Using multimedia to enhance the accessibility of the learning environment for disabled students: reflections from the Skills for Access project

As educators' awareness of their responsibilities towards ensuring the accessibility of the learning environment to disabled students increases, significant debate surrounds the implications of accessibility requirements on educational multimedia. There would appear to be widespread concern that the fundamental principles of creating accessible web‐based materials seem at odds with the creative and innovative use of multimedia to support learning and teaching, as well as concerns over the time and cost of providing accessibility features that can hold back resource development and application. Yet, effective use of multimedia offers a way of enhancing the accessibility of the learning environment for many groups of disabled students. Using the development of ‘Skills for Access’, a web resource supporting the dual aims of creating optimally accessible multimedia for learning, as an example, the attitudinal, practical and technical challenges facing the effective use of multimedia as an accessibility aid in a learning environment will be explored. Reasons why a holistic approach to accessibility may be the most effective in ensuring that multimedia reaches its full potential in enabling and supporting students in learning, regardless of any disability they may have, will be outlined and discussed

The Relationship Between Physical Fitness and Academic Achievement

The purpose of this study is to show what relationship exists, if any, between physical fitness and academic achievement among eighth grade junior high school boys

Aspirations for Higher Education amongst students in 16 - 19 education in three London Boroughs

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.This study is of the higher education aspirations of a group of students in 16 - 19 education. Data was collected from students in three London boroughs, Bamford, Newton and Rishworth. These students were in the final year in either sixth forms or colleges of further education and taking courses that would enable a successful candidate to gain access to higher education. Both local authority and independent sector institutions were represented in the study. The research began by developing a conceptual framework within which an analysis could be made of the above mentioned students higher education aspirations. Two main types of research was used. Interviews were held with those involved in the provision of 16 – 19 education and with the counselling of students as to higher education entry. A questionnaire was distributed to the above mentioned group of students, requesting information as to various aspects of their background and their aspirations. Some 100 + interviews were carried out with borough councillors, L.E.A. administrators, careers officers, school teachers, and college lecturers. Some 1,500 questionnaires were distributed to students at 31 schools and three colleges of further education. There were 952 replies. The information received was computerised and processed using a prime computer and application package S.P.S.S. An analysis was made in terms of higher education aspirations and L.E.A. area, type of institution, type of course, mode of attendance, socio-economic grouping, family circumstances, type of housing and gender. The findings of this analysis were compared with the original hypothesis and conclusions drawn

Structural Descriptions in Human-Assisted Robot Visual Learning

The paper presents an approach to using structural descriptions, obtained through a human-robot tutoring dialogue, as labels for the visual object models a robot learns. The paper shows how structural descriptions enable relating models for different aspects of one and the same object, and how being able to relate descriptions for visual models and discourse referents enables incremental updating of model descriptions through dialogue (either robot- or human-initiated). The approach has been implemented in an integrated architecture for human-assisted robot visual learning

'Learning together': Sharing international experience on new models of primary care

No abstract available

Comparing Techniques for Mobile Interaction with Objects from the Real World.

Mobile interaction with objects from the real world is gaining in popularity and importance as different mobile technologies increasingly provide the basis for the extraction and usage of information from physical objects. So far, Physical Mobile Interaction is used in rather simple ways. This paper presents a comparison and evaluation of more complex and sophisticated techniques for Physical Mobile Interaction. The results indicate the importance of usability guidelines that pay attention to these new interaction techniques

Simulated Data for Genomic Selection and Genome-Wide Association Studies Using a Combination of Coalescent and Gene Drop Methods

An approach is described for simulating data sequence, genotype, and phenotype data to study genomic selection and genome-wide association studies (GWAS). The simulation method, implemented in a software package called AlphaDrop, can be used to simulate genomic data and phenotypes with flexibility in terms of the historical population structure, recent pedigree structure, distribution of quantitative trait loci effects, and with sequence and single nucleotide polymorphism-phased alleles and genotypes. Ten replicates of a representative scenario used to study genomic selection in livestock were generated and have been made publically available. The simulated data sets were structured to encompass a spectrum of additive quantitative trait loci effect distributions, relationship structures, and single nucleotide polymorphism chip densities