Morality Play: A Model for Developing Games of Moral Expertise

According to cognitive psychologists, moral decision-making is a dual-process phenomenon involving two types of cognitive processes: explicit reasoning and implicit intuition. Moral development involves training and integrating both types of cognitive processes through a mix of instruction, practice, and reflection. Serious games are an ideal platform for this kind of moral training, as they provide safe spaces for exploring difficult moral problems and practicing the skills necessary to resolve them. In this article, we present Morality Play, a model for the design of serious games for ethical expertise development based on the Integrative Ethical Education framework from moral psychology and the Lens of the Toy model for serious game design

Lessons Learned in Public Reporting: Physician Buy-In Is Key to Success

Shares lessons from Aligning Forces for Quality communities about securing physicians' support for public reporting of quality performance data, including the need to allow them to review their data and give easy access to improvement tools and resources

A vision system planner for increasing the autonomy of the Extravehicular Activity Helper/Retriever

The Extravehicular Activity Retriever (EVAR) is a robotic device currently being developed by the Automation and Robotics Division at the NASA Johnson Space Center to support activities in the neighborhood of the Space Shuttle or Space Station Freedom. As the name implies, the Retriever's primary function will be to provide the capability to retrieve tools and equipment or other objects which have become detached from the spacecraft, but it will also be able to rescue a crew member who may have become inadvertently de-tethered. Later goals will include cooperative operations between a crew member and the Retriever such as fetching a tool that is required for servicing or maintenance operations. This paper documents a preliminary design for a Vision System Planner (VSP) for the EVAR that is capable of achieving visual objectives provided to it by a high level task planner. Typical commands which the task planner might issue to the VSP relate to object recognition, object location determination, and obstacle detection. Upon receiving a command from the task planner, the VSP then plans a sequence of actions to achieve the specified objective using a model-based reasoning approach. This sequence may involve choosing an appropriate sensor, selecting an algorithm to process the data, reorienting the sensor, adjusting the effective resolution of the image using lens zooming capability, and/or requesting the task planner to reposition the EVAR to obtain a different view of the object. An initial version of the Vision System Planner which realizes the above capabilities using simulated images has been implemented and tested. The remaining sections describe the architecture and capabilities of the VSP and its relationship to the high level task planner. In addition, typical plans that are generated to achieve visual goals for various scenarios are discussed. Specific topics to be addressed will include object search strategies, repositioning of the EVAR to improve the quality of information obtained from the sensors, and complementary usage of the sensors and redundant capabilities

Early college placement testing: Outcomes and impacts of the Early ACCUPLACER partnership

The Early ACCUPLACER Program was administered in partnership between the University of Alaska (UAA) and Anchorage School District (ASD) between 2006 and 2013. Using the UAA placement test (ACCUPLACER) as an instructional tool, the program intended to help students understand the differences between high school graduation requirements and college-level coursework. Test scores were used to advise students to take more rigorous high school curricula so they would be better prepared for the academic expectations of the college environment. In its seven years of operation, the program served thousands of ASD students. This report reviews Early ACCUPLACER test scores and subsequent academic performance for high school juniors and seniors who tested in the 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 academic years. The data show that, at the time of testing, many of those high school students’ test scores would place them into developmental classes in college. This analysis was unable to examine high school transcripts to see whether or not students heeded advice to take additional and more rigorous high school courses; however, by following the participants who subsequently attended college in the UA system1, the data show: • Students who participated in the program did not exhibit substantively higher college placement test scores than other incoming students who did not receive the intervention. • Most students who participated in the program performed better on the test at the time of college matriculation than when they took it in high school, but the increases in performance, on average, were not large enough to change their recommended course placements. For approximately a quarter of students, test performance decreased between high school and college. • Upon matriculation, more students needed developmental coursework in math than in English or reading. • Upon attending college, between two-thirds and three-quarters of the Early ACCUPLACER program participants performed well enough in their first year to meet eligibility requirements for federal financial aid. • Persistence rates for Early ACCUPLACER participants were slightly higher than the overall UAA rates; however they were similar to other recent high school graduates, who tend to have higher persistence rates than nontraditional-aged students. The data suggest that the program did not significantly impact the college readiness or later college performance for its participants who later attended UA. However, the data and literature suggest opportunities to use high school-college partnerships as part of a robust outreach agenda. Recommendations include evaluating the relationship between high school course-taking behavior and college readiness, and broadening the definition of “college readiness” to include other attributes known to promote success.Executive Summary / Introduction / Method / Findings / Discussing / Recommendations / Conclusion / Reference

