Thesis ((MEng)--Stellenbosch University, 2015. / ENGLISH ABSTRACT: When constructing a submarine pipeline, construction teams must work in the hostile environment in the ocean known as the surf zone. The surf zone is the area along a shoreline stretching between the first evident point of wave breaking and the beach line. In order to ensure that the pipeline is shielded from the imposing forces within the surf zone, engineers use a burial technique which leaves the pipeline length in the surf zone buried underneath the active seabed once construction is finished. Thus a temporary surf zone trench is dredged and protected by an open-ended cofferdam built using iron sheet piles. As a result of the incoming wave climate and the surf zone currents created by this wave climate, sedimentation in and around the trench becomes problematic. In this study alternative geometric layouts for the open-ended cofferdam protecting the surf zone trench are investigated, attempting to minimize the sediment build-up in and around the trench. This was done by using both a 3D qualitative physical model conducted at the CSIR in Stellenbosch, and numerical model using MIKE developed by DHI. However, this study only considers sediment build-up and not structural integrity and constructability of the cofferdam designs. Combining the observations of both the physical- and numerical models, a conclusion was drawn that a structure built perpendicular to the shoreline with a 45oextended arm built from the upstream edge of the cofferdam wall, is the most effective. No dimensions are given as the cofferdam design will change depending on the site specific characteristics. Also an increase in structure length will result in the mouth of the structure being located outside the active sediment zone, which leads to a longer period of time before the pipeline pathway is compromised by sediment. / AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Tydens die konstruksie van 'n onderwaterse pyplyn, moet konstruksie spanne in 'n gevaarlike gedeelte van die see werk naamlik die brandersone. Die brandersone kan gedefinieer word as die area tussen die eerste punt waar branders breek en die strandlyn. Om die pyplyn te beskerm teen die kragte wat branders op dit uitoefen, gebruik ingenieurs 'n installasietegniek waar hul die brandersone seksie van die pyplyn onder die aktiewe seebodem begrawe. Om die tegniek te bewerkstellig, grawe kontrakteurs 'n sloot deur die brandersone en beskerm dit met 'n tydelike struktuur bekend as 'n kofferdam. As gevolg van die inkomende branders en die strome wat deur die branders aangedryf word, kan die opbou van sediment in, en rondom die sloot in die brandersone problematies word. Hierdie studie ondersoek alternatiewe uitlegte vir die tydelike kofferdam struktuur met die oog daarop om die opbou van sediment in, en rondom die struktuur te verminder. Die doel was nagestreef deur gebruik te maak van beide 'n 3-dimensionele fisiese model, gebou en gebruik by die WNNR in Stellenbosch, en 'n numeriese model wat op MIKE, ontwikkel deur DHI gedoen was. Let wel die studie het slegs die sediment beweging in die nabye area van die tydelike kofferdam struktuur in ag geneem en nie die praktiese implimentering en strukturele integriteit van die struktuur nie. Deur die observasies van beide die fisiese- en numeriese modelering in ag te neem, is die volgende gevolgtrekkings gemaak. 'n Struktuur wat loodreg met die strandlyn gebou is en met 'n 45o arm wat na die stroom-op kant toe uitstrek, was die mees effektiewe een. Geen dimensies is deurgegee nie aangesien die ontwerp sal verskil afhangende van die spesifieke area waar die projek aangepak word. Daar is ook gesien dat indien die struktuur langer gemaak word, sal die kontrakteur langer tyd h^e voordat daar sediment probleme in die brander sone sloot ondervind sal word.

