A research report submitted by Safura Khan in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Master of Science in Science Education, Faculty of Science. University of the Witwatersrand, School of Physics, September 2008. / This study investigated understanding of measurements by students in scientific activities that are experimentally based. The study focused on grade 12 high school learners in an urban South African School. The majority of these students were second language English speakers. Data were obtained through a written questionnaire given to students, to explore learners’ ideas about data collection, data processing and data comparison, in particular the need to repeat measurements and the implication of the scatter associated with numerical and graphical data. An alphanumeric coding scheme adapted from Lubben et al. (2000), was used as an analysis tool. This included categorising responses into point or set paradigms. The findings of this limited study maybe summed up as follows: There is some consistency in reasoning across the experimental phases of data collection and data processing but it was noted that there is little use of set reasoning. It seems that students had specific difficulties in understanding the role and value of statistical tools in assessing confidence in measurement. By and large the learners in this study did not appreciate the need for error analysis. The overall study suggests that though the correct procedures are followed students have little or no understanding of the factors taken into account during data analysis. The findings show that very few students are true set reasoners; 75% of the students chose to take an average because that is the way it was always done. Students’ views may have been influenced by either exposure to ‘cook book’ laboratory sessions or by the context of the questionnaire which asks for three repeats. The study also shows that students had specific difficulty in understanding the role and value of statistical tools in assessing confidence in measurement (Mc Dermott & Redish, 1999). In conclusion though analysis shows a large percentage of students appear to be point reasoners, they may appear at first sight to be set reasoners. The term average was used by students yet a recurring value was chosen. There is therefore a need to perform experiments in a meaningful context and move away from ‘cook book’ laboratories to appropriate non-traditional laboratory activities, so as to enhance higher order thinking.

The study aims at investigating the problems that learners of English as a foreign language in three secondary schools in Tripoli, Libya, have in developing English reading skills. The study is conducted within a conceptual framework for the study of reading and the development of reading skills, developed on the basis of a literature study. Information was obtained by requesting 60 Grade 11 learners in the three selected schools to complete an English comprehension test (to determine their ability to interpret a written text), by observing teachers teaching English reading in these schools, by conducting interviews with the learners and by interviewing selected lecturers at a Teachers' Training College in Tripoli. The information obtained in this way was analysed and interpreted in order to answer the following questions: <ul><li> What problems do learners in Libyan secondary schools experience with reading in EFL? </li> <li> What are the main causes of these problems? </li> <li> Do the curricula for EFL reading and the didactic approaches of educators contribute to the problem? </li> <li> What are the possible ways to resolve these problems? </ul> </li><ul>Findings include: <li>EFL learners in Tripoli cannot recognise sentences and paragraphs. </li> <li>They have restricted vocabulary knowledge. </li> <li>They are not able to extract correct information from texts. They cannot understand both implied and explicitly stated information. </li> <li>They do not understand figurative language. </li> <li>They cannot express the technical relations between parts of texts through the use of cohesive devices. </li> <li>They cannot determine or identify the main idea of texts. </li></ul> The reasons for these problems are that the learners do not have a structured knowledge of the English language, their English reading skills are underdeveloped and non-appropriate didactic approaches are used by educators in EFL classrooms. Possible ways to resolve these problems are that EFL learners must acquire better proficiency in English, their English reading skills must be developed properly, and educators in EFL learners' classrooms must use more appropriate didactic approaches to enable EFL learners to acquire proficiency in English and to develop their reading skills, by following the steps prescribed in the EFL reading curriculum. The curriculum that is used in the Teachers' Training College must be implemented more effectively in teacher training programmes, and lecturers must ensure that teacher trainees have a proper understanding of the curriculum of EFL reading skills when they graduate. / Dissertation (MA(Applied Language Studies))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Afrikaans / unrestricted

No description available.

