This research evaluates two-dimensional top-down dungeon generated levels regarding fundamental and micro dungeon design patterns. Additionally, it investigates the meaningfulness of the evaluation results in terms of accessibility to level designers and similar. The research method concentrates on two dungeon-generation techniques – Cellular Automata and Drunkard Walk. Each generated level gets evaluated based on three evaluation stages that build on top of each other: the passability of each tile; categorization of each collection of tiles with the same attributes; and player-centric gameplay data. The results show key differences between Cellular Automata and Drunkard Walk as the risk of using Cellular Automata to generate up to 90% unreachable space, while drunkard walk always has a playable relative space size of 100%. The evaluation also shows results that depend on the requirements of a game or constraints of a level designer. Cellular Automata generates more rooms, while Drunkard Walk provides more decisions per room. In conclusion, the evaluation results show differences between the two algorithms, presented using a vocabulary that is familiar to a level designer.

As a response to finding innovative ways of using games as tools for learning we explore the design process of creating a game system meant to promote self-directed learning. This thesis explores what design pillars a game system needs to follow when making a game that is meant to promote self-directed learning through reflection on cause and effect relations. We use a theoretical framework based on procedural rhetoric and self-directed learning in video games to inform our design process when creating an eco-adapted game system that provides experimentation opportunities. We adapt an ecosystem as a simulated real life context for our game environment and identify the major design pillars that video games looking to promote self-directed learning needs to consist of. The major pillars we found most important were; 1, activate participation, to engage the player by allowing them to experiment with different perspectives and the game state. 2, avoid correlating rhetorical arguments, to not influence players as they set their own goals when playing in an informal setting. 3, provide observational clarity, to let players learn how the actions they perform affect the actors and events in the game system. 4, enable trial and error, to give players time to explore multiple approaches in a safe environment where they can fail and try again without penalties. This thesis focuses primarily on the design process and documentation around the creation of a game system that adapts self-directed learning principles as a central design directive. In our design documentation we provide an open discussion of our design process around the decisions, findings, and implementations that make our simulation. / Som ett svar på att hitta innovativa sätt att använda spel som verktyg för lärande undersöker vi designprocessen för skapandet av ett spelsystem som är avsett att främja självstyrd inlärning. Denna uppsats undersöker vilka designpelare ett spelsystem behöver följa när man skapar ett spel som är avsett att främja självstyrd inlärning genom reflektion över orsaks- och påverkansrelationer. Vi använder ett teoretisk ramverk baserat på procedurell retorik och självstyrd inlärning i datorspel för att informera vår designprocess när vi skapar ett eko-adapterat spelsystem som ger experimenteringsmöjligheter. Vi anpassar ett ekosystem som en simulerad verklig omgivning till vår spelmiljö och identifierar viktiga designpelare som datorspel som vill främja självstyrd inlärning behöver bestå av. De huvudsakliga pelarna som vi fann viktigast är; 1, aktivera deltagande, för att engagera spelarna genom att låta dem experimentera med olika perspektiv och spelets tillstånd. 2, undvik korrelerande retoriska argument, för att inte påverka spelarna när de sätter sina egna mål medan de spelar i en informell miljö. 3, ge observationsklarhet, så att spelarna lär sig hur handlingarna de utför påverkar aktörerna och händelserna i spelsystemet. 4, möjliggör försök och misstag, för att ge spelarna tid att utforska flera tillvägagångssätt i en säker miljö där de kan misslyckas och försöka igen utan straff. Denna uppsats fokuserar främst på designprocessen och dokumentationen kring skapandet av ett spelsystem som tillämpar självstyrda inlärningsprinciper som ett centralt designdirektiv. I vår designdokumentation ger vi en öppen diskussion om vår designprocess kring de beslut, resultat och implementeringar som utgör vår simulering.

