Active Learning Using Student Recorded Monologues

This paper will detail the planning, execution and feedback of an initiative to promote active learning and improve student speaking and writing using student recorded monologues. After determining the goals of the project, a rubric was created to clarify these goals and assessment criteria for both students and instructors. A 15-lesson unit was then developed based on four personal narratives. For each narrative, students completed a series of preparation activities before producing both written and spoken versions of their narratives and uploading these in the form of online assignments. Students were encouraged to review the rubric before, during, and after work on their texts. Feedback from students and instructors on completion of the program indicated that the goals were clear and relevant, there was a high level of student engagement with the unit, and that the rubric was an effective tool for guiding the learning process

Creating an Advanced Level Speaking Test

This extension to the standard speaking test was designed to assess the speaking level of higher tier students in second year university classes, using the CEFR-J as a basis. It was designed to complement the existing speaking test and to enable students to demonstrate skills up to B2 level of the CEFR-J. The test was designed to fit in with the existing curriculum using topics covered within it. The validity of the test was established with reference to Bachman and Palmer’s 1996 model for establishing test usefulness

Reflections on designing and implementing a task-based unit using gamebooks

A small scale action-research project was designed to explore the effectiveness of using interactive narratives to facilitate L2 output in a communicative English class. A four-week unit of instruction was implemented across five classes comprised of non-English major students at a university in Japan. Using graded reader gamebooks from the Atama-ii series, activities were designed to simultaneously engage students in English reading while also promoting active discussion in English. Data was collected in the form of instructor field logs and student surveys. Researchers concluded that although the activities did not facilitate in-class L2 communicative output, the gamebooks did serve to increase students’ willingness to engage in English activities

Searching for Binary Y Dwarfs with the Gemini Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics System (GeMS)

The NASA Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) has discovered almost all the known members of the new class of Y-type brown dwarfs. Most of these Y dwarfs have been identified as isolated objects in the field. It is known that binaries with L- and T-type brown dwarf primaries are less prevalent than either M-dwarf or solar-type primaries, they tend to have smaller separations and are more frequently detected in near-equal mass configurations. The binary statistics for Y-type brown dwarfs, however, are sparse, and so it is unclear if the same trends that hold for L- and T-type brown dwarfs also hold for Y-type ones. In addition, the detection of binary companions to very cool Y dwarfs may well be the best means available for discovering even colder objects. We present results for binary properties of a sample of five WISE Y dwarfs with the Gemini Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics System. We find no evidence for binary companions in these data, which suggests these systems are not equal-luminosity (or equal-mass) binaries with separations larger than ~0.5–1.9 AU. For equal-mass binaries at an age of 5 Gyr, we find that the binary binding energies ruled out by our observations (i.e., 10^(42) erg) are consistent with those observed in previous studies of hotter ultra-cool dwarfs

LACEwING: A New Moving Group Analysis Code

We present a new nearby young moving group (NYMG) kinematic membership analysis code, LocAting Constituent mEmbers In Nearby Groups (LACEwING), a new Catalog of Suspected Nearby Young Stars, a new list of bona fide members of moving groups, and a kinematic traceback code. LACEwING is a convergence-style algorithm with carefully vetted membership statistics based on a large numerical simulation of the Solar Neighborhood. Given spatial and kinematic information on stars, LACEwING calculates membership probabilities in 13 NYMGs and three open clusters within 100 pc. In addition to describing the inputs, methods, and products of the code, we provide comparisons of LACEwING to other popular kinematic moving group membership identification codes. As a proof of concept, we use LACEwING to reconsider the membership of 930 stellar systems in the Solar Neighborhood (within 100 pc) that have reported measurable lithium equivalent widths. We quantify the evidence in support of a population of young stars not attached to any NYMGs, which is a possible sign of new as-yet-undiscovered groups or of a field population of young stars

Discovery of An Unusually Blue L Dwarf Within 10 pc of the Sun

We report the discovery of an unusually blue L5 dwarf within 10 pc of the Sun from a search of Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) spectra. A spectrophotometric distance estimate of 8.0+/-1.6 pc places SDSS J141624.08+134826.7 among the six closest known L dwarfs. SDSS 1416+13 was overlooked in infrared color-based searches because of its unusually blue J-K_S color, which also identifies it as the nearest member of the blue L dwarf subclass. We present additional infrared and optical spectroscopy from the IRTF/SpeX and Magellan/MagE spectrographs and determine UVW motions that indicate thin disk kinematics. The inclusion of SDSS 1416+13 in the 20 pc sample of L dwarfs increases the number of L5 dwarfs by 20% suggesting that the L dwarf luminosity function may be far from complete.Comment: 15 pages, 3 figures, accepted for publication in AJ; updated version includes corrected radial velocit