Personal intelligence

A model of personal intelligence is developed. Personal intelligence is defined as the capacity to reason about personality and to use personality and personal information to enhance one\u27s thoughts, plans, and life experience. Approaches to related concepts such as intrapersonal intelligence and psychological-mindedness are reviewed. Next, a model of personal intelligence is proposed that emphasizes the capacity to: a) recognize personally-relevant information; b) form accurate models of personality; c) guide one\u27s choices by using personality information; and d) systematize one\u27s goals, plans, and life stories. A discussion examines the possible contributions and limitations of the personal intelligence concept

Cognitive modeling of social behaviors

To understand both individual cognition and collective activity, perhaps the greatest opportunity today is to integrate the cognitive modeling approach (which stresses how beliefs are formed and drive behavior) with social studies (which stress how relationships and informal practices drive behavior). The crucial insight is that norms are conceptualized in the individual mind as ways of carrying out activities. This requires for the psychologist a shift from only modeling goals and tasks —why people do what they do—to modeling behavioral patterns—what people do—as they are engaged in purposeful activities. Instead of a model that exclusively deduces actions from goals, behaviors are also, if not primarily, driven by broader patterns of chronological and located activities (akin to scripts). To illustrate these ideas, this article presents an extract from a Brahms simulation of the Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station (FMARS), in which a crew of six people are living and working for a week, physically simulating a Mars surface mission. The example focuses on the simulation of a planning meeting, showing how physiological constraints (e.g., hunger, fatigue), facilities (e.g., the habitat’s layout) and group decision making interact. Methods are described for constructing such a model of practice, from video and first-hand observation, and how this modeling approach changes how one relates goals, knowledge, and cognitive architecture. The resulting simulation model is a powerful complement to task analysis and knowledge-based simulations of reasoning, with many practical applications for work system design, operations management, and training

Opportunity-Rich Schools and Sustainable Communities: Seven Steps to Align High-Quality Education With Innovations in City and Metropolitan Planning and Development

Details challenges and steps for linking quality education and community and economic vitality, including establishing a shared vision and metrics, aligning investments for prosperity, and expanding access via transportation. Lists promising practices

Mathematics teachers’ professional development and identity in a distance education setting

This paper discusses the influence of an in-service distance education course in the construction of mathematics teachers’ professional identity, especially regarding their views and practices of reflection and collaboration and their relation with information and communication technology. The course was based in open-learning pedagogy and focused on conducting exploratory and investigative work in the mathematics classroom. Evaluation results show that the perspectives and involvement of the participant teachers depend very much on their previous professional experience and relationship with the Internet. Teachers that use e-mail for collaborative work found this a very stimulating experience whereas those with less professional involvement had some difficulty in assuming the roles and values required for this kind of activity

Building Medical Homes in State Medicaid and CHIP Programs

Presents strategies, best practices, and lessons learned from ten states' efforts to advance the medical home model of comprehensive and coordinated care in Medicaid and Children's Health Insurance Programs in order to improve quality and contain costs

Measuring What Matters: Using Assessment and Accountability to Improve Student Learning

This report hails testing and accountability as key to improving student learning. CED cautions, however, that tests are a means, not an end, to school reform. More work must be done to ensure that tests are good measures of learning. CED's K-12 efforts will engage business leaders in sustaining support for performance measurement in education and in identifying and overcoming barriers to delivering public education in new ways