Ratio is one of the key mathematics concepts included in the South African Mathematics curriculum. It is applied in other topics of the Grade 7 curriculum, including geometry, functions and relationships, algebra, similarity and congruency. The aim of this qualitative research study was to explore the difficulties that learners experience in learning ratio. The primary research question for the study was: What is Grade 7 learners’ knowledge of ratio? This research question was answered through the following secondary research questions: How do learners solve problems involving ratio? What is learners’ conceptual knowledge of ratio? And what learning difficulties do learners experience when learning about ratio? The study was informed by Kilpatrick, Swafford and Findell’s (2001) five strands of mathematical proficiency; however, the focus was on conceptual and procedural knowledge of ratio. The interpretivist paradigm and the single exploratory case study design were used to gain insight into the learning of ratio. Data was collected from Grade 7 learners (23 of the 35 learners originally sampled) through a self-developed test that followed the prescripts of the Grade 7 Mathematics curriculum in South Africa and through semi-structured interviews. The test scripts were analysed using the Atlas.tiTM windows coding system and the results were used to construct questions for the semi-structured interviews. The interviews were used to corroborate data emerging from the test. The results of the study indicated that Grade 7 learners can do simple and routine manipulations of ratio as well as non-proportional ratio problems but struggle to solve problems that require multiplicative thinking and proportional reasoning skills. Although there could be other factors contributing to learners’ struggle to tackle proportional ratio problems requiring multiplication and proportional reasoning, a lack of conceptual knowledge seemed to contribute significantly. / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2020. / Science, Mathematics and Technology Education / MEd / Unrestricted

This research project is an attempt to determine how principals handle educator misconduct in public schools in a sample of both primary and secondary schools. Procedures on handling misconduct are still new to schools principals. The need to empower principals with knowledge and procedures to handle educator misconduct is the main concern of the study. The main aim of the study is to investigate how principals handle educator misconduct in public schools. It is revealed in the introductory orientation of this study that educator misconduct is one of major challenges in principals' management of schools. Educator misconduct is a continuous problem that principals experience in their management of schools. Principals being given legal authority to handle less serious misconduct at school level, have a mammoth task and responsibility to ensure that procedural requirements are met in such misconduct cases. The attempts to workshop train and educate principals on handling educator misconduct which all proved insufficient. Misconduct among educators is on the increase and principals seem to fall short of handling such misconduct cases properly. In this regard both the literature study and an empirical investigation through interviews are used in the study. Principals are involved because they have a duty to handle educator misconduct. Procedures handling misconduct also involve educators. These data collection methods are useful in providing insights into principals' handling of educator misconduct as well as getting educators' views on how principals handle misconduct cases. The findings and recommendations of this study are expected to improve principals' handling of educator misconduct. The findings are supposed to help principals to realise the need to follow procedural steps and to apply principles of handling misconduct fairly and consistently. Based on what the study will find, it is recommended that principals adhere to principles, rules and procedures of handling misconduct as they serve to empower principals in their management responsibilities. Principals support mechanisms in the form of workshops, seminars and training programme should be provided to ensure that principals are well trained and have clear knowledge in both theory and practice of handling educator misconduct. / Dissertation (MEd (Education Management and Policy Studies))--University of Pretoria, 2003. / Education Management and Policy Studies / unrestricted

