American Journal of Educational Research

This paper aims to share the use of Tracker a free open source video analysis and modeling tool that is increasingly used as a pedagogical tool for the effective learning and teaching of Physics for Grade 9 Secondary 3 students in Singapore schools to make physics relevant to the real world. We discuss the pedagogical use of Tracker, guided by the Framework for K-12 Science Education by National Research Council, USA to help students to be more like scientists. For a period of 6 to 10 weeks, students use a video analysis coupled with the 8 practices of sciences such as 1. Ask question, 2. Use models, 3. Plan and carry out investigation, 4. Analyse and interpret data, 5. Use mathematical and computational thinking, 6. Construct explanations, 7. Argue from evidence and 8. Communicate information. This papers focus in on discussing some of the performance task design ideas such as 3.1 flip video, 3.2 starting with simple classroom activities, 3.3 primer science activity, 3.4 integrative dynamics and kinematics lesson flow using Tracker progressing from video analysis to video modeling, 3.5 motivating performance task, 3.6 assessment rubrics and lastly 3.7 close mentorship. Initial research findings using pre and post perception survey, triangulated with student interviews suggest an increased level of students enjoyment. Most importantly, the artefacts of the students performance task in terms of the research report and Tracker .TRZ files, further suggest that the use of the Tracker for performance tasks, guided by the Framework for K-12 Science Education by National Research Council, USA, can be an innovative way to mentor authentic and meaningful learning that empowers students to be more like scientists as defined in the K-12 Science Education Framework in classrooms.

There are five chapters: chapter 1, Why (We) Use PBL; chapter 2, Changing the Landscape; chapter 3, No Problems? No Problems, chapter 4, Controlling Chaos in PBL: The Messy Middle, and chapter 5, What Now? Evalution, Revision, and Reflection. The authors use stories and conversations throughout the book to describe the differences and similarities among their pedagogies and the challenges each of them have encountered on their journeys to implement Problem-based Learning (PBL) in their courses. Personal reflections provide the basis for discussions centered on topics such as course design, group work, and assessment. The first chapter captures the reader’s attention when the authors delve into scenarios that describe the first day of class. Drawn into the collaborative dialogues that describe a different type of teaching paradigm, the chapter offers information about What is PBL?, A Brief History, and What Isn’t PBL. Chapter 2, Changing the Landscape, focuses on the context and culture of the classroom. Through their personal experiences, the authors recount the transformations that occurrred in their classrooms. Clearly a major change in the instructor’s role and student involvement are two issues that infuence the success of PBL. Three key elements recommended for considerations when redesigning the course and learning enviornment are the extent and duration of using PBL, the establishment of stable groups for collaboration, and the methods of assessment and evaluation.

[ http://pubs.sciepub.com/education/5/11/2/index.html ] Abstract The purpose of this research is to evaluate the correlation between the undergraduate programs (Higher Education) offered by Departments of Physical Education and Sport Science (DPESS) and the Physical Education (PE) curriculum followed in Greek Primary (years 6-12) school and Middle (years 13-15) school. Specifically, we aimed to investigate whether the perspective PE teachers were adequately prepared to teach (after their graduation) the thirteen (13) main athletic subjects of the PE school curriculum. Fifteen (15) criteria were developed, in order to evaluate whether the athletic subjects offered by the departments, as described within their annual undergraduate catalogs, adequately prepare their graduates to teach PE in Primary and Middle school. Useful conclusions were drawn concerning: a) the mean values of the fifteen criteria, b) the Trigonometrically transformation of the Multidimensional Scaling solutions (MDS-T), which eventually included thirteen of the fifteen criteria, and c) other selected criteria of the fifteen criteria-based matrix. Keywords: evaluation, undergraduate programs, higher education, undergraduate catalogs, physical education, teacher education.

