Design principles for integrating authentic activities in an online community of foreign language learners

Actively encouraging foreign language learners to establish a meaningful connection with the target language culture - by engaging in authentic activities with other learners and native speakers in real-world communicative contexts - is a critical goal of foreign language education. This paper describes a design-based research study that investigated how students of Italian at an Australian university engaged with and responded to a web-based learning environment which integrated authentic learning tasks to facilitate social interaction and meaningful collaborative language practice with native speakers of the target language. The findings suggest that the use of the critical elements of authentic activities actively supported student learning across different domains. A major outcome of this research was the development of a set of design principles and guidelines for the design and development of authentic foreign language learning environments that could inform and guide other language educators within their specific educational context

Maps of zeroes of the grand canonical partition function in a statistical model of high energy collisions

Theorems on zeroes of the truncated generating function in the complex plane are reviewed. When examined in the framework of a statistical model of high energy collisions based on the negative binomial (Pascal) multiplicity distribution, these results lead to maps of zeroes of the grand canonical partition function which allow to interpret in a novel way different classes of events in pp collisions at LHC c.m. energies.Comment: 17 pages, figures (ps included); added references, some figures enlarged. To appear in J. Phys.

High country river processes : a technical discussion of results from research on the Kowai River system, Springfield, Canterbury

A sub-catchment (Torlesse Stream) of the Kowai River, Canterbury, has been the site of an interdisciplinary study of the relationships between erosion and stream sedimentation (Hayward 1975). It was logical to extend the stream sediment investigation of that study (Hayward 1978) into the Kowai system proper in order to establish changes in the nature and distribution of the stream sediments with distance downstream. The sediment sampling study, comprising Part I of Paper A in this volume, analyses the changes in size, distribution, form and rock type of the river gravels from ahead water mountain stream to the wide braided river beds of the middle reaches of the Kowai River. Part 2 of Paper A discusses the possible implications for the management that these sediment studies have for this and other similar river systems. It is believed that if thought necessary it is possible to design a river training programme to guide the river towards a more manageable pattern. Paper B of this volume compares the results of the present river gravel survey with those from a sedimentological analysis of fluvio-glacial outwash gravels deposited several thousand years ago within the lower reaches of the Kowai system. This comparative study is used to indicate differences in the hydrologic environment prevailing at their respective times of deposition, and aids in our understanding of the processes at work in hill and high country rivers today. Both Papers A and B relate to the Kowai River system, but the authors wish to emphasise that the findings from these studies are believed to have application to other similar gravel bed river systems

Pension funding and the actuarial assumption concerning investment returns

An assumption concerning the long-term rate of return on assets is made by actuaries when they value defined-benefit pension plans. There is a distinction between this assumption and the discount rate used to value pension liabilities, as the value placed on liabilities does not depend on asset allocation in the pension fund. The more conservative the investment return assumption is, the larger planned initial contributions are, and the faster benefits are funded. A conservative investment return assumption, however, also leads to long-term surpluses in the plan, as is shown for two practical actuarial funding methods. Long-term deficits result from an optimistic assumption. Neither outcome is desirable as, in the long term, pension plan assets should be accumulated to meet the pension liabilities valued at a suitable discount rate. A third method is devised that avoids such persistent surpluses and deficits regardless of conservatism or optimism in the assumed investment return

Tunneling and the Band Structure of Chaotic Systems

We compute the dispersion laws of chaotic periodic systems using the semiclassical periodic orbit theory to approximate the trace of the powers of the evolution operator. Aside from the usual real trajectories, we also include complex orbits. These turn out to be fundamental for a proper description of the band structure since they incorporate conduction processes through tunneling mechanisms. The results obtained, illustrated with the kicked-Harper model, are in excellent agreement with numerical simulations, even in the extreme quantum regime.Comment: 11 pages, Latex, figures on request to the author (to be sent by fax

