The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of death on the family of the pastor. The study poses a question of what pastoral care model can be used to help the pastor’s family cope during their period of bereavement. A qualitative methodological design was followed, allowing individual experiences to emerge. Five female participants were interviewed. A qualitative analysis was undertaken in order to explore their grief and coping mechanism during the period of bereavement. The study traces the origin and causes of death, with the emphasis on African and biblical perspectives. The aspect of how people make meaning of death is also explored. The study revealed that death had a different impact according to their different culture. Death leads to grief which can be psychological, emotional, social, or spiritual. Several themes emerged from the study. The themes were used to produce a bereavement model that can be used to provide pastoral care to families during their period of bereavement. / Dissertation (MA Theol)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / gm2014 / Practical Theology / unrestricted

The objective of my thesis is to measure magnetic field gradient decay in an MR tomograph, process and evaluate the data measured and analyse the issue. The theoretical section focuses on the reasons for the gradient distortion which has a negative impact on NMR measuring techniques and it also describes options to eliminate the negative effects, focusing mainly on pre-emphasis filtration. It also lists methods of gradient magnetic field measuring. The practical section contains results of magnetic field decay measurements taken with the tomograph in the Institute of scientific instruments of the Academy of sciences in Brno using the method of instantaneous frequency with and without pre-emphasis compensation. The data are processed with MAREVISI and MATLAB programmes. MATLAB is used to develop a modern method of filtration to eliminate noise in useful signal leading to more accurate measurements of MR magnetic fields. This filtration uses a method of time-dependent variable thresholds and two-channel filter banks. MATLAB is also used to design a programme for approximation of the measured gradient magnetic field decay. The decay must be approximated in order to obtain time constants and the degree of exponential decay, which serve to set up the pre-emphasis compensation.

The present study explored the relationship between Latter-day Saint (LDS) seminary students' in-class oral participation and their perceived in-class spiritual experiences according to LDS theology. Since the release of the Teaching Emphasis in 2003, LDS seminary leadership has consistently emphasized the facilitating relationship between student in-class oral participation and desired spiritual outcomes of LDS seminary students. However, no known studies to date have gathered and analyzed data specific to varied amounts of LDS seminary student in-class oral participation or perceptions of in-class spiritual experience to evaluate the relationship between these two variables. Data regarding in-class oral participation and perceived spiritual experience were obtained via a self-report survey from 563 LDS seminary students. Participants were from classes of 25 randomly selected released-time LDS seminary teachers in Salt Lake, Summit, and Wasatch counties in the state of Utah. Data were analyzed using Pearson correlation, multiple regression, and analysis of variance. Findings indicated a statistically significant correlation (r = .32, p < .01) between self-reported amounts of participant seminary students' in-class oral participation and perceived spiritual experience, with four significant (p < .05) oral participatory predictors of perceived spiritual experience (reading/reciting something out loud, explaining LDS doctrines to others, singing, and testifying to others by expressing beliefs), and significant mean differences (p < .05) of perceived in-class spiritual experience between low, medium, and high oral participating seminary students. The present study explores the practical implications and recommendations for future research from these findings.

Because the terms art and aesthetic are often ambiguously used, the purpose of this study was to develop a method of analyzing and clarifying their usage in written texts. Chapter I includes hypotheses and assumptions of this study. The first hypothesis was that it is possible to develop a systematic, objective, and replicable method of analyzing and clarifying the usage of art and aesthetic in art education texts. The second hypothesis is that, as a result of this analysis, it is possible to compare the usage of art and aesthetic in one text with the usage of these same terms in another. The two texts chosen as sources of data were Becoming Human Through Art by Edmund Burke Feldman and Emphasis; Art by Frank Wachowiak and Theodore Ramsey. The assumptions upon which this analysis was based are (a) that frequency of mention indicates author emphasis, and (b) that, based on analysis which indicates emphasis, summary definition of an author's teaching beliefs regarding art and aesthetic would be possible. Although both hypotheses are accepted, limitations of the method result from the subjectivity which existed in the selection of variables, the inference of contextual meaning which determined placement of variables in categories, and inference of emphasis based on resulting frequencies. Recommendations for further research are (a) examination of categories for appropriateness and inclusion of all relevant variables; (b) use of the method of contingency analysis to determine the usage of other ambiguous words and phrases; (c) use of variables associated with art and aesthetic as a thesaurus for future reference; and (d) application of the method to other literature in art education, transcribed interviews, and/or classroom instruction.