On the marketplace, many music action games have been released. Some of them have become very popular and obtained important commercial results. According to experts, the first music game to be released on a home console was Dance Aerobics (known as Dance Studio in Japan), which dates back to 1987. This precursor of many dance-oriented computer games required players to use the NES Power Pad to mimic an on-screen instructor who moved to the music. Users would have to follow the on-screen characters' moves by stepping on the correct parts of the mat. Dance Aerobics was an early example of rhythm action game. A multilayer view is fit for treating complex information entities by keeping contents properly organized within a unique framework. In fact, music information is made of heterogeneous facets, whose degree of abstraction may range from a purely logical definition in terms of symbols to the physical description of audio signals. Adopting the IEEE 1599 terminology, music information can be organized into the following layers: General, Logic, Structural, Notational, Performance, and Audio. Figure 2 shows the typical 6-layer structure of an IEEE 1599 document, together with an example of contents. Please note that the multi-layer approach for music has been discussed in earlier works, such as [25], [26] and [27]. It is worth mentioning that not all layers are necessarily present for a given music piece. Of course, the higher is the number of available layers, the richer is the music description. For instance, many jazz pieces have no full score and a given performance could only be transcribed a posteriori. Similarly, some folk songs or popular tunes do not present commonly-accepted metadata or instrumentation. Besides, no hierarchical relationship is implied among layers, since they show different facets of the same music piece. • Inter-layer synchronization – It takes place among contents described in different layers, which have by definition heterogeneous data types. Applications involving multi-media and multi-modal fruition, such as score following, karaoke, didactic products, and multimedia presentations, can be realized thanks to this kind of synchronization; • An IEEE 1599 viewer, namely an environment oriented to a multi-layer and synchronized musical experience. This software is able to present simultaneously information contents from multiple layers, allowing the user to enjoy them together and to choose the material to bring to front. The user is active in the choice of current materials (scores, audio tracks, video clips, etc.), and he/she can use standard navigation controls (start, stop, pause, change current position); however, from the performance point of view, the user can only experience already prepared materials;

This paper presents strategies that support the realization of experimentation in times that we cannot be in face-to-face situations in teaching laboratories. Experimentation and recreational activities, concept maps, bibliographic research, analogies, in combination with didactic readings were the main strategies on which it was supported for the realization of this work. It is exemplified by the didactic sequence “Influence of pH on plant irrigation." with its respective didactic reading. The results of the exercise of evaluation and regulation of the learning obtained in a Course of High School Chemistry are also presented

Art, depending on its properties, has an expressive language and if a concept accompanies it, or being said in an artistic language, it would be eternal, too. A review of the literature shows that the artworks, directly or indirectly, reflect the philosophy and idea of the artist, by which he has created the work. Thus any art piece has a negative or positive message to his audience and would affect him in one of these two trends. The Educational outcomes of these two approaches, has a long term and strange effect on the audience. The Article in addition of analyzing these approaches in photos of the Bam earthquake, analyses the orientation of artworks being produced after that and its impact on the audience. The research results show that the art can have wide conceptual effects on the audience. The analyzed samples indicate that some of the images emphasizing the positive implications from devastations of the earthquake, associations hope and mobility to audience. On the other hand, some of the images by showing negative concepts associate despair and hopelessness. The dual and also significant impact of art works shows that during the natural disasters and damages, we can use it as a factor in improving the situation and helping injured victims.

