How Faculty and Students Understand and Experience the Development of Critical Thinking in the Online Classroom

Objectives: There are essentially three schools of thought regarding critical thinking—humanistic, cognitive, and behavioral. Given the disagreement among them, confusion continues about what critical thinking means, and how it can be taught to students. Methods: In this qualitative phenomenological study, researchers interviewed students and faculty in a distance education master of public health program about their perceptions and experiences of what critical thinking means and how it is developed in the online classroom. Results: Themes emerging from student interviews included (a) differing thoughts on the meaning of critical thinking; (b) learning and meeting course requirements as students’ primary role; (c) technology as useful in learning; and (d) confidence in learning linked to engagement, feedback, and course alignment. Themes from faculty interviews included (a) how online classrooms promoted critical thinking; (b) critical thinking identified when students demonstrate the application of independent thought; (c) facilitating and keeping students on track as faculty’s primary role; (d) promotion of critical thinking through questioning and student collaboration; (e) assessment of critical thinking through discussion posts; and (f) faculty facilitation and focus on application as essential to student learning. Conclusions: Students and faculty engaged in the online classroom agree in some ways that critical thinking skills are gained through practical applications. But this is where agreement ceases. Students believe they are developing critical thinking skills in their online environments, when in fact they are reproducing rote information in assignments. Implications: Engaging in activities has been shown to develop critical thinking more effectively when it is accompanied by mentoring, dialogue, and authentic instruction. Online educators who want to help students develop their critical thinking skills can use mentoring, dialogue, and authentic instruction alongside online activities

Rock Hill Banking Collection - Accession 1361

This collection consists mostly of materials associated with the Rock Hill National Banks including the People’s National Bank (founded in 1906) and the C & S National Bank; the rest of the collection consists of entries that are linked, either directly or indirectly, with the Banking systems of Rock Hill. The collection consists of mainly of photographs of unknown employees and patrons of People’s National Bank and C & S National Bank, photos of events either attended by members or sponsored by the People’s National Bank and C & S National Bank, photos of employees or customers, a photo of C & S employees serving free drinks to Winthrop students during registration, and photos of the city of Rock Hill, it’s railway system, and Winthrop. The collection also includes a history of the of the Peoples national Bank of Rock Hill and The Peoples Trust Company, correspondence, brochures, posters, certificates, and newspaper articles and clippings.https://digitalcommons.winthrop.edu/manuscriptcollection_findingaids/2659/thumbnail.jp

Relationship between long-chain omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid intake and ankle brachial index, pulse wave velocity and resting heart rate in a sample of overweight adults: A secondary analysis of baseline data in the HealthTrack study

Aim: The present study aimed to explore the association between dietary long-chain omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid (LCn3PUFA) intake and cardiovascular risk indicators (ankle brachial index, resting heart rate and brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity) in a clinical sample of overweight and obese participants volunteering for a weight loss trial. Methods: This was a secondary analysis of baseline data from the HealthTrack study (n = 351). LCn3PUFA intake was calculated via a diet history and the association with ankle brachial index, resting heart rate and brachio-ankle pulse wave velocity was explored using linear regression after controlling for covariates. Results: LCn3PUFA intake was inversely associated with ankle brachial index (R2change = 0.021, F change (1, 339) = 8.864, P \u3c 0.05) and resting heart rate (R2change = 0.014, F change (1, 342) = 5.337, P \u3c 0.05) but not with brachio-ankle pulse wave velocity (R2change = 0.001, F change (1, 339) = 0.725, P \u3e 0.05). Conclusions: In this clinical sample of overweight adults, LCn3PUFA consumption was significantly associated with a lower resting heart rate, adding to the current evidence on the potential benefits of LCn3PUFA consumption. It also supports the value of targeting a diet rich in this nutrient when planning future dietetic approaches. Relationships with ankle brachial index and pulse wave velocity require further investigation. Future research should assess the effect of changes in dietary LCn3PUFA intake on novel cardiovascular risk indicators

Games and enculturation: A cross-cultural analysis of games and values in Austronesia

