This study examined the influence of a professional development project on the process of change experienced by four veteran physical education teachers. This study was part of a larger study that included all of the physical educators within an entire school district. The information shared here is from a sub-group of teachers who taught primary-age students. The professional development project was content-based, situated in classroom practice, sustained over time, focused on the design and implementation of standards-based content and assessment into physical education classroom practice. A qualitative methodology was used to investigate the process of change experienced by these teachers before, during, and after participating in this project. Findings were based on project conversations, interviews, multiple classroom observations, questionnaires, and document analysis of materials produced during the project and in the classrooms of these four veteran physical education teachers throughout the three-year span of the project. It was found that the participants changed their thoughts and practices regarding content, instruction, and assessment in an interconnected non-linear manner. Changes include: student learning became a predominant instructional goal; standards were viewed as a planning tool; and assessment for and of student learning became important. Perceptions of self as professional changed from feelings of marginalization to being an important and valued member of their schools. Four major conclusions were drawn from the findings about the features of the professional development project. These are: (a) teaching is an isolated enterprise, and the social context of this project supported change; (b) learning to teach as a situated endeavor and by situating the project in the context of classroom physical education supports change; (c) adequate resources to maintain a sustained focus during implementation of practices supported change; (d) incompatibility of teacher knowledge and beliefs with the intentions of the professional development personnel inhibited change. / Ph. D.

Ankle taping and bracing are important components in the world of sports medicine and athletic training. There are different types of tape that are used for athletes by athletic trainers. However, little research has compared the performance of Kinesio™ Tape and an ASO ankle brace on a lateral grade I ankle sprain. The purpose of this study was to determine if there are therapeutic effects of Kinesio™ tape on a grade I lateral ankle sprain, using an ASO as the control group. The gold standard protocol for a grade I lateral ankle sprain is an ASO ankle brace.Twenty five students from 9 different high schools in 2 sister counties participated in the study. These students were all athletes, who suffered a grade I lateral ankle sprain. Twelve student-athletes were in the Kinesio™ tape group and thirteen of the student-athletes were in the ASO brace group, also known as the control group. The student-athletes completed five functional tests; Single Leg Stance, Single Leg Squat, Single leg Hop, Box Drill , and the Illinois Test, at each of the three sessions 0, 4, and 8 weeks.Results found there was no significant difference between the Kinesio™ tape group and the ASO™ ankle brace group when it came to pain level, single leg hop for distance, the box drill or the Illinois test, when tested at three different times; week 0, week 4, and week 8. However, results showed that there was a significant difference between the two groups on the single leg squat test. It was determined that the control group also known as the ASO™ ankle brace group, were able to perform more squats at week 4 and week 8, than the treatment groups also known as the Kinesio™ Tape group. / Ph. D.