Magister Educationis - MEd / A DESCRIPTION OF ENTRY LEVEL TERTIARY STUDENTS' MATHEMATICAL ACHIEVEMENT (Towards an analysis of student texts) M.S. Jacobs PhD Thesis, School of Mathematics and Science Education, University of the Western Cape. This research provides insights into the mathematical achievement of a cohort of tertiary mathematics students. The context for the study is an entry level mathematics course, set in an engineering programme at a tertiary institution, the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT). The participant members are first year, first semester students. The materials for the inquiry are student produced test scores and examination scripts taken from their entry level course. The characteristics of the mathematical achievement of the cohort concern the understanding of procedural and conceptual knowledge and problem solving abilities in mathematics. The facility with mathematics is another central concern of this study as it forms the dominant aspect of mathematical achievement which is accessible to research in the materials employed for the study. This research also develops a mathematical achievement profile for individual members of the cohort. The methodology makes use of content - and textual analytic methods for profiling the students. When viewed across the different kinds of profiling techniques adopted, this study suggests that these techniques complement one another: the profiles developed provide a cohesive and complementary overview of the achievement of the cohort. 111 This study challenges perceptions that responses to constructed response questions offer little information about the mathematical knowledge of students. This study investigates the possibilities of providing a bridge between the assessment of students by means of tests scores and a taxonomy of mathematical objectives, on the one hand, and the critical analysis of student produced texts, on the other. Findings suggest that diagnostic uses of paper and pencil tests can be revealing about the achievement of students. The wide range of responses to test items revealed a distribution of incompleteness in terms of employing algorithmic techniques. This research revealed that even in cases of wrong solutions, participant members' responses were reasonable, meaningful, clear and logical. The participants responded in many ways as predicted by the research literature. Evidence could be found for the use of child methods; poor use of reflective abstraction for coordination; accessing the wrong cognitive frames; not seeing the underlying structure of the mathematics and treating letters as objects. Findings suggest that the use of a textual analytic method, which led to the creation of critical indicators as a way of sign-posting events, enhanced the achievement profile of the students. / The Grassmate Project (SothAfrica/Norway)

<p>Urban models are of growing importance today for urban and environmental planning, geographic information systems, urban simulations, and as content for entertainment applications. Various methods have addressed aerial or ground scale image-based and sensor-based reconstruction. However, few, if any, approaches have automatically produced urban models from satellite images due to difficulties of data noise, data sparsity, and data uncertainty. Our key observations are that many structures in urban areas exhibit regular properties, and a second or more satellite views for urban structures are usually available. Hence, we can overcome the aforementioned issues obtained from satellite imagery by synthesizing the underlying structure layout. In addition, recent advances in deep learning allow the development of novel algorithms that was not possible several years ago. We leverage relevant deep learning techniques for classifying/predicting urban structure parameters and modeling urban areas that address the problem of satellite data quality and uncertainty. In this dissertation, we present a machine learning-based procedural generation framework to automatically and quickly reconstruct urban areas by using regularities of urban structures (e.g., cities, buildings, facades, roofs, etc.) from satellite imagery, which can be applied to not only multiple resolutions ranging from low resolution (e.g., 3 meters) to high resolutions (e.g., WV3 0.3 meter) of satellite images but also the different scales (e.g., cities, blocks, parcels, buildings, facades) of urban environments. Our method is fully automatic and generates procedural structures in urban areas given satellite imagery. Experimental results show that our method outperforms previous state-of-the-art methods quantitatively and qualitatively for multiple datasets. Furthermore, by applying our framework to multiple urban structures, we demonstrate our approach can be generalized to various pattern types. We also have preliminary results applying this for flooding, archaeological sites, and more.</p>