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Abstract Since Markowitz (1952) proposed modern portfolio theory to evaluate the correlation between investment returns and risk, a portfolio constructed by securities (mainly stocks and bonds) is called¡¨ security portfolio¡¨, which becomes popular and recognized to the financial market. Mutual funds are one of the security portfolios managed by investment professionals. To maximize the portfolio return by choosing a combination of stocks and bonds, to decide an adequate investment philosophy, strategy, process and asset reallocation, are key elements of obtaining considerable returns with limited risk and main standard of manifesting the quality and capability of fund managers. The past performance of funds is publicly available, which is scrutinized to decide what to purchase or redeem. Many studies about evaluation of portfolio performance focus on fund performance. Nevertheless recent researches focus on fund flows instead. In this study, we will examine variables that influence flows of open-ended equity mutual funds in Taiwan and have a better understanding of investor behaviors of purchasing or redeeming. We first identify variables that influence fund flows and then employee those to analyze the influence in between. We discovered that the investors are more zealous in chasing previous winners based on the short-term performance, approximately 3 to 6 months. However, once the performance of the invested fund improves for the past 12 months they trend to redeem shares to realize profit. Furthermore, they review risk before making the decision, but ignore it after investment. Investors incline to buy or sell funds of high £] and are more susceptible to related expenses and react negatively to funds that require high expense. Investors are significantly willing to invest funds that are actively traded.

Creativity is an ever relevant concept in problem-solving. Indeed, one could argue that no problem is really problematic unless it requires creative thinking; such problems can be solved by simply applying known facts and employing suitable algorithms. Yet, that is exactly how many tasks in mathematics textbooks are structured today. The present study aims to find other tasks, which can infuse creativity in the mathematics classroom. Special attention is turned towards a class of tasks known as open-ended tasks because of their creative potential. A literature review spanning 70 sources yields 17 types of open-ended tasks, and these are subsequently exemplified, classified, analyzed, and discussed from a teacher’s perspective. / Kreativitet är ett begrepp som ständigt är relevant i problemlösning. Man skulle till och med kunna hävda att ett problem egentligen inte är problematisk såvida det inte kräver kreativt tänkande; sådana problem kan ju annars enkelt lösas genom att applicera kända fakta och använda lämpliga algoritmer. Ändå är det precis så som många uppgifter är strukturerade i dagens matematikläroböcker. Den här uppsatsen syftar till att hitta andra sorters uppgifter som därmed skulle kunna ingjuta kreativitet i matematikklassrummet. Särskild uppmärksamhet riktas mot en viss klass av uppgifter – öppna uppgifter – på grund av deras kreativa potential. En litteraturgenomgång av 70 källor alstrar 17 typer av öppna uppgifter, och dessa exemplifieras, klassificeras, analyseras, och diskuteras sedan utifrån ett lärarperspektiv.

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The aim of this study in social work was to investigate, describe and analyze six Swedish men’s description and experiences of relationships with bargirls in Thailand, whom the men initially paid for sexual services. We also aim to find out how these men look upon prostitu-tion, masculinity and gender and we analyze these themes in relation to the men’s description of their relationships. The theoretical approach was social constructivist theories of masculini-ty in combination with gender theory. The study was conducted using qualitative individual half structured definition interviews with six men living in Thailand and the interviews were conducted in Pattaya, Thailand. The results show that the men’s view of prostitution differs from what they experience in Thailand and that they therefore don’t perceive it as prostitution. This is partly a consequence of their view of masculinity, which includes that the man shall have economic responsibility for women. The men find it harsh to adapt to the gender equali-ty discourse in Sweden and express that they appreciate that the relations with the bargirls consists of separate duties for the sexes.

The Gazebo Project is an open ended, generative, model eliciting project that was designed to allow students to develop their own understanding of fractions rather than receiving direct instruction. The students were placed in three different sections to work on the project, a group section that allowed for collaborative work, a peer tutoring section and an individual section. All students were given a pre-project clinical interview to assess their knowledge prior to beginning The Gazebo Project. They were then separated into one of the three sections for the project. The Gazebo Project charged the students with the task of designing a gazebo that would maximize the amount of seating and minimize the size of the entrance, which needed to be a whole side length. By challenging the students to minimize the entrance they were guided to explore the relationship between side length and number of sides. Upon completion of the project all students were then given a post-project clinical interview to determine the growth in their understanding of fractions. The study suggested that The Gazebo Project was effective in helping students develop their understanding of fractions, but only when the students worked in the group section or the peer tutoring section. The element of student discourse created an environment where students could create, and critique each other’s plan and in the process student discourse contributed to revised thinking. This study challenges educators to consider the benefits of open ended generative activities and discourse in student learning and also encourages the use of regular clinical interviews to assess student reasoning. / text