Como não há pleno consenso, atualmente, entre as múltiplas definições dos conceitos de \"design\" e de \"design de produto\", as fronteiras do campo de atuação do designer de produto resultam percebidas e determinadas, em grande parte, por exemplos visuais veiculados por livros, revistas e jornais acessíveis ao grande público e a estudantes, designers ou aqueles envolvidos com esta área de projeto. Uma observação inicial, anterior a esta pesquisa, percebeu que em publicações de design ilustradas, havia hipertrofia na representação de certos produtos de design e rarefação na de outros, situação que podia chegar, no limite, à inexistência de referência até mesmo de produtos familiares e comuns. A presente investigação se propôs, assim, quantificar, objetivamente, este desequilíbrio na representação de produtos existentes em bibliografia da área, por meio de contagem das imagens de objetos em livros de design. A par desta contagem de ocorrências de imagens de produtos, foram também identificadas, claramente, em outras fontes, situações de forte demanda da atividade do design de produto na vida cotidiana de sociedades contemporâneas. Estas demandas, ao final da pesquisa, apontaram para a existência de um espectro mais amplo e objetivo do campo do design de produto o que permitiu aferir, por comparação, se havia fidedignidade no mapeamento do campo, como havia sido delineado pelo levantamento numérico de imagens. Na primeira parte do problema deste estudo, foi conduzida uma extensa contagem direta de imagens de objetos de design de produto, do modo como estes se apresentavam na bibliografia. Esta bibliografia foi selecionada após o estabelecimento de critérios nítidos, antecipadamente definidos. Com a finalidade de efetuar contagem dos produtos de maneira organizada, foram estabelecidas categorias às quais cada objeto foi alocado por suas características. Os resultados das contagens foram traduzidos em tabela e gráficos, que permitiram fazer comparações numéricas (digitais) e visuais (analógicas) entre as diversas categorias de produtos contabilizados ou entre os vários livros selecionados ou ainda entre categorias de produtos em um mesmo dado volume e, sobretudo, em uma terceira fase, entre os produtos contados quando confrontados com necessidades reais, que podem ser atendidas pelo design de produto. Estes dados de realidade estão amparados em números oficiais. 7 As análises, assim conduzidas, permitiram concluir que, de fato, interpretações mais comuns acerca da natureza e dos limites do campo do design de produto se revelaram severamente distorcidas. Adicionalmente, a consulta aos livros ilustrados de design de produto indicou que existe certo modelo de seleção de imagens, tomado por padrão contemporâneo do design, que tende a ser mimetizado entre obras bibliográficas. Esta distorção pode acarretar, assim, efeitos compreensivelmente indesejáveis do que seja design no entendimento de clientes em potencial. O mesmo fato pode afetar negativamente a percepção de alunos, designers, professores, profissionais de áreas afins e ainda daqueles que modelam políticas relativas ao design, que tomam conhecimento de uma realidade apenas parcial do campo do design de produto, mediada e filtrada por decisões editoriais orientadas por ênfases reducionistas acerca do espectro real e possível da atividade. / Since, presently, there is no consensus with regard to various definitions of the concepts of \"design\" and \"product design\", the boundaries of the product designers\' field are perceived and shaped, to a great extent, by visual examples supplied by books, magazines and newspapers that are accessible to the general public, as well as to students, designers, and to those in any way connected to the design area. Initial research conducted before this one showed that in illustrated design publications, certain design products were presented in an excessive way, while others barely appeared, a situation that could reach the point of no representation at all of even familiar or common products. The present study is meant to measure, therefore, in an objective way, the lack of balance in the presentation of products in the design bibliography, by counting pictures of the objects in design books. Simultaneously with thepicture counting, an effort was made while using different sources of information to clearly identify situations of strong demand for product designer skills in everyday life of contemporary societies. These demands, at the end of this study, pointed towards a much broader and objective spectrum of the field of design, which permitted, by comparison, checking how true to reality was the portrait of product design presented by the counting of pictures. In the first part of this research, an extensive counting of design products was done, taking into consideration in the bibliography the way in which they were presented. This bibliography was selected after clear criteria of choice were established. With the purpose of counting products in an organized way, categories were established where each object would fit, depending upon its particular characteristics. The results of the counting were translated to a table and several graphs, which allowed for making numerical comparisons (digital) or visual comparisons (analogical) between several product categories, in general, and between data in several books, several product categories in the same book, and most importantly, the results allow for comparing the numbers of the counting to real needs that can be answered by product design. The real life situation data is supportedby official numbers. 9 The analysis thus conducted, in fact, led to the conclusion that the usual interpretation concerning the nature and limits of the field of design suffered from severe distortion. Additionally, the examination of design books revealed a certain bias in image selection, and this is taken as the contemporary model of what design should be and tends to be copied by other similar books. Therefore, this distortion may understandably lead to undesirable effects on potential customers\' understanding about what the meaning of design is. The same misunderstanding may negatively affect the way the subject is perceivedby students, designers, teachers, professionals working in similar areas and also by those who are responsible for shaping political decisions concerning design: they get in touch with only a partial reality of the field of product design, a reality that suffers mediation and filtering of editorial decisions that decide which is the real and possible spectrum of the design field, oriented as they are by a reductionist emphasis.

