A Qualitative Study of Iranian EFL University Teachers’ Attitude towards Professional Development

Within the past few years, teachers have no longer been conceived as mere transmitters of knowledge. The image of the teacher as the exclusive holder of all the information related to teaching and learning has changed dramatically. It the new context, teachers are supposed to act as transformative agents who pay attention to new aspects of their profession in the process of developing professionally as individuals. In other words, the concept of teachers’ professional development (PD) has been recently viewed as a continuous process focusing on planned and systematic activities designed to trigger and enhance their growth. The current status of professional development in Iran, however, is not satisfactory. Summarizing the findings of the interview with the small group of English university teachers, this study attempted to find out the attitudes of participants to PD and discuss the constraints they faced on their way towards PD. Results indicated that a number of impeding factors have influenced the effective implementation of PD policies which need a reoriented and revitalized perspective to make them more compatible with new requirements of the present context

Voicing up in debate competition: oral development of two Malaysian ESL learners

This research used a qualitative approach to focus on the classroom debate between Malaysian English second language learners (ESL). Since debate has been often perceived as not a suitable activity for low proficiency students due to their limited linguistic resources, there has not been much emphasis on the impact of debate on incompetent ESL learners; however, this study was an attempt to concentrate on two students who were not competent in English to investigate their oral development via debate. The study observed the communicative strategies employed in this challenging task during the five debate rounds. Although the progress made was quite limited, the study showed that debate competition can be a relevant and meaningful practice for speaking activity among low proficiency students. Moreover, it showed that debate can be used to scaffold students’ practice in speaking

A case study of the development of an ESL learner's speaking skills through instructional debate

This study aimed to describe the implementation of debate activities in teaching English to Malaysian secondary students which can enhance students’ speaking skills. Moreover, through observing a Form One student, it was tried to identify the strategies used to compete in classroom debates and to describe the development of the participant’s speaking skills through debates. The study found that debate activities had an impact on the participants through improving collaborative skills, raising awareness of speakers’ roles and guiding participants via prepared texts. Besides, the main communicative strategies employed by the participant were compensatory and avoidance strategies. The result has also shown the improvement of the participant’s speaking skills after five rounds of debate activities

Is There a Place for Post-method Pedagogy in the Educational Context of Iran: Voices of EFL Teachers

In an attempt to liberate teachers from deficiencies of the conventional methods, Kumaravadivelu (1994) proposed the concept of “post method condition” to overcome the challenges caused by the very nature of methods. The literature regarding post-method pedagogy has indicated that most of the studies focus on its theoretical aspect, while the practical realization has been largely untouched. To this end, the present study was an endeavor to unveil the perspective of Iranian EFL teachers concerning the applicability of this pedagogy. 21 male and female in-service EFL teachers from different cities in Iran (Shiraz, Marvdasht, Bushehr, Tehran, and Gonbad-e-Kavus) participated in this qualitative research where data came from semi-structured interviews as the primary source of data collection. The interview data were transcribed and coded using Straus and Corbin’s (1998) constant comparative method, including three codification processes of open, axial and selective codings. The finding indicated that absence of required autonomy among teachers, teacher’s job security, students’ passivity, absence of critical thinking skills among students, dominance of transmission model of teacher education, inefficiency of the textbooks, teacher’s focus on coverage and grade pressure, and demanding nature of post-method pedagogy as the main pedagogical barriers which prevent language teachers from applying this pedagogy in their teaching practices

An English debate league competition among lower form students: an experiential learning activity

This paper presents a study of an experiential learning debate program held among second language learners of a Malaysian boarding school. It was a co-curricular activity carried by the ELS (English language society) and the EDC (English debate club). The English panel felt that not everyone would have the chance to speak or voice their opinion in a 40-minute English lesson. Hence, the rational to hold the debate tournament as this would create a real context for students to use English language. The British parliamentary debate was adopted. Thirty-two ELS members were briefed to run the tournament whilst 24 English debate members were trained to adjudicate. Two hundred and forty students (120 form one and 120 form two students) were grouped in pairs as debaters according to their sports house system. The debate lasted for three months and quantitative and qualitative data was drawn. A survey of participants’ perception undertaken revealed that students felt they had improved their speaking and listening skills. They suggested that after each debate, the adjudicators should discuss the motion and inform them of their weaknesses. Later, data drawn was used to explain how debate helped students to develop their speaking ability

Artificial Intelligence and Its Application in Optimization under Uncertainty

Nowadays, the increase in data acquisition and availability and complexity around optimization make it imperative to jointly use artificial intelligence (AI) and optimization for devising data-driven and intelligent decision support systems (DSS). A DSS can be successful if large amounts of interactive data proceed fast and robustly and extract useful information and knowledge to help decision-making. In this context, the data-driven approach has gained prominence due to its provision of insights for decision-making and easy implementation. The data-driven approach can discover various database patterns without relying on prior knowledge while also handling flexible objectives and multiple scenarios. This chapter reviews recent advances in data-driven optimization, highlighting the promise of data-driven optimization that integrates mathematical programming and machine learning (ML) for decision-making under uncertainty and identifies potential research opportunities. This chapter provides guidelines and implications for researchers, managers, and practitioners in operations research who want to advance their decision-making capabilities under uncertainty concerning data-driven optimization. Then, a comprehensive review and classification of the relevant publications on the data-driven stochastic program, data-driven robust optimization, and data-driven chance-constrained are presented. This chapter also identifies fertile avenues for future research that focus on deep-data-driven optimization, deep data-driven models, as well as online learning-based data-driven optimization. Perspectives on reinforcement learning (RL)-based data-driven optimization and deep RL for solving NP-hard problems are discussed. We investigate the application of data-driven optimization in different case studies to demonstrate improvements in operational performance over conventional optimization methodology. Finally, some managerial implications and some future directions are provided

