Able and gifted: judging by appearances?

In this article I reflect upon an aspect of my research involving Year 6 pupils identified by their teachers as ‘able’ or ‘gifted’ in mathematics, using ‘able’ to refer to high achievers and ‘gifted’ to exceptionally high achievers. I discuss the differences I observed between the able and gifted when solving mathematical tasks, and consider what these differences may mean for professionals involved in identifying gifted pupils. I speculate that teachers’ judgements are highly influenced by those aspects of achievement that are readily visible, such as answering questions quickly, and discuss the potential problems associated with judging by appearances

Catalogers explore a new frontier: establishing a NEASC evidence center

This article describes how cataloging staff at the Roger Williams University Library established, managed, and planned to preserve an online NEASC Evidence Center for the University’s reaccreditation process. It highlights use of MARC and AACR2rev for effective organization of the Center’s records and the continuing importance of professional cataloging skills

A study of the influence of the socieconomic background of the nursing student on attitude toward selected nursing activities

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston UniversityThis study was undertaken to determine the influence of socio-economic background of nursing students upon attitude toward selected nursing activities. The review of literature suggested that there may be a relationship between socio-economic background and student attitudes. The sample chosen for study was composed of fifteen junior students in a medical-surgical nursing class of a basic collegiate school of nursing. A tool was developed to elicit attitudes about twenty-seven commonly performed nursing activities. Socio-economic background factors were obtained by collecting data pertinent to occupational classification of the father, age of the student, number of siblings, previous work experience in a hospital, participation in household tasks, and number and kind of employed household help. This information was analyzed in relation to the students' expressed attitudes toward the selected nursing activities [TRUNCATED

The Future of Institutional Repositories at Small Academic Institutions: Analysis and Insights

Institutional repositories (IRs) established at universities and academic libraries over a decade ago, large and small, have encountered challenges along the way in keeping faith with their original objective: to collect, preserve, and disseminate the intellectual output of an institution in digital form. While all institutional repositories have experienced the same obstacles relating to a lack of faculty participation, those at small universities face unique challenges. This article examines causes of low faculty contribution to IR content growth, particularly at small academic institutions. It also offers a first-hand account of building and developing an institutional repository at a small university. The article concludes by suggesting how institutional repositories at small academic institutions can thrive by focusing on classroom teaching and student experiential learning, strategic priorities of their parent institutions

International Conference on Dublin Core and Metadata Application 2004

The International Conference on Dublin Core and Metadata Applications took place on October 11-14, 2004 in Shanghai, China. It was the fourth in a series of expanded Dublin Core conferences that included a conference, tutorials and workshops. Prior to the first in this series of conferences held in Tokyo in 2001, eight Dublin Core workshop series had been held in various North American and European countries starting in 1995. These workshops and conferences have provided a forum where researchers and practitioners can exchange new ideas and demonstrate the development of metadata standards and applications from practical aspects

Hey, Look What I Can Do

Take a word like FLING, add the letter I, and you have filing. Described below are other word-pairs in which one becomes the other merely by the addition of I. Answers are found in Answers and Solutions at the end of this issue

Impact of online learning on student effort and persistence in technical college students

Includes bibliographical references

The production and deployment of an on-line video learning bank in a skills training environment

This paper describes the introduction of videos as aids in clinical skills teaching. Although the process explored focuses on a nursing clinical skills environment it is relevant to many other disciplines. With the introduction of the pre-registration degree in nursing in Ireland in 2002, the formerly hospital-based schools of nursing amalgamated into larger programmes with their affiliated higher education institutes (HEIs). The result was a considerable increase in class sizes. The current average annual cohort in the School of Nursing, Dublin City University (DCU) is 240 students. This has resulted in a need to review the way we teach clinical skills on campus. These skills form a large part of the programme and are taught to students in the school-based simulated nursing environment to prepare them for their practical experience in the clinical environment. Until 2006 the skills had been taught to groups of 25-30 students using a demonstration and practice technique. This teaching method has posed a number of problems: •Learning experiences vary depending on the mix of demonstration and practice in each session. •It can be difficult for students to absorb all of the information presented in a single demonstration. •It is highly resource intensive. It was decided that video technology incorporating a large scale deployment of skills videos over a video web server, in conjunction with a shift in emphasis in the teaching contact sessions could offer a useful tool to aid the teaching process. This paper will discuss the production process, the implementation of the project in the teaching environment and the evaluation findings

Measuring Irish Capital

Irish National Income and Expenditure Accounts do not contain information on capital stocks or capital services estimation. Estimates of the national capital stock and the depreciation of its fixed assets are basic macroeconomic aggregates and are integral components for many modelling exercises. This paper presents a detailed asset-level analysis of the stocks and depreciation of Irish fixed assets and the capital formation flows used to derive them. It applies an improved perpetual inventory methodology for calculating depreciation based on best practice employed for the US National Income and Product Accounts (NIPA). The paper shows how the three basic capital variables – the net capital stock, consumption of fixed capital and capital services – are linked through a standard equation for the value of an asset. The paper then presents estimates of the volume of capital services for the Irish economy as well as by asset type. The volume index of capital services (VICS) weights together the growth in the net stock of assets using shares that reflect the relative productivity of the different assets that make up the capital stock i.e. without controlling for the share of housing in the capital stock, total factor productivity will be overestimated for growth accounting purposes.