Critical factors in the teaching of Japanese in New Zealand at years 7 and 8 : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Second Language Teaching at Massey University

Current literature about the teaching of Japanese in New Zealand has raised a number of issues. However, there has been no attempt made to rank these issues either in terms of priority or in terms of how they may be addressed. In addition, in the existing literature, the writers have not provided any solutions or recommendations themselves. This research identifies and ranks issues in Japanese language teaching programmes at Years 7 and 8 in the New Zealand school setting. Two professional groups (teachers and principals) were approached to provide the data. Discussions were held in focus groups with teachers of Japanese from around New Zealand. Issues which either constrain or facilitate the implementation of a Japanese language teaching programme were elicited from participating teachers. These issues have been termed "factors" to avoid any negative connotations. Professional responses to the most critical factors were also sought from the teachers. The critical factors generated by teachers were grouped into four broad categories and the focus groups then contributed professional responses to these. Initial results showed that teachers identified "commitment from principal", "pressure and time" and "availability of resources" as being important. Questionnaires were then developed and sent to principals in schools offering Japanese at these levels. Principals identified "commitment from principal", "availability of resources" and "confidence of teachers" as being important. The results of this study are discussed with reference to the current literature and a number of implications for teaching programmes are proposed. These suggestions are intended to guide schools contemplating the introduction of Japanese or another international language at these levels. The model developed for group discussions could be used in further research when trying to determine critical factors in the teaching of either other languages or indeed other curriculum areas

Power arc welder touch-started with consumable electrode

Power arc welder formed as a hand-held welding gun touch-starts, retracts a consumable electrode to create the desired arc, and then commences feeding of the consumable electrode at the rate required to form the intended bead or spot. This device achieves uniform spot welds repeatedly

Rank-based attachment leads to power law graphs

We investigate the degree distribution resulting from graph generation models based on rank-based attachment. In rank-based attachment, all vertices are ranked according to a ranking scheme. The link probability of a given vertex is proportional to its rank raised to the power -a, for some a in (0,1). Through a rigorous analysis, we show that rank-based attachment models lead to graphs with a power law degree distribution with exponent 1+1/a whenever vertices are ranked according to their degree, their age, or a randomly chosen fitness value. We also investigate the case where the ranking is based on the initial rank of each vertex; the rank of existing vertices only changes to accommodate the new vertex. Here, we obtain a sharp threshold for power law behaviour. Only if initial ranks are biased towards lower ranks, or chosen uniformly at random, we obtain a power law degree distribution with exponent 1+1/a. This indicates that the power law degree distribution often observed in nature can be explained by a rank-based attachment scheme, based on a ranking scheme that can be derived from a number of different factors; the exponent of the power law can be seen as a measure of the strength of the attachment

A Case Study of Health Risk Communication: What the Public Wants and What It Gets

Dr. Trauth presents a content analysis of 40 years of coverage of a major local source of air pollution by a Pittsburgh newspaper. She also summarizes the results of a survey conducted to determine the extent to which citizens of most likely affected communities, e.g., understand health risks and desire further information

Communication channels and induced behavior

This paper reports recent findings on the effects of cheap talk communication on behavior. It exemplifies how different communication channels influence decisions in various games and information environments and addresses possible consequences for the design of real-world economic environments.communication, economic experiment, bargaining, public good

The merchant banker, the broker and the Company chairman: a new issue case study

This paper explores the roles of a merchant banker, Everard Hambro, and the chairmen of two companies, Thames Iron and Trollope, Colls & Co., in the restructuring of their companies at the beginning of the twentieth century. Their correspondence provides evidence that the choice of corporate capital structure had little to do with company needs or risk characteristics. Instead, Hambro, in concert with stockbrokers, concentrated on legal issues and on ensuring that the securities issued conformed in amount, type and price to market norms, including the avoidance of stock watering. The company chairmen concentrated on ensuring that they retained control and that the new issues were deemed a success.Corporate finance, stock watering, underwriting, new issues

Total Colourings of Direct Product Graphs

A graph is k-total colourable if there is an assignment of k different colours to the vertices and edges of the graph such that no two adjacent nor incident elements receive the same colour. The total chromatic number of some direct product graphs are determined. In particular, a sufficient condition is given for direct products of bipartite graphs to have total chromatic number equal to its maximum degree plus one. Partial results towards the total chromatic number of the direct product of complete graphs are also established