The central goal of this thesis is to provide additional criteria towards implementing open-ended evolution in an artificial system. Methods inspired by biological evolution are frequently applied to generate autonomous agents too complex to design by hand. Despite substantial progress in the area of evolutionary computation, additional efforts are needed to identify a coherent set of requirements for a system capable of exhibiting open-ended evolutionary dynamics. The thesis provides an extensive discussion of existing models and of the major considerations for designing a computational model of evolution by natural selection. Thus, the work in this thesis constitutes a further step towards determining the requirements for such a system and introduces a concrete implementation of an artificial evolution system to evaluate the developed suggestions. The proposed system improves upon existing models with respect to easy interpretability of agent behaviour, high structural freedom, and a low-level sensor and effector model to allow numerous long-term evolutionary gradients. In a series of experiments, the evolutionary dynamics of the system are examined against the set objectives and, where appropriate, compared with existing systems. Typical agent behaviours are introduced to convey a general overview of the system dynamics. These behaviours are related to properties of the respective agent populations and their evolved morphologies. It is shown that an intuitive classification of observed behaviours coincides with a more formal classification based on morphology. The evolutionary dynamics of the system are evaluated and shown to be unbounded according to the classification provided by Bedau and Packard’s measures of evolutionary activity. Further, it is analysed how observed behavioural complexity relates to the complexity of the agent-side mechanisms subserving these behaviours. It is shown that for the concrete definition of complexity applied, the average complexity continually increases for extended periods of evolutionary time. In combination, these two findings show how the observed behaviours are the result of an ongoing and lasting adaptive evolutionary process as opposed to being artifacts of the seeding process. Finally, the effect of variation in the system on the diversity of evolved behaviour is investigated. It is shown that coupling individual survival and reproductive success can restrict the available evolutionary trajectories in more than the trivial sense of removing another dimension, and conversely, decoupling individual survival from reproductive success can increase the number of evolutionary trajectories. The effect of different reproductive mechanisms is contrasted with that of variation in environmental conditions. The diversity of evolved strategies turns out to be sensitive to the reproductive mechanism while being remarkably robust to the variation of environmental conditions. These findings emphasize the importance of being explicit about the abstractions and assumptions underlying an artificial evolution system, particularly if the system is intended to model aspects of biological evolution.

The students in my elementary art classes did not seem to be creating for themselves. They seemed to have the understanding there was only one correct answer in art class, and the art teacher knew what that answer was. By way of research I have found ways to create an atmosphere in my art room that promotes imagination and self expression in children, thus fostering a free and creative reaction from my students. Through understanding how and why one uses their imagination, an art teacher can enhance a student's ability to build and use his or her knowledge base. I believe an art teacher can help students build artistic confidence by using strategies such as introducing new art materials to children in a play atmosphere, planning lessons that are open-ended, giving choices for materials used, and guiding students using mental imagery.

This thesis presents an e-learning solution to facilitate formative assessment of electronically submitted open-ended written assignments.It is widely accepted that formative assessment is highly beneficial to student leaning. A number of researchers are active in developing specialized approaches and software systems for assisting formative assessment of student work. However, no comprehensive e-learning solution exists for facilitating formative assessment of students' open-ended written work. The project presented in this thesis has developed a new approach for using computers to facilitate formative assessment of electronically submitted open-ended written assignments.Based on the literature review of the education theories around formative assessment and current computer software technologies, this project has developed three principles for e-learning support for formative assessment of open-ended written assignments:1. It needs to facilitate all the activities that are potentially required for formative assessment of student assignments (for example, the creation of assessment criteria, the submission of assignments, and the analysis of the assessment results), not only the marking activity to create feedback on assignments.2. It needs to provide an onscreen marking tool which enables human markers to mark open-ended written assignments in an intuitive and efficient way by replicating their paper-based assessment approaches.3. It needs to provide a generic solution for facilitating formative assessment of open-ended written assignments from all disciplines, not a limited solution restricted to some specific domains (for example, computers science or business courses).Based on these principles, a specification of an e-learning system for facilitating formative assessment of open-ended written assignment was developed and a system was implemented accordingly. This system, called the Written Assignment Assessment (WAA) system, has been already used in the assignment marking of several courses at Massey University.