Modelling of root reinforcement and erosion control by ‘Veronese’ poplar on pastoral hill country in New Zealand

Background The control of erosion processes is an important issue worldwide. In New Zealand, previous studies have shown the benefits of reforestation or bioengineering measures to control erosion. The impetus for this work focuses on linking recent research to the needs of practitioners by formulating quantitative guidelines for planning and evaluation of ground bioengineering stabilisation measures. Methods Two root distribution datasets of ‘Veronese’ poplar (Populus deltoides x nigra) were used to calibrate a root distribution model for application on single root systems and to interacting root systems at the hillslope scale. The root distribution model results were then used for slope stability calculations in order to quantitatively evaluate the mechanical stabilisation effects of spaced trees on pastoral hillslopes. Results This study shows that root distribution data are important inputs for quantifying root reinforcement at the hillslope scale, and that root distribution strongly depends on local environmental conditions and on the tree planting density. The results also show that the combination of soil mechanical properties (soil angle of internal friction and cohesion) and topographic conditions (slope inclination) are the major parameters to define how much root reinforcement is needed to stabilise a specific slope, and thus the spacing of the trees to achieve this. Conclusions For the worst scenarios, effective root reinforcement (>2 kPa) is reached for tree spacing ranging from 2500 stems per hectare (sph) for 0.1 m stem diameter at breast height (DBH) to 300 sph for 0.3 m stem DBH. In ideal growing conditions, tree spacing less than 100 sph is sufficient for stem DBH greater than 0.15 m. New quantitative information gained from this study can provide a basis for evaluating planting strategies using poplar trees for erosion control on pastoral hill country in New Zealand

Evaluation of Year 1 of the Academic Mentoring Programme: Impact Evaluation for Year 11. Evaluation Report: An exploration of impact in Year 11