In Uganda, university teachers are recruited on the strength of their class of degree rather than pedagogical content knowledge and skill. Given the frequent changes in technology with resultant paradigm shifts from teacher to learner-centered education and competence-based approaches, increasing demand of accountability from society, and demand for quality, among others, university teaching can no longer be left to subject expertise alone. Effective teaching and quality graduates requires university teachers to possess a combination of content and pedagogical knowledge. Using data collected through an interview guide and end-of-workshop evaluation questionnaire for a four-year training period (2006 - 2010), this article focused on the lessons learnt from a series of pedagogical training workshops offered by Makerere University management to her teaching staff. Findings show that the main training needs among the teaching staff include assessment and grading of students, managing large classes, and using ICT in teaching and learning. Overall, the staff appreciated the workshop methodology, the co- teaching approach and the sharing of experiences. However, there were concerns about the timing of the trainings and inability to implement what is learned due to institutional constraints. The study underpins the importance of undertaking needs assessment before designing any staff training program. Rather than claim that addressing individual training needs will improve quality, staff pedagogical training should be combined with institutional changes so that institutional constraints that hinder utilization of knowledge and skills acquired during training are concurrently addressed. In addition, training approaches should transcend the deficit model of continuous professional development commonly used to the use of a variety of models including the cascaded model. Through the cascade model the capacity of academic staff could be built, these would continue to learn from each other, thereby developing a critical mass at faculty or academic unit level.

The 2020 pandemic suddenly emerged and left devastating consequences on global societies; the origin is still debated as are treatments and preventive steps. This research had a goal of extracting a common denominator for the disease dominance and find important preceding evidence for its rising pathogenicity, all through public domain records. Systems science, based on biologic principles, was used to identify patterns in extracted data, categorize them into either, unhealthy states of chaos and entropy, or a health territory; those classifications led to knowledge creation. The identified long-term evidence has been pointing to an unfavorable resolution of the unhealthy states of global societies. This study highlights the upstream etiology to this downstream disease that lie in the vanished individual health, propelled by the extraordinarily persistent separation of decision-consequences learning loop; it is only an individual who can extract meaning and learn from each completed loop, thus gaining health; no amount of health care can ever do that

Background: The first two decades of 21st Century found major dominance of poor health in all global societies with consequential pandemic and war. It is a seeming enigma why so much physical and cognitive illness still exists while so much is known about human biologic systems. The purpose of this study is to explore the dilemma. Material/Method: Public domain records, related to biologic systems in health and disease, have been studied. Systems science methodology was used; it offered corresponding method for the examination of living systems in health/peace or war. Results/Conclusions: The perception of self, how we see ourselves and the world around us, the human perceptional reality, has a parallel influence on our decisions and relationships, and, in a feedback loop, impacts the state of health. It is not what the eye can see but how it is interpreted that affect the creative epigenome for health or disease. The combined outcome of ‘what you see and what you do’, especially on a global level, leads to the prevalence of similarly tainted global decisions-from poor health to pandemics and wars. A foundational positive shift in world’s affairs can only come from ever-increasing optimizing individual decisions, which would eventually diffuse up, from ‘people working in the trenches’ to the ‘governing vertical societal hierarchies’.

The objective of this paper is to apply Kotter’s 8-Stage Process for Change in transforming traditional school organizationsinto models for 21 st century instruction and explore research that suggests the change process was effectively implemented in order to improve student achievement. This paper is developed through inquiry and research that describes a course of action for a change initiative to enrich curricula and meet a vision for competency-based curricular reform. Two analyses were conducted including (1) review of literature and statistics driving the need for curricular reform and (2) a qualitative analyses of data collection from studies conducted on schools which instituted curricular reform to develop interdisciplinary curricula in the areas of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). Analyzing and using the statistics and data from school systems in the state of Maine, which have made changes in their curricula and instructional methods, allows for critical review of the success of the change process. Results reveal that curriculum reform in the areas of STEM that creates a shift towards a more integrated approach in curriculum design has improved student achievement. Improving curriculum and instruction would be a hollow gesture without identifying and reviewing the research that suggests the use and application of the principles from John Kotter’s 8-Stage Process for Change outlined in his book Leading Change was applied to deeply root successful change. Curriculum reform is a response to the growing need for educating future innovators that can continue to keep our world moving forward. Kotter’s first step to creating change begins with a sense of urgency and currently we have a wealth of studies that are conducted that speak loudly to our society that we must focus on curriculum that involves students in problem solving challenges and innovative thinking activities to prepare them for the needs our society today and in the future. The educational system we have today is a product of the industrial age and was organized like an assembly line to produce a standardized product, which was considered the educated. At the time, it fit the needs of businesses. It is time that we begin asking what skills we will need our learners to know in the next twenty years. Engineers work in teams to solve large, complex problems and educational systems lack necessary skill building activities to foster what industries will need for the future success of our global society (Senge, 2014). As our economy moves from a manufacturing-based economy to, an information and service-based economy, the demand for a workforce well educated in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) is growing. Unfortunately, the number of students who choose STEM fields continues to decline (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2009; Galloway, 2008; National Research Council Committee on Science, Engineering Education Reform, 2006; Mooney & Laubach, 2002). As such, there is a great need to spark interest among our K-12 youth in STEM, and to develop and facilitate quality engineering experiences for K-12 students (National Science Board, 2003; Frantz, DiMiranda & Siller, 2011) (Table 1).

