Reflective Outcomes in Asynchronous Computer Mediated Communication: A Case Study using a Comparative Method

ABSTRACT In an era of constant educational reforms, many acknowledge teachers’ professional development as the keystone to educational improvement. The issue of whether teachers’ development is adequate has been crucial in all times, especially now that professional education faces a number of challenges due to the rapid technological development and the need for lifelong learning incited by globalization of world economies. Nevertheless, although common acceptance exists that reflective practice is a key ingredient for professional development, the art of cultivating reflection in the context of CPD requires further attention. A review of the literature shows a long history on research that embraces a wide range of strategies that argue to promote teacher reflection. However, there is unclear evidence about whether reflective thinking – as a meaningful professional objective – may be promoted through collaborative computer mediated discourse. What’s more, although there is a plethora of assessment tools that claim to assess reflexivity, very few authors exemplify the theoretical framework underpinning the notion of reflection employed in their studies. The purpose of this study has been to examine whether, and if yes how, reflective thinking is promoted through collaborative asynchronous computer mediated communication by comparison with traditional face to face discourse. A case study using a comparative method was employed to analyze the electronic discourse by comparison with the face to face dialogue of twenty post 16 education practitioners in the UK. Research design considerations and implications related to what constitutes evidence of reflection and how it may be represented for the purposes of reporting on research outputs are also critically examined. The results lend support to the view that, although reflective outcomes can be accomplished in an asynchronous computer mediated communication, the recurring theme of storytelling observed in the face to face discourse appears to cultivate and influence the depth of reflexivity achieved

Imprint of galaxy clustering in the cosmic gamma-ray background

Star-forming galaxies are predicted to contribute considerably to the cosmic gamma-ray background (CGB) as they are confirmed γ-ray emitters and are the most numerous population of γ-ray sources, although individually faint. Even though the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope will be able to resolve few star-forming galaxies individually, their fractional contribution to the CGB should become far more significant than it was for past measurements of the CGB as many of the brighter, formerly unresolved sources will be resolved out. Thus, the clustering feature of galaxies imprinted on the CGB might be detectable by Fermi. In anticipation of such measurements, we calculate the predicted angular auto- and cross-power spectra of the CGB from normal galaxies. We find that the amplitude of the auto-power spectrum is smaller than that for other sources, such as blazars and dark matter annihilation; the shape is also characteristic. We also show that the cross-power spectrum with galaxy surveys features larger amplitude. Fermi should be able to detect the correlation signature in both the auto- and cross-power spectra at angular scales of ~1°–10° after 5 years of operation. Such a detection would be valuable in confirming the level of the star-forming galaxy contribution to the CGB and, more importantly, in serving as a tool in the effort to discriminate between possible origins of the CGB

The Spectral Index Distribution of EGRET Blazars: Prospects for GLAST

The intrinsic distribution of spectral indices in GeV energies of gamma-ray--loud blazars is a critical input in determining the spectral shape of the unresolved blazar contribution to the diffuse extragalactic gamma-ray background, as well as an important test of blazar emission theories. We present a maximum-likelihood method of determining the intrinsic spectral index distribution (ISID) of a population of gamma-ray emitters which accounts for error in measurement of individual spectral indices, and we apply it to EGRET blazars. We find that the most likely Gaussian ISID for EGRET blazars has a mean of 2.27 and a standard deviation of 0.20. We additionally find some indication that FSRQs and BL Lacs may have different ISIDs (with BL Lacs being harder). We also test for spectral index hardening associated with blazar variability for which we find no evidence. Finally, we produce simulated GLAST spectral index datasets and perform the same analyses. With improved statistics due to the much larger number of resolvable blazars, GLAST data will help us determine the ISIDs with much improved accuracy. Should any difference exist between the ISIDs of BL Lacs and FSRQs or between the ISIDs of blazars in the quiescent and flaring states, GLAST data will be adequate to separate these ISIDs at a significance better than 3 sigma.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figures, emulateapj; accepted for publication in Ap