The National Tutoring Programme (NTP) Academic Mentoring (AM) programme (2020/21) was designed to help disadvantaged pupils ‘catch up’ on missed learning by providing trained academic mentors to deliver one to one and small group tutoring in schools. This evaluation covers year 1 of the AM programme as delivered by Teach First from November 2020 to July 2021 (delivery was in three waves starting 26th October 2020, 15th January 2021 and 22nd February 2021). AM was one arm of the NTP. The NTP aimed to support teachers and schools in providing a sustained response to the Covid-19 pandemic and to provide a longer -term contribution to closing the attainment gap between disadvantaged pupils and their peers. The NTP was part of a wider government response to the pandemic, funded by the Department for Education (DfE) and was originally developed by the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), Nesta, Impetus, The Sutton Trust, Teach First, and with the support of the KPMG Foundation. The DfE appointed Teach First to manage the provision of mentors (referred to as ‘academic mentors’) to schools; recruiting, training and placing them in schools. The mentor worked in the school setting as an employee of the school. It was expected that each academic mentor would work with at least 50 pupils between the date they started in school and the end of the academic year. Mentoring was provided online and/or face-to-face; and was one to one, or in groups of 2-4 pupils; and available in English/literacy, maths, science, humanities, and modern foreign languages. Mentoring was expected to be delivered in schools during normal teaching time, as well as before or after school. In certain circumstances, mentoring could be delivered online with pupil(s) at home. The AM programme was targeted at state-maintained primary and secondary schools serving disadvantaged populations. 89% of the schools met Teach First’s priority criteria, which is based on the proportion of children living in income deprived families (IDACI) and whether the school is in an area of chronic and persistent underperformance (AEA). The remaining 11% of schools had an above average proportion of pupils eligible for Pupil Premium (Teach First, 2021). Participating schools could decide which pupils received support from academic mentors. However, the programme encouraged them to select pupils from disadvantaged households or those whose education had been disproportionately impacted by Covid-19. Pupils in Years 1–11 were eligible (5–16 years old). The programme aimed to reach a minimum of 900 schools and 50,000 children, with 1,000 academic mentors. By the end of February 2021, it had surpassed targets having trained and placed 1,124 academic mentors in 946 schools and delivered mentoring sessions to 103,862 pupils, 49% of whom were identified by mentors as being eligible for Pupil Premium of Free School Meals (FSM), and 23% of whom were identified as having a special educational need or disability. The AM programme was initiated and delivered at a time of great pressure for schools when the education system had been disrupted by a series of school closures to most pupils and was contending with ongoing widespread pupil and staff absences. Covid-19 related issues disrupted the anticipated operation of academic mentoring during the year. The AM programme involved initial training and ongoing support from Teach First as intended but there was greater variation in schools’ deployment of mentors during the latter stages of the Autumn Term 2020/21, and during the January to March 2021 period of school closures to most pupils. This evaluation report presents the analysis of the impact of the AM programme on maths and English attainment outcomes for Year 11 pupils only—who represent a very small proportion of individuals targeted by the AM programme. Originally, it was planned to evaluate impact across all year groups (Years 1 – 11) at primary and secondary level using schools’ standardised assessment data from Renaissance Learning (RL) assessments and, in addition, to evaluate the impact for Year 6 pupils using Key Stage (KS) 2 data. However, these analyses could not go ahead as KS2 assessments were cancelled in summer 2021 (related to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic) and because the number of schools providing agreement to use their RL data was insufficient to warrant impact analyses. Data was only available for pupils in Year 11. Since GCSEs could not go ahead as planned in 2021, the data was in the form of Teacher Assessed Grades (TAGs), which had not previously been used as an outcome measurement tool. Checks were therefore undertaken to explore if TAGs would be suitable as an outcome measure. The only analysis that could proceed was therefore exploratory. The evaluation uses a quasi-experimental design (QED), in which a group of secondary schools and Year 11 pupils who did not receive the AM programme were selected for comparison with schools and pupils who received the AM programme. Comparison schools were selected by matching schools that were similar in important, observable regards to the schools that participated in AM. The evaluation included analysis on the availability of AM for pupils who were eligible for Pupil Premium (a key focus of the overall NTP), and all pupils, as these groups could be identified for both the AM and non-AM schools. In addition, the evaluation aimed to analyse the impact on pupils who received AM by predicting their participation and identifying a comparison group of pupils with similar characteristics. Analysis was based on data about Year 11 pupils’ attainment and characteristics from the National Pupil Database (NPD) merged with data provided by Teach First about pupils’ participation in AM. In total, 159 AM schools (8,977 Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium) and an equal number of comparison schools (8,419 Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium) were included in the final analysis. The evaluation assessed impact in English and maths using Teacher Assessed Grades (TAGs) from 2021. Where appropriate, this impact evaluation refers to important implementation features from the implementation and process evaluation (IPE) conducted by Teach First themselves. However, there is no independent IPE data to draw on in the interpretation of the impact results. Of the Year 11 pupils selected for Academic Mentoring in this evaluation, 46% of them were eligible for Pupil Premium, however, despite this it is important to note that the number of Year 11 Pupil Premium-eligible pupils selected for AM in AM schools was small as a proportion of all Year 11 Pupil Premium-eligible pupils, and the number of these Year 11 Pupil Premium-eligible pupils receiving AM in maths and/or English (as opposed to other subjects), was smaller still. The same is the case when considering the whole year group of Year 11 pupils – the number receiving AM was small as a proportion of all Year 11 pupils. This means that in the analysis, the number of Year 11 pupils who actually received AM in maths and/or English was heavily ‘diluted’ by the number of pupils who did not. The primary impact findings must be therefore treated with a high degree of caution. The analysis was subject to very high dilution; a large proportion of the pupils eligible for Pupil Premium included in the analysis in AM schools were not selected for AM. This was due to limited programme reach and a tendency for teachers to allocate both non-Pupil Premium and Pupil Premium eligible pupils to the programme. This dilution means that, in order to detect an effect, either the effect would need to be very strong amongst the very small proportion of Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium who were selected for mentoring (and there was no indication that this was the case elsewhere in our analysis), and/or there would need to be strong spillover effects amongst the rest of the Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium. Although the programme Theory of Change includes such a mechanism, it is unlikely to be relevant at the dilution levels seen. With such high dilution, it is hard to detect whether AM had an effect on those who received mentoring in the analyses focusing on pupils eligible for Pupil Premium and on all pupils. It is not possible to conclude whether a lack of observed impact is due to the small proportion of disadvantaged pupils who received mentoring, or because AM did not work for those who received it. An additional challenge was that it was not possible to construct a comparison group of similar Year 11 pupils in nonAM to schools to those who received mentoring in AM schools, based on observable, pupil-level characteristics, and this impact analysis did not go ahead. Schools used information such as classroom assessments to select pupils into the programme that was not observable in the available datasets, suggesting that pupil-level selection was driven by unobserved dimensions. These constraints, both of very high dilution and not being able to identify a comparison group with similar pupil characteristics, mean that the evaluation is unable to conclude, with any certainty, whether or not AM had an impact on the English or mathematics attainment outcomes of those pupils who received it. The report must be considered in the light of these caveats. Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium in schools that received AM made, on average, similar progress in English compared to Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium in comparison schools (there was no evidence of an effect). In maths, Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium in schools that received AM made, on average, slightly more progress (equivalent to 1 months’ additional progress) compared to Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium in comparison schools. However, there is uncertainty around this result; it is also consistent with a null (0 months) effect or an effect of slightly larger than 1 month’s additional progress. A particular challenge in interpretation is that, on average, only 13% of Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium were selected for mentoring by schools, and only 4.2% of Year 11 pupils eligible for Pupil Premium were selected for mentoring in maths and 2.9% in English, meaning that the vast majority of pupils eligible for Pupil Premium included in the analysis did not receive mentoring. Therefore, this estimated impact of AM is severely diluted and it is unlikely any of these differences were due to AM. When looking at all Year 11 pupils, pupils in schools that received AM made, on average, similar progress in English and maths compared to all Year 11 pupils in comparison schools (there was no evidence of an effect). However, this finding was similarly subject to severe dilution: on average only 10% of Year 11 pupils in the analysed schools were selected for mentoring, with 3.4% in maths and 2.1% in English, and therefore it is hard to detect any effect that may (or may not) have been present. Within schools that offered AM to Year 11 pupils, there was no association between the number of completed mentoring sessions in maths and Year 11 outcomes in maths, or between the number of completed mentoring sessions in English and Year 11 outcomes in English. These results are associations and not necessarily causal

NOVO REGISTRO DE BIOMPHALARIA INTERMEDIA (MOLLUSCA: GASTROPODA: PLANORBIDAE) PARA O ESTADO DE ALAGOAS, BRASIL

A espécie de Planorbidae, B/ompha/aria intermedia (Paraense & Deslandes) foi previamente registrada apenas no estado de São Paulo e adjacentes. Neste trabalho um novo registro de B. intermedia é apresentado. Os espécimes foram coletados em um açude artificial localizado no município de Maceió, Alagoas. Este novo registro sugere que a distribuição geográfica da espécie é mais ampla do que era acreditado anteriormente

NOVO REGISTRO DE BIOMPHALARIA INTERMEDIA (MOLLUSCA: GASTROPODA: PLANORBIDAE) PARA O ESTADO DE ALAGOAS, BRASIL

A espécie de Planorbidae, B/ompha/aria intermedia (Paraense & Deslandes) foi previamente registrada apenas no estado de São Paulo e adjacentes. Neste trabalho um novo registro de B. intermedia é apresentado. Os espécimes foram coletados em um açude artificial localizado no município de Maceió, Alagoas. Este novo registro sugere que a distribuição geográfica da espécie é mais ampla do que era acreditado anteriormente