Preparing student teachers for Teaching Practice: early placements in Initial Teacher Education

This paper reports a pilot project of ten initial teacher training students engaged on a three-year undergraduate programme leading to BA(hons) in English with QTS. In the first two years of their programme, student teachers normally receive academic input only, embarking on a one-year practicum stage in the third year of their programme. The project allowed student teachers to become closely associated with one of the University’s partnership schools to enable them to understand the daily life in schools and begin to engage with teaching. In addition they used secure social networking through the Mahara e-portfolio system to exchange ideas and experiences. The project proved highly successful in reducing isolation, enhancing communication and it helped student teachers to decide which kind of school they wished to work with in the future

DOING OTHER PEOPLE’S TRAINING PRESENTATIONS - a guide for teachers in implementing a scheme

Often, experienced teachers in schools and colleges are asked to present training packs written by others. The assumption is that since they are experienced teachers, making training presentations to their colleagues will be easy. They often find that it is not. Usually, the material has been designed to be delivered using a model where one person within a school or college will make themselves responsible for familiarising themselves with Trainer's Notes, the Teachers' Guide and the rest of the support material provided. They will then be able to use the pack to make a presentation to the rest of their colleagues

Business Process Review/Re-engineering at the University of Sunderland – the immediate effect on staff and systems.

In Spring 2001, the University of Sunderland began a comprehensive Business Process Review and Re-Engineering (BPR) activity. This was carried out under the auspices of a Project Team (Project “Plus 2”), which was set up to procure and implement a new Student Administration System, a Virtual Learning Environment and a Managed Learning Environment. This project lasts 3 years, beginning in September 2000. A principal element of the Project’s philosophy was to be as inclusive as possible – drawing in as much of the University community of staff and students as possible. There were two main objectives for this philosophy – to ensure institutional ‘buy-in’ to the systems being procured and implemented; and to utilise as much of the University’s significant expertise as possible to ensure that sound and valid decisions were made. This paper describes the methodology and immediate effect of the Business Process Review. The evaluation that followed the BPR activity, which sought to find the effect on the BPR itself on the University and its staff, will be reported here. The evaluation of the BPR findings themselves (that is, did the findings of the BPR lead to lasting changes in the processes) will follow

Independent Distance Learning – is it worth it?

This paper describes an approach to the management of the development of independent distance learning programmes (IDL) adopted by the University of Sunderland. The University through its Faculty of Education and Society has had significant success over many years of delivering a small number of programmes through IDL and this paper shares some of the areas that need to be addressed as more pressure is brought on programme deliverers to adopt the IDL approach. The paper goes on to explore the financial considerations, including the ‘at risk’ costs and the possible rewards. It is intended to act as a step-by step briefing for non-academic managers of the considerations necessary from idea to implementation, stopping short of delivery. It takes the perspective of, and its intended audience is, the managers of the process – there are many other papers and guides that deal with the distinctive pedagogy of IDL in depth and similarly many written by and for academic staff

Shakespeare and the Spheres:the representation of astrology, astronomy and folklore surrounding the moon in King Lear, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Tempest.

This paper discusses the representation of astrology, astronomy, and folklore surrounding the moon, in King Lear, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Tempest. It includes an explanation of the forms of astrology and astronomy practiced during the Renaissance while discussing their representation within the three plays. The paper shows how Shakespeare’s reference to astrology and the folklore surrounding it reflects the social, historical and cultural significance of his work at the time, and therefore the importance of Shakespeare and his place in English Literature

Boys’ Writing: A ‘Hot Topic’ … but what are the strategies?

This research was undertaken to investigate the validity of specific current research into Boys’Writing, especially in the English National Curriculum’s Key Stage 1. A single-subject case study approach was carried out in an English International School in Egypt. The findings show that although most aspects of the research proved valid, an integration of the studies is suggested in order to evaluate the most effective approach to boys’ writing. In particular, a focus on gender issues may have led to the impact of handwriting instruction being overlooked in intervening and helping boys’ writing. In addition, it is suggested that journal writing may need to be more thoroughly integrated into the National Literacy Strategy (NLS) framework in order adequately to address the needs of younger writers

Arithmetic coding revisited

Over the last decade, arithmetic coding has emerged as an important compression tool. It is now the method of choice for adaptive coding on multisymbol alphabets because of its speed, low storage requirements, and effectiveness of compression. This article describes a new implementation of arithmetic coding that incorporates several improvements over a widely used earlier version by Witten, Neal, and Cleary, which has become a de facto standard. These improvements include fewer multiplicative operations, greatly extended range of alphabet sizes and symbol probabilities, and the use of low-precision arithmetic, permitting implementation by fast shift/add operations. We also describe a modular structure that separates the coding, modeling, and probability estimation components of a compression system. To motivate the improved coder, we consider the needs of a word-based text compression program. We report a range of experimental results using this and other models. Complete source code is available

A near real-time algorithm for flood detection in urban and rural areas using high resolution Synthetic Aperture Radar images

A near real-time flood detection algorithm giving a synoptic overview of the extent of flooding in both urban and rural areas, and capable of working during night-time and day-time even if cloud was present, could be a useful tool for operational flood relief management and flood forecasting. The paper describes an automatic algorithm using high resolution Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite data that assumes that high resolution topographic height data are available for at least the urban areas of the scene, in order that a SAR simulator may be used to estimate areas of radar shadow and layover. The algorithm proved capable of detecting flooding in rural areas using TerraSAR-X with good accuracy, and in urban areas with reasonable accuracy