Stars are one of the most frequently covered topics in introductory astronomy classes. From a constructivist framework, one must know what conceptions students bring with them to the classroom in order to effectively facilitate deep conceptual learning about stars. This study investigated the beliefs about stars that students hold when they enter an introductory astronomy course, and used that information to develop a concept inventory that can be used to assess those beliefs pre- and postinstruction.First, students' preinstructional beliefs were investigated through the use of student-supplied-response (SSR) surveys, which asked students to describe their ideas about topics such as what is a star, how is starlight created, how are stars formed, are all stars the same, and more. More than 2,200 students participated in this portion of the study during four semesters. Responses were inductively analyzed in an iterative process and coded for themes. Calculated frequencies show that although many students (80%) understand that stars are made of gas, a third to half of the participants (32-44%, depending upon the question) believe that starlight is created (or energy otherwise emitted) as a result of the star burning. Nuclear fusion, the true energy source in stars, is identified by fewer than 10% of the students. Interviews with seven volunteers confirmed that the responses seen on the SSR surveys were consistent with verbal explanations.The second portion of the study involved the design and testing of the Star Properties Concept Inventory. After item development and testing on Versions 1 and 2, interviews with 18 participants about their responses to Version 1, and an expert review by 26 volunteer astronomy instructors, Version 3 was created and tested during the Fall 2005 semester. Results from approximately 2,000 students who took Version 3 show that those students in an introductory astronomy course for nonscience majors increased their scores significantly over the semester, whereas a control group (students in an introductory earth science course for nonscience majors) showed no increase. These results support the purpose of this concept inventory to investigate the effectiveness of instruction on the topic of star properties and formation.

This study looked at one classroom's manifestation of inquiry. Looking at tasks as part of the Full Option Science System (FOSS) shed light on the way in which inquiry took shape in the classroom. To do this, detailed descriptions and analysis of the enactment of inquiry-based tasks were conducted in one fifth-grade elementary school classroom during an 8-week period of instruction. A central finding was that the intended tasks differed from the actual tasks. This incongruence occurred primarily due to the actions of individuals in the classroom. These actions shaped tasks and transformed inquiry-based tasks from highly ambiguous, high-risk tasks to a routine set of steps and procedures. Teacher's actions included establishing a classroom culture, creating a flow to classroom events, and making instructional decisions. These actions resulted in implicit structures in the classroom that determined the pace and sequence of events, as well as how the requirements and value of work were understood by students. Implicit structures reflected shared understandings between the teacher and students about work and the overall system of accountability in the classroom.

South Africais a country with many well documented inequalities. To reduce some of them there are many volunteers working in the country. What is it like to observe and work with people affected by all these inequalities? The aim of this study is to develop an understanding of how volunteers experience their work with children inCape Town. The questions I intend to answer in the study are: How do the volunteers experience their work when meeting kids in vulnerable situations and seeing the situation in the country they work in? Does the volunteer work create more cross- culture understanding and do the volunteers' views change during the course of their volunteer work? What goals and/or reasons do the volunteers have for volunteering?           The study was performed inCape Town,South Africa, and consists of nine semi-structured interviews with volunteers that, in different ways, work with children.                       Previous research about volunteers suggests that volunteer work can increase cross-culture understanding but there is also a risk that it might strengthen the stigmatisation. It is also suggested that volunteer tourism is a more sustainable way of travelling than other forms of tourism. The volunteers are driven by different reasons for volunteering they can have altruistic reasons or they can be driven by more self-developing reasons. The participants in this study had different reasons for volunteering like making a change, getting new experiences etcetera. Many of the volunteers described their first encounter with the South African culture as a bit of a shock due to the extreme poverty evident in the country. They also stated that meeting the children was simultaneously a positive and negative experience, as the poverty and social deprivation affecting the children was hard to observe, yet these are still kids and they play and are happy like any other kids in the world. Many of the participants also felt that they could contribute trough their work and that they had the chance to make a difference.                       The results have been analyzed through two articles on the subject of cross-culture understanding and reasons on volunteering.     A majority of the volunteers described an increased cross-culture understanding, but seemed unaware of the risk of stigmatisation. The volunteers have both more self-fulfilling reasons for volunteering and some more altruistic reasons.