Como não há pleno consenso, atualmente, entre as múltiplas definições dos conceitos de \"design\" e de \"design de produto\", as fronteiras do campo de atuação do designer de produto resultam percebidas e determinadas, em grande parte, por exemplos visuais veiculados por livros, revistas e jornais acessíveis ao grande público e a estudantes, designers ou aqueles envolvidos com esta área de projeto. Uma observação inicial, anterior a esta pesquisa, percebeu que em publicações de design ilustradas, havia hipertrofia na representação de certos produtos de design e rarefação na de outros, situação que podia chegar, no limite, à inexistência de referência até mesmo de produtos familiares e comuns. A presente investigação se propôs, assim, quantificar, objetivamente, este desequilíbrio na representação de produtos existentes em bibliografia da área, por meio de contagem das imagens de objetos em livros de design. A par desta contagem de ocorrências de imagens de produtos, foram também identificadas, claramente, em outras fontes, situações de forte demanda da atividade do design de produto na vida cotidiana de sociedades contemporâneas. Estas demandas, ao final da pesquisa, apontaram para a existência de um espectro mais amplo e objetivo do campo do design de produto o que permitiu aferir, por comparação, se havia fidedignidade no mapeamento do campo, como havia sido delineado pelo levantamento numérico de imagens. Na primeira parte do problema deste estudo, foi conduzida uma extensa contagem direta de imagens de objetos de design de produto, do modo como estes se apresentavam na bibliografia. Esta bibliografia foi selecionada após o estabelecimento de critérios nítidos, antecipadamente definidos. Com a finalidade de efetuar contagem dos produtos de maneira organizada, foram estabelecidas categorias às quais cada objeto foi alocado por suas características. Os resultados das contagens foram traduzidos em tabela e gráficos, que permitiram fazer comparações numéricas (digitais) e visuais (analógicas) entre as diversas categorias de produtos contabilizados ou entre os vários livros selecionados ou ainda entre categorias de produtos em um mesmo dado volume e, sobretudo, em uma terceira fase, entre os produtos contados quando confrontados com necessidades reais, que podem ser atendidas pelo design de produto. Estes dados de realidade estão amparados em números oficiais. 7 As análises, assim conduzidas, permitiram concluir que, de fato, interpretações mais comuns acerca da natureza e dos limites do campo do design de produto se revelaram severamente distorcidas. Adicionalmente, a consulta aos livros ilustrados de design de produto indicou que existe certo modelo de seleção de imagens, tomado por padrão contemporâneo do design, que tende a ser mimetizado entre obras bibliográficas. Esta distorção pode acarretar, assim, efeitos compreensivelmente indesejáveis do que seja design no entendimento de clientes em potencial. O mesmo fato pode afetar negativamente a percepção de alunos, designers, professores, profissionais de áreas afins e ainda daqueles que modelam políticas relativas ao design, que tomam conhecimento de uma realidade apenas parcial do campo do design de produto, mediada e filtrada por decisões editoriais orientadas por ênfases reducionistas acerca do espectro real e possível da atividade. / Since, presently, there is no consensus with regard to various definitions of the concepts of \"design\" and \"product design\", the boundaries of the product designers\' field are perceived and shaped, to a great extent, by visual examples supplied by books, magazines and newspapers that are accessible to the general public, as well as to students, designers, and to those in any way connected to the design area. Initial research conducted before this one showed that in illustrated design publications, certain design products were presented in an excessive way, while others barely appeared, a situation that could reach the point of no representation at all of even familiar or common products. The present study is meant to measure, therefore, in an objective way, the lack of balance in the presentation of products in the design bibliography, by counting pictures of the objects in design books. Simultaneously with thepicture counting, an effort was made while using different sources of information to clearly identify situations of strong demand for product designer skills in everyday life of contemporary societies. These demands, at the end of this study, pointed towards a much broader and objective spectrum of the field of design, which permitted, by comparison, checking how true to reality was the portrait of product design presented by the counting of pictures. In the first part of this research, an extensive counting of design products was done, taking into consideration in the bibliography the way in which they were presented. This bibliography was selected after clear criteria of choice were established. With the purpose of counting products in an organized way, categories were established where each object would fit, depending upon its particular characteristics. The results of the counting were translated to a table and several graphs, which allowed for making numerical comparisons (digital) or visual comparisons (analogical) between several product categories, in general, and between data in several books, several product categories in the same book, and most importantly, the results allow for comparing the numbers of the counting to real needs that can be answered by product design. The real life situation data is supportedby official numbers. 9 The analysis thus conducted, in fact, led to the conclusion that the usual interpretation concerning the nature and limits of the field of design suffered from severe distortion. Additionally, the examination of design books revealed a certain bias in image selection, and this is taken as the contemporary model of what design should be and tends to be copied by other similar books. Therefore, this distortion may understandably lead to undesirable effects on potential customers\' understanding about what the meaning of design is. The same misunderstanding may negatively affect the way the subject is perceivedby students, designers, teachers, professionals working in similar areas and also by those who are responsible for shaping political decisions concerning design: they get in touch with only a partial reality of the field of product design, a reality that suffers mediation and filtering of editorial decisions that decide which is the real and possible spectrum of the design field, oriented as they are by a reductionist emphasis.