Cytotoxicity effect of pineapple extract on breast cancer cells (4T1)

Aqueous extract of pineapple (Bromelain) is used in medicine. Bromelain has anticancer effect on leukemia, lymphoma, sarcoma and melanoma. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the anticancer effect of bromelain on mouse breast cancer (4T1) cells under in-vitro conditions. Methods: Mouse breast cancer (4T1) cells were incubated with different concentrations of the bromelain for 2, 24, 48 and 72 hours. The growth-inhibitory was investigated via 3 (4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium-bromide (MTT) assay. Kruskal-Wallis and Dunn’s tests were used to evaluate the statistical significance of the difference between the experimental and control groups. Findings: Bromelain significantly inhibited proliferation of 4T1 cells in a concentration-dependent manner. In all concentrations, cell viability decreased with respect to the control incubated cells in the absence of extract (P < 0.05). Bromelain exerted highest antiproliferative effects on 4T1 cells for concentrations of 100, 200, 300, 400 and 600 µg/ml (P < 0.05) for 24, 48 and 72 hours, while cell viability increased for times shorter than 2 hours. The half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) value of 142.6 g/ml was obtained from treating 4T1 cells. Conclusion: Results showed that bromelain has cytotoxic effects on the growth and proliferation of 4T1 cells for 24, 48 and 72 hours of incubation. This study is ongoing to assess the extract mechanism of action

The value of a simple method to decrease diagnostic errors in Turner syndrome: a case report

Introduction: Turner syndrome is a genetic disorder in females and is the result of complete or partial loss of an X chromosome during fertilization. The missing X chromosome is originally either from the mother's ovum or the father's sperm cell. Approximately 45% of patients have the 45,X karyotype and the rest have other variants of Turner syndrome, which are either mosaicism patterns or structural abnormalities of the X chromosome. Here, we report a case of Turner syndrome that is the fifth case of Turner syndrome with balanced Robertsonian translocation of (13;14)(q10;q10), and the sixth case with 44,X chromosomes, reported in the literature thus far. Case presentation: A 10.3-year-old Persian girl was brought to our clinic by her parents, with the complaint of failure to thrive and short height. She had been examined and investigated by endocrinologists since the age of 4 years, but no definite diagnosis was made. At the time of presentation, she had been through three provocative growth hormone tests and had been on no medications for about a year. Her physical examination revealed mild retrognathia and micrognathia. Initially, she was started on somatropin treatment which, after 12 months, did not appropriately improve her height velocity. Therefore, a more thorough physical examination was performed, in which high arched palate and low posterior hairline were observed. There was also a difference between target height and patient height standard deviation scores. Karyotype study was requested, and Turner syndrome was confirmed. Conclusion: The diagnosis of this case was not straightforward, both because the somatic presentations were not obvious, and because the physicians had not looked for them when performing the physical examinations. This case report introduces a rare 44,X chromosome karyotype of Turner syndrome and highlights the value in using the difference between target height and patient height standard deviation scores as a simple and inexpensive tool for diagnosis of this syndrome

Estimating the Adverse Reaction Among Iranian Blood Donors:The First National Report

Background: The aim of this study was to estimate the incidence of reactions caused by blood donations in Iran as well as exploring three potential scenarios of the worst, moderate, and the best situations for adverse reactions among Iranian blood donations by specifying the under-reporting rate. Methods: There are two different designs; first, the ecological study was coducted to estimate the blood donation adverse effects by using the data registered in the donor vigilance part of Iranian Blood Transfusion Organization (IBTO). Second, the cross-sectional study was conducted to estimate under-reporting in the data. For the cross-sectional study, 2408 donors were selected randomly in three cities. Results: In general, based on the estimations of this study, adverse reactions to blood donation in Iran is 2%(CI 95%, 1.4-2.6%). Local and systemic reactions estimated are 1.7%(CI 95%, 1.2-2.2) and 0.3%(0.1-0.5), respectively. Based on the national report, in general, adverse reactions to blood donation in Iran is 0.5(CI 95% 0.4-0.6). Local and systemic reactions estimated are 0.38%(CI 95% 0.28-0.48) and 0.03%(0.0.02-0.04), respectively. Conclusion: Adverse reactions may vary from region to region in Iran, but in total, there is a lot of under-reporting in the incidence of adverse reactions to blood donation in Iran, most of which are related to local reactions.</p

Electrochemical Reduction of CO2 Using Cu (II) and Ni (II) Complexes with 8-Hydroxyquinoline Ligand

Two dinuclear Cu (II) and Ni (II) complexes of the general formula [Cu2L2], (1), and [Ni2L6].4 (C2H5OH), (2), which L=8-Hydroxyquinoline have been synthesized and characterized by elemental analysis, IR and UV-Vis spectroscopic methods. The crystal structure analysis showed the binuclear structure for 1 and the Cu (II) centers adopt a distorted square pyramidal geometries. Two Cu centers in complex 1 are linked via µ-O coordination bridge modes of 8-hydroxyquinoline ligands with the Cu-Cu distances of 3.534 Å. The electrochemical behavior of the free ligand and corresponding 1 and 2 complexes was studied in DMF. The cyclic voltammetry of the complexes 1 and 2 show an irreversible metal and ligand based reductions at negative potentials. The electrocatalytic activity of the complexes 1 and 2 was monitored for CO2 reduction in DMF solution. The results show that the complexes can be used as new electrocatalysts for CO2 reduction, leading to formation of carbon monoxide product