This curriculum project reviews the methods, materials, and supplemental reading activities that have been shown in the literature to be effective in developing or promoting positive attitudes toward reading and how these can be used as an integral part of the daily reading program. The major findings and some various methods and materials used to measure attitudes toward reading are also discussed. This curriculum project is specifically designed for fourth grade teachers to use in correlation with the Ginn 720 Series, Level 10. The project includes directions for developing a curriculum of activities to promote or develop positive attitudes toward reading in correlation with Ginn, Level 10. The criteria for selection of the activities and stories are included. This project includes a list of the reviewed activities categorized under one of the following headings: oral activities, written activities, arts and crafts, and dramatics. Finally, the stories in Ginn, Level 10 and the suggested activities to promote or develop positive attitudes toward reading are listed for teachers to use as an integral part of their reading program.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-28T19:34:13Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Waldivia.pdf: 889675 bytes, checksum: b5d3a71241218bc17992f5e68fb74607 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007-05-23 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / This dissertation includes research on Portuguese Reading, Writing and Education and is theoretically based on an interactionist, social-cognitive approach to Text Linguistics, complemented by Functionalism, Pragmatics, Linguistics, and Education Science. With a focus on the organization of the expository/argumentative text under the linguistic education perspective, the purpose of this study is to verify the applicability of linguistic and education theories to the pedagogic practice so as to analyze the methodological teaching procedures adopted by Portuguese teachers from Public Schools for structuring such text. We assume that the pedagogical actions aimed at the interaction between learned and new knowledge help expand the students linguistic repertoire and accordingly develop the communicative ability in written language. The analysis material was obtained through questionnaires applied by Portuguese teachers and the results obtained have shown that the interaction between learned and new knowledge contributes to expand the students linguistic repertoire, but it is not sufficient to build abilities relating to the efficient apprehension and use of linguistic categories, which structure the expository/argumentative text. In order to possibly filling this gap, we presented a teaching proposal based on problem situations, grounded in the fact that continued linguistic education may help students understand concepts related to the structuring of the expository/argumentative text / Esta dissertação situa-se na linha de pesquisa Leitura, Escrita e Ensino de Língua Portuguesa, está embasada teoricamente na Lingüística Textual de base sóciocognitiva interacionista, complementada pelo Funcionalismo, pela Pragmática Lingüística e pela Ciência da Educação. Com o foco na organização do texto expositivo-argumentativo, na perspectiva da educação lingüística, tem por objetivo verificar a aplicabilidade de teorias lingüísticas e da educação na prática pedagógica, tendo em vista examinar o procedimento metodológico de ensino de professores de língua materna da Rede Pública, para a estruturação deste mesmo texto. Tem por hipótese que as ações pedagógicas, que visam à interação, entre os conhecimentos dados e novos, contribuem para a ampliação do repertório lingüístico de educandos e, conseqüentemente, para o desenvolvimento da competência comunicativa na modalidade da língua escrita. O material de análise foi coletado por questionário, aplicado a professores de língua materna e os resultados obtidos indicaram que a interação, entre os conhecimentos dados e novos contribui para a ampliação do repertório lingüístico de educandos, mas não é suficiente para construir competências, relativas à apreensão e uso eficazes das categorias lingüísticas, estruturantes do texto expositivo-argumentativo. Para o possível preenchimento desta lacuna foi apresentada proposta de ensino, fundamentada em situações-problema, sob o fundamento de que uma educação lingüística continuada pode contribuir para que o educando apreenda conceitos relativos à estruturação do texto expositivo-argumentativo