Magistro darbo tyrimo tema – vadybinės veiklos vertinimas laiko vadybos aspektu. Baigiamojo darbo teorinėje dalyje išnagrinėta laiko valdymo problemų analizė F. Tayloro mokslinuose darbuose. Aprašyta neefektyvaus laiko valdymo problemų mastas ir galimos pasekmės. Laiko planavimo priemonės, bei potencialios vidinės ir išorinės aplinkos įtakojimas laiko praradimo priežastims. Praktinėje baigiamojo darbo dalyje nagrinėjama vadovų ir vadybininkų veiklos rezultatai apie tai, kas yra statybinėse įmonėse laiko valdymas, jo reikšmė, ką jis duoda, jo formavimo veiksniai. Tyrimo metu nustatyta, kad tiek statybinių įmonių vadovai, tiek vadybininkai supranta laiko valdymo reikmę statybinėse organizacijose, taip pat suvokia laiko valdymo svarbą. Paskutinėje magistro darbo dalyje yra pateikiamos išvados, kurios išryškina esminius darbo klausimus, taip pat pateikiamos rekomendacijos. Mūsų magistriniame darbe norime parodyti, ką šia tema rašo teoretikai, palyginti skirtingas autorių nuomones. Taip pat bandėme pažiūrėti ką apie statybinių įmonių laiko valdymą mano patys vadovai ir vadybininkai. Atlikus mokslinės literatūros analizę, nustatyta, jog vieningos ir visa apimančios įmonių laiko valdymo sąvokos nėra. Bet vis dažniau laiko valdymas yra apibrėžiamas, kaip idėjų, jausmų, suvokimų ir įsivaizdavimų, kuriuos asmuo ar jų grupė turi įmonių atžvilgiu, visuma, jai turi įtakos materialūs ir nematerialūs organizaciniai elementai, komunikacija bei asmeninės ir socialinės vertybės. / The title of Masters thesis research is „The valuation of Management activity in time management aspect“. In the theoretical part of thesis is analyzed time control problems in F. Taylor academic works. Described defective time control problem dimension and possible consequences. Means of time management and potential internal and external environments influence of time loss reason. In the practical part of final thesis is analyzed the activity results of head managers and managers – what is the time control in building companies, the meaning and benefit of time control and its formation factors. During the research it was find out that head managers of companies and also managers understand the necessity and importance of time control in building organizations. In the final part of Masters Degree thesis are given conclusions that bright the essence questions of the work. Also are given the recommendations. In our final thesis we wanted to show the theoretical part and different standpoints of authors comparing with practical part of building sector. What head managers and managers themselves think about the time control. Analyzing of Scientific literature made an conclusion that there is no united and whole covering concept of time management. More often the time control is defined as concepts, emotions, perceptions and imaginations that person or groups had with respect to companies. Influence with material and non-material organizational elements... [to full text]

A qualitative case study was presented in order to explore an inquiry-based learning approach to teaching risk in two different grade 11 mathematics classes in an urban centre in Canada. The first class was in an all-boys independent school (23 boys) and the second class was in a publicly funded religious school (19 girls and 4 boys). The students were given an initial assessment in which they were asked about the safety of nuclear power plants and their knowledge of the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident. Following the initial assessment, the students participated in an activity with the purpose of determining the empirical probability of a nuclear power plant accident based on the authentic data found online. The second activity was then presented in order to determine the impact of a nuclear power plant accident and compare it to a coal power plant accident. The findings provide evidence that the students possess intuitive knowledge that risk of an event should be assessed by both its likelihood and its impact. The study confirms the Levinson et al. (2012) pedagogic model of risk in which individuals’ values and prior experiences together with representations and judgments of probability play a role in the estimation of risk. The study also expands on this model by suggesting that pedagogy of risk should include five components, namely: 1) knowledge, beliefs, and values, 2) judgment of impact, 3) judgment of probability, 4) representations, and 5) estimation of risk. These ii components do not necessarily appear in the instruction or students’ decision making in a chronological order; furthermore, they influence each other. For example, judgments about impact (deciding not to consider accidents with low impact into calculations) may influence the judgments about probability. The implication for mathematics education is that a meaningful instruction about risk should go beyond mathematical representations and reasoning and include other components of the pedagogy of risk. The study also illustrates the importance of reasoning about rational numbers (rates, ratios, and fractions) and their critical interpretation in the pedagogy of risk. Finally, the curricular expectations relevant to the pedagogy of risk from the Ontario secondary curriculum are identified.

