattern analysis of cultural tourists at World Heritage Sites: empirical evidence based on CHAID analysis

This study investigates tourists’ expenditure patterns in the city of Évora, a world heritage site (WHS) classified by UNESCO. The use of chi-squared automatic interaction detection (CHAID) was chosen, allowing the identification of distinct segments based on expenditure patterns. Visitors’ expenditure patterns have proven to be a pertinent element for a broader understanding of visitors’ behaviour at cultural destinations. Visitors’ expenditure patterns were revealed to be increasing within years studied.

Semi-automatic keyword based approach for FIRE 2016 Microblog Track

This paper describes our semi-automatic keyword based approach for the four topics of Information Extraction from Microblogs Posted during Disasters task at Forum for Information Retrieval Evaluation (FIRE) 2016. The approach consists three phases.