In Part 1 of this thesis the interaction of personality variables in predicting risk of disordered eating is examined. Shyness and an interaction between neuroticism and introversion were found to increase risk of disordered eating in independent university samples. These findings highlight a potential genetic susceptibility to eating pathology by demonstrating similar personality vulnerabilities in clinical eating disorders, as in nonclinical disordered eating. However, the implications and generalizations that can be drawn from these first two studies are limited by the equivocal relationship between disordered eating and eating disorders. Part 2 of the thesis examines the continuum theory of eating disorders. A theoretical hypothesis is introduced and offers a framework for thinking of thoughts separate from behaviours. Through a review ofexisting literature, it is noted that eating disorder thoughts are far more prevalent than the behaviours, and while the thoughts can occur independent of the behaviours, behaviours are necessarily tied to pathological thoughts. Preliminary empirical support for this hypothesis is presented by modeling eating disorder thoughts and behaviours as distinct latent constructs in a confirmatory factor analysis using data from a large sample of university females. Frequency analyses of eating disorder thoughts and behaviours offered support for the argument that eating disorder symptoms are not normally distributed across non-clinical settings. As predicted, thoughts occurred independent of the behaviours, and behaviours occurred only in conjunction with thoughts. The interaction of eating disorder thoughts with eating disorder behaviours provided the most robust predictor of psychopathology, although the relative contribution of thoughts and behaviours to psychopathology was not equivalent. These results were replicated in a national epidemiological sample offemales ages 15 to 34 years, and the findings were consistent with results from the university sample. Behaviours were more consistently associated with psychopathology in both the university sample and the national sample. The contribution of this thesis to the field of epidemiological research in eating disorders is through the recommendation that screening instruments use behaviours to identify cases and a high threshold of thoughts in risk assessment. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Measuring the participation of young children is important in informing their health and well being and designing rehabilitation services. To our knowledge, there are no participation measures that have been developed or adapted to the Singapore context. The Young Children’s Participation and Environment Measure (YC-PEM) was developed in North America and its content may not be relevant to the Singapore context. Three studies were conducted to culturally adapt and validate the YC-PEM with children with and without developmental needs in Singapore. These studies involved (1) adapting the YC-PEM culturally based on interviews with 10 service providers and 10 parents, (2) evaluating the psychometric properties of the adapted YC-PEM with 151 children with and without developmental needs in Singapore and, (3) examining the validity and utility of the YC-PEM to describe and compare the participation patterns between children with and without developmental needs in their childcare/preschool and community environments. The outcome of this dissertation is a culturally relevant and validated YC-PEM (Singapore) for young children with and without developmental needs, aged 0 to 7 years old. The YC-PEM (Singapore) could be used by service providers to provide participation-focused intervention and researchers to implement population-based research to improve the participation of young children in Singapore. New knowledge has been developed through the cultural adaption process of the YC-PEM. Firstly, it is important to adapt instruments culturally before they are used in a new culture, even when language translation is not required. Secondly, cognitive interviews were found to be useful in the cultural adaption process. Thirdly, participation and perceived environmental support differences were found between children with and without developmental needs in Singapore as well as children between Singapore and America. Cultural influences such as the society’s political agenda and parental beliefs were hypothesized to have potential influence on the participation of young children. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Aside from a change in their physical environment from home to a long-term care facility, most clients with dementia in a long-term care (LTC) setting experience an advanced level of degenerative change in both cognitive and body functions, which leads to increasing challenges in engagement in occupation. To analyze their occupational performance, establish therapy goals, and measure the outcomes of intervention, occupational therapy practitioners use assessment tools in the therapy process (American Occupational Therapy Association [AOTA], 2014). However, there is the significant mismatch between existing assessment tools and the clinical need to properly capture functional progress in residents with dementia in a LTC setting. Therefore, this project introduces the FPM-D, which was specifically designed for residents with moderate to moderately severe dementia in LTC facilities. To maximize the usefulness of this new instrument, the author reviewed previous attempts made to address the need and obtained feedback from current occupational therapy practitioners in this setting. This new assessment tool is 1) designed to assess the function of clients with dementia; 2) has a progress-tracking feature with different timelines; 3) takes less than 15 minutes for administration; 4) allows customization of target activities, 5) includes only items appropriate for a LTC setting; and 6) assesses both cognitive and physical aspects of function based on the Cognitive Model in occupational therapy practice (Lazzarini, 2005). Along with the development process, this project includes plans for evaluation and dissemination. The follow-up study for evaluation aims to investigate the usefulness of the instrument in the LTC clinical setting and dissemination activities focus on disseminating this innovation in occupational therapy practice. The author believes that this new instrument will make a positive contribution to the quality of occupational therapy services in LTC facilities by effectively meeting the clinical needs of residents with dementia.

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Sampling in onarm production environments presents challenges that must be considered when doing hazard analysis. The sensitivity and specificity of the test used and the sample types chosen will have an impact on the food safety outcome and food safety decisions made during the interpretation of results. In this work, broiler houses were sampled for the presence of Salmonella spp. using two different sampling strategies and four different microbiological isolation procedures. The study was undertaken after complications arose during a field study evaluating the role darkling beetles play in the transmission of foodborne pathogens. It was determined that, based on this work, incorporating a secondary enrichment procedure into the isolation protocol significantly increased the isolation rate from the various sample types, including drag swabs and litter samples. It was also determined that when attempting to characterize the Salmonella-status of a particular broiler house, no one sampling strategy is superior. The results of this study demonstrate that both drag swabs and litter samples need to be utilized to accurately determine if the pathogen is present in a flock. Not only did the secondary enrichment procedure have a higher isolation frequency than the other three methods compared, it also highlighted the discrepancies of the other methods. Two commonly used isolation procedures, tetrathionate and Rappaport-Vassiliadis, were found to disagree on a significant number of samples analyzed. While the isolation frequencies for these procedures were not found to be statistically different, the analysis for agreement, kappa, did indicate that the procedures did not identify the same samples as positive. Overall, the secondary enrichment procedure identified all the samples positive that were also found to be positive by either of the other methods used. Since the secondary enrichment method is a modified version of the traditional delayed secondary enrichment procedure, which requires five additional day of incubation, this study also compared these two procedures. It was determined that the secondary enrichment protocol was as effective for isolating Salmonella from broiler house samples as the delayed secondary enrichment procedure. The secondary enrichment procedure, did however, provide for a quicker turn around for results.

No Child Left Behind (NCLB; 2002) requires student assessment to be reported by school districts based on certain demographic variables. Research indicated that other variables may relate to student achievement. This study calculated the relationship between average school district scores and the demographic variables required by NCLB (ethnicity, gender, socio-economic status, special needs, migrant status and English language learners) as well as literature identified variables (source of district funding, pupil-to-teacher ratio, average teacher salary, per-pupil-expenditure, school district population size.) The subject area tests used for this study were Algebra I, Biology I, English II and United States History tests for all districts in the state of Mississippi. The study found that there was a relationship between ethnicity, and socio-economic status of students and the district?s average scores on the subject area tests, and the gender of students showed a very weak relationship. Source of funding and per-pupil-expenditure returned a significant relationship, and population size and teacher salary was significant, but weaker and more sporadic. Further research is suggested for some of the variables.

No description available.

No description available.