Closing the gap? Overcoming limitations in sociomaterial accounts of early literacy

This article uses a sociomaterial perspective to explore how deficit views of young children’s language and literacy are sustained and can be challenged. Foregrounding the notion of multiplicity, it considers how diverse sociomaterial relations work to uphold particular kinds of practice and particular arrangements of bodies and things over others. These relations may interfere with and interface with each other in different ways, sometimes sustaining but also potentially disrupting deficit discourses and practices. Our sociomaterial perspective is illustrated with a short vignette from a study of children and touchscreen tablets in an early years setting. An initial analysis is followed by a series of alternate and tentative tracings of other kinds of relations that play through those moments. The article contributes to debates about social inequality by troubling the certainties generated though deficit models of children’s literacy, whilst working proactively to envision and produce alternate possibilities that foreground the potentialities generated as people and other materials assemble together

Opening the Web of Learning: Students, Professors, and Community Partners Co-Creating Real-Life Learning Experiences

This article documents an example of a successful learning partnership for an activity called the Leadership Challenge (LC), an experiential learning design used by Royal Roads University (RRU) in its Master of Arts in Leadership Program. The LC is based on a co-learning model in which professors create the conditions for students’ learning; community-based organizations bring an authentic challenge as a scenario for learning to the students; and organizations, professors, and students all learn from one another throughout the process. We believe this experience is an example of how genuine partnerships between universities and community organizations can be created in which community partners are squarely placed in the center of the academic experience, rather than being treated as peripheral. Written from the perspective of representatives from both the university and the community service organization, this article also documents the limitations of this activity based on the short time frame allowed

Empirical Support for the HCR‐20: A Critical Analysis of the Violence Literature

Summary: The purpose of this project was to conduct a comprehensive search of the empirical literature published in peer-reviewed journals between 1997 and 2005 to identify studies that presented support for variables included on the HCR-20. This report includes a separate section for each of the measure’s 20 items, with one exception. Empirical support for Items C5 (Unresponsive to Treatment) and R4 (Noncompliance with Remediation Attempts) are presented together under a single heading because studies that were relevant to one item also tended to apply to the other item. Moreover, these studies could not be differentiated on the basis of having a present (clinical) or future (risk management) focus. Under each section, the most significant and methodologically sound studies identified in the search are summarized; abstracts of additional studies of relevance to the item are reproduced (with separate headings for studies that presented data on violent or non-vonviolent outcomes). Each section also lists narrative/qualitative literature reviews relevant to the item, as well as studies that offer “contradictory” empirical evidence. A table is presented at the beginning of the report that indicates whether, for each reference, a summary is provided, the abstract only is reprinted, or if it is a narrative review. Bookmark links are provided for each section of this report

Capacity Investment under Demand Uncertainty: The Role of Imports in the U.S. Cement Industry

Demand uncertainty is thought to in uence irreversible capacity decisions. Suppose local demand can be sourced from domestic (rigid) production or from (fl exible) imports. This paper shows that the optimal domestic capacity is either increasing or decreasing with demand uncertainty depending on the relative level of the costs of domestic production and imports. This relationship is tested with data on the U.S. cement industry, where, because cement is costly to transport over land, the diff erence in marginal cost between domestic production and imports varies across local U.S. markets. Industry data for 1999 to 2010 are consistent with the predictions of the model. The introduction of two technologies to the production set one rigid and one exible is crucial in understanding the relationship between capacity choice and uncertainty in this industry because there is no relationship at the aggregated U.S. data. The analysis presented in the paper reveals that the relationship is negative for coastal districts, and signi cantly more positive in landlocked districts

Sources of Bias in Synchronization Measures and how to Minimize Their Effects on the Estimation of Synchronicity: Application to the Uterine Electromyogram

Non

Divided attention in young drivers under the influence of alcohol

Aim: The present research evaluates driving impairment linked to two crashes factors, divided attention task and alcohol, and determines whether it is higher for novice drivers than for experienced drivers. Method: Novice and experienced drivers participated in three experimental sessions in which blood alcohol concentrations (BACs) were 0.0 g/L, 0.2 g/L and 0.5 g/L. They performed a divided attention task with a main task of car-following task and an additional task of number parity identification. Driving performance, response time and accuracy on the additional task were measured. Results: ANOVA showed a driving impairment and a decrease in additional task performance from BAC of 0.5g/L, particularly for novice drivers. Indeed, the latter adopt more risky behaviour such as tailgating. In the divided attention task, driving impairment was found for all drivers and impairment on information processing accuracy was highlighted, notably in peripheral vision. Impact of research: The divided attention task used here provides a relevant method for identifying the effects of alcohol on cognitive functions and could be used in psychopharmacological research

Make/shift Pedagogies: Suggestions, Provocations, and Challenges for Teaching Introductory Gender and Women’s Studies Courses

Drawing on over four decades of diverse teaching experiences as well as our recent work facilitating the NWSA Curriculum Institute, this article discusses some of the politics and praxis of teaching the introductory Gender and Women’s Studies course in the U.S. academic classroom. While mapping different pedagogical strategies, it offers some suggestions, recommendations, and provocations that inform our commitment to design syllabi, plan courses, and teach materials that introduce students to formative works and concepts in Gender and Women’s Studies, chart current trends, and signal new developments in the field.  RésuméEn s’appuyant sur plus de quatre décennies d’expériences d’enseignement diverses ainsi que sur nos travaux récents pour organiser l’institut des programmes d’études de la NWSA, cet article discute certains aspects de la politique et de la pratique de l’enseignement du cours d’introduction Études sur le genre et les femmes dans les classes d’université aux É.-U. Tout en exposant différentes stratégies pédagogiques, il propose des suggestions, des recommandations, et des idées provocantes qui contribuent à notre engagement à concevoir un programme d’études, à planifier des cours et à enseigner un contenu qui initient les étudiants aux travaux et aux concepts formateurs des études sur le genre et les femmes, rendent compte des tendances actuelles et signalent les nouveaux développements dans le domaine