Counselor resilience is the ability to transform adversity into growth opportunities that become part of the professional's identity and the core values of a counselor. However, researchers have yet to identify why some counselors exhibit higher levels of resilience while others exhibit less. Counselor resilience can be learned and nurtured at any point of an individual's development. The purpose of this study was to examine how differences within the foundational edification of a research-embedded curriculum impact a counselor's level of resilience. Participants included practicing counselors who received their counseling degrees from a 2014 U.S News and World Report (USNWR) Nationally Ranked Best University\Colleges. Using a quantitative, comparative design, 123 counselors were surveyed using a demographic questionnaire and the modified CD-RISC (CD-RISC-27). An analysis of variance was used to examine the impact of differences among counseling professionals' levels of therapeutic resilience based on the ranking of the institutional and research emphasis within their respective counseling programs. The results from this study indicated that research-embedded curriculum had no significant difference in a counselor's level of resilience (p >.05). Outcomes for this study provide statistical evidence that curricular differences and university ranking do not explain the variance in counselors' demonstrated resilience. These findings validate the academic and clinical application of non-research based training programs and non-traditional learning environments.

In communication system environment speech signal is corrupted due to presence of additive acoustic noise, so with this distortion the effective communication is degraded in terms of the quality and intelligibility of speech. Now present research is going how effectively acoustic noise can be eliminated without affecting the original speech quality, this tends to be our challenging in this current research thesis work. Here this work proposes multi-tiered detection method that is based on time-frequency analysis (i.e. filter banks concept) of the noisy speech signals, by using standard speech enhancement method based on the proven spectral subtraction, for single channel speech data and for a wide range of noise types at various noise levels. There were various variants have been introduced to standard spectral subtraction proposed by S.F.Boll. In this thesis we designed and implemented a novel approach of Spectral Subtraction based on Minimum Statistics [MinSSS]. This means that the power spectrum of the non-stationary noise signal is estimated by finding the minimum values of a smoothed power spectrum of the noisy speech signal and thus circumvents the speech activity detection problem. This approach is also capable of dealing with non-stationary noise signals. In order to analyze the system in time frequency domain, we have implemented two different filter bank approaches such as Weighted OverLap Added (WOLA) and Fast Fourier Transform Modulated (FFTMod). The proposed systems were implemented and evaluated offline using simulation tool Matlab and then validated their performances based on the objective quality measures such as Signal to Noise Ratio Improvement (SNRI) and Perceptual Evaluation Speech Quality (PESQ) measure. The systems were tested with a pure speech combination of male and female sampled at 8 kHz, these signals were corrupted with various kinds of noises at different noise power levels. The MinSSS algorithm implemented using FFTMod filter bank approach outperforms when compared the WOLA filter bank approach.

This study aimed at exploring the school effectiveness characteristics of two high schools, one with high (School A) and one with low (School B) levels of placement ratio in &Ouml / SS for their graduates, to observe their characteristics as perceived by their stakeholders (students, teachers, parents, school administrative staff and managers). In this study, a comparative pre-structured case study method was employed. The study was conducted in two private high schools in the province of Ankara, Turkey. The participants were 10 students, 10 teachers, 10 parents, 2 non-academic staff and 3 administrators from School A, and 10 students, 10 teachers, 7 parents, 3 non-academic staff and 2 administrators from School B. A framework drawn by the researcher as a result of review of relevant literature was used to conceptualize the study and to guide the interview schedules to collect data. According to this framework, six general areas in effective school literature were explored. These areas were academic emphasis, organization and administration, school climate, home-school relations, teaching staff, and physical and financial resources. The data collected through semi-structured interviews were analyzed using content analysis technique. The findings revealed that two case schools had major differences almost in all areas explored. The only major similarity between two schools was in the leadership and leader qualities under organization and administration area. The effective school characteristics of the school with high levels of placement ratio in &Ouml / SS, in all six areas explored were added to the conceptual framework drawn at the beginning of the study.

This thesis studies the impact of market orientation on the business performance of the Sri Lankan apparel manufacturing organizations in the post MFA environment. An attempt is made to enhance the existing market orientation theory by addressing a research gap and highlighting the importance of the relationship perspective in business to business marketing. A four dimensional market orientation construct is developed to overcome the limitations identified in the extant market orientation theories. The study also identifies resource availability as an antecedent of market orientation along with six other antecedents which are commonly discussed in literature. It further investigates whether the market orientation-business performance relationship is moderated by the prevailing business environment. The proposed modifications to the theory are empirically tested within the context of the apparel industry.