Comparative Analysis Of Learning Outcomes In Face-To-Face Foreign Language Classes Vs. Language Lab And Online

Action research was conducted for two consecutive semesters comparing beginning level Spanish courses taught in the traditional classroom and the same class taught exclusively in the language lab. A subsequent semester compared an intermediate class taught in the traditional classroom compared to the same class conducted online. Assessment scores were compared for quizzes, tests, oral interview and final exam. Overall course GPA and student opinions were also compared. Identical treatments showed the classroom performed significantly better than the lab class yet the following semester showed the lab performing better but not at a significant level. A second study compared a higher level of students for classroom vs. online. This study showed the classroom performance was better in three out of four assessments, however this difference was not significant

The Effects Of Songs In The Foreign Language Classroom On Text Recall, Delayed Text Recall And Involuntary Mental Rehearsal

Music represents an integral part of the human culture, and particularly language and communication. Music can be a powerful tool in the learning experience. The purpose of the present study is to investigate whether English native-speaker students learning a foreign language can benefit from integrating music into the curriculum. Students’ text recall was measured after listening to songs and text passages. Delayed recall and involuntary mental rehearsal (din) were also measured. Results showed text recall was better in the song condition that text passage. Also, treatment condition did not affect delayed recall; however it impacted involuntary mental rehearsal. Implications and suggestions about future applications of music in the curriculum are also explored

STRUCTURE OF FARMING UNDER FREER TRADE AMONG NAFTA COUNTRIES

International Relations/Trade,

Exploring cloudy gas accretion as a source of interstellar turbulence in the outskirts of disks

High--resolution 2D--MHD numerical simulations have been carried out to investigate the effects of continuing infall of clumpy gas in extended HI galactic disks. Given a certain accretion rate, the response of the disk depends on its surface gas density and temperature. For Galactic conditions at a galactocentric distance of ~20 kpc, and for mass accretion rates consistent with current empirical and theoretical determinations in the Milky Way, the rain of compact high velocity clouds onto the disk can maintain transonic turbulent motions in the warm phase (~2500 K) of HI. Hence, the HI line width is expected to be ~6.5 km/s for a gas layer at 2500 K, if infall were the only mechanism of driving turbulence. Some statistical properties of the resulting forcing flow are shown in this Letter. The radial dependence of the gas velocity dispersion is also discussed.Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ Letter

Bounds on the mass and abundance of dark compact objects and black holes in dwarf spheroidal galaxy halos

We establish new dynamical constraints on the mass and abundance of compact objects in the halo of dwarf spheroidal galaxies. In order to preserve kinematically cold the second peak of the Ursa Minor dwarf spheroidal (UMi dSph) against gravitational scattering, we place upper limits on the density of compact objects as a function of their assumed mass. The mass of the dark matter constituents cannot be larger than 1000 solar masses at a halo density in UMi's core of 0.35 solar masses/pc^3. This constraint rules out a scenario in which dark halo cores are formed by two-body relaxation processes. Our bounds on the fraction of dark matter in compact objects with masses >3000 solar masses improve those based on dynamical arguments in the Galactic halo. In particular, objects with masses $\sim 10^{5}$ solar masses can comprise no more than a halo mass fraction $\sim 0.01$. Better determinations of the velocity dispersion of old overdense regions in dSphs may result in more stringent constraints on the mass of halo objects. For illustration, if the preliminary value of 0.5 km/s for the secondary peak of UMi is confirmed, compact objects with masses above $\sim 100$ solar masses could be excluded from comprising all its dark matter halo.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ Letter

Jerusalén. La ciudad y la palabra en la obra de Jacques Derrida

In this article we may try to track down the use and the presence of Jerusalem in Jacques Derrida works. Between the real city and the word that designates it, the jerusalemite topic rises in Derrida’s writing as a bazillionth symptom of a self-confessed obsession. The Jewishness of the father of Deconstruction is one of the most decisive signs in his relationship with texts and words and, in the case of the thrice holy city it serves to explain one of the speech acts that perhaps he more committed with. Promise, as well as forgiveness and confession, is a paradoxical speech act where its conditions of possibility turn into impossible. Far from any calling related to truth or falseness, the city and the word, the town and the concept, will serve us to follow some of the most decisive trail in the biography and the work of one of the most outstanding thinkers of our philosophical traditio

Hermenéutica y existencia en el Cuarto Evangelio

En el presente artículo tratamos de justificar la presencia de una hermenéutica existencial en uno de los textos fundacionales de nuestra tradición: el Prólogo del Evangelio de Juan. Para ello, planteamos una interpretación crítica de las traducciones clásicas de dicho texto e intentamos defender que la escatología joánica no atiende a un emplazamiento cronológico sino a otro preferentemente espacial. A lo largo de nuestro estudio examinaremos el uso y la traducción de las preposiciones en el Prólogo y la Carta Primera para subrayar la función sígnico-existencial de la Encarnación del Hijo. A partir de esta hipótesis, reconstruiremos una interpretación a través de la cual el Prólogo del Evangelio de Juan puede y debe interpretarse como un precedente remoto y fundacional de una de los marcos filosóficos más relevantes del siglo xx: la hermenéutica de la existenciaIn this paper we aim to justify the presence of an existencial hermeneutics in one of the foundational texts of Christian, or Judeo-Christian tradition: the Prologue to the Gospel of John. To this end, we raise a critic interpretation of the classical translations of the text and try to verify that the Saint John’s eschatology does not meet a chronological emplacement but a spatial one. Throughout this work we examine the use of prepositions in the Prologue and the First Letter in order to remark the signifying and existential function of the Incarnation Starting from this hypothesis we aim to defend that the Prologue to the Gospel of John states a foundational, albeit chronologically distant, precedent of one of the most relevant philosophical frameworks in the 20th century continental philosophy: the hermeneutics of existenc

The animal that does not speak: disability and the limits of the human

En el presente artículo tratamos de exponer el modo en que algunas premisas éticoontológicas implícitas en la Declaración Universal de los Derechos Humanos han imposibilitado la construcción de discursos morales verdaderamente inclusivos con respecto a la discapacidad. Así, defenderemos que gran parte del reto filosófico de pensar la discapacidad debe pasar necesariamente por la revisión de algunas premisas generales que a través de su paulatina asimilación histórica han terminado por desdibujarse en el debate ético y político. Por ello, en este artículo trataremos de evidenciar las insuficiencias conceptuales tradicionales para enfrentar moralmente la realidad de la discapacidad psíquica y plantearemos a modo de hipótesis algunos presupuestos desde los cuales esperamos reconstruir una moralidad eficazmente inclusiva con aquellas personas que padecen algún tipo de discapacidadIn this paper we aim to expose how some tacitly-assumed ontological and ethical premises in The Universal Declaration of Human Rights have historically hindered the construction of moral paradigms inclusive with disability. We therefore argue that a central part of this philosophical challenge must be the exposure and revision of these general premises, which have been blurred by historical assimilation yet are nevertheless important in ordinary ethical and political debates. This paper will try to highlight the deficiency of our traditional concepts when we try to face this problem from an ethical point of view. We will then try to propound some other conceptual categories so as to set up an inclusive, efficient and satisfactory moral theory for intellectual disabilit