Probing the Intergalactic Magnetic Field with the Anisotropy of the Extragalactic Gamma-ray Background

The intergalactic magnetic field (IGMF) may leave an imprint on the angular anisotropy of the extragalactic gamma-ray background through its effect on electromagnetic cascades triggered by interactions between very high energy photons and the extragalactic background light. A strong IGMF will deflect secondary particles produced in these cascades and will thus tend to isotropize lower energy cascade photons, thereby inducing a modulation in the anisotropy energy spectrum of the gamma-ray background. Here we present a simple, proof-of-concept calculation of the magnitude of this effect and demonstrate that current Fermi data already seem to prefer non-negligible IGMF values. The anisotropy energy spectrum of the Fermi gamma-ray background could thus be used as a probe of the IGMF strength.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figures, MN LaTeX style; accepted for publication in MNRA

High Energy Polarization of Blazars : Detection Prospects

Emission from blazar jets in the ultraviolet, optical, and infrared is polarized. If these low-energy photons were inverse-Compton scattered, the upscattered high-energy photons retain a fraction of the polarization. Current and future X-ray and gamma-ray polarimeters such as INTEGRAL-SPI, PoGOLITE, X-Calibur, Gamma-Ray Burst Polarimeter, GEMS-like missions, ASTRO-H, and POLARIX have the potential to discover polarized X-rays and gamma-rays from blazar jets for the first time. Detection of such polarization will open a qualitatively new window into high-energy blazar emission; actual measurements of polarization degree and angle will quantitatively test theories of jet emission mechanisms. We examine the detection prospects of blazars by these polarimetry missions using examples of 3C 279, PKS 1510-089, and 3C 454.3, bright sources with relatively high degrees of low-energy polarization. We conclude that while balloon polarimeters will be challenged to detect blazars within reasonable observational times (with X-Calibur offering the most promising prospects), space-based missions should detect the brightest blazars for polarization fractions down to a few percent. Typical flaring activity of blazars could boost the overall number of polarimetric detections by nearly a factor of five to six purely accounting for flux increase of the brightest of the comprehensive, all-sky, Fermi-LAT blazar distribution. The instantaneous increase in the number of detections is approximately a factor of two, assuming a duty cycle of 20% for every source. The detectability of particular blazars may be reduced if variations in the flux and polarization fraction are anticorrelated. Simultaneous use of variability and polarization trends could guide the selection of blazars for high-energy polarimetric observations.Comment: Matches published version in Ap

Detecting the Elusive Blazar Counter-Jets

Detection of blazar pc scale counter-jets is difficult, but it can provide invaluable insight into the relativistic effects, radiative processes and the complex mechanisms of jet production, collimation and accelation in blazars. We build on recent populations models (optimized using the MOJAVE apparent velocity and redshift distributions) in order to derive the distribution of jet-to-counter-jet ratios and the flux densities of the counter-jet at different frequencies, in an effort to set minimum sensitivity limits required for existing and future telescope arrays in order to detect these elusive counter-jets. We find that: for the BL Lacs $5\%$ of their counter-jets have a flux-density higher than 100mJy, $15\%$ are higher than 10 mJy, and $32\%$ have higher flux-density than 1 mJy, whereas for the FSRQs $8\%$ have a flux-density higher than 10mJy, $17\%$ are higher than 1 mJy, and $32\%$ are higher than 0.1 mJy (at 15 GHz). Future telescopes like the SKA and newly operating like e-MERLIN and JVLA may detect up to $99\%$ of the BL Lac and $77\%$ of the FSRQ counter-jets. Sources with both low apparent velocity and a low Doppler factor make prime candidates for counter-jet detection. Combining our findings with literature values we have identified five such counter-jet detection candidates. Finally, we discuss possible effects beyond relativistic deboosting that may complicate the detection of counter-jets and that need to be accounted for in the interpretation of detections.Comment: 13 pages, 15 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA