Assessing Children's Oral Storytelling in their first year of School

This paper discusses some findings from a small-scale investigation of the assessment of young children's oral narrative skills that was conducted in three primary schools in London, UK. Effective early language and literacy teaching with children from diverse backgrounds such as those in London depends on having articulated knowledge about children’s skills (McNaughton 1995). A particularly important area is that of narrative skills since the ability to narrate and report is a vital skill for future academic success and is highly correlated to later fluency in reading (Beals and DeTemple 1993; Dickenson and Snow 1987). Teachers need to have sufficiently detailed descriptions of their pupils’ language skills and this is especially important where populations are diverse. A procedure, developed and used extensively in New Zealand, exists for increasing teachers’ knowledge of their pupils’ language skills on entry to school. This story retelling activity (Tell Me) lends itself to use in the normal course of classroom teaching and is the focus of the present study

The dimensions of inhomogeneous self-affine sets

Funding: SAB thanks the Carnegie Trust for financially supporting this work. JMF was financially supported by a Leverhulme Trust Research Fellowship (RF-2016-500) and an EPSRC Standard Grant (EP/R015104/1).We prove that the upper box dimension of an inhomogeneous self-affine set is bounded above by the maximum of the affinity dimension and the dimension of the condensation set. In addition, we determine sufficient conditions for this upper bound to be attained, which, in part, constitutes an exploration of the capacity for the condensation set to mitigate dimension drop between the affinity dimension and the corresponding homogeneous attractor. Our work improves and unifies previous results on general inhomogeneous attractors, low-dimensional affine systems, and inhomogeneous self-affine carpets, while providing inhomogeneous analogues of Falconer’s seminal results on homogeneous self-affine sets.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Non-continuous and variable rate processes: Optimisation for energy use

The need to develop new and improved ways of reducing energy use and increasing energy intensity in industrial processes is currently a major issue in New Zealand. Little attention has been given to optimisation of non-continuous processes in the past, due to their complexity, yet they remain an essential and often energy intensive component of many industrial sites. Novel models based on pinch analysis that aid in minimising utility usage have been constructed here through the adaptation of proven continuous techniques. The knowledge has been integrated into a user friendly software package, and allows the optimisation of processes under variable operating rates and batch conditions. An example problem demonstrates the improvements in energy use that can be gained when using these techniques to analyse non-continuous data. A comparison with results achieved using a pseudo-continuous method show that the method described can provide simultaneous reductions in capital and operating costs

Developing an ‘outdoor-inspired’ indoor experiential mathematical activity

The issue of poor retention and achievement rates is one that plagues many British universities. While well documented and researched, there is still need for innovative practices to address this problem. This article outlines the theoretical underpinning of the Activity Guide, a tool the authors developed to support mathematics departments in order to make the transition to university easier for students and thus increase retention and attainment. Some of the topics covered here include reflective practise, experiential learning and independence; topics adapted from an outdoor frontier education course that had been specifically tailored by the authors to target and develop study skills particularly important for mathematics subjects. To allow for transferability and use by the entire higher education mathematics community the Activity Guide was produced to bring a similar course on university campuses, or even in classrooms, to better cater for resources and the scale the institutions’ facilities allow. The Activity Guide contains all that lecturers will need to plan, set up and deliver a range of activities to their students

Coincidence and disparity of fractal dimensions

We investigate the dimension and structure of four fractal families: inhomogeneous attractors, fractal projections, fractional Brownian images, and elliptical polynomial spirals. For each family, particular attention is given to the relationships between different notions of dimension. This may take the form of determining conditions for them to coincide, or, in the case they differ, calculating the spectrum of dimensions interpolating between them. Material for this thesis is drawn from the papers [6,7,8,9,10]. First, we develop the dimension theory of inhomogeneous attractors for non-linear and affine iterated function systems. In both cases, we find natural quantities that bound the upper box-counting dimension from above and identify sufficient conditions for these bounds to be obtained. Our work improves and unifies previous theorems on inhomogeneous self-affine carpets, while providing inhomogeneous analogues of Falconer's seminal results on homogeneous self-affine sets. Second, we prove that the intermediate dimensions of the orthogonal projection of a Borel set ⸦ ℝⁿ onto a linear subspace are almost surely independent of the choice of subspace. Similar methods identify the almost sure value of the dimension of Borel sets under index-α fractional Brownian motion. Various applications are given, including a surprising result that relates the box dimension of the Hölder images of a set to the Hausdorff dimension of the preimages. Finally, we investigate fractal aspects of elliptical polynomial spirals; that is, planar spirals with differing polynomial rates of decay in the two axis directions. We give a full dimensional analysis, computing explicitly their intermediate, box-counting and Assouad-type dimensions. Relying on this, we bound the Hölder regularity of maps that deform one spiral into another, generalising the `winding problem’ of when spirals are bi-Lipschitz equivalent to a line segment. A novel feature is the use of fractional Brownian motion and dimension profiles to bound the Hölder exponents."This work was supported by a PhD scholarship from The Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland [grant number EP/L1234567/8]." -- Fundin

Proficiency testing of laboratories for paralytic shellfish poisoning toxins in shellfish by QUASIMEME: A review

AbstractParalytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP) toxins are some of the most toxic substances known to man and consumption of shellfish containing these naturally-occurring neurotoxins can lead to a range of different symptoms including death in extreme cases. It is imperative therefore, to implement robust shellfish monitoring programs to minimise the possibility of contaminated product reaching the marketplace. To improve the quality assurance of these programs, QUASIMEME, the proficiency test provider added to its scope PSP toxins in shellfish. Since 2009, six proficiency testing exercises have been delivered by QUASIMEME with a total of thirty-four different laboratories submitting data using a range of different methods. These include animal and antibody based assays, together with High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) techniques using post and pre-column oxidation and more recently LC-MS/MS methodologies.Data from these exercises is presented and laboratory performance is assessed to determine any changes in overall performance over the six rounds, together with any potential method-related performance issues. The data showed the improvement of laboratories over the six exercises with between laboratory CV% values decreasing from an average of 39% in the first year to 22% in 2014 and the average percentage of participants receiving satisfactory z-scores increasing from 50% in 2009 to over 66% in 2014

Electrokinetic generation of iron-rich barriers in soils:realising the potential for nuclear site management and decommissioning

Following earlier field-scale pilot work on nuclear site materials in the late 2000s, there has recently been renewed research and industry interest in the application of electrokinetic technologies for nuclear site management and remediation in the UK. One relatively novel application of electrokinetics is the use of sacrificial steel electrodes (coupled with an in situ generated pH-Eh gradient in the treated material) to precipitate sub-surface iron-rich barriers for groundwater and/or leachate containment, which could be used to grout or contain contaminated fluids in the sub-surface on working nuclear sites or sites undergoing decommissioning. Here, we report previously unpublished data from two work programmes exploring the higher Technology Readiness Level (TRL) application of this electrokinetic iron-barrier approach to materials typical of those found in the subsurface of the Sellafield nuclear licensed site, UK. The first programme, funded by the UK National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL), assessed the electrokinetic generation of iron-rich barriers at metre + scale in simulated Sellafield materials, while the second programme, funded under the current UK TRANSCEND consortium project, examined electrokinetic iron-barrier formation at smaller (&lt;1 m) scale, but in real site materials. Both programmes indicate that iron-rich barriers can be conveniently and electrokinetically grown in different geometries over reasonable timescales (months) in realistic site subsurface materials (sands), in electrolytes similar to natural waters found in the environment. Voltage requirements are low (&lt;1 V cm−1) with energy and consumables costs of no more than single-digit or tens of US dollars at the metre-plus scale. Further work is needed however to assess the longevity of the iron precipitates forming the subsurface barrier, and to explore barrier generation at the geometries and scales required for (site specific) field application.</p

Developing an 'outdoor inspired' indoor experiential mathematics activity

The issue of poor retention and achievement rates is one that plagues many British universities. While well documented and researched, there is still need for innovative practices to address this problem. This article outlines the theoretical underpinning of the Activity Guide, a tool the authors developed to support mathematics departments in order to make the transition to university easier for students and thus increase retention and attainment. Some of the topics covered here include reflective practise, experiential learning and independence; topics adapted from an outdoor frontier education course that had been specifically tailored by the authors to target and develop study skills particularly important for mathematics subjects. To allow for transferability and use by the entire higher education mathematics community the Activity Guide was produced to bring a similar course on university campuses, or even in classrooms, to better cater for resources and the scale the institutions facilities allow. The Activity Guide contains all that lecturers will need to plan, set up and deliver a range of activities to their students

Projection theorems for intermediate dimensions

Funding: Carnegie Trust (SAB); UK EPSRC Standard Grant (EP/R015104/1) (JMF and KJF).Intermediate dimensions were recently introduced to interpolate between the Hausdorff and box-counting dimensions of fractals. Firstly, we show that these intermediate dimensions may be defined in terms of capacities with respect to certain kernels. Then, relying on this, we show that the intermediate dimensions of the projection of a set E ⊂ Rn onto almost all m-dimensional subspaces depend only on m and E, that is, they are almost surely independent of the choice of subspace. Our approach is based on ‘intermediate dimension profiles’ which are expressed in terms of capacities. We discuss several applications at the end of the paper, including a surprising result that relates the boxdimensions of the projections of a set to the Hausdorff dimension of the set.PostprintPublisher PDFPeer reviewe

The use (and misuse) of phylogenetic trees in comparative behavioral analyses

Abstract Phylogenetic comparative methods play a critical role in our understanding of the adaptive origin of primate behaviors. To incorporate evolutionary history directly into comparative behavioral research, behavioral ecologists rely on strong, wellresolved phylogenetic trees. Phylogenies provide the framework on which behaviors can be compared and homologies can be distinguished from similarities due to convergent or parallel evolution. Phylogenetic reconstructions are also of critical importance when inferring the ancestral state of behavioral patterns and when suggesting the evolutionary changes that behavior has undergone. Improvements in genome sequencing technologies have increased the amount of data available to researchers. Recently, several primate phylogenetic studies have used multiple loci to produce robust phylogenetic trees that include hundreds of primate species. These trees are now commonly used in comparative analyses and there is a perception that we have a complete picture of the primate tree. But how confident can we be in those phylogenies? And how reliable are comparative analyses based on such trees? Herein, we argue that even recent molecular phylogenies should be treated cautiously because they rely on many assumptions and have many shortcomings. Most phylogenetic studies do not model gene tree diversity and can produce misleading results, such as strong support for an incorrect species tree, especially in the case of rapid and recent radiations. We discuss implications that incorrect phylogenies can have for reconstructing the evolution of primate behaviors and we urge primatologists to be aware of the current limitations of phylogenetic reconstructions when applying phylogenetic comparative methods