More than 650 million women in the world have entered marriage as children. Every year, about 12 million girls get married before their 18th birthday. Getting married as a child is common in several different parts of the world and a large part of the people who have come to Sweden in recent years come from countries where child marriage is allowed. This has meant that some of the children who have come to Sweden are married. The Swedish legal system has thus had to take a position on both areas of law as well as legal conditions that deviate from the Swedish ones in important respects. The question of international private law regarding how Sweden should relate to these legal relations entered into in foreign states has thus become increasingly relevant. Child marriage is often linked to oppression and violence against women, and over time, Swedish legislation has taken an increasingly restrictive approach to both Swedish child marriage and child marriage entered into abroad. Today, the Swedish assessment is harsh – The Supreme Administrative Court confirmed in the case HFD 2012 ref 17 that not even foreign child marriages entered into a few days before the parties’ 18th birthday are recognized in Sweden. The attitude to foreign child marriage is certainly based on a desire to protect the child and protect its best interest, but the attitude has received criticism as it has been considered contrary to both the free movement of the EU and the right to respect for private and family life in the European Convention. Even from an international private law perspective, it is clarified by the principle of loyal application that Sweden and other countries must respect the legal systems of other states in their application of law. A decision made in accordance with the legal system in another country shall thus apply in Sweden, provided that it was valid in the country where it was entered into. This essay examines the international private law issue of Sweden’s attitude to foreign child marriage from an EU law and convention law perspective. The conclusions drawn are that it is doubtful whether the Swedish regulation in this area is compatible with Sweden’s international commitments. / Mer än 650 miljoner kvinnor i världen har ingått äktenskap som barn. Varje år gifter sig därmed ungefär 12 miljoner flickor före sin 18-årsdag. Att gifta sig som barn är vanligt i flera olika världsdelar och en stor del av de personer som kommit till Sverige de senaste åren kommer från länder där barnäktenskap är tillåtet. Det här har inneburit att en del av de barn som kommit till Sverige är gifta. Det svenska rättssystemet har därmed behövt ta ställning till såväl rättsområden som rättsförhållanden som i viktiga avseende avviker från de svenska. Den internationellt privat- och processrättsliga frågan om hur Sverige ska förhålla sig till dessa rättsförhållanden som ingåtts i främmande stater har därmed blivit aktuell i allt större utsträckning. Barnäktenskap kopplas ofta till förtryck samt våld mot kvinnor och med tiden har Sveriges lagstiftning intagit ett allt mer restriktivt förhållningssätt till såväl svenska barnäktenskap som barnäktenskap som ingåtts utomlands. Idag är den svenska bedömningen hård – Högsta förvaltningsdomstolen bekräftade i målet HFD 2012 ref 17 att inte ens utländska barnäktenskap som ingåtts några dagar före parternas 18-årsdag erkänns i Sverige. Den svenska inställningen till utländska barnäktenskap grundar sig förvisso i en önskan om att skydda barnet och värna om dess bästa, men inställningen har emellertid fått motta kritik då den ansetts strida mot såväl EU-rättens fria rörlighet som rätten till respekt för privat- och familjeliv i Europakonventionen. Även ur ett internationellt privat- och processrättsligt perspektiv tydliggörs det genom den lojala tillämpningens princip att Sverige samt övriga länder ska respektera andra staters rättsordningar i sin rättstillämpning. Ett beslut som fattats enligt ett annat lands rättsordning ska därmed gälla även i Sverige, förutsatt att det var giltigt i det land där det ingåtts. Uppsatsen granskar den internationellt privat- och processrättsliga frågan om Sveriges inställning till utländska barnäktenskap ur ett EU-rättsligt samt konventionsrättsligt perspektiv. De slutsatser som dras är att det är tveksamt om den svenska regleringen på området är förenlig med Sveriges internationella åtaganden.

Machine learning has been widely used in computer games for a long time. This is something that has been proven to create a better experience and well-balanced challenges for players. In 2017, the game engine Unity released the ML-agents toolkit that provides several machine learning algorithms together with examples and a user-friendly development environment for free to the public. This has made it simpler for developers to explore what is possible in the world of machine learning in games. In many cases, a developer has spent a lot of time on a specific place in a game and would like a player to visit that area. The location can also be important for the gameplay, but the developer wants to steer the player there without the player feeling forced. This thesis investigates if it is possible to create a smart agent in a modern game engine like Unity that can affect the route taken by a player through a level. The results show that this is fully possible with a high success rate for a simple environment, but that it requires much time and effort to make it work on an advanced environment with several agents. Experiments with a randomized environment to create an agent that is general and can be used in many situations were also done, but a successful agent could not be produced in this way within the timeframe of the work.

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Immersive environments are a big part of videogames. With hardware being more capable thanever of displaying millions of triangles at once boththe capability and demand of more content in anenvironment increases. This puts more strain onlevel designers who have to spend more time perscene to make everything meet the constantly increasingvisual standards. Being able to procedurallydecorate any environment in such a fashionthat it follows the hand-made hero scenes of thegame becomes an important way to save time andmoney better spent elsewhere in the project.This thesis investigates a hierarchical method ofprocedurally generating objects inside an environment.This was accomplished by creating an artifactto analyze the feasibility of efficiently hierarchicallydecorating environments at run-time ofa video game. Though focusing on furniture anddecorative objects of rooms the system can also beused to procedurally place game related content.