A qualitative case study was presented in order to explore an inquiry-based learning approach to teaching risk in two different grade 11 mathematics classes in an urban centre in Canada. The first class was in an all-boys independent school (23 boys) and the second class was in a publicly funded religious school (19 girls and 4 boys). The students were given an initial assessment in which they were asked about the safety of nuclear power plants and their knowledge of the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident. Following the initial assessment, the students participated in an activity with the purpose of determining the empirical probability of a nuclear power plant accident based on the authentic data found online. The second activity was then presented in order to determine the impact of a nuclear power plant accident and compare it to a coal power plant accident. The findings provide evidence that the students possess intuitive knowledge that risk of an event should be assessed by both its likelihood and its impact. The study confirms the Levinson et al. (2012) pedagogic model of risk in which individuals’ values and prior experiences together with representations and judgments of probability play a role in the estimation of risk. The study also expands on this model by suggesting that pedagogy of risk should include five components, namely: 1) knowledge, beliefs, and values, 2) judgment of impact, 3) judgment of probability, 4) representations, and 5) estimation of risk. These ii components do not necessarily appear in the instruction or students’ decision making in a chronological order; furthermore, they influence each other. For example, judgments about impact (deciding not to consider accidents with low impact into calculations) may influence the judgments about probability. The implication for mathematics education is that a meaningful instruction about risk should go beyond mathematical representations and reasoning and include other components of the pedagogy of risk. The study also illustrates the importance of reasoning about rational numbers (rates, ratios, and fractions) and their critical interpretation in the pedagogy of risk. Finally, the curricular expectations relevant to the pedagogy of risk from the Ontario secondary curriculum are identified.

This qualitative case study examined a researcher-designed professional development intervention focused on improving teachers’ understanding of the interactions among students and between students and teachers in the teachers’ own classrooms. Participating teachers collaborated with the researcher in determining what they would observe and collaborated with each other in making sense of what they saw. The study analyzed participants’ discourse to characterize what they saw, how they worked together, what they found helpful in the intervention, and how they benefited. The study took place over a three-month period at a Canadian Community College in Qatar committed to guiding its faculty in adopting a learner-centred approach. Four participants worked in pairs to share and discuss video of their own classes in action as they sought to adopt the desired learner-centred approach. After a Group Training Session led by the researcher to develop a Video Analysis Framework, the pairs worked through two iterations of individual video recording and selection of a ten-minute clip for sharing, followed by paired analysis of the clips. The researcher recorded the training session, the paired discussions, interviews, and focus group discussion. Data from transcriptions and researcher field notes were analyzed inductively and connected closely with findings from the literature on the benefits of video analysis in enhancing the effectiveness of teacher-directed professional development. Faculty participants benefited from the intervention in a variety of ways. Production, selection, and discussion of video of participants' own class sessions drew participants into focused reflection on student interactions, which led to heightened awareness of phenomena important to participants in becoming learner-centred teachers. Sharing perspectives with their peers generated consensus in interpretation. Iterations led to higher levels of inference and the emergence of a problem-solving approach in making sense of phenomena. Motivated by video analysis, participants experimented with what they considered to be improved teaching techniques. Participants demonstrated significant risk-taking, enhanced peer professional relationships, and ownership and autonomy in professional development. / Thesis (Master, Education) -- Queen's University, 2012-01-31 16:50:24.598

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<p>Cognitive neuroscience is an interdisciplinary enterprise aimed at explaining cognition and behavior. It appears to be succeeding. What accounts for this apparent explanatory success? According to one prominent philosophical thesis, cognitive neuroscience explains by discovering and describing mechanisms. This "mechanist thesis" is open to at least two interpretations: a strong metaphysical thesis that Carl Craver and David Kaplan defend, and a weaker methodological thesis that William Bechtel defends. I argue that the metaphysical thesis is false and that the methodological thesis is too weak to account for the explanatory promise of cognitive neuroscience. My argument draws support from a representative example of research in this field, namely, the neuroscience of decision-making. The example shows that cognitive neuroscience explains in a variety of ways and that the discovery of mechanisms functions primarily as a way of marshaling evidence in support of the models of cognition that are its principle unit of explanatory significance.</p><p> </p><p>The inadequacy of the mechanist program is symptomatic of an implausible but prominent view of scientific understanding. On this view, scientific understanding consists in an accurate and complete description of certain "objective" explanatory relations, that is, relations that hold independently of facts about human psychology. I trace this view to Carl Hempel's logical empiricist reconceptualization of scientific understanding, which then gets extended in Wesley Salmon's causal-mechanistic approach. I argue that the twin objectivist ideals of accuracy and completeness are neither ends we actually value nor ends we ought to value where scientific understanding is concerned. </p><p>The case against objectivism motivates psychologism about understanding, the view that understanding depends on human psychology. I propose and defend a normative psychologistic framework for investigating the nature of understanding in the mind sciences along three empirically-informed dimensions: 1) What are the ends of understanding? 2) What is the nature of the cognitive strategy that we deploy to achieve those ends; and 3) Under what conditions is our deployment of this strategy effective toward achieving those ends? To articulate and defend this view, I build on the work of Elliot Sober to develop a taxonomy of psychologisms about understanding. Epistemological psychologism, a species of naturalism, is the view that justifying claims about understanding requires appealing to what scientists actually do when they seek understanding. Metaphysical psychologism is the view that the truth-makers for claims about understanding include facts about human psychology. I defend both views against objections.</p> / Dissertation