Dyslexia and Minecraft Education. A qualitative study exploring Minecraft Education as a tool for working with English literature for students with dyslexia

The following thesis aims to explore the experiences pupils with dyslexia have when using Minecraft Education to work with English literature. The study used a qualitative approach where 10 pupils with dyslexia had to complete different tasks in Minecraft education after reading a chapter from the novel The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. The participants’ experiences were captured using screen recording and interviews following the pupil’s completion of the tasks related to the reading. Thematic analysis of the collected data revealed three themes with codes: multimodal visualization, creativity, and game literacy. The findings from the themes showed that pupils benefited from the visual aspects of Minecraft Education, as it is often not present in combination with English literature. Further, the creative aspect combined with feelings of mastery made the experience more motivational for the pupils. The pupils also placed a high value on cooperation and wanted it incorporated into the tasks. However, while this could benefit some pupils, it could also impose difficulties for teachers as they have to prevent unvented gaming behavior

Agroecology

Contributing institution: Carleton CollegePreviously hosted as part of Mann Library's Locale collection

A Cross-Sectional and Longitudinal Examination of Adjustment and Coping in Female Undergraduates in Response to Sexual Coercion

The present study is a cross-sectional and longitudinal examination of psychological adjustment and coping in female undergraduates in response to unwanted sexual intercourse before and during their first year of college. This study represents an important contribution because of its longitudinal and prospective design. It also is one of the first studies to examine the Sense of Coherence (SOC) construct in women reporting unwanted sexual intercourse. Questionnaires were mailed to the entire class of incoming women at a Northern Plains state university at the beginning of the 1993-94 academic year (N = 778). Over half of these women responded (n = 411) to the first mailing, and the two subsequent mailings netted 249 (63%) and 246 (62%) respondents, respectively. These samples permitted estimates of prevalence and incidence rates of unwanted sexual experiences. Concurrent prediction using multiple regression- analysis revealed that SOC predicted General Severity Index (GSI) scores from, the Brief Symptom Inventory in women reporting an incident of unwanted sexual intercourse (USI group) prior to beginning college, while incident variables (e.g., degree of force used by the man) did not make significant contributions to the prediction. At the first assessment, the USI group differed from women who denied any type of unwanted sexual contact (NSC group) on their SOC scores and GSI scores, although the latter difference was of questionable clinical significance. This study found that making a distinction on the type of coercion (e.g., verbal vs. physical) did not affect psychological adjustment. It also found that the NSC group\u27s expectations about how they would cope with a sexually coercive event differed from the USI group\u27s actual report of coping behaviors they had used after such an incident. The prospective analysis revealed that only pre-incident GSI scores were able to contribute significantly to the prediction of post- incident GSI among women reporting unwanted sexual intercourse during the course of this study. These findings emphasize the importance of controlling for pre-incident adjustment when examining adjustment and coping after sexually coercive incidents. It also offers some preliminary evidence that SOC may be an important variable to examine in this population

Breccia dikes from the Beaverhead Impact structure, southwest Montana

While shatter cones are generally accepted as indicators of meteorite impact, older petrologic features are not widely recognized in the geologic community. Breccia dikes are one such feature. They are found in many large impact structures occurring over an area at least as extensively as shatter cones. Breccia dikes will survive moderate degrees of metamorphism and tectonism, unlike many other microscopic features (shocked quartz grains, high-pressure polymorphs, etc.) and even large-scale features such as annular or bowl-shaped topographic features. Thus, they are important diagnostic criteria, especially for large, poorly preserved impact structures. The Beaverhead Impact structure is a recently discovered, deeply eroded impact structure in southwestern Montana. The remains of the structure are delineated by the occurrence of shatter cones, found in an area greater than 200 sq km, occurring within the Cabin thrust plate, part of the Cretaceous Sevier fold and thrust system. The distribution of shatter cones is further truncated by Tertiary normal faults. The present remains represent an allochthonous fragment of a larger structure

A study of lipids from animal skin secretions

Within the akin of animals are situated various glands which secrete their products to the outer surface of the skin. The glands exist in many forms and their functions are diverse. A satisfactory classification based on the morphology of the glands has been worked out and the glands of the vertebrata are recognised as belonging to three main types: - holocrine, eccrine and apocrine glands. In man the holocrine glands are referred to as sebaceous and the eccrine as sudoriferous or sweat glands. These terms are often used also for animals. Comparatively few animal skin glands or secretions have been investigated chemically. The sebaceous secretion of the sheep, wool wax, has been much investigated owing to the commercial value of this product; and the author participated for some years in studies of wool wax at the National Chemical Research Laboratory, Pretoria. In Chapter I is summarised the present knowledge of wool wax chemistry, including contributions from this laboratory into the investigation of dihydric alcohols and hydroxy-acids and the syntheses of iso-acids which occur in wool wax. Skin secretions which have no commercial applications are nevertheless of great interest from a physiological and biochemical point of view. In this respect human skin secretions may naturally attract more attention than those of other animals. Their investigation may prove rewarding in throwing further light upon the studies of dermatological disorders in general, and more particularly upon the all-important problem of skin cancer. A study of human sebaceous secretions was taken up in this laboratory by the author; the aliphatic alcohols and some polycyclic hydrocarbons present were investigated. The chemistry of human sebaceous secretions is reviewed in Chapter II. Chapter III reviews work of other investigators on various skin gland secretions. The "scent" glands of musk deer and other animals and the "preen" glands of some birds have been investigated. Some materials of human origin such as ear wax, which are considered as related to sebaceous secretions, are included in this review. Natural fats and waxes are generally of complex composition and early workers did not succeed in isolating many pure components from such materials. As a result of improved techniques and methods considerable progress has been made in the last few years towards the elucidation of the fine structures of fats and waxes

Relative Resistance of LEW Rats to Rotation Stress

Rotation stress induced by a grammophone turntable has profound effects on the immune system of mice. In the present study, we tested the effect of the method on the weight of lymphoid organs and cellularity of peripheral blood and lymph in rats. After four days (4 X S X 10 X 78 revolutions) the spleen weight was significantly reduced in rotated rats as compared to controls. Small, but not significant, reductions were also seen in body weight gain, thymus weight, inguinal lymph node weight, thoracic duct lymphocyte number and peripheral blood leukocyte number. After twenty days (20 X 5 X 10 x 78 rpm) the differences between rotated and control animals were smaller and not significant. We conclude that the stress regimen induced a slight temporary reduction in total body lymphocyte number, but that the rats adapted to the situation with time. Consequently, the method cannot be recommended for longterm experiments in rats

Improved LeRoy-Bernstein near-dissociation expansion formula. Tutorial application to photoassociation spectroscopy of long-range states

NDE (Near-dissociation expansion) including LeRoy-Bernstein formulas are improved by taking into account the multipole expansion coefficients and the non asymptotic part of the potential curve. Applying these new simple analytical formulas to photoassociation spectra of cold alkali atoms, we improve the determination of the asymptotic coefficient, reaching a 1% accuracy, for long-range relativistic potential curve of diatomic molecules.Comment: This article is part of Daniel Comparat's PhD thesis available at http://tel.ccsd.cnrs.fr