Abstract The study sought to identify the effectiveness of 3E, 5E learning cycle and the conventional approaches in teaching a Biology lesson. The mixed method approach was used for this study. Three science classes in three Senior High Schools were randomly selected. For the quantitative aspect, a pre-test-post-test non-equivalent quasi-experimental design with two experimental groups was used. The qualitative part constituted an interview to find out students’ views with regards to the 3E and 5E teaching approaches. The students in the experimental groups were instructed through 3E and 5E learning cycle whilst those in the control group were instructed on the same concept through conventional approach. ANCOVA and independent t-test were used to analyse the data. The results of the study showed that the experimental groups performed better on the post-test as compared to the control group. The results also revealed that the learning cycle approach was more effective in teaching the biology concepts than the conventional approach. The 3E learning cycle was found to be more effective for improving the performance of low achievers. The students exposed to the 3E and 5E approaches showed positive attitudes towards learning cycle when they were interviewed. Teachers should be encouraged to learn and use the learning cycle approach in the teaching and learning process of Biology concepts. (19) (PDF) Effectiveness of 3E, 5E and Conventional Approaches of Teaching on Students’ Achievement in High School Biology. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322856439_Effectiveness_of_3E_5E_and_Conventional_Approaches_of_Teaching_on_Students'_Achievement_in_High_School_Biology [accessed Jan 09 2019].

Cheating has reached alarming proportions in all segments, creating widespread cynicism and an erosion of trust. The root of the problem can be found in our schools, where academic dishonesty is rampant. We, academic communities, are in deep trouble if young people, students, maintain these habits as the next generation. The advancement of technologies, such as cell phones, iPods, internets, has broadened the ways by which people can achieve the goal of cheating. Traditional methods of detection may no longer be wholly successful in fully preventing cheating in examinations. New strategies need to be considered and employed to better manage the advancement of technology use for illegitimate purposes. Therefore, this review article will thoroughly discuss the nature of academic dishonesties (traditional and the 'modern' ones), their causes, their diverse natures, the shift from traditional to modern era and measures to be applied to shape the values and attitudes of young people engage in thoughtful, systematic and comprehensive efforts to promote integrity and prevent cheating, especially compatible with the advancement of technology.

The present investigation was conducted to see the effect of gender of head teachers on the academic success of the school students in . A total of 60 head teachers (male = 37, female = 23) and 3776 students (boys = 2142, girls = 1634) were randomly selected from the schools in a divisional town in to serve as sample. Academic success records of the students in their Primary School Completion Examination and Secondary School Certificate Examination were collected from the results published by the ‘Rajshahi Education Board’. The results indicate that the gender of the school head teachers has significant effect on the academic success of the students. The result also revealed that the students in primary schools under the leadership of female head teachers performed significantly better than those led under male head teachers, whereas the students in secondary schools obtained significantly better grades in the examinations under the leadership of male head teachers than the students led by female head teachers.