While most animals play, only humans play games. As animal play serves to teach offspring important life-skills in a safe scenario, human games might, in similar ways, teach important culturally relevant skills. Humans in all cultures play games; however, it is not clear whether variation in the characteristics of games across cultural groups is related to group-level attributes. Here we investigate specifically whether the cooperativeness of games covaries with socio-ecological differences across cultural groups. We hypothesize that cultural groups that engage in frequent inter-group conflict, cooperative sustenance acquisition, or that have less stratified social structures, might more frequently play cooperative games as compared to groups that do not share these characteristics. To test these hypotheses, we gathered data from the ethnographic record on 25 ethnolinguistic groups in the Austronesian language family. We show that cultural groups with higher levels of inter-group conflict and cooperative land-based hunting play cooperative games more frequently than other groups. Additionally, cultural groups with higher levels of intra-group conflict play competitive games more frequently than other groups. These findings indicate that games are not randomly distributed among cultures, but rather relate to the socio-ecological settings of the cultural groups that practice them. We argue that games serve as training grounds for group-specific norms and values and thereby have an important function in enculturation during childhood. Moreover, games might server an important role in the maintenance of cultural diversity.Introduction Children’s play Games Possible drivers of cooperative goal structures - Interdependence in foraging. - Intra- and inter-group conflict. Lack of social stratification Methods - Games - Cultural covariate data - Statistical analyses Results - Descriptive statistics - Cultural variables and goal structures Discussion Conclusio

The differential effects of phonics versus sight-recognition methods of teaching reading on the eye movements of good and poor second-grade readers

The purpose of this study was to investigate how children who had been taught reading by different methods and who differed in reading achievement scan tachistoscopically- presented words. Twenty second-grade children were grouped according to phonics or sight-recognition methods of initial reading acquisition and according to low or high reading achievement scores. As four-letter stimulus words were presented tachistoscopically, electrooculograms (EOG's) were recorded for each subject. The EOG's were averaged by the use of a digital/analog minicomputer and this analog record was digitalized. Three dependent measures were obtained from these averaged records: total amount of eye movements evoked by the stimulus word, direction of the eye scan, and scanning time. For the total amount of eye movements, it was found that both good and poor readers taught by a phonics method moved their eyes less than poor sight-recognition readers. However, good readers taught by a sight-recognition method moved their eyes less than any other group

The Austronesian game taxonomy: A cross-cultural dataset of historical games

Humans in most cultures around the world play rule-based games, yet research on the content and structure of these games is limited. Previous studies investigating rule-based games across cultures have either focused on a small handful of cultures, thus limiting the generalizability of findings, or used cross-cultural databases from which the raw data are not accessible, thus limiting the transparency, applicability, and replicability of research findings. Furthermore, games have long been defined as competitive interactions, thereby blinding researchers to the cross-cultural variation in the cooperativeness of rule-based games. The current dataset provides ethnographic, historic information on games played in cultural groups in the Austronesian language family. These game descriptions (Ngames = 907) are available and codeable for researchers interested in games. We also develop a unique typology of the cooperativeness of the goal structure of games and apply this typology to the dataset. Researchers are encouraged to use this dataset to examine cross-cultural variation in the cooperativeness of games and further our understanding of human cultural behaviour on a larger scale.Background and summary Methods - Defining games. - Defining the goal structure of games Search criteria and methodology - eHRAF - Pulotu - American Anthropologist - The Journal of the Polynesian Society - Additional sources Data records - Variable definitions - Descriptive statistics of games Technical validation - Cultural group identifiers - Record linkage - Filtering and coding of games - Austronesian language phylogeny Research opportunitie

Hadron hadron collider group

The objective of this group was to make a rough assessment of the characteristics of a hadron-hadron collider which could make it possible to study the 1 TeV mass scale. Since there is very little theoretical guidance for the type of experimental measurements which could illuminate this mass scale, we chose to extend the types of experiments which have been done at the ISR, and which are in progress